it's important to have goals.

someone once asked the buddha: how do we escape the heat of a summer's day?
the buddha replied: why not leap into a blazing furnace?

puzzle that one out in your spare time.

today i had my first criminal law tutoring session of this, my last semester. annalisa (ahhhhna, that's very important, she said) told me it was very helpful, and shane (that's a good irish name, i said, like my nanny and my mother before me would've, and that thought came and went like a flash, didn't it?) raised a fist with a mighty yessssssss when i answered the question and said yes, every week, mondays, five to six i'll be here and thinking about my dinner the whole time, and a month month month before what i hope hope hope is an offer.

an offer. isn't that a bad word? i didn't like it when i first heard it, and i don't like it now, but i still want it all the same. as long as it takes as full of time. i'd like the offer because i'd like all this to happen, like i see it happening, moving real quick like and rushing to find some place, and the studying like mad for the bar in a state i've only been to a few times and see when i close my eyes for a minute as the place i'd like to walk the lake around and the cold i'd like to complain about and the summer i'd like to walk and sweat in.

so i'll take the offer. after you, offer, it will be off to somewhere else i won't name at the moment. let's wait until we get there, yes?okay.

moze art

dude. it's mozart's birthday today! 250 years old, and still celebrated. now that is what being a rockstar is all about. when i was a kid i used to go to the library almost every day (your nerd alarms should be flashing), and one of my favorite books was this biography about mozart. he went everywhere and did an almost impossible amount of things and met with kings and dukes and emperors and queens, and danced with marie antoinette, even! everyone wanted to hear him play or compose for them. he had brothers and sisters too. i wish i could find that book. i still remember what the cover looks like.

possibly maybe

so i think i have a cavity. a cavity that needs to be searched, if you get my meaning.

and i think you do.

good news! i think! cook county called me yesterday morning to say that if there was still interest on my part to work for them, they would like me to come in for a "final interview" at the end of the month. februrary twenty-seventh at noon. what does final interview mean? does that mean an offer at the end? does that mean they don't know about me, so they're on the fence? i feel so much more pressure this time than in november. but i think: they wouldn't ask me to fly out there again if they just wanted to reject me, would they? this is the second time now. right? right. or maybe not?

i'm trying not to think about it too much.

and anyway, i have an auction to go to soon. the fabled "pee-la" auction, that is. i have been told i will be served wild salmon and spaghetti squash. and wine and beer. and some "hot fried ass." or something. i'm looking forward to all of it.

the weird thing about having only two classes is that things are stressful, but just take longer.

i should mention here that i'm not complaining about the final interview with cook county. i'm honored. i'm excited, even. i'm just nervous as all get out and anxious! anxious! i thought i would find out-find out, you know? not another interview! what if i throw up on them? what if i release the beast? yee!

the redesign of the nintendo ds came out and the good news is that it looks awesome. the bad news is also that it looks awesome.

i have to put the milk away now.

don't turn to someone else

it says here: scheduled outage at: 4:00PM. figure that out for yourselves.

there has been a bet made here. a wager, even. the wager: the liquor or liquors of your choice, the winner's choice, in an amount not exceeding twenty-five dollars. sometimes you don't want a fifth. sometimes? you want a pint. a half-pint. just a bit, even. jessi dobos, et al., will be happy to hear that i have wagered in favor of the steelers. if you can't root root root for the home team, try try again. let's do this.

you fall apart again and you can't find a friend. okay. i think it's the beginning.

i am rediscovering shiraz. syrah? did you know they are the same grape, just different regions? well! now you know.

i'm worried sick that i won't like you any longer when i see you again. are you worried this is you, or you? it's not, so you can forget it. you, now, on the other hand: okay. let's just see how this goes and feel it out, and that will be that. there was a time i couldn't think of myself apart from you, but now i don't know how to negotiate that any longer. now i just worry. worry, they say, is how a coward loves with the whole of the heart. so be it, then.

