Lacking in the Internet

I'm on a new assignment now, and it's much more strict than my last one. And much more organized, which I'm appreciating immensely. They monitor our time very closely and we can't check email on the doc review computers, only the two computers in the middle of the other room that are very easy to spy on if you happen to be walking by. We have to sign in and out for lunch and break. Yeah, it's all closely-watched.

Jason was here this weekend and we had great times. Saturday we met up at the Zoo with a couple of Jason's friends who were in town for the weekend. My new favorite animal is the marmoset, and I repeatedly asked Jason to buy me one a la Veruca Salt. Alas, no marmoset. But they're so cute. I have pictures. Which I will post when I have time. Um, which will probably be two weeks from now after I move.

I have to say, although I liked Jason's friends a lot, my favorite person of the weekend was their 8 year-old cousin, Mei, who they brought to DC with them. I cannot even express to you how much of a riot this little girl was. Her comments kept us rolling. Seriously, I think I almost fell down a couple of times.

I think the best comment of hers was when she looked at my car as we were walking into Chili's and informed me that I had a "sweeeeet car," with all the enthusiasm of someone on Pimp My Ride.

Let me inform all of you who don't know, I have a white Ford Focus sedan. Her name is Bunny and I love her, but I have never considered her ghettofabulous in any form. But to Mei she was all that.

If I could be guaranteed to have children as cool as Mei I would have one immediately.

On the iPod

"Just Like Jesse James"
Cher

Struttin' into town like he's slingin' a gun
Just a small town dude with a big city attitude
Honey, are you lookin' for some trouble tonight?
Well, alright!

Alright, indeed.

Come on, baby, show me what that loaded gun is for?

I think 80's Cher is right up there with Journey on the "classic" level.

If you can give it
I can take it
Cause if this heart is gonna break, it's gonna take a lot to break it.

The best part is, I completely forgot I even had this song. It's like a little present tied up in a bow from my iPod.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

So would it be too cheesey to say, "Kiss me, I'm Irish!" to Jason when I pick him up at the airport tonight? I mean, it is true. Even my name is awash with shades of Ireland. So much so that one of the partners at the little firm I was at insisted on speaking to me only with an Irish accent and saying things like "Faith and begorrah!" a lot.

And I figure while I have someone to kiss I should take advantage of these holiday traditions, right?

Speaking of green (like the segue?), it's getting to be Spring around here and I love it. There are daffodils and crocuses and pansies blooming all over the District and the housing development where I live in northern Virginia. Plus, yesterday morning I walked out of my apartment in the early morning sunshine and realized the grass is GREEN again! It's been brown for so long, I forgot that it gets so very, very green. The green is one thing that takes my breath away about northern Virginia (and maybe the green in southern Virginia would too, but I have no experience with southern Virginia except for driving through on the way to Tennessee in November, and it's not green anywhere in November). When I first moved here last summer and was driving around, getting acquainted with the area, I kept feeling completely blown away by the towering trees and the brilliant emerald of the grass. I know I've lived in other places where green played a large factor in the surrounding landscape, but it just seems more vivid here for some reason.

I will miss the green, although a New England Autumn will just about make up for it.

And The Answer Is No

Well, this is weird. I emailed them asking for a little more detail about the position. Their ad basically had the name of the firm and said they were hiring an associate. Upon googling the firm, NO webpage came up, but I did manage to look at it once the associate emailed me and I got the extension off of his email address.

After looking at the website some more, I had pretty much decided I would go in for the interview just for practice, but I didn't see it going anywhere. It's a VERY small firm, only 2 attorneys. Not really any work I'm interested in, a lot of litigation.

The email he sent was super informal, signed with his first name, and just saying got your resume, want to interview? So I wrote back and just said thank you for getting in touch with me. Since the ad wasn't very detailed, could he tell me a little about the firm and the position? Perfectly nice.

He emailed me back a half hour later to just say what the practice area was (not anything I have any experience or demonstrated interest in) and we could discuss it further if I came in for an interview. THEN 10 minutes after that, the partner emailed me and said all the time slots are full, thanks anyway.

Um, ok. I guess we don't like questions? Does that strike anyone else as a tad abrupt?

And Jason just said to me, "You are worth more than that." Thanks!

I'm not at the point of desperation yet, so I can still be indignant instead of despondent. :)

Writing

Hmmm....So I'm working on my writing sample for the job, right? I've been thinking about it for a few days, wondering how exactly to approach it, and I'm kind of doing what I was afraid of. See, I have to write 2 policy issue letters on the same topic to two different entities. Basically, the second letter is winding up sounding a lot like the first, with a few adjustments for the additional facts. Do you think they expect that? I wish I could ask, but that's probably frowned upon. I'm sure they want a basic idea of what I can do when given an issue to approach. Anyway, I'm done for the night. I'll mull it over at work tomorrow and finish writing tomorrow night.

I really like writing academically. I forget that sometimes. But I turn on Miles Davis and Charlie Parker and just start typing away.

