So Profound

A while ago I asked my husband a very profound question in my sleep as he was getting ready for work.

This morning, I did the same thing. From the depths of my sleep, I voiced a very deep concern:

"Why doesn't anyone make special sauce out of mustard?"

Keeping The "C" Out Of Class

As my public benefits law professor handed out our take home exam on the last day of class he made one thing very clear. He does not like to give out C's. My professor went to the University of Washington Law School when they did not give out letter grades. All classes were pass/fail.

My professor turned to the class and asked, "What is the grading like at Seattle University? You mostly get A's and B's right?" 40 heads smiled over-enthusiastically and nodded in unison. I exhanged smirking looks with the girl next to me. If this was true, my transcript would show that I am the worst (or unluckiest) law student on the planet with my handful of C's.

"I try not to give out C's. You have to really botch this exam to get a C. You have to, like, draw pictures instead of actually writing out an answer." My professor exclaimed. Then he continued, "In fact, in law school I really hated this one professor. I knew the class was pass/fail and I really doubted he would fail me, so I actually had the nerve to draw a picture on my exam. It was pretty funny. But DONT do that on this exam."

This is the best news I've heard all semester. This is the one class I never read a thing for. And I'm being rewarded for it! Now I can skim the syllabus for relevant cases and write a simple discussion of the holding in them and how they apply to the take home. If I decide to put in some extra effort on top of that, I could possibly breeze by with an A. Wow, I just got sprinkled with some lucky dust or something. Cha-ching.

I love professors who don't give C's.

Overheard In Law School 2

"Think of Goldberg v. Kelly as Star Wars and Mathews v. Elridge as Emperor Strikes back. And those big walker machines are stomping all over the 14th Amendment." -Public Benefits Professor

"I'd hate to be the person giving my presentation after him. I mean, that'd be like on American Idol if Kristy Lee Cook had to go up after David Archuleta." - Law Student in my row

I am so sick of the valley girl law students sitting next to me. It's so weird to hear them talk about serious things like adverse possession when every other word coming out of their mouths is "like" and with stereotypical flamboyant gay man voice fluctuations..."So like, the main elements of adverse possession, are like, actual possession. Open and notorious. Yeah, and like, hostility. And isn't there like one more? Oh my god. Is that like, a picture of your bf? How old is he? I totally like his hair."

How do these people trick admissions into getting accepted?

Boob Worries

Can one anatomical part perform two functions at the same time?

All my non-reproducing life, I've associated boobs with one thing: sex. Boobs are sexy. I will proudly admit that I am a "boob" girl and (this might be crossing the decency line for the blog world but...) I get turned on by my own pair, especially now that they are two sizes bigger.

But what happens when you become a mom and those symbols of sex take on a more utilitarian function: that of nurturing your baby? I plan to nurse, in fact, I really look forward to it. But I don't want my boobs to lose their OTHER function. So, can boobs still bring you "pleasure" when you're a nursing mom? Can they still be a turn on? If not, can that function be restored at a later date?

I think my husband is crazy sometime because, although I'm over five months pregnant, he still thinks I'm sexy (or so he says....). Ok, maybe I can buy that. Maybe. It seems a stretch to me but people have had weirder fetishes I guess. But how sexy will it be if I started to leak all over the place during sex AFTER the baby? Yeah, didn't think so. Cringe.

Am I the only pregnant person who worries about these things? Am I just being silly? Is it a pointless worry because I will be so tired and consumed by my role as a new mom that sex will be the last thing from my mind? It would just be nice to know how it all works.

The Best Profession Ever

Last night my husband and I watched A Civil Action with John Travolta. In my civil procedure class 1L year, we read about the Woburn case as a case studying for learning the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Like Rule 11, my professor was obsessed with Rule 11. I'm pretty sure my husband was bored with the movie. Not a typical thriller. No violence, no blood, no shooting.

And when I was running at the gym last night, 60 minutes came on featuring Justice Scalia. It was amazing to watch him interact in the interview. He's a real, down to earth person. Even he has days where the legal profession makes him angry. How amazing would it be to be a Supreme Court Justice?

Every once in a while I doubt my decision to go to lawschool. But the truth is, being a part of the legal profession- even if just as a student for now- is like being in some exclusive club. I feel special knowing things that are not common knowledge. The shared experience of law school torture, socratic method, and taking a bar exam just initiates all lawyers and lawyers-to-be into the same social club. It's a separate academic and intellectual world that we become part of.

