Christmas Reading

I'm home for the holidays! This means several things:

First, I'm done with yet another semester of school.

Second, I get to hang out with my friends and family.

Third, I have plenty of spare time on my hands.

So the question is, what shall I do with my spare time. There are two possibilities for me right now, read or write, and since I am feeling a block on all things creative, reading seems to be my only option. So, what's on my reading list for Christmas break?

Here goes:

Catch 22

Gods in Alabama

Dracula

A Confederacy of Dunces (which I just need to finish)

Mansfield Park (another that I just need to finish)

Northanger Abbey

North by Northanger Abbey

and several other random books.

We'll have to see how far I get. I think I may have to get back on a reading schedule in 2010.

Loathsome Songs

There are certain songs that just set me off. Maybe I shouldn't share this inside secret with you, in case you decide to use it against me... hrmmmm. Maybe I'll just keep out the song titles, since I'm on a rant...

There's probably one in every genre that sets me off. Of course there are also varying degrees of annoyance.

Level One Annoyance: Visual Grimace - not bad enough to request the song be changed, but I probably cringe.

Level Two Disgust: Physical Grimace - this is usually the type that I will request the song be changed nicely, or if it's under my own control the station will be changed or volume adjusted.

Level Three Abhorrence: Physical Control - this is about the time I DEMAND the song be changed, or forcibly change the song myself. (I have done this before in other people's cars) Should someone I know and love be singing this song, I will probably reach out and cover his or her mouth.

Level Four Hatred: Get the Freak Out - There is only ONE song that I can think of that makes this happen, but if I can't control my surroundings I can control myself. I have in fact left stores when this comes on in the overhead music. I will plug my ears and institute the 'la la la la la' loudly to block the sound. (Yes, it does become very childish)

So what brought this on this morning? My own iTunes collection. That's right - some of the songs I absolutely hate are in my own collection. I can't bring myself to delete them. It's not that I forget. I just don't do it. This morning it was only a level 2 song. I hit next when it came on (well about a minute in, as I wasn't paying attention and found myself singing along).

Am I crazy or what? Yeah. I thought so.

Fantasy Land and late nights

Okay - you may know this about me, and you may not - my dreams are often influenced by my surroundings. Maybe all people are like this. I dream about what I read about, what I watch, and occasionally, a messed up version of what happens in real life.

So yesterday between watching the new Star Trek - Chris Pine is delicious in case you didn't know that already, and reading The Lightening Thief - which is really fun and entertaining, I had a full head of other worlds when I went to sleep.

This led to strange dreams about strange lands, monsters, and fighting... which led to waking up, a lot.

Tonight before I go to bed, I'm going to read or watch something happy and silly. I want a good night's sleep. But can I keep Chris Pine?

EPIC FAIL

So, NaNoWriMo is officially over.

Did I make it? Can't you tell by the title to the post? No I did not. I am about 17 THOUSAND words away. whoops.

However, I did get a new story idea of out if, so I guess it's not all bad.

Next year, my NaNo, I'll get you, and your little word count too...

Bits from the word battle...

Yes - NaNo is still in full swing. I however, am not. That's right. I'm about 15,000 words behind. Yep. That's a whole lotta words. I've hit a bit of writers block - at least on this story - and random other things I feel like working on have been pushed to the back burner until after finals. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to finish this.

Here's another little bit though:

It wasn’t even 7:00, it was way too early to go to bed, but tonight she didn’t care. She slid out of bed only to get out of her suit, and instead of sleeping au natural as they usually did, she grabbed one of Andy’s shirts and pulled it on, letting it envelop her in his scent again.

She fell asleep with her cell phone clutched in one hand, and his note in the other, hoping it was all a bad dream.

The Re-education of Fat Girl

There are many things I love about law school, and today I am reminded of another.

I love the people. I learn so much from them. I'm currently sitting in my office discussing comic books. Yesterday, we were discussing books. Sometimes we discuss movies or music or other things. Yes, I know, some people are shocked to learn that I can discuss any thing by law - but there you have it.

I am a total book junky, most people know that. But most of the boys in my non-law life, have no desire to read a book. So having boys that read, anything from comic books to classics, and like to discuss them, is just so much fun.

I love to learn from other people... it makes it so much more fun.

Monday Monday

That's right. Here it is, Monday morning, barely 7 am and I'm up and at 'em.

There are several reasons one might be up at this hour:

a) one must be at work in the relatively near future

b) one must try to get something (usually homework) done before heading off to where ever one needs to be

c) traveling

d) one must register for classes, which opens at 7 am sharp

e) insomnia

f) one has not yet been to bed

Care to guess which one applies today?

*ding*ding*ding*ding* Today the winner is registration day. (you probably guessed right! Way to go!)

So here I am, up by 6:45, so I can be logged in and make sure nothing will stand in my way of getting the classes I want. That's right, I sat and watched the digital number change on the clock on my computer from 6:59 to 7:00. After all the stress and preparation for registration, which includes the following: determining which classes will fit together, which classes are required, what the final schedule is, and when it comes down to optional classes which ones you WANT to take, the list is made.

The list is the schedule written out with dates and times of classes, and exam times - again double checking for any thing overlapping that would be problematic.

Once that list is made, the secondary list must be compiled, which includes the course registration numbers, so they're all in easy reach, ordered by which class will likely fill up first.

Now the above mentioned process, choosing classes and making lists, took me about an hour yesterday. Weeding out classes I wanted to take based on final times (the tax class I wanted to take has a final the same day as the one class I MUST take - and if you've never taken a law school exam, trust me on this, you do NOT want to take two finals on the same day. YOWZA). Taking classes by professors I love. And determining helpful subject matter. A fun way to spend an hour (NOT REALLY).

Anyhow - one of the classes I want to take has a cap of 22. So out of all of the potential students registering for classes (about 325 between both classes) only 22 people can take this class. Now granted my class (of about 170) gets first crack at registering, but still 22 spaces and 170 people could be problematic even. So I have to feel the stress of making sure I'm up and ready to register at 7:00 sharp.

Registration timing was a thing I learned early on. End of 1L year - first crack at registering, I made my husband wake me up at 6:50 so I could get up and register then go back to bed (it was between semesters, and I had no reason to get up early). I got up, I registered at 7 am sharp, I got all my classes and my professors. A few days later I was having lunch with a couple other people from my class - one of the girls was just like me, on time to a fault, and the other two waiting until mid afternoon, because that was when they thought about it finally. Neither of the other two got all the classes and professors they wanted because a lot of the smaller classes were full already. In the middle of 2L year we had to register for spring semester (just like today) and we had to take a class with a partner for a writing project. My partner, being just like me in some ways, was up and ready to register right on time too, but I got into the class (with the professor we wanted) and she didn't. We registered at the same time and the class filled up that fast. She had to be put on the waiting list and eventually got into the class - it all worked out in the end - but man was it stressful for a little bit.

So this morning, being the first group of registrants, I probably had nothing to worry about - out of the 5 classes I'm taking two have 40 seats, one has 65, and one has 100. The only problematic one was the 22 - and I just did what I've done in the past, register for that class first, separately (don't want to waste time typing in all those other codes), then go on and register for the rest. Worked like a charm.

So after all this stress and preparation - any guess on how long registration actually took me? LESS THAN ONE MINUTE. All that work and planning for less than a minute. Talk about anti-climactic.

Only now - that I have all of the classes I wanted for my final semester of school, am I annoyed that I'm up way before I need to be. Oh well, if nothing else it gave me time to update my blog.