Sexy Gams

Apparently my square-toed, imminently practical, comfortable enough to walk around the city, Payless special dress shoes combined with my suit skirt create an irresistible combination. Not only have multiple homeless men informed me how nice my legs look while wearing said outfit, but today a few reputable-looking businessmen gave my legs a second glance. Frankly I consider my legs kind of large, but whatever. I guess I'm showing them off to their full advantage today. Of course, said businessmen were also in their 50's, and I have always gotten complimentary looks from the older men. At least I have some sort of appreciative audience.

More advice:
I sent a resume to a firm without really knowing what they did. Their ad just said they were looking for an associate and had no further information. I couldn't find their website when I applied. I just got an email from an attorney there asking if I'm available for an interview next Wednesday. Based on the guy's email address I found their website. It looks like they do mostly immigration with some personal injury/workers comp stuff. Nothing I'm really interested in. I'm tempted to just tell them I'm not looking anymore, but would that be dumb? I just don't know about flying up to Boston, missing another day of work, and at least one night when I should be packing, for an interview with a firm that I would have to convince I'd actually want to work for. I can't really say "Oh, yeah, well your ad was so vague I just thought 'Why not apply?'"

Update
I may not have to choose between pay and the interview. We're booking through the documents so quickly that we may only be working a couple of days next week. I'm ok with that since we've had 3 weeks of work, and I was just submitted for another project today. So I may be able to use my Jet Blue credit and go to Boston for a day or two.

Which Apartment Should Kelly Choose?

I was going over things tonight in my head, wondering how I would choose in the next couple of days, and it occurred to me that I have all of you to ask for advice. Here are my choices:

Apartment 1
Pros:
1) 10 minute walk to the train and then a half hour ride into DC (probably more like 45 minutes given all the stops and starts on the Blue Line lately)
2) Nice new apartment with a pool and a workout center.
3) Internet and cable.

Cons:
1) On the 4th floor. I can handle that day to day, but moving a bunch of stuff up 3 flights of stairs to the 4th floor to live there for just a few months and then move it all back out again doesn't sound like fun. Especially since I don't know if I'm going to have anyone around to help me move in a couple of weeks.
2) $40 more per month in rent than I'm paying now.
3) Living with 3 other girls, who on first glance seem a little Molly-esque and definitely younger than me. I'd be sharing a bathroom with one of them.

Apartment 1's lease ends at the end of August. If I move before then, I'd definitely have to find someone to take my place, which might be hard given the price of the place and the desire for the Mormon summer interns to find places for around $300.

Apartment 2
Pros:
1) My own very large bedroom AND my own bathroom. I have my own bathroom now and it's lovely.
2) Only one other roommate in a very big space.
3) $15 less per month than I pay now.
4) Seemingly cool, laid back roommate.
5) Washer and dryer in the apartment.
6) Pool in the apartment complex.

Cons:
1) Kind of far out. A 10 minute drive (maybe longer during rush hour) to the train and then a 30-40 minute ride in on the train. (on the other hand, closer to Dulles when Jason comes to visit).
2) No internet or cable (unless I want to pay to have them installed for the 3 months I'm there. While I have internet at my current job, I've been told that most doc review jobs don't have internet so if I was on one of those jobs I'd have no internet at all.)

Apartment 2's lease is up at the end of June. The girl in the apartment now has been living there by herself, but doesn't want to pay the whole rent by herself anymore. Regardless, her situation is kind of up in the air too so she understands that I may be leaving sooner. If I don't leave sooner, but move to Boston at the end of June, I will have hopefully worked and saved money doing 3 months of document review (assuming the myriad of projects supposedly starting at the end of March/beginning of April actually begin when they're supposed to).

I'd love to hear your thoughts. Obviously both places have pros and cons, and I'm sort of dithering, although I suppose I'm leaning toward #2. I just don't relish how far out it is and the no internet thing. However, if I'm working doc review, I probably won't be there much anyway and maybe with the money I'm making I could get the internet hooked up for when I am home.

A Day of Rest

I always knew that I got lazy and useless on Sunday and I loved indulging in Sunday afternoon naps and lazing about in general, but yesterday I got the full vision of why we should take 1 day out of 7 off. There is just something programmed in my body that rejects the whole idea of working on Sundays. I worked 10 hours yesterday and by about 2 PM I felt like I was going to fall asleep. My mind was wandering and I was getting really annoyed at the documents in general.

Finally I had to get out. I moseyed down to the lobby at about 4 and called Jason just to chat for a few minutes. Then I moseyed across the street to CVS and wandered the aisles for a few minutes trying to figure out if I should get a soda, snackies, nail polish... I bought some Twizzlers (bad Kelly!) and the combination of chewing and sugar managed to keep me awake until I had to leave at 7.

It's just Sunday, though. Today I'm back at work and I feel okay. Just another workday. Maybe the normal groove of being on the Metro in the morning surrounded by other commuters has me in the right frame of mind. Or maybe I'll crash at about 4 and need to get out again.

On the iPod

I cannot express to you how happy I Believe in A Thing Called Love by The Darkness makes me.