one time--and stop me if you've heard this--actually many times, my nanny would hear a good song on the tv or the radio or the record player my father owns, still, now, and she would start to dance, just dance all by herself in the living room that no one used uses and of course, my mother or i or my father would go to dance with her, and i wish wish wish with all my heart i could do that again because i can't tell you the half of it, how happy she was just then. you can shake whatever head you have and whatever you have inside of that head thinking about how little i've rationalized this or how resistant i am to doing so, but i would rather think of my nanny dancing in the living room with the new wood floor and the beautiful furniture by herself, just for a little while, until one of us came to dance with her and how happy she was when she had a partner. and how that grew with each each each of us, and how the dog would try to herd us all into one room because she was too worried--and remember about the worried, and how cowards can be braver than what we think we are--and i would and will and stay happier than you are, and maybe happier isn't the word, maybe just more honest. my heart breaks for the things that have happened to me, my friend, from selfishness and a chronic inability to see past myself, but that's incomparable to the things that go unnamed, today, that have happened to you, in that house, in that kitchen or hallway, that made things as they are today tonight.

take it as you will.

here's where we are

robert, thank you for reminding me about the revolution. i almost forgot.

today is a nice day outside, but i am facing a problem in the form of wanting to read, and it's too cold to sit outside. so....open the window and read in bed? not a bad solution. this is what happens when i have two classes and it's just too early to study for the bar yet. soon it will be. that's good to remember.

supposedly, the first week of february will come great rejoicing or terrible disappointment. either one. keep your fingers crossed and your prayers prayed, and maybe i'll have a job very soon.

the west wing has been cancelled. nbc is in trouble. only two shows on right now with any interest in them: law and order (did i even need to say that?) and something called "las vegas." which.....doesn't that star rob lowe, or something? maybe i'm thinking about something else. anyway, another show that receives great critical acclaim but terrible ratings. deal or no deal, on the other hand, well. you haven't lived until you've seen a minister screaming "no deal! no deal!" at his niece on national television while bobby of "bobby's world" looks on approvingly. like the whole thing was a stageplay of matthew 6:24, except i didn't really want to buy tickets to that show, i thought i was going to see "wicked." or something.

going to be = am

so, i'm thinking about buying some vintage video games. i've never done anything like that before, so i'm nervous. and i'm nervous about buying things from people i don't know, but then again, i do that all the time. which gets me to thinking how weird that is. we have so much trust, don't we? we trust that the soap we buy isn't going to burn our skin and it'll make us clean and smell nice, we trust that the food we eat won't kill us and not be rotten, a million things.the blindess we don't mind between us and them.

i'm waiting to go out to dinner with my parents, who continue not to pressure me into getting a job after law school but still manage to stress me the fuck out on occasion. they are blind to things, not willingly but unknowingly and lovingly, if you can believe that.

i smell like coffee. i'm going to be late.

God Bless the Queen

You Passed the US Citizenship Test

Congratulations - you got 10 out of 10 correct!

Could You Pass the US Citizenship Test?

lo mein deliciousness

so i just chinese food syndromed some freshly cut pineapple. i just couldn't stop and now my hands are sticky and my stomach doesn't have a lining. see what happens? keep away from the fresh express aisle, located near the produce. keep away.

now the problem i'm having is what to have for dinner, which i'm sort of at a loss over. pizza is always the answer, isn't it? but what kind? and maybe that's not exactly what i want right now.

booklist! i didn't forget!

the first week of februrary i will find out if cook county wants to make me an offer. they mail them out then. it's hard to think about getting it, and it's hard to think about not getting it either. i hope so much that God will just make my heart ready for whatever is written on the page. yee.

tomorrow school starts. the last semester! i know you're dying to hear what classes i'm taking, so here goes: trial advocacy ii, juvenile law, and remedies. one two three, just like that. and then i'll be done! only one exam this time, even. i'll be tutoring two sections of criminal law, working for professors donkey kong, marge, and the triple threat, as usual, and i'll still be telling kids to slow the fuck down, or so help me.

and lucky you, you're still here!

fists of fury

that's what my name would be, if i was having more fun.

this is post one hundred fifty. chris mentioned his milestone in passing, so i thought i'd do the same. originally i was just going to say something at one year, and maybe i still will, but i just noticed about this one right now so i figured, why not? updating right now is a crapshoot anyway. might as well put something matter-of-fact in.

i'm having trouble sleeping. i can't seem to settle down, is the problem. also the problem is, the greater problem is, i'm feeling awfully lonely tonight. the raw kind of lonely, and hurting, hurting so that i'm not quick enough to remember i'm only angry because it's easier and safer, and i'm not angry at all but just feeling terrible. it's just that it seems like all the people i wish i could share a city or a zip code or even a state with aren't here, and they won't ever be here, and i'll never get that job in cook county, with the four red stars and the white and light blue background, so then i'll just stay here and that'll be fine except more like this, just a little worse.

