Queries

Have you ever stayed up past your normal bedtime & then gotten "stuck" wherever you happened to be (i.e., glued to the couch watching TV), and couldn't get up to go to bed?

Have you ever realized that you can reach a point where you are too old to be out at the mall as you look weird/creepy if you don't have a baby/small child with you?

Have you ever gotten to the point where your house/apartment/living space is driving you crazy because it's gotten messy & needs straightening up, but it's made you so crazy you don't even want to deal with it?

Have you ever been studying for a bar exam and decided that perhaps you should look into the life of a gypsy?

Have you ever waited past the regular wet food feeding time for your cats and then realize that if you wait an hour or so, the cats stop whining for food and go back to sleep, and wonder what would happen if you just ... didn't feed them wet food tonight? After all, you are stuck on the couch and are tired enough to go straight to sleep after getting in bed...if only you could get to bed.

Have you ever cheated and found out what your Christmas presents are before Christmas?

Have you ever gotten annoyed with yourself for watching too much TV and wanted to just not watch any TV at all but again, you're stuck on the couch and can't move your arm over 2 feet to grab the remote?

Do you remember your favorite Christmas gift (okay, favorite present)? I don't from childhood. I think from adulthood it would have to be my Patagonia down vest Husband surprised me with (it was a complete surprise), tied with the SATC complete set he got me for my birthday that same winter. He claims he got me a gift-to-top-all-gifts this year for my birthday (which will be tough, given all the T&Co. jewelry he's given me over the span of our relationship, not to brag) and only spent $60. He keeps talking about it & it makes me want to smack him because I cannot handle not knowing something. I'm the type that wants to know everything about the movie BEFORE I go see it. I know, so anticlimactic. So ... un-endorseable.

Have you ever been thirsty for water but because you're lazy (okay, stuck on the couch) and the glass of juice is closer than the water, you drink the empty-calorie-laden beverage?

Have you ever gotten a nice, complement-garnering haircut and then shortly thereafter (say, 2 months) decided it's "not working" and that you have to break up & grow out your hair again? Not because you want it to be blah, but because short doesn't really work for your life - I mean, it'd be nice to be able to employ a ponytail when you're out of power for 3 whole days & can't wash your hair because the water is so cold you'd risk hypothermia. Not that I want to grow it out to my arse (yes, it's been that long - a long time ago) or not have a style, but would it be so terrible to have a longer style?

Have you ever wondered if perhaps you set out on the wrong career course and maybe you should just give up this whole "bar thing" already? Not that I'm considering doing that, I'm just so annoyed that I have to be doing this again because I missed 12 fucking points. Okay, I'm a little angry, too.

Have you ever gotten to the age where you realize that the Holidays really are more fun when kids are involved? This year Husband & I will be spending Christmas with his mom & step-dad and one of his step-sisters and her family. She has 3 kids - 4, 6, and 8 years, and I think Christmas morning (or Christmas Eve, as is the case in their family - which is just wrong!) will be so much fun to watch them open up gifts.

Speaking of Christmas morning vs. Eve, who out there falls where? My family was ALWAYS Christmas morning (unless it fell on our church day, then we had to wait until after it was over which was unbelievably rotten when you're 6 years old). Husband's family is Christmas Eve. I don't think I'll ever adjust to that - it makes Christmas morning seem so anticlimactic! This year I'm going to take a few small gifts from my family (sister, etc.) in my suitcase so I have something to open up on Christmas morning. Seriously.

Okay, I think that's about all the queries I have for now. I think it's really time to get unstuck from the couch, feed the cats their wet food, and go to bed.

POWER! IT'S A WONDERFUL THING!

On Thursday night at about 7:00 pm we lost power. We didn't get power back until last night, roughly 72 hours after we lost it. Holy moly, is it ever nice to have heat and lights again! You don't realize how automatic it is to walk into a room and switch on the lights until you can't. We were able to take hot showers on Friday morning, but that was it...until last night. I think I washed my hair twice and face about 3 times. No, really. There is something so nice about a hot shower.