A Real Interview

This trip to Boston was not in vain like my last trip. I actually had a real interview, with an actual health care trade association for an actual job that they actually need to fill. I know! I was excited too.

The job sounds so interesting. Lots of moving and shaking and policy and legislation. Right up my alley. The government relations lady who I would be working most closely with sat down and said right away, "I loved your resume!" Neat-o! So all that work I did and the internship and getting the Health Law Society going counts in some people's minds.

I feel like I would really like to do this job. Apparently, the feeling was mutual. As I was leaving, they said they would be sending out a writing exercise to a few candidates over the next couple of weeks. I got the email with the writign exercise in it 3 hours after the interview.

Assuming they like my writing, and then assuming I meet with the President and she likes me too, this still all hinges on whether they can pay me enough to live. I was thinking about it and I don't need that much to scrape by. But I do have a level I have to be at, and I have no clue what they're offering.

Exciting! You know what else is encouraging? Despite all my moaning over the last several months, I've only really been looking for a job for a little more than 2 months now. The moaning prior to that was about some half-hearted resume submissions in DC and Boston as I dealt with my angst related to wondering where exactly I should be trying to find a job. One promising interview in what has been described to me as a "soft market" for a position actually in my area of interest is pretty darn good, in my opinion.

Anyone Know of Any Good Relaxation Techniques or Maybe Just Where the "Off" Switch for My Brain Is?

I swear, this is getting ridiculous. Last night I was on the phone with Jason until 1. We were only supposed to talk for a few minutes, but that didn't happen. It never seems to. So I'm asleep by like 1:05 AM. Then my eyes flew open at 5:30 AM. No good reason, just so that my brain could entertain itself by saying "oh crap oh crap oh crap" over and over again apparently. I managed to get back to sleep at 7:15 (even though that was about 15 minutes after I should have probably gotten up) and slept until 7:50. Then I set a new personal landspeed record by still leaving the house at 8:13 so I could catch my bus on time. I took a shower and everything. Well now that I know I can do that, it's going to be very tempting to set the alarm later.

This afternoon I'm in a better zen place. First of all, I checked with the firm and it seems like we will be working some this weekend. So I'm flying to Boston tomorrow night and flying back early Friday morning. They seem ok with me taking Thursday off for the interview. And while it's not as fun as having a whole weekend with Jason, at least I'll get to see him a teensy bit in between his work responsibilities. I'm definitely on the team for the additional duties, and they're thinking that will probably go at least a bit into next week, if not the whole week.

Second, there is a major project coming up that everyone is all abuzz about. Two people I work with at the firm went to the agency I interviewed at yesterday and the reps were thrusting extra business cards at them, saying, "Tell your friends!" They're talking about needing contract attorneys in the hundreds. It's supposed to start at the end of the month, and I hope it does for real. None of this lollygagging and delays that are so infuriating and make the bank account balance too small.

And now I feel like I have some different options depending on whether various things happen or don't happen. My interview on Thursday could go great and I could get offered a job. A REAL JOB! They're a non-profit organization, though, so there's a chance they might not pay me enough. Seriously, I forgot how expensive Boston is. The DC area is expensive, but I've been checking out apartment listings in Boston and even with 2 or 3 roommates, it's still significantly more per month than what I'm paying here. Now I know I have a good deal, but I've seen other places that are comparably priced. It's just pricey up there. So that is a factor, as much as I hate that it is. However, they might pay enough and then I have a job and I move back right away. Yippee!

OR I might not get the job and if this upcoming project starts on time, I can work through April and probably make enough to move to Boston and to hold me over until I get temp work or a real job there.

OR if this upcoming project starts on time, I can stay for the entire 2-3 months and make enough to save some, live my life, AND pay most, if not all, of my credit cards off. In my mind that's a Double Yippee! Of course that also entails definitely moving from the apartment I'm in now and being somewhere temporarily. I'm going to talk with a couple of girls tonight who have apartment spaces to see how they feel about my uncertain status.

Of course the sad part about possibly staying here for the next few months is that I won't get to go to Boston probably at all because we'll be working 70-80 hours a week. However, Jason and I emailed about it today and he seems cool with coming down here more and hanging out with other people he knows while I'm at work. {gushy moment} He's very sweet in that he wants me to do whatever is best for me.

So suddenly I feel like maybe I have some options after all, and maybe, just maybe, the world isn't going to end. I know, I was shocked too.

Decisions, Decisions

I'm moving back to Boston. Maybe it seemed to you like I had already made that decision, but not really. I didn't really have it confirmed in my head that, yes, this is actually happening. After being up until 5 AM on Saturday night/Sunday morning, I woke up at 2 PM on Sunday somehow feeling better. I spent those long hours before going to sleep doing job research. I applied for a health policy analyst position at an insurance company, I emailed out two resumes, and prepped a cover letter and another resume to mail. Only one of the jobs was really something I was excited about, but the others were ones I figured I can do and be fine.