and, well wait, it could be that it's the end of winter break, a long and satisfying and incredible and astonishing and unbelievable (in parts) sort of break, and so i'm just missing and missing and missing, but i don't want to be that person so i just default to all of you shaking your heads slightly and smiling knowingly. it's easier to think of it that way.

tomorrow is sunday.

even the stars at night agree that the sky is falling apart

freshly done with the second cookie and before that, dinner, in the form of chicken and potatoes, that homestyled staple of whatever culture you wish to name, i suppose it's time to update the internet diary. the blog. the online journal. what are our parents calling it now? i can't remember, really.

i can, however, remember your parents, mainly because i've seen them more recently than you have (perhaps) and i unfortunately have the good grace of God to give me some sort of weird empathy for them, and disgust? or is that the slight feeling we all have for any of our parents--as if the label came, duty-free, with that revulsion--it's hard to say.

what is not hard to say is that i continue to wish i had made several other, better choices after i read/listen the news.

it's hard to listen to bonnie raitt(?) sometimes. somehow that's true, though also sometimes it seems to make me uncertain, like i'm not supposed to like or even feel anything provoked or stirred by a musical "artist" that we demand i put in quotes. i said we and i meant it. challenge me on that: it would be better.

one time we were going to get a banjo and a mandolin for mr steve lynch, except we settled for the former and turkmenistan has a better version of the latter, i suspect.

what is not hard to listen to is david grey's babylon. really.

remember when i said that a booklist was forthcoming? it still is. don't give up: you will see it shortly. it's just that i'm too much prone to that sort of procrastination where i put things off for others that are less important, and so because there's nothing of much importance to do at the moment, the lesser ones suffer. get your head around that and i'll give you the rest of it.

the other thing i remember is kristin saying: sing with me! can you imagine? she sang o holy night on christmas eve midnight service (where i come from, we call it mass, you know) and i wept, even, and once i got to sing with her, this once and twice even. do you really think she was with eminem (not kristin)?

i've been thinking of calling my old roommate, just because i miss her, strangely, even though school has strangled a lot of those old things--like taking dictation sometimes: you will forget what you were, once, when you skipped all your classes and you drank and smoked and popped and did whatever else you could, you will forget all of that because you are now something else--i just thought, maybe i'd call.

but i guess there's always the pocky, after all.

moo.

what flavor pocky are you?

[c] sugardew

You Are Milk Pocky

Your attitude: caring and charming Smooth and silky... invigorating and natural. You are like comfort food for the soul.

What Flavor Pocky Are You?

it's time to eat

forthcoming: a book list. i promise to put on my blog a special section for where you can see what i've finished reading and a little work up about it. i hope to do this so it links to that rather than just constantly updating this on my ordinary posts, because i don't want to abuse my blogging privileges (like some people i know).

i really liked that part of megan story nee householder's old blog (which, megan? what the fuck? where did you go? i mean this in the best way), so i'm going to be a TOTAL POSER and do the same thing, but less nicely.

i come home tomorrow, thanks be to the good Lord. jared and i will drive home through the shitburger that is indiana. i wonder how the time will pass?

wait for it.

maybe the cab will come now

i'm in the best/worst hotel i've ever stayed in, waiting for one of two taxis i've called today. the reason i had to call a taxi is because michele and liz have taken my car (shh! don't tell mom!) in order to visit all the schools they're hoping to apply to for grad school.

unfortunately, at the same time i'm writing this, the live confirmation hearings of samuel alito are on. the opening remarks are being made, and it's like watching the most important sports championship ever played. it's horrible to see. all i want is to shut it up and just sit on the couch and read my book, because i just can't stand the idea of things that are very real and happening and here. that's vague and sort of lame, but that's really how i feel. i'd rather see the end of the game than the opening play.

i'm seeing some great senators, though. so far, two of them i've liked and one of them i've disliked. maybe not all senators are bloodthirsty, are they? are they all? this is more a topic for monsterbeard, i think.

