Thanks Bob

In a fit of excitement last night, Bob managed to land a paw right on my face with the full force of his 50 lb. doggie body behind it. I now have two lovely red welts going down my right cheekbone.

So no, I haven't been blogging because I have in fact been wallowing. I seriously sit on my ass all day. On Wednesday I slept til noon. Well, I got up and fixed the girls' breakfast and did their hair, and then went back to sleep once they left for school. I never sleep past 7:30--what is that about?

I have an interview next week for a temp job. It is a short term project, but it pays well. The only problem is that I may have slightly exaggerated my qualifications for this position. When I said that I had experience drafting Daubert motions in products liability cases. I have actually drafted one Daubert motion for one products liability case. But it was a multi-party case with multiple experts all rolled into one motion.

I'm really not one to exaggerate my abilities. I don't know what came over me. My biggest problem is usually that I am too honest. Anyway, we'll see if I can make it through another interview without screwing it up. Meanwhile, I will be researching this weekend to make sure I don't look like an idiot if they start quizzing me about my experience. Which would be a lot easier if I still had Westlaw/Lexis access.

What I'm reading

In response to Zuska's recommended reading, I thought I'd post what I've been reading and what's on my to-do list. Since the bar I have read:

Harry Potter--of course, and I loved it.

Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man by Fannie Flagg (of Fried Green Tomatoes fame). Fannie Flagg is always good for a hilarious, lite read. This was no exception.

I Don't Know How She Does It by Allison Pearson. Just finished this one. It was a hilarious and honest look at balancing work and motherhood. I really liked this book, but didn't care for the ending.

On my nightstand:


Boomsday by Christopher Buckley. Found it at the library and picked it up because it is by the author of Thank You for Smoking and that movie was great.


The Supreme Court: The Personalities and Rivalries that Defined America by Jeffrey Rosen. Just in case I feel like reading something lawyerly


Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier. Because is was only a buck at the used bookstore and it's supposed to be good.


The Mammoth Cheese by Sheri Holman. Another $1 book, and the title intrigued me.


And finally, read recently (as in within the last year):

Atonement by Ian McEan. I really liked this book and could totally see it becoming a movie when I read it (which it is now.) I had previously read Saturday by McEwan and almost gave up. Saturday was very slow going, but finally picked up about 2/3 of the way through and ended up ok. Atonement kept a much better pace.

And if you prefer something trashy:

The Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich. This is my dirty little secret--I am seriously embarrassed to admit reading these books. But they are freaking hilarious. And it was nice to have something lite and easy to wind down with after studying all day. I can easily knock out one of these books in just a couple of hours. But I don't recommend anything else by this author. My mom left me a book not from this series and it was the absolute most ridiculous thing I have ever read.

So, this is what I did today

I started to wallow, but a friend that I haven't spoken with in forever called and that seemed to pull me out of my funk.

So, then I did this...

The line is from stitching the two images together because I don't happen to have a 12' X 12' scanner. This is the first time I have scrapped in about 8 months, and the picture is old because I don't think I have had prints made since Christmas.

And then I did this...

Because I though the girls needed freshly baked cookies to celebrate the first day of school. And so they came home and we sat and ate cookies and talked about their day and it was nice.

And then I applied for the only new job that I have found today.

And here is my current game plan. If nothing is happening by the end of this week, I am going to email all of the firms in my town seeking temp work. There are only a dozen or so firms here, and they are all small or solos. Is that too weird? I have never done the blast resume thing, because I don't think it's particularly efficient or effective. But I think it could work since this is a small suburb fairly remote from the city.

What am I supposed to do now?

The girlies started school today. And I am home. I am not accustomed to being home alone. All day long. I don't know what to do with myself. I guess there's always more painting, organizing and cleaning. But my house is more organized that it has been since I moved in. And the laundry is caught up. (That is a miracle around here. Laundry is the bane of my existence.)

I really thought I'd have a job by now. I have pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I will not find an attorney position before bar results. So now I am looking for any kind of temporary or contract legal work. I don't really care as long as it gets me out of the house. If I stay here I will wallow.