Yesterday I went and looked at an apartment. It's cheap, but not very practical as it's very far out and not really close to a Metro line. It would probably take me more than an hour to get into DC - assuming I actually have work and stuff.

After going there, I drove home, thinking more and more how I just don't want to move. Or, rather, what I really want is to just move back to Boston and be done with it. I don't know if moving back to Boston at the beginning of May or sooner is really a possibility. If I could get contract work for the next month and a half, I could definitely do it. But right now that's looking like a big if.

Today was an emotional rollercoaster day. First off, this job I'm on keeps being vague and noncommittal. We went in today, but they sent us home early so we have no overtime. We're going in tomorrow, but we may not even be there until 5:30 like we were today. Wednesday, who knows. The last batch of documents were supposed to be loaded in by this morning, and now they're saying they'll be done on Thursday.

The good news of this morning was that they're going to be doing an additional project for a few days after the documents are all reviewed, for which they'll keep a few of us. Me and three of the people who sit around me have been recommended for that. I call us the worker bees because we churn out over 500 documents a day, while down at the other end of the room is the other group that seems to talk a lot. The disparity between our groups was pointed out to me on Saturday: there are 20 attorneys on this project. On Saturday I finished up batch 15 from Friday, did batch 29, and then at the end of the day was given batch 39.

20 attorneys.

Those numbers aren't adding up and the documents are all really comparable so I know the other attorneys could be going quickly too. The woman who sits next to me was right there with me with batches 14, 30, and 40. Fortunately, our work has been noticed and we're up for the additional days. However, right now I don't know when that's going to start for sure, and I definitely don't know how long it will last or if it's really going to happen next week. I don't even know if the firm knows that since the vendor keeps messing things up and the firm keeps getting extensions for everything.

It's just really infuriating because in the meantime I don't know what my end date is and no other agency will send you out for a job until you're definitely free from your former one.

Well, then I met with another staffing agency over my lunch hour and they told me they're staffing for 3 projects right now, which will start at the end of the month. Great, except what do I do for the next two weeks about money? Especially if the current firm continues being flakey.

The highlight of the day was a call I got regarding a health policy job that I submitted my resume for in Boston. I got an interview. It's scheduled for Thursday, but I'm thinking that I may try to move it to Friday. The company is a non-profit, which probably means crappy pay and continuing the putting off of the student loans. But it would probably be great experience and hopefully something I could parlay into a better job eventually.

For about an hour and a half I was blissful today thinking everything was working out all of a sudden. I got a call to start a long document review project on Monday. Big pay, long hours. It would mean I could definitely move back to Boston at the beginning of May. It also meant I could schedule my interview for Thursday and then stay the weekend in Boston before the long hours started. An hour and a half after I got the call, they called back. Whoops. The client just told them they want people with a science background only (to which I thought, aren't all the attorneys with science backgrounds raking it in as IP lawyers and not really doing the contract thing?) So for about an hour and a half, everything fit together perfectly.

Now I'm going to try to move my interview to Friday in the hopes that I can miss just that day, spend the weekend in Boston, and still get to be on the additional assignment team come Monday. You know, if it actually starts on Monday.

I seem to be having a lot of these major realizations lately, but today's highs and lows and the scrambling to fit in a trip to Boston just further shows me that being in Boston is the only way this is going to work, both with my relationship with Jason, and with finding a job. I need to be there.

Oh, another good thing from today: I got a call from someone at staffing agency in Boston who saw my resume on Monster and wanted to talk to me about contract attorney work. I'm going to try to schedule an interview with them after my real job interview. Say like I don't get the policy job. If I can make some money to tide me over and then go up there, then maybe I can get some temp stuff to continue tiding me over.

Yesterday I was feeling good and today I'm just trying to convince myself that the good feeling was real. I made the decision to move back to Boston, and to move back as soon as I could, and I felt good. I don't really know how to explain it, but I felt more open and like a good feeling was washing over me. I felt like reading my scriptures, amazingly enough. I haven't felt like that for months as I've questioned my decisions and my faith over and over. I pulled out my Bible and read through some Psalms, then pulled out Jan Karon's Patches of Godlight to read some nice spiritual quotes. This is the first time I've really had a consistent, day-long feeling of lightness and good energy since I moved here. Today it lessened some, but I just have to hold onto it, if I can.

So now here is what I really want to do: I want to move back to Boston at the beginning of May. I don't know if I'll be able to. If I don't get any work in the next couple of weeks, I won't be able to. But today is only Monday, right? Maybe tomorrow another agency will have something else come in for next week. It could happen. Right?

Today is the epitome of a conversation in the movie version of Anne of Green Gables about getting caught up in the glorious flight of anticipation, then crashing back to the earth with a thud. That's how I feel right now. Thudded. I'm so exhausted at the strain of trying to juggle everything that came at me today. Because for a short time this afternoon everything fit together, and then it all came apart. I hope tomorrow things start fitting together again, but this time for keeps.

More of the Same

I don't know if you all have noticed, but my profile says basically one thing. "I'm done with law school. Now to find a job." Every so often I glance over to the left and see those words there like a glowing, blinking neon sign.