There are still lots and lots of people without power...I hope it comes back soon. The apartment building behind us is apparently on a different power grid as they didn't get power back until this morning. I would have been so pissed if I lived there! Because we live in an apartment & a generator is not really an option, we did keep the fireplace going (thank goodness we can burn wood!). We also played a lot of poker, blackjack, rummy, uno, and monopoly. By yesterday morning we were both starting to crack up a bit. We do have an emergency radio/flashlight/blah blah blah thing - it can be either battery-powered or hand-cranked powered, so we did have some Christmas music, which was nice. But still - "cabin fever" really can happen!

Yesterday we did go up North a little ways to where there was power restored just to be inside somewhere with heat. We walked around a mall, & I started having evil thoughts about everyone who did have power. Of course you could tell the people who didn't have power - the greasy hair and "I'm so over it" expressions - but the people who didn't have greasy hair were on my shit list. Not really, but it was to the point where Husband & I tried to get our hair cuts just to get a hair wash. SERIOUSLY.

We went to 2 movies yesterday: Borat and Apocalypto. Borat was hysterically funny. Seriously, go see it! Apocalypto was awesome - not at all funny, but excellent. It was such a great story. It's a little violent, but it doesn't feel gratuitous.

Since I work for a very large company, I get three paid days of Bereavement Leave per year. I'm taking that leave today, tomorrow, and Wednesday. The service was on Saturday, and in some ways it was nice to have a quiet, media-free weekend so I could take pause.

So what do I have planned for these few days? Oh, something very exciting - studying. That and getting all the Christmas presents sent out and Holiday cards written out and sent...oh, and packing since we're moving next week after Christmas. Sigh.

I hope everyone is enjoying their Holiday season. We had a tree up (fake, I would never tempt my cats with a real tree, yet)...but it didn't last long. It was only up for 2 days, and in that time it got taken down approximately 12 times. No, really. Apparently my cats hate Christmas. Little grinches. We decided it wasn't worth the fight this year when we're not even going to be home during Christmas weekend. If we were, I might have considered nailing it to the floor and/or tying it to the walls with fishing line.

Well, it's about time for me to go back to sleep for a spell before I get up and commence studying (*sob*). Have a jolly day.

Life is beautiful

My grandfather passed away last night. He wasn't really in much pain, which I'm very grateful for. He was also my last grandparent. I am so glad I was able to go when I did.

Those of you who still have grandparents, cherish them.

In which the Negligent Gnomes broaches a very serious topic.

On Friday I had to take an emergency trip to Michigan to see my Grandfather. He is dying. Almost all of us grandkids came. I am exhausted. I am emotionally drained. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to get up and go to work tomorrow morning.

It was very hard to go and see my Grandpa, who was a farmer, looking so frail and bedridden, hardly able to speak. He was aware all of us grandkids were there, and it did make him smile and cry to see us. I'm so glad I was there, although it was so hard. He is ready to die, and kept saying "I'm ready to die", "why can't I die"... I don't want anyont to interpret this as me being heartless or cruel, but I can see where there's a time and a place for helping people die. Would it really be so terrible to be able to hand someone a button they can push where they can just quietly go to sleep? My grandpa isn't eating, he's hardly drinking, and he just wants to die. Yesterday he said my grandma was there with him, and she died about 8 years ago. He also called each of us in one at a time to impart his final words of wisdom.

All in all, I don't think I've ever cried so much in so few days. But I'm so glad I was there.

Open Letter to the Gentleman Sitting Next to Me on the Bus this Morning

Dear Sir:

I'm sure you are an upstanding, decent, well-liked human being. In fact, you appear to be at least mildly successful in your career of choice. I'm happy you dress well and seem to act like an adult, unlike other bus riders Who Shall Remain Nameless. And you do seem to be a genuinely nice person.

However, I have a small complaint. It's regarding your arse. Or rather, the noxious odors that were so frequently emanating from your arse this morning. Sir, it would seem you have a rather serious gastrointestinal problem judging from the toxic smells your arse was emitting. Now, I am not completely hard-hearted; I understand that occasionally you may eat a few too many flatulence-inducing items for dinner. I myself am a vegan and eat lots of vegetables and soy products, which do not always lend themselves to a sweet odor wafting from my rear. However, sir, you did not smell as if you'd merely had a big plate of broccoli and onions for dinner last night. You smell as if you are on the verge of needing to have some serious colon work done.