I am angry. I am angry at the Career Services Office for doing so little to help the 80% of us not in the top 20%. It seems like the only thing they manage is to organize OCR. I am angry at everyone in the law school for not warning us. For not telling us ahead of time that we would not have jobs on graduation--that we would not be able to get jobs for a full 6 months after graduation. For not telling us that we would be on our own in finding a job if we don't make the OCR cut. I am angry that they misrepresented starting salaries. According to my school, the starting salary in private practice is $90K. In reality, the starting salary at a small firm or in government is $50K or less. A mid-size firm might net you $80K. The large firm salaries are so elevated that they skew the rest of the results.

I know my blog is a downer lately. But I do this more for me than for you. I want to be able to one day look back at this emotional rollercoaster--and hopefully laugh. And at least for now, venting helps a little bit.

I am Betty Freakin' Crocker

Last night I had to make banana chocolate-chip muffins with crumb topping because I had not yet managed to haul my butt to the grocery store and my poor starving children would have nothing for breakfast. Yes, they are as delicious as they sound.

Today I finally made it to the store. In anticipation of someday being employed, I am experimenting with bulk cooking. We got in the habit of eating out way too much while I was in school, and it was good for neither our health nor our budget. So while I have all this leisure time, I am trying to stock up.

Last week I cooked up 3 lbs. of ground beef with onion and then froze meal-size bags flat in the freezer. (Flat defrosts quicker.) I can have a meal on the table in 15 minutes by defrosting the beef to throw into spaghetti sauce, mexican pile-up, goulash, etc.

Today I bought 6 lbs of chicken breast. I kept one lb out and have it sitting in a marinade for sesame chicken tonight--yum. The other 5 lbs are in the crockpot with about a cup of broth, and onion and some pepper. I'll freeze part of it as is to go into pasta, salads or other quick dinners. The rest I am making into chicken pot pie (I have a yummy and easy chicken pot pie recipe), chicken enchiladas, and chicken spaghetti to be frozen and defrosted later. I bought aluminum pans to put them in so that I can have the nanny put them directly in the oven (again assuming I ever have a job).

I'll probably spend about 2 hours preparing meals today (plus the half hour I already spent), but I'll have one meal on the table, three in the freezer and at least 5 packets of cooked meat for a quick dinner. Some people do this once a month, and it is an all day event. You can google OAMC or Once A Month Cooking for recipes, but I found that a lot of them are full or cream soups and cheese and other artery clogging ingredients. Pretty much anything you can freeze will work, and I prefer to use my own tried and true recipes.

My husband is the Supreme Awsome Computer Geek of the Universe

I have been having trouble with the power jack on my laptop for awhile. I had to contort the cord into all sorts of weird positions to get it to connect inside the jack. Two nights ago I had the cord strung up through my toes to maintain tension while the battery charged. It was not pretty.

I tried replacing the cord, but it didn't help. The problem was in the jack. Unfortunately, the power jack is soldered into the motherboard and replacing it is not nearly as easy as it should be.

Yesterday it quit working completely. No matter how I tried to position the cord I couldn't get any power, and of course, the battery was dead. My laptop was rendered a worthless rock with all my very valuable data (like links to everyone else's blogs) trapped inside.

But DH came to my rescue. He salvaged the power jack from the motherboard I blew up. Then he spent all night breaking my computer down into a hundred million little pieces. Seriously, this stupid tiny little part (about 1 square cm) could not be any more difficult to get to. It took 10 minutes to replace the part and 3 hours to take my laptop apart and put it back together.

And somehow, miraculously, it worked. I no longer have to string my power cord up through my toes. And there were only three screws left over.

BItchfest

So I received a response back from my thank you email, which sounded pretty much like a blow off. They were very polite and told me what a great asset I will be to the legal community and wished my luck on my bar results. Which seems to imply that 1) they do not intend to see me again before bar results; and 2) they do not think I will be a great asset for their firm.