And I love having access to the legalese:
Joinder- sounds like a type of drug to me "hey man, wanna smoke a joinder?"
Quantum meruit- a type of space travel, perhaps?
Interrogatory- a torture tool
Indemnification- just sounds dirrrrty...

Mostly, I'm proud to be part of the legal profession. Unlike how I felt my 1L year- lost, dazed and inadequate, I am now confident, in awe of legal concepts, and I have a sense of belonging. I have taken law and made it mine. I feel like I belong to it, and it belongs to me. I feel like it's something that makes me unique and sets me apart from others while at the same time, uniting me with lawyers and law students all around the world.

I still have my off days and I still have days where I hate law school more than I hate folding laundry or more than I hate paying a cover to get into fun places (that's some intense hatred there).

But the best part of the legal profession is that as you grow intellectually, there is always something in the field to stimulate you. Law's philosophical roots tie us to great thinkers like Aristotle, Hume, Kant, Jefferson, Madison. It also connects us to current events and asks us to come up with solutions for society's existing problems. There will never be a shortage of people to help, legal doctrines to study and law articles to read.

Law is the best profession ever. Now I just have to repeat this mantra 100 times a day until finals are over.

You Know You're Old When The Word Prom Makes You Think Of, Not Yours, But Your Future Kid's Prom

When I got married, we moved right into the city. It's a small city with a small downtown and it still has rural elements to it. But it's fun to live right in the action and near everything...even if it means hearing police sirens at night. We went out for dinner and actually WALKED. It was nice. It took ten scenic minutes- we walked near the water and across a bridge, the mountains were hovering in the background- it was beautiful.

We went to one of my favorite restaurants. It's called the Boat Shed and its on the water, literally. Part of the restaurant is held up by piers over a saltwater inlet. In fact, people can drive their boats up to the reastaurant, tie it to the dock and walk up for dinner. There are some pictures on their website http://www.theboatshedrestaurant.com/. The Boat Shed serves a great selection of seafood, burgers, sandwiches, and a number of excellent salads. Almost every table is by a window and EVERY table has a view of the water. There is a bar area and they serve good beer and fun drinks...only 123 days until I can have a lemon drop! Woo hoo :)

Seated out on the patio was a group of highschoolers all dressed up for a formal dance. They looked really cute seated in pairs. Then there was a bulbous girl hobbling around awkwardly in heels- it looked like she was going to tip over. I'm only 23, those highschool days aren't that far behind me. But it feels like forever ago. Anyway, seeing this group reminded me of my dances. I loved dancing! The excitement of getting dressed up and hanging out with my girls. Of course, I was lame and never had a date- except for prom. I was always pretty shy at school. I didn't want to stand out for fear of what people thought about me.

I was a completely different person at our school dances. I rocked the dance floor. It felt good moving with the music and didn't care what people thought- in fact, as ridiculous and wacky as my dance moves were (cringe) people actually tried to emulate them! At dances, I was all about having fun, even if it meant looking silly doing it-- and people always wanted to join in. I think not having to worry about impressing a date helped a lot too.

Now that we're going to have a baby, I found myself thinking about the day my own kids will go off to prom all dressed up. I definately look forward to it. But I still feel too young to be thinking about that kind of thing. I know it will be exciting to watch my boy, in a tux, bring bring his prom date to meet us. That is, if he doesn't hate us by then. Then I realized what I was thinking about and it kind of freaked me out.

Every now and then, I catch myself thinking old matronly thoughts and it makes me shudder. While I'm totally gonna be a hip and hot mom (wink), I'm still young myself. I guess it all happens in time, I just don't want to be too eager for the future and miss out on the now.

Working Out My Tastebuds

I wanted to run today, really I did. I planned on running too, just as I had planned on running Monday and Wednesday.

Then I got home. And sat on the couch. And ate some Cheez-its from my hidden stash. And fell asleep for 3 hours.

I feel guilty that I'm not sticking to my running goals or to a daily running routine. It's so easy for me to use pregnancy as an excuse to opt out of a workout when, really, it should be the reason that I work out. Healthy mommy = healthy baby! But I've been pretty exhausted lately. Not exhausted like I didn't get enough sleep exhausted. More like exhausted because I just ran a half marathon exhausted. Physically, I feel so drained. It's super hard to force myself to do a workout when I feel like I've already done one, or two, or three!

Tonight, I'm gonna sit on my butt, eat a whole bag of kettle corn and watch movies. If I get enough energy, I might move the pile of my freshly folded undies (thank you neat freak husband) off the kitchen table and on top of my dresser (it's asking too much to put it IN the dresser).