Sir, if you are in the same state on a future morning wherein you may contemplate sitting next to me on the bus, please don't be offended when I either (a) get up and move as far away as open seating will allow, or (b) pull out my handy-dandy gas mask. It was all I could do this morning not to vomit.

Thank you ever so much for your future kind consideration of my nose.

Sincerely,
Me

Pfffft

Sigh...Happy Monday everyone.

The weekend is already over? Really?

At least it was somewhat productive - Husband & I got all! our Christmas shopping done. DONE! We are so on the ball this year. We even did Holiday postcards! Look at us go! Now we just have to wrap & send everything. The optimistic goal is to get that done next weekend. But I'm not going to hold my breathe.

I officially started studying last night. Big Sigh. I really didn't want to, but was in that icky place where I was feeling itchy because I hadn't yet started, so I just decided to bite it and get started. And I started with a doozy - Civ Pro. Hooray for titillating topics! It went fairly smoothly, so I hope this is a sign of things to come with studying this time.

I hope everyone's Thanksgiving went swimmingly well. I'm assuming you're all still in food coma as I haven't had ANY visitors for the last two weeks (according to my site meter)! It's shocking!

We put up the Christmas tree last night. It's a fakey, but with two cats (both of whom could still be classified as kittens), a real tree is definitely not worth it! I did decorate it, but only with lights. Husband & I took bets about how long it would take the cats to knock down the tree, and I won. They knocked it down at about 2:30 am on Sunday morning. Which is precisely why I opted for no ornaments & just lights - I don't want to have to collect ornaments every night when I get home from work.

We're moving. Ugh. Because we've just decided in the last few months that we wanted to buy, we not ready to buy immediately - we want to spend some time looking and watching the housing market here - we're moving into another apartment unit. We would have loved to stay in our current unit, but they're making everyone move out at the end of their lease term to do renovations (read: increase rent) on every unit. So we decided we'll probably be further ahead financially if we stay at this apartment complex, so we're going into a renovated (read: more expensive) unit sometime around Christmas. It's supposed to be done around the 20th, but I'm not moving on Christmas (we won't even be here!), so I'm anticipating we'll be in the new unit by the 1st.

Anyways. I am listening to Christmas music at work to keep myself in the Holiday mood. It certainly helps, as I've lately become disenchanted with my job. Ahh, but that's for another post.

Hooray for Snow Days!

What's better than a snow day when you're in elementary school? A snow day when you're an ADULT!!! Hooray! Although perhaps it's technically more of an ice day. The road I live on is blocked off because there's a hill that's a sheet of ice (hmmm, ice sledding, anyone?) and there are 2 Metro buses stuck at the top of the hill from last night! And speaking of last night, it took me 2 hours to get home - miserable.

So I get to stay home today! Hooray!

I hope all of you find something equally joyous today.

Well isn't that interesting...

Maybe I should go back to not updating...visits here have completely dropped off since I started posting again!

In other news, what are all of you doing for Thanksgiving? My dad is currently in town, and tomorrow morning bright and early we are heading down (in a Southerly direction, that is) to my sister's. I'm very excited to see my 7 year old nephew and 1 1/2 year old niece, who is now saying "MINE!" to everything! Oh, and it'll be nice to see my sister, of course.

Anyways, I hope you all have a great Turkey day (or Tofurkey day, as the case may be). I'll be back on Saturday night. See you all then.

Hooray!

This morning I received some delightful news: the tech guy that was trying to extract stuff off my bad hard drive was successful! I am so thrilled! Of course now I have to procure somewhere in the vicinity of 20 CDs to burn this stuff to, but at least I haven't lost anything! Hot dog!

I hope you all have a great day, too!

Blech

Today is the type of day where your shoes eat your socks.

Change is a' blowin'...

Hmm. I feel like we went through a bad breakup but are now forced to be friends. I'm not sure where exactly to start or what to say. I could revert to doing a list, but wouldn't you feel cheated out of a "hey, I'm back" real post?

Let's start with the obvious. I decided the site needed a little revamping. And I'd been away for so long that I didn't realize the changes Blogger had instituted. Not that I'm complaining. I like it. And I think I like the new look to this site. What do you think? (That is assuming there are any of you left as loyal readers given my unexplained, totally un-called for disappearance.)