So it is back to job hunting (as if I ever really stopped). I am trying very hard not to fall into the depths of depression and self-pity. It is hard not to think that I made a terrible, terrible mistake. My family was doing fine before I decided to flit off to law school. If I am not employed by the time my loans come due things will be very, very bad. I thought that I would be making things better for my family, but from where I sit right now, I have only made things worse.

And the optomists are bugging the shit out of me. The perfect job just hasn't come along yet--it will all work out. How do you know that? How do you know that I won't get stuck in some crappy-ass job that I hate because it is the only job that I can get? I actually liked law school, and there are several areas of the law that I would really enjoy wroking in. But none of them seem to be heading my way.

I have applied for about 40 jobs since late March. Since then I have had 2 interviews. How am I ever going to get my foot in the door at this rate? Once the kids are back in school next week I will start looking for contract work.

Let's talk about $ex, baby

Oh yes, tonight we had The $ex* Talk. Because PS's BFF's mom informed me today that after the girls' sleepover last week she found a spiral full of pen1s drawings. I so did not know we were there yet. PS doesn't even turn 9 until next month, but most of her friends will be 10 in the next few months. And I'm so protective about what she is exposed to. But all three girls have been fascinated with pen1ses since we got Bob. (The dog--and he gets excited a lot.) FortunatelyBFF's mom was cool about it and we both chalked it up to normal curiosity. But we both thought that we should talk to the girls to make sure that they understood $ex and anatomy on our terms.

We were going to the library anyway, so I picked up a book. I had bought PS "The Care and Keeping of You" about a year ago, which is an excellent resource for explaining a girl's changing body. But I needed something that went a little further to explain pen1ses and $ex. The book I found had lots of drawings demonstrating how your body changes during puberty, how a pen1s works, and how $ex works.

Overall I think it went well. Until we got to the page about contraception. I explained that that is what you used if you were going to have $ex but didn't want to have a baby. PS asked, completely bewildered, "But why would you want to do that?" To which I responded, "Because sex is fun." And then I had to add, "But you should not have sex until you find someone that you really love." She then informed me, "Destiny told me her parent's aren't married." And I had to explain that you don't have to be married to have sex or have babies, but most people think that you should be. The most important thing is that you do it with someone that you love.

I refuse to demand abstinence or preach waiting until marriage. For one thing, it's just not realistic. But I hope that by being honest and keeping the lines of communication open with my daughters they will talk to me when these issues arise. At least I know I am doing better than my mom. My $ex talk, when I was 17, consisted of "be sure you have $ex with lots of men before you get married so that you can make sure you are $exually compatible with your husband." That is some damn awesome parenting.

*I'm not a prude, just trying to avoid the perv hits.

I don't know

How my interview went, that is.

It did not start off well. First, no one knew I was coming. The HR manager with whom I was corresponding claimed I never confirmed. Umm, yes I did and I have the email to prove it.

But I still got to meet with the department head, and the interview went pretty well. The position is with a mid-size civil litigation firm that is expanding into family law. Family law isn't my top choice, but at least I would get some litigation experience, and at this point I'm not too picky. And I have experience in family law. This firm wanted an experienced attorney, but the department head said that the experience I had was great and shouldn't be an issue.

She also seemed impressed with my psych background, which actually is sort of useful for family law. Her main concern was finding someone who felt comfortable interviewing clients.

So everything was going great and I though we were getting along well. Until she asked what I wanted--like salary or hours. And I made the mistake of telling the truth. I said that I was willing to compromise a higher salary for lifestyle and that I would like to have dinner with my family more often than not. I emphasized that I was perfectly willing to do what was needed from home after my kids were in bed, but I think that I had already sunk my ship. Heaven forbid that there is an attorney who wants to be home by 6:00 pm at least 3 nights a week. I think they tricked me--all their talk of how family friendly they were. And I got too comfortable and fell for it. I should know better by now.

So anyway, she said that I would have to have a second interview with a partner before any decisions were made, and that the HR manager should contact me within a few days. I guess we'll see. Meanwhile, I sent a follow-up email trying to clean up all the messes without making it look like that was what I was doing.