It has now been about 10 months since I graduated from law school. 2 months to study for the Bar, 1 month to take a post-Bar trip and move to DC, 7 months of nothing special. Oh, right, except for that cute boy. But he's not job-related, really, and that's what I'm talking about.

Anyway, last Fall was kind of a wash. I did some networking, sent out some resumes, signed up with 8 staffing agencies, and got sent out to do some data entry and a little filing. Then came January with the whole DC Bar-pending thing, which I thought meant contract attorney jobs would be showered forth upon me. Not so much. After being postponed a week, it turns out this job I'm on right now is really seriously not going to last anything like the 2 weeks and 70 hours per week (30 of which were overtime hours) that it was supposed to. When all is said and done, I will probably have made as much as I would have working 3 steady weeks at the little firm I was at. Plus, I would have had less stress (at least from wondering where my next paycheck was coming from) and would be in Boston this weekend.

I've emailed every single one of my agencies (I think I'm up to 10 now, and I have an appointment with the 11th on Monday) and they've all said "Thanks for letting us know your status. Buh-bye now." Or something like that.

After all of that, I have questions in my mind about what my next moves should be in the coming 2 months or so. I have decided to move back to Boston. I have this vague idea in my head about sometime at the end on the summer. However, if I get a job before then, I'll move then. Which brings this whole moving from this particular apartment I'm living in right now into question. Because say like I move and then a month later I get a job and then I have to find someone to sublet this place I've just moved into and what if I can't? But I want the extra time here because I'm hoping to work contract jobs and save up money so I can move and support myself for a bit in Boston if need be. Although those contract jobs aren't really appearing as of yet.

On the other hand, what are the odds that I will really be able to find a job in Boston while I'm trying to work long hours here (fingers crossed) and am not actually physically there?

I feel like my thoughts are all over the place. What I'm getting at is, I'm moving to Boston - eventually. I miss Jason a lot and how fab would it be to move there May 1 instead of September 1? But I have no job in Boston. I already moved to one town without a job, how stupid would I be to move back to Boston without a job?

I wonder if any of my Boston friends would mind a couch crasher until I get on my feet.

What I really wonder is, will I ever get on my feet?

I feel very stuck. If I could work a contract job steadily for the next month and a half, with overtime, I could seriously consider moving back to Boston at the end of April. Of course, I don't know if ANY work will present itself, let alone steady work. Steady work with overtime. Plus, would it be insane to move back to Boston just like that? Probably.

I felt so right about moving to DC and lately I don't know anything at all except for I'm not happy here and I'm not happy not knowing when the next time I will see Jason is. Right now we have plans for the next couple of weekends, but with the nature of these jobs, I may have to cancel one, if not both. If I was in Boston and was able to get temp work there, we could see each other after work and there would be no flying here and there.

I've worked 60 hours this week and I'm tired, so I should probably go to bed and hope these thoughts don't wake me up at 5:30 like they usually do. I hope writing them out has helped me. I really do want your thoughts though, dear internet. Those of you who know me in real life, and those of you who don't. I want someone to hand me a script and show me the stage direction for what happens next. Because I really don't know.

Fashion Update

I don't care who you are or how good your butt is or how sexy your little walk is, the following shall never, ever, ever be paired with any sort of boot: floods, capris, gauchos. I have seen way too much of that nonsense this winter, thank you very much.

And to the girl wearing the capris and the spiky heels, it's COLD outside today. I am in my winter coat and my cheeks are rosy from the wind. Put some clothes on and accept that it's only the beginning of March.

That is all.

The Battle Continues

I've started another blog. It's about the whole losing weight thing. Just for kicks.

Shake What Ya Mama Gave You

5:24 AM

The above is the time I woke up this morning, my head churning away about moving. I've basically agreed to do my best to move out by April 1. I saw a place on the the LDS listserv that looked promising and I knew my roommates had a friend whose lease was up April 1. She does want to take my spot, which actually works out well because she doesn't have a lot of stuff and that means I don't have to move all of my big bulky furniture right away - possibly not even until I move back to Boston (shooting for August).

However, I talked to the available apartment girl last night and it turns out it's a loft bedroom. Which means it hangs out over the living room and is missing one or more walls. Ummm.....??? She assured me she's never had a problem with it so I'm actually going to look at it tonight, but I'm already prejudiced against it because of the whole no walls thing. Basically I'm thinking of people watching movies until the wee small hours in the living room below and the fact that there will be no privacy for phone calls - or anything else really, despite the curtains hanging up as a barrier.

I did see another apartment on the listserv yesterday that sounds great, and from what I can tell, this bedroom will have walls. I emailed the girl and hopefully she'll email me back.

On the job front, the client has more documents and it looks like we'll be working until next Thursday or Friday. Phew! The woman who sits next to me (and since that's getting to be a long name to type every time, and since she's chatty and we sit next to each other for 9.5 hours every day so she will probably figure here occasionally, I'm going to call her SJ) was taking me along on her panic ride yesterday as she emailed all of the staffing agencies only to find out that no one has anything starting next week. Hopefully something will start up the following week.