I finally got my computer back with it's brand-new, empty, wiped-clean harddrive. That's really the rub, there - my laptop is completely free of anything I ever put on it. One of the computer tech guys at work is angelically and heroically trying to extract whatever he can from it, but it's extraordinarily disheartening to not have anything left. If I ever want to put a new CD or new music on my ipod, doing that will (at least as far as I'm aware now) erase what music I no longer own. This doesn't mean I'm a big music thief, it just means that one of my CD cases was stolen (still not over that one) and I'd purchsed iTunes music, that I don't think they'll let me download again just for free.

In craftsy news, I now know how to crochet. You can call me Harriet Homemaker, it's okay. And yes, I even crocheted on the bus on Friday - and I did feel like a 58-year-old woman, but it's fun. I'm currently making dishcloths for Christmas presents. It keeps me occupied (and not studying, hee!).

Husband & I have decided to enter into a very adult activity: buying real estate. We've started looking with the aim of buying in 6 months to a year. It's very exciting, although I found a townhouse I love, but we're not ready to buy yet, and it's a little more than we could afford right now. I'm hoping that by the time we are ready to buy, I'll be making lawyer money and we can afford something like that.

OK, now it's time to go get one of the cookies I made last night - Dark Chocolate Peppermint. Divine.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Life has gotten kind of crazy. I know that's not really a good excuse for why I haven't been updated, but it is what it is.

Let's start with today and move backwards, shall we?

I found out TODAY that there is a DSW opening up on FRIDAY in Bellevue!!! Hooray!!! I absolutely cannot wait for it to open! And since I'm a DSW Rewards member, I got invited to a preview on Thursday night - I'm SO going to be there!

I am currently engaged in a serious battle of germs in my sinuses. Now that we've moved into the new building at work, it's like an incubation tube for germs... or like working in an airplane cabin. Fantastic. So many people have been sick last week. I'm sure the candy corn I'm currently cracking out on is helping the germ warfare.

I entered into new territory yesterday: I dyed my hair. It's actually not completely died, but instead I got 3 different colors put in with foils. It's very subtle, but I really, really love it! I think next time I'll do it a little bit more obvious.

This last weekend, Husband & I went to see his mom & step-dad in Vegas. It was a quick weekend trip - we flew there Friday night, flew back late Sunday night. But it was so much fun! We went to Red Rock Canyon on Saturday afternoon, then to see Cirque du Soleil's show Ka Saturday night - it was AWESOME!!! We did gamble a little bit, but only on the nickle slots. And I won $8.62! Sunday morning we got up and all went to the driving range - it was my first time hitting a golf ball...let's just say that I'll be checking into lessons come Spring. :-) Then the Mother-In-Law & I went shopping! It was fun! We went to DSW!!!

In the ongoing saga of my poor little laptop-with-the-dead-harddrive, I am still waiting for my system replace disks from Compaq. They were supposed to arrive on the 16th. Apparently, Compaq still doesn't have them from their supplier, and they don't know when they'll get them. This is awesome. Tonight the tech guy offered to give me a deal on a brand-new laptop because this current situation is "ridiculous" (I wholeheartedly agree!) - he said less than $600. While a great deal, I just want my damn system disks so I can have my computer back. That and I'm wondering how low they'll go when I don't have my disks in another 2 weeks. :-)

I have also waged a very serious war with Verizon Wireless. I think I won, but does one ever really know with cell phone companies? They're all out to screw you one way or another, I suppose. I don't think I have the energy to go all back into details, but they were trying to screw me by making me either stay in a contract extension they never told us about or pay through the ass. I think I have gotten the $100 charge reversed, but in any event my contract is up on November 6th. So only a little over 6 more days with them, then I can shop around. What a pain, though. All I have to say is once you sign a contract, NEVER EVER change ANYTHING on your contract or else you'll be getting yourself into a heap of trouble.


This coming weekend I am going to San Francisco to see my two of my bestest friends from college! It'll undoubtedly seem way too short, but regardless, it will be so good to have some quality girl time! The weekend after that my aunt & uncle are coming to visit from Chicago - I can't wait for their visit! Then we have something like 5 days and then my dad is coming for Thanksgiving. It's going to be a busy month! And of course at some point in there I'll start studying again...sigh.

So, how are all of you?

Guess who's having THE BEST WEEK EVER!!!