i'm tired of being away. i like chicago very much, and it's been very nice to spend time doing things i wouldn't normally get to do, but i miss my bed and my things, and i have to get in a few days of rest before law school starts, this one last time. there are so many things that will and must happen in the next year, and i feel like i'm just sitting on the brink of it.

let's start over, i missed my cue

soon, i'm off again to the bookstore. being there last night was so relaxing, just reading and not really caring what time it was for once, constantly checking the clock, worried that i'll get too involved in my book i'll miss this or that meeting. i'm hoping to recapture the magic today, but i have a feeling that won't happen. things are fleeting, that's true bob. i have that same feeling sometimes.

i'm reading a good book about a country doctor from ohio that treats mainly amish patients. it's like the best parts of little house on the prairie/in the big woods, you know, the parts where pa doesn't have any nails so he has to make wooden pegs? i loved those parts. it's kind of like that, and just in short story form, almost. what i'm saying is, i'm glad i borrowed it. i actually think it might be mine. yesterday i bought a book about lucrezia borgia, "the most notorious woman of the Renaissance." i think my new year's resolution is so far being attacked with vigor, at least for now.

there have been two games of scrabble played. in one of those games, collates spelled b-i-n-g-o. i won't let the cat out of the bag and tell you if michele or i got it.

another observation about iowa: they chop everything up and put in in salads. the cucumbers? chopped. the tomatoes? chopped. the roasted red peppers? chizzy-chopped. all over the place.

let's not lie: the roasted red peppers can be found, to the best of my knowledge, in only one place. to no one's surprise, i'm going back there tonight.

tomorrow i'm going to chicago. whew. it'll be nice to be somewhere else for a change, i'll tell you what. if you think ohio is a hick state to live in, you should take yourself a little trip out here to the i to the o-wa. there are some things nice about it, though. don't get me wrong. got that? don't.

i think a walk down michigan avenue will clear things right up.

i thought it had an e too.

today: slept for a very long time. shower. went to barnes and noble for a couple hours. read a book, bought another, got a journal. went to dinner, drank some scotch, got some ice and back in time for some videogames. tomorrow i will make my list of things i want back in my life after i graduate from law school.

did i mention jared called? or that i broke a nail?

i got my grades today. all bs, really. i like that you can read that as bullshit or more than one b. discuss.

this post isn't going to last very long because i'm on my stomach on the bed, and i have a hard time with that for anything more than a bit. how are you? lyndsey, i love the way you recapped the year on your blog, and i wanted to do the same, but now i feel like a poser and am realizing just how lazy i can be. the answer is: very.

this year will be upheaval.

it's videogame time

greetings from iowa. i like the way that name sounds and looks. i also like that i don't live here.

yesterday i was in the most remote location i have ever stayed the night: north english, iowa. right now i'm in cedar rapids, iowa, which looks like a big chapel hill plus north akron plus cantonish downtown area. the hotel i'm staying in is nice, and the bed is big, and i went out to the best buy over yonder to get a direct hookup for my ps2 so i could occupy my time when necessary.

this trip has been interesting on a inner level, by which i mean it's been interesting to realize things about myself that i never really knew or just assumed. i am a lot more selfish than i wish i was. it's just that i am missing spending three more days with bob while he's here, and chris before he moves, and even though i've spent a countless number of hours with them--plus the fact that i'm actually doing something good and helpful here--i still feel that tug of wishing i was there sometimes.

that's not to say i'm not glad to be here at the same time. it's nice to spend time with michele, and her grandma (plus her house) is awesome. it's helpful to see why things are so hard. and it's nice to have time to myself, too, especially while i'm in a place so different from where i've been or where i live. that's the adventure part that i've always liked about going places. so, it turns out.

tomorrow i will be on my own all day and part of the night. friday we leave for chicago, which i'm pretty excited about. i didn't get a chance to do anything when i was there last time for my interview, so i'm happy i get some more time this weekend and part of next week to go to the museums and some restaurants, and check out michigan avenue and so forth. i'll be driving back to akron with jared on wednesday, which is pretty soon, really. it'll be a ghost town when i get there, compared to what it was when i left--so many people i love home, and constant time with them for two weeks was so much fun--one of the best winter breaks i've ever had. probably the best, even. when i get back, there'll be no katie, no bob, no jess--and only chris for maybe a couple more days. it makes me very sad to think about that, but it'll make my leaving easier when the time comes, i suppose.

travelling makes me tired. so does introspection.