Jesus Saves*

But apparently I do not. I drafted several documents for my last job that I knew would be good samples for me to use later, or writing samples (properly edited, of course) if necessary. I saved them all on a flash drive, which I cannot find anywhere. This is the problem with technology getting smaller--you can't find it if you lose it. WWJD? Back up the damn flash drive onto something that can't get lost.

My problem is that I do not have a good writing sample. I have an interview tomorrow and although they have not asked, I wanted to have a writing sample available just in case. My best sample is a memo I wrote for an international law course. Unfortunately, we were working in conjunction with the DOJ and signed confidentiality agreements stating that we would not even discuss subject matter of our papers. It was tough research, I worked hard and made a good grade. The most infuriating part is that the point of the paper is now completely moot--the issue has been very publicly resolved. But I'm still thinking I can't use that memo.

Everything else I have is crap. I did a response to a MSJ for the DA's office. But looking back it is terrible. My arguments were good, but the style was terrible. I was using a sample from an old form book (it's the government, you didn't get to use Westlaw unless you had a darn good reason.)

I have a couple of very basic motions that I drafted for my clinic, but I don't think they will be helpful. It didn't occur to me to keep anything I did in my first job.

Argh. I hope DH can miraculously find the flash drive tonight. I'm pretty sure I let him borrow it and haven't seen it since.

Oh yeah, and in case you were wondering, the concert was great. It was nice to get out.

*Jesus and Satan have a discussion as to who is the better programmer. This goes on for a few hours until they come to an agreement to hold a contest, with God as the judge. They sit themselves at their computers and begin. They type furiously, lines of code streaming up the screen, for several hours straight. Seconds before the end of the competition, a bolt of lightning strikes, taking out the electricity. Moments later, the power is restored, and God announces that the contest is over. He asks Satan to show what he has come up with. Satan is visibly upset, and cries, "I have nothing. I lost it all when the power went out." "Very well, then," says God, "let us see if Jesus fared any better." Jesus enters a command, and the screen comes to life in vivid display, the voices of an angelic choir pour forth from the speakers. Satan is astonished. He stutters, "B-b-but how? I lost everything, yet Jesus' program is intact. How did he do it?" God smiled all-knowingly, "Jesus saves."

See you at the show

DH and I are going out tonight--yea! I bought him concert tickets for his b-day--which was right before the bar, so not much celebrating then. He is out with the girls getting them a movie and Happy Meals for their night in with the sitter. Why do I always feel the need to bribe my children when I go out? It's not like they care, they are just thrilled to see the nanny again. DH and I only go out alone maybe 2-3 times a year (something we really need to work on), so it's not like this is a regular thing. I guess I just feel like they should get a treat if we are going to be out having fun.

Why yes, I do have too much time on my hands

I did the Superhero Quiz, mostly because my girls are so into superheroes. But this is a fairly accurate description. I have become so used to going 100 mph that I don't know how to slow down. Since getting back from my post-bar trip, I have been cleaning, organizing and of course painting. Oh yeah, and I do find superheroes kinda boring. But I am kinda bummed that I got such a boring superpower. I always wanted to be invisible.

Your Superpower Should Be Super Speed

You're quick witted and fast to act. You're mind works at warp speed. From your perspective, everyone else is living in slow motion. You get so much done, people have accused you of not sleeping. Definitely not a couch potato, you feel a bit crazy if you're not busy doing something. Why you would be a good superhero: You're be the first on the scene... and likely to finish the job before anyone else shows up Your biggest problem as a superhero: Being bored by everyone else. Including other superheroes!

What Should Your Superpower Be?

Bowling Zen

Took the day off from painting yesterday. The girls were going stir-crazy and I though they needed to have some fun since there is only one week of summer left before school starts. We wracked our brains for something fun to do. It has been 104 outside all week, so outdoor activities were not happening. No kid movies we wanted to see at the local theater. Tried to talk them into the art museum, but the twins thought it would be boring. They wanted to go to the Science museum, but there is a special exhibit that DH wants to see so we wanted to wait for him. Finally, I spotted free passes to the bowling alley sitting on top of the microwave. The kids thought it sounded like great fun, and with free passes it would be pretty cheap.