Obviously I'm not going to Boston this weekend, but I'm thinking maybe the following weekend will work out. I'll just have to wait and see. It's only been a week since I've seen Jason, but I miss him a lot.

Tiggeriffic

So the team leader and the lady who sits next to me and I did a little calculating today and figured out that with the number of documents we have to review, the number of attorneys on the project, and the speed we're going, there is NO WAY this job is going to last two weeks. I'm a little torn as to when I hope it ends exactly. Because if it ends Friday then I can go to Boston this weekend after all. But if it ends Saturday or Sunday then that's some extra time and a half pay hours. I figure if it really is going to end early, then they might as well tell us for sure by Friday so we can start lining up work for next week (and I'm hoping it's just that easy, although I have my doubts). And if it's going to end, well by all means, let me go to Boston at least since I won't be getting the 2 weeks of phat money I was expecting. Mama needs some lovin' with a letdown like that.

The team leader guy gave me the name of his contact at another staffing agency. They are apparently ramping up for more stuff too, so I'm hoping my myriad of agencies, plus this new one, can keep me busy in the coming weeks.

Your mind goes weird places sometimes when you're just sitting there for hours. For one, has anyone else ever noticed how the Cure has REALLY long song intros? Jason burned 2 Cure CDs for me and I promptly put them on my iPod so they're in heavy rotation now. Every time a Cure song comes on (except the ones I know from the radio) after about 2 minutes I start thinking, "Well, maybe it's an instrumental" and just as I go to skip it, Robert Smith starts singing. Every single song.

Another thing I've discovered is why my mom calls me Tigger. It's not that I'm really hyper exactly, just that there's a lot of energy pent up in me that makes me feel like I'm going to leap out of my skin if I don't move around enough. When I was small, my parents bought me a tiny little trampoline so I could bounce while we were watching TV. Now whenever my mom sees that caged wild animal look in my eyes because I've been still for too long she'll say, "Boing boing boing!"

Document review is not very conducive to soothing my savage beast, as it were. By the time I'm on the bus back to my apartment I feel like I could leap up and run up and down the aisle about 20 times. As it is I get off of the bus early so I'll have a longer walk home and then I throw on my workout clothes and turn on Denise Austin. Today it was a bit of kickboxing and abs (and my abs are SORE).

The money is great, but I really don't think I could do this full-time like some people in DC do. I need a real job. I know I'll be at a desk most of the time, but it's not the same. The firm I was at before had me running around a lot of the time, and that's how I like it.

So document review is good for self-discovery apparently. Padding the bank account a bit and self-discovery. They should have me write the ads.

Document Review Awards of the Day

It's funny what you come across during document review. Generally the documents in this case so far have been boring, tedious, and other words that mean something fills me with ennuis.

Every so often, though, something will pop up that makes for interesting reading.

Best term for blue-collar folk as quoted in a press release: Joe and Mary Lunchbucket

Best conversation sent over corporate email: two employees discussing whether they would train together for the upcoming half marathon, with one of them obviously over-impressed at the other's running prowess.

Best document ever: a single page with the word "HELP" in large letters across the top. I thought about printing it out and affixing it to the window.

For more interesting reading, I would refer you to Maria and Miss Nemesis's blogs about what not to say to single people. They're a hoot.

Wishing I Could Sleep Right

First off, my job got postponed. Well, actually we went in Friday, got all orientated, did 3-4 hours of document review, and then the person in charge from the firm realized the vendor had entered all the information into the system incorrectly. They told us to go home, take the weekend off, and come back Monday. So this fabulously paying job I was supposed to start last Tuesday has been postponed to Monday and I'm now just really hoping it happens Monday. I was expecting to have at least 3 days of pay coming to me this Thursday and now I only have 1 and money is getting tight because, you know, I haven't worked for an entire week basically. Kind of annoying. Kind of stressful. Thus the sleeping issues.

No matter when I go to sleep lately, my brain is waking me up at 5 or 6 AM. Yesterday it was 5 AM. Since I was rolling around all these thoughts about paying bills and getting organized, I just got up and paid the bills and started to get organized. Then I got online and emailed my resume out to a couple of people and did some job searching. Have I mentioned that no one wants to hire new attorneys? Yeah, they still don't.

5 hours later I managed to fall back asleep for a couple of hours.

Last night I went to sleep at about 2 AM and dutifully set my alarm for 9 so I could get up in time to have a nice leisurely shower and breakfast before church. My churning and whirling brain woke me up at 6 AM. This time I was thinking about money, but also moving. I'm trying really hard to not think about the fact that I have to move in 2 months until it gets much closer, but that whole putting off the thinking about it thing isn't really working. Because I'm a worrier. I'm also a planner. This is a bad combination when for the last 6 months or so there has been no way to have a concrete plan in my life. Everything is up in the air. Job, where I'm going to live, money.