Let's just have a short recap, shall we?

Saturday morning: I find out I only passed half the bar exam. We're thankful for the bits and pieces.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday: At work, we moved into a new building, a brand, spanking new building, and Tuesday was the first day in the building. We have these new Mutli-Function Devices (or, rather mother f*cking devices as we prefer to call them) that I have jammed every single day this week...jammed to the point that the technician had to call the back-up technician. Lovely.

Tuesday night: after being on hold with Best Buy's Geek Squad for 40+ minutes, I find out my laptop's hard drive is beyond dead. Dead, naughty, gone to hell and burned up, never coming home, GONE. My laptop is less than 2 years old. Stupid piece of Compaq CRAP. I'm just glad I bought the 3 year warranty. In any event, if they can't recover anything off my DEAD & GONE hard drive, I'll have lost: all my pictures, all my music (as in CDs that were stolen, iTunes music I bought, etc.), everything I ever did for any bar exam I've ever taken, everything I did for law school (there are a few things on Husband's Apple computer) ... sob ... GONE.

Wednesday: I went and picked up my essay answers and found out that I missed passing the bar by 12 (TWELVE) points. If I had gotten 10 more points, I could have appealed not passing. At least I was very close - I'd rather be super close than way off the mark.

Thursday morning: I found out some potentially really bad health-related news about Husband's mom. She's probably going to be okay, but we won't know until next week. Sigh.

Thursday night: I take Husband out for dinner & beer, and as we're coming out of the restaurant, I slip on the gravel/small rocks and take a lovely, BIG, HARD fall. I land on my lower back/upper arse and elbow. You should see my bruises. I've got 2 separate spots of bruises on my ass, and my elbow is looking delicious.

Today: I decided to cough up $595 dollars for an bar essay course that is essentially 1-on-1 tutoring. Hopefully exactly what I need.

I think that about covers it...

The proper way to recover from half-disappointments...

I say "half-disappointments" because I half-passed the bar. I'm not complaining - I'm VERY glad I passed part of it, don't get me wrong, I'm just still not over not having passed the other half. Grrrr. At least come February, I only have to re-take the naughty portion. I say "naughty" 'cuz I'm going to kick its ass.

Ok, so, the proper way to recover:

1. Take Monday off. If you're lucky like me, you got today off as a PAID holiday. I know, I know, too cool for school.

2. Sleep in. Only get out of bed when you are good and ready to.

3. Call massage place and make an appointment for an hour and a half hot rocks massage.

4. Go get your eyebrows waxed.

5. Go enjoy the absolute bliss of the hour and a half hot rocks massage. Awesome, by the way, truly awesome. I've been relaxed all afternoon!

6. Go downtown and meet a friend for drinks at this cool wine bar.

7. Come home, eat naughty food, watch bad reality TV (or anything on MTV), cuddle with the cats.

8. Go to bed early. Hot dog - extra sleep!

Apparently we're doing this in baby steps...

Thank you, Bob Wiley, I see your therapist's book "Baby Steps" has jumped from the DVD to my real life. Awesome. I passed half the bar. Seriously. Half the fucking exam.

I can't believe I didn't pass the entire fucking piece of crap exam. I know, I know - at least I passed half of it. We're taking a minute to get to that whole glass-half-full outlook.

Yes, I'm a little angry. I suppose this is normal after all the abuse California put me through. I thought the WA bar would be a more considerate... ah.. lover - more polite, less demanding, more sensitive, less throwing the blame my way...

Apparently, we're only 1/2 way there...now...la la, ...

And yes, this reminds me of a certain Bon Jovi song... and yes, you're all very welcome to sing that particular song to me. In fact it might even be welcome.

I think it's time for another glass of spiked cider - with top-shelp Jamaican rum. Hoo-hah.

I also have to ask - do you any of you know of a good essay tutor?!?

and I also have one more thing to say: LOOK OUT, YOU STUPID PIECE OF FUCKING CRAP EXAM, COME FEBRUARY, YOU'RE GOING TO MEET YOUR FUCKING MAKER! COURTESY OF ME, BITCH, COURTESY OF ME! YOU'RE SO GOING DOWN! (And you might want to put down a piece of padding to cushion your fall, just an FYI.)