I bowl maybe once every two years and I have never been very good. I am lucky to hit 100. But something overtook me and I suddenly became a good bowler. I was sending them straight down the middle of the lane every single time. I had three strikes and two spares. (Maybe that's not too impressive, but it is really good for me.)

This was especially entertaining because a 20-something single guy took the lane next to us. He seemed amused at our group of girls trying to bowl. He was trying to show off, sort of pitching his ball down the lane. And I was kicking his ass. I think he got embarrassed, because he started off friendly but he got quieter and quieter as I continued to out-bowl him.

We are now considering joining a family bowling league. How cheesy is that? We would so not be competitive (the kids were really terrible), but it would be a fun family thing, I think.

Can you hear the sound of hysteria?

I love the "real" version of this song, but this is freakin' hilarious!

My kids apparently have not read Tom Sawyer

They seem to think painting is fun and keep pestering me to let them help. Two six year olds and an 8 year old are hardly helpful. Well, the 8 y.o. is somewhat helpful, but the little ones are just in the way.

Meanwhile, it's a darn good thing I went to law school, because I do not have a future as a painter. I am the sloppiest painter ever. And I don't mean the paint on the walls--I mean the paint that I get everywhere else. My hands are covered in primer and it won't come off. Last night the bottoms of my feet were completely covered--how the heck did that happen?

I'm having to prime all of the walls because they are disgusting. Seriously, you would think that we live in absolute filth by looking only at the walls. There is a continuous streak of grime 2 1/2' from the ground. Apparently small children cannot walk through a room without running their hands along the wall.

So I am already tired of painting and I have a lot left. It will take at least the rest of this week and probably a good part of next week, too. If I were smart I would have waited until I had a job and paid someone to do this. But I just couldn't take the grime (or sitting home doing nothing.)

P.S. I have an interview next week. Trying not to get too excited. Seems unlikely that something would come of my first interview.

Arghhhhh!

So I had been corresponding over the weekend with a firm that claimed to have a contract attorney position. They asked me to call this morning, so I did. It turns out that their contract position was not a contract position at all. It was office sharing. I would pay them for space in their offices. The would not pay me at all, but I would get referrals for whatever walked through the door that was not in anybody else's area of practice. I would essentially be going solo.

I am a little irritated. I would not have pursued this if they had plainly stated it was an office sharing arrangement. I think they were misleading in advertising this as a contract position. Although I have considered something similar as my emergency backup plan, I really feel like I need some experience and a regular paycheck right now. And I couldn't do this until November anyway (which they knew). And if I were going to do an office sharing arrangement, it would not be 40 miles from my home.

Stupidheads!

My Week in Review

So posting is spotty because, as previously mentioned, my life is boring now. But in the last week I have:

• Returned to the human race. The bar turned me into a troll. Virtually every part of my body needed to be shaved, waxed or depilitated (is that a word?). I had 3 inches of roots to be colored. My feet were so rough they were catching on the sheets at night. So earlier in the week the girls and I did mani/pedi's while watching Bridge to Terebithia.* My feet are now smooth and my toes are Hot Magenta. The next night I colored my hair and did the routine eyebrow wax while the color set. I am overly blessed in the eyebrow area. Think Brooke Shields in 1983. I swear I always look like I've had a face lift when my brows are done. And whole head is the same color again, and those pesky greys have gone back into hiding.
• Bought school supplies. 4 stores. $150.
• Bought Webkinz. 4 stores. $35. And I am an awesome mom because as soon as DD's friends have come trickling in from their vacations, their first question is, "What Webkinz do you have?"
• Cleaned. The junk drawer, the pantry, the spice cabinet (2 jars of ginger, 2 jars of poppy seeds, 3 jars of cloves. I never cook with any of these things), my bedroom, most of the downstairs.
• Lost 3 lbs. With minimal effort. But I purged the house of all the bad stuff. And by purging I mean I ate the last 1/3 of the box of oreos and the last 1/2 of the ice cream.
• Job Hunted. 15 resumes. 1 rejection. 1 nibble. (A contract position that would be a long commute so not necessarily a good thing.) 1 job that I would really like and that I am really well qualified for and doesn't require bar.
• Bought Primer and a Sample of Paint. I figured as long as I am unemployed I would paint the downstairs. I am now in knee deep because I have 1' test patches of "dapper tan" on various walls. My house is an open floor plan so I have to do the whole downstairs in one swoop. 1500 sq. ft. of wall by my (probably incorrect) calculation.