I sent in a deferment for one of my loans yesterday and in my explanation as to why I couldn't make payments yet I basically said that my income is sporadic and over the last 6 months I've worked an average of 2 out of every 4 weeks. That sucks and also explains why I'm constantly calculating and recalculating my checking account balance with the bill payments due and strategically planning when to pay what in order to ensure that I don't get overdrawn.

I'm so tired of this. I just want a job that pays me enough to live my life and pay down my student loans. At this point, as an attorney, I never thought it would be this hard. I wonder if I'm the only person from my class at my school who is having this hard of a time. It seems like it. Everyone I knew well enough to discuss future plans with either had something lined up at graduation, or has since found something. I realize that my job search has been kind of sketchy due to my being unsure about where to look, but now that I'm focusing more definitely on Boston, I just worry that there still won't be anything, because so far, there just isn't anything.

**My First Car Accident**

(I thought some little hearts and flowers around the subject line would be appropriate a la a children's book like My First Trip to the Zoo or My First Pee-Pee in the Big Potty, but I don't know if there is an html way to do hearts and flowers so the asterisks will just have to do)

So I got in my first car accident today. Well, if you don't count the time I tapped a minivan in high school causing no damage to either car, which only formerly-Santa-Cruz-now-Cambridge Jenn knows about since she was there. Interestingly enough, this scenario played out just like the experience in high school. Basically, I got rear-ended because the lady thought I was turning, looked over her shoulder to check traffic, and turned back around to see that I hadn't turned and she was too late to stop. I've almost done the same thing forty-seven thousand times myself (including once last night in Jason's car. Shhh! Don't tell him!)

The bump was pretty hard and once it dawned on me that I had been hit, I started shaking. I'm not hurt at all and Bunny only has some scratches, but I didn't stop shaking until 10 minutes after I drove away. The lady asked if we could take care of it outside of insurance, which is fine with me and my high deductible. She's a colonel in the Army so I figure she's fairly trustworthy.

And now I'm going to watch a Netflix movie and maybe take a nap because I caught the 6:40 flight out of Boston this morning. No, actually I was supposed to catch the 6:40 flight, but fog in DC delayed us until 8:30, which just makes me wish there was some way they could know that before I get to the airport so that I could have slept for another hour or two.

Still in Boston

Despite the high winds and all, I did make it to Boston Friday night. I actually left for the airport a little early considering my flight wasn't supposed to leave until 11, and I'm really glad I did. I walked up to the gate at 9:30 and suddenly they're announcing that they're boarding my flight. Yippee! Of course we didn't actually take off until 10:30, but somehow being on the plane at 9:45 made me feel like I was actually going to get to Boston that night.

Jet Blue is my new favorite airline, by the way. Especially on the leg between DC and Boston because they fly these smaller planes that have rows of two seats on both sides, which means everyone gets an aisle or a window. No poopy middle seats! Opa!

They also have Direct TV so the latest VH1 80's countdown can distract me from any turbulence and the fact that when flying into Boston you're over water until about 5 seconds before the plane touches down. Whoever decided it would be a great idea to have the runways jutting out into the Harbor was wrong.

Jason and I went out to dinner Saturday night for a late Valentine's Day/early Anniversary celebration. We had our first date 6 months ago yesterday. It's weird because for the longest time I felt like we had been dating a lot longer than we had. Like at 2 weeks or a month I could have sworn we'd been together for 6 months already. Now suddenly I don't really feel like we've been together that long. Especially as I consider my tentative plan of moving back to Boston in 6 months or so. By that point we would be up to a year of dating. But 6 months doesn't really seem so far away and still doesn't feel like we would have been dating that long. I don't really have an explanation for my changed perspective except for the fact that time is funny sometimes.

I got a call from the staffing agency yesterday telling me my job was postponed until Friday morning instead of this morning (Tuesday). I figured I could either go home and do job research or I could stay here and do job research AND catch a glimpse of Jason in the morning and at night as he dashed in between his apartment and work. The second option sounded more fun and would actually result in my getting back a little of the money I spent to change my ticket so I could leave Monday night instead of Tuesday morning (once again, I heart Jet Blue. So easy and cheap.)

Instead of doing much job research today though, I've actually spent most of the day cleaning. Well, cleaning and cuddling with the cat. Tiny is very snuggly. Part of the reason I cleaned is the one I told Jason's brother this morning and for which he thinks I'm a magnanimous and generous woman: to say thank you for letting me stay here. The other part of the reason is not so magnanimous, but since I can place the blame squarely on my mom I don't feel like too much of a twit for it. The other part of the reason is because they're boys and their place is kind of dirty and I've been coming here for 6 months and it just seems to get worse and my fingers were itching to clean the bathroom. Itching, I tell you! I would just like to say again that it's all my mother's fault. She taught me to clean young, and she taught me to clean well. Not that you can tell by my apartment excatly. I try to be clean, but I usually wind up with piles all over the place that my mother would never stand for. But sometimes the mood strikes and I just scour and disinfect and deodorize in a manner that would make her proud.

