It was better then

Sometimes (like right now) I miss being a kid. When I was little, fall was birthday season. All my friends had fall birthdays, myself included. In second grade, I went to my friend Annie's birthday party, and it was so much fun! We went ice skating, and she had two different kinds of pie instead of cake. I tasted lemon meringue pie for the first time. It was a slumber party afterward, and we all stayed up late giggling and talking about silly things.
I didn't have to worry about jobs, money, school, passing the bar exam, my [bad] health, elderly parents, or "making something of myself."
Now, all my friends are preoccupied with buying houses, investments, boyfriends, girlfriends, marriage, babies, and jobs. It's lame.
Life was better when I watched "She-Ra" after school, played Barbies, and stirred up strange mixtures of ice cream, soda, and cereal with my friends--and then ate it. My biggest worry in second grade was math, because I wasn't good at it. I'm still not good at it, but now it's one of the few things I don't worry about. I want to be seven years old again.

Mad Men

Holy crap, I love this show. It's set in the early 1960's in the Madison Avenue advertising scene, it depicts an era I know little about. My parents were teenagers at that point, and I wonder, were peoples' attitudes and demeanor really like that? Was it actually acceptable for men at the office to act like a bunch of jackass 15-year olds and drink all day? Were women really that repressed and talked down to? How would I have fared if I was 29 years old in 1960? I can relate to little bits of each of the female characters, but not one as a whole:

• Betty: being generally thought of as quiet and sweet, but suddenly, occasionally, exploding.
• Peggy: Quiet and often made fun of, but with a lot more going on beneath the surface.
• Joan: Cynical and tactless, but actually well-meaning.
• Rachel: Ambitious and very independent, but lonely.

Amazing clothes and sets. Really evokes [what I imagine to be] the atmosphere of the era.

I've been watching this from Netflix, and, if stupid Comcast had given me the adapter box (which they were supposed to, but refused--grrr!), I would still be getting AMC and would be able to watch the third season as it aired. Something needs to be done about that!

Minor Victory, Major Affirmation

Tonight in Criminal Law, I commented on a case we were reading, and the professor said that I had made a very important point--in fact, she said that if I had been the prosecutor for this case, the defendant would have been convicted. (In reality, the prosecutor had missed the point I made, and the defendant escaped a homicide charge.)
Hells Yeah! I really am supposed to be in law school! And I can succeed at being a lawyer!

What a relief!

By the way, I almost didn't go to that class tonight because once I was at school, I realized I had forgotten my book at home. Good thing I didn't skip!

For now though, I need to work on getting that clerkship...it's due the 19th.

High End Coyote

I was driving home late last night, when I saw what I at first thought was a stray dog crossing the road near Strohecker's, the swanky Portland Heights grocery store near my house. Wait a second! That's not a dog! It was a coyote! In Portland Heights!
Weird! Maybe he came up from Forest Park on one of the trails. Portland Heights is only a mile or so from downtown, after all. Very exciting.

Yay! Weekend

I haven't had a relaxing weekend in ages: always out of town or just on the go. But not so, this weekend. I'm really looking forward to both inane activities, and special ones.

I'll start with the special:

• The Time Based Art Festival is just beginning! I love it!
• Chinese dinner tomorrow, hopefully at Wong's King (never been there before)-mmmm
• Helping Alex paint his brand-new house

Here's the inane (but equally good, because sometimes I'm boring):

• Grocery shopping
• Laundry
• Apartment Cleaning
• Getting ahead on my homework

Best of all, it's a 3-day weekend, which means I can sleep and sleep and sleep.