* Bridge to Terebithia was a pretty good movie standing on its own. And it was a decent interpretation of the book. I was very skeptical going in because Bridge to Terebithia was my favorite book as a child. The movie previews led me to believe that they had massacred the book. But other than taking great liberties with the imaginary Terebithia and modernizing the setting, the movie stayed pretty true to the book.

I feel so loved

The girls keep asking me when Lucy is coming back. Lucy is the nanny. I should probably be offended by this, but I am pretty sure they are only asking because I make them do chores, eat their veggies, and limit tv time to 30 minutes a day.

On the bright side, it's nice to know the kids love their caregiver. She is like a grandmother to them. I just hope she doesn't find another job while I am looking for a job. One more reason why I really need to start working.

Why knew Lysol had so many uses?

Lysol douche ad, 1928, at MUM All I have to say is, "ouch!"

The trials of the unemployed

I have spent the last three hours applying for jobs. I have applied to a grand total of -------5 jobs. Job hunting takes forever. I researched and compiled a list of about 20 jobs last night. So today all I have to do is minor edits to my stock cover letters and fax, print or email. Ha! There is a lot more faxing and printing than emailing. Why oh why is it so hard for lawyers to accept the virtues of email? I can dash off an email in literally 1/5 the time it takes to fax. Perhaps I am just inept, but it takes forever for me to send a doc through the fax wizard. Even good old fashioned printing takes less time.

Maybe by the end of the day I'll have my 20 resumes out. Or maybe the end of the week.

My life is boring now

I feel like I have regressed back to being a SAHM. I've had that life, and I was happy to be home with my children when they were young, but I would never want to go back to that. Today I went to the pet store for critter food and then the grocery store. I will start cooking again. I also started looking into a weight loss plan and joined sparkpeople.com. I gained about 10 lbs. while in law school, and when I started I was still carrying around 10 lbs of baby weight. I am hoping to drop about 20 lbs. by the time bar results come out in November. So this is my life now--with entirely too much focus on food.

I am thrilled to have time with the kids before joining the real world, but my elation is really dampened by not knowing exactly when I will be rejoining the real world. I am purposeless right now and I hate it. I don't exactly want a job that starts tomorrow, but I would love to know that I had a job waiting within the next few weeks. There is absolutely no way that I can wait until November to start working. I am ready to start the next phase of my life. I am done with law school and the bar (hopefully), and I am ready to move on. I hate this empty limbo purgatory phase.

I know this post sounds whiny. It is really more frustrated than whiny. I loved law school and I love practicing law. I just want to get started.

Back to Reality

Despite my whining about not getting to take an exotic vacation, my post-bar trip was perfect. We took off to the cabin that my grandfather built shortly before I was born. I spent most of my childhood vacations there, but haven't been in at least 10 years. But I felt like I had never left, and still knew exactly where to find all the secret spots I loved as a kid. It was so much fun to show my kids the place I loved so much growing up.

The cabin is in a remote area, 30 miles and an hour drive from the nearest town. It is nestled into the side of a mountain, overlooking a valley with a small pond. There are a dozen or so other cabins in the area, but most were unoccupied while we were there, so we had the whole mountainside while we were there. Two of the girls and I caught our first fish (and we squealed like little girls when we did--we are not exactly outdoorsy), and we hiked to the top of the mountain. We also hiked to a tiny hidden cemetery where nearly all of the graves are more than 100 years old.

There was no tv or cell phone reception. I didn't even bother taking my laptop. It was the perfect post-bar trip. Completely stress-free and relaxing.

Next week I re-start the job search, deep clean my house, and start preparing for the kiddos to go back to school.