You never realize how bumpy a bus ride is until you have to pee...

Tomorrow I am probably geting bar results.

Holy freaking crap, people, holy freaking crap.

Shit shit shit f*ck shit.

That's about all I have to say about that.

Perhaps an R.I.P. for my laptop...

Last night my laptop decided it didn't want to fully boot up. It got part way through, and then decided to go to this very ominous looking blue screen with all sorts of scary code and message that said it was erasing all the physical memory. I've had it less than 2 years... stupid piece of Compaq crap.

So I'm on Husband's iBook G4... I'm afraid the inevitable is finally coming to fruition - am I really going to become a Mac convert now?

Husband & I are currently enjoying all the fruits Halloween has to offer - we're getting into our Halloween movie list. Tonight we're watching The Nightmare Before Christmas - very cute! We have already watched Psycho, Night of the Living Dead (the original), and this one. Yes, we are a little slow...but thank goodness for Netflix! And I am chock full of Halloween spirit - my apartment has been decorated for about 2 weeks now. Hooray for Halloween!

And yes, along with all the Halloween lovliness, there are plenty of those little bite-size candy bars. My thighs are happy to say the least. And of course all my nerves waiting for bar results this weekend has me eating without really thinking about it. Ugh. But I. CAN'T. STOP.!!!

In all seriousness, I think the reason I'm so Halloween-crazy is because I wasn't allowed to celebrate Halloween growing up - I had a very Footloose childhood, but without the fun dancy ending. So naturally I rebelled and am gung-ho into holidays. Especially Halloween. At work we're moving to a new building this weekend, so on Tuesday (I have monday off, lucky dog that I am) I am going to bring in some little Halloween desk decorations. Very excited.

The only thing is that I want to know from you guys about your favorite Halloween costumes. So spill it!

Trying to rack up last-minute karma points...

Blogging has been hard work for me lately. And instead of writing something half-assed, I'd rather just not write anything at all. Stuff has been going on - I got my hair chopped off by a friend who works at a very hoity-toity salon (very cute, short, graduated bob, which has led my stylist friend's husband to call me "Bob"), decorated the apartment for Halloween (hooray!), and made some travel plans.

I think I've come to a conclusion about my job. If I get good news next week (yes, already next week - more on that later), I'm going to begin quietly looking for another job . Don't get me wrong - I really love working for my current employer, but given that it's a fairly enormous corporate gig, my ability to move up from current menial secretarial position to hot-shot attorney isn't exactly mindblowing. I mean, there are opportunities for upward movement, but I'm not sure I'd be able to be patient enough to wait out the process. So I think I'll start seriously looking at options after Christmas - I'm going to try and stick with my verbal year commitment - and hopefully find something perfect. Despite the fact that my job isn't very cerebral, I'm not in a huge rush to leave it willy-nilly. I have really great benefits, and it's paying my student loans...so why leave that stability for anything that isn't a good fit, you know?

Yes, so by next week this time, I should have my bar results. If the postal service is running well and the gods don't hate me. I REALLY don't know how I feel about getting results via the mail, where I'll have to hold an actual envelope and decide whether I want to tear into it or open it slowly with the aid of Vodka. And speaking of vodka, Husband & I just got a very big bottle of vodka and a very big bottle of top shelf rum this weekend. Hooray for liquor! I've been used to getting results in California, where you get your rejection in a more instantaneous fashion. At least I'll have serious confirmation so there'll be no doubts.

If any of you want details about WA bar results, email me & I'll let you know. And may all of us still waiting on results be blessed with lots of good karma...

Apparently you guys aren't joiners...

So either I've gotten really boring and nobody comes to visit anymore, or you're all a bunch of wallflowers.

I saw SARAH JESSICA PARKER!!! She was here promoting her perfume Lovely. I didn't buy the perfume, so I didn't actually get to tell her how much I love her, but I did go up & down the escalators to watch her. And man, is she ever gorgeous in reality! It was so cool!

Of all the people I've seen when I lived in LA, I think I got the most excited about her! So it was a great week!

Who's LOVELY?!?

Guess who I saw today?

No really, GUESS!!!

Here are some hints:

1. She's an actress with a very successful TV show behind her, and she's in films
2. She lives in NYC
3. She's LOVELY (no, not de-lovely, lovely)