Traveling

Everyone send some good vibes to the weather/travel gods on my behalf. My flight tonight is delayed 2 hours as of right now and I'm hoping it doesn't get delayed much more or they might cancel it altogether. And this weekend is the last time I get to see Jason for a month {whine whine whine}.

Good News!

I got a contract attorney job! It starts next week. It's going to be a killer. 2 weeks, 7 days a week, 10 hours a day.

Yeah.

Here are the benefits:
PHAT paycheck! (It requires the "ph". I'm sorry, but it just does)
Document review experience, which will make me more marketable for future document review projects.

The downside (besides being really really REALLY tired) is I have to cut my trip to Boston this weekend a little short. I also have to cancel my trip to Boston for the first weekend of March. This just pretty much solidifies for me that if I want things to work out with Jason, I need to move back to Boston. We actually talked a little about that last night. He's working a lot this coming semester, and will always have kind of a random schedule now and in the future what with doing research and such. No matter what job I end up getting, I'm sure I'll be working some long hours and won't be able to really plan to take off every other weekend. In order to keep this relationship from fizzling out, I think we need to be in the same city where we can work around each other's schedules. And since I'm the more mobile of the two of us...

I sent out some more networking emails today and have a couple of phone call appointments set up. Plus, I have some more people to contact from some initial Boston networking over the past couple of weeks. I only need to find one person who knows of one employer who wants to hire me. I just have to find that person and I hope I'm going about it the right way.

If you can't tell, I'm feeling a little better today. I have had more extreme highs and lows over the past 6 months than I think I ever have before. I'd really like to get a job and feel semi-balanced emotionally for once.

************************

Oh right, Happy Valentine's Day! As someone who has spent all but two prior Valentine's Days alone, I don't generally pay much homage to this day. However, there was an abundant supply of chocolate at work, which I admit to indulging in, and my boss gave all of his women little quilted coin purses (in my office there is my boss, a 59-year old Jewish man who likes to sprinkle his conversation liberally with Yiddish exclamations, and there are 4 20-something women, all of us sassy. I think he's trying to build his own force of Charlie's Angels).

You know the trendy quilted coin purses I'm talking about. You know the ones.

I ranted about this in an email earlier, but could someone please tell me what is up with the quilted bags. I'm okay with the tiny little ones, but does anyone else find it rather incongruous to see the super-chic, urban 20-somethings dressed in their Ann Taylor toting around giant countrified, chintzy quilted bags?

Hyperventilating A Bit

I just found out that the lease on my apartment is up May 1, not June 1 like I thought. That's only 2 1/2 months!

Plus, one of my roommates just informed me that they basically only want to re-sign this lease with someone who is definitely going to be here the whole year. Which I can't promise, of course.

I was hoping that maybe I could stretch it out here through the end of the summer at least, hopefully get some contract attorney work and save some money/pay off some debts/set aside a bit to move back to Boston. Now I'm DC Bar pending, but I'm still getting the same line from the staffing agencies that I did before I was DC Bar pending. Basically, "thanks for letting us know you're still out there" and then silence. So what exactly did I pay $700 for?

No one in Boston who I've talked to has heard about ANY jobs. Plus, despite my having the impression that the DC market was somewhat better, one of my roommates just told me she probably knows of 30 or so people who have moved out here with law degrees in the past year, only to move back to where they came from 8 months or so later because they couldn't break into the DC legal scene.

WHY did I go to law school?! Am I really this big of an idiot to be 29 and to have completely ruined my life with debt and useless degrees?

Bwahahahaha!

I just commented on someone's blog and the super-secret password to okay my comment was "ant pie." Hee hee.

I'm in Boston and it's snowing like crazy outside. They've upped the estimates from 8-12 inches to 16-24 inches. I just checked the FAA site and the Boston airport isn't closed so I probably will really be leaving tomorrow morning despite the weather.

Jason and I just went for a walk in the snow (pictures to follow when he emails them to me) and dug out his car a bit since we figured it would be better to do it now than at 6 AM tomorrow when he has to drive me to the airport. A member of the bishopric of Jason's ward emailed everyone last night and said they would be holding regular church services (I'm guessing they're probably the only ward in the area that did) and that we should follow the guidance of the Spirit to determine whether we should come or not. And, oh yeah, there's no parking on Brattle during a snow emergency so you can't drive to church.

I love those "You don't have to come, but if you really think about it the Spirit will tell you that you should" types of guidance/guilt trips from leadership.

I woke up this morning and looked out the window and told Jason the Spirit was giving me a big "N-O" on the whole church thing. Jason's brother Brandon said that's because I'm influenced by the spirit of evil (lest you all think he's a stick-in-the-mud, he was being sarcastic. He doesn't really think I'm evil. Not completely, at least). Whatever lets me sleep in and stay in my PJ's until 1 while the wind howls and the snow falls sounds like the right spirit to me.

You may wonder why if I'm in Boston I'm blogging rather than sitting on Jason's lap or something obnoxious like that. He's currently in the living room giving his sister lessons in basic Chinese since she leaves on a mission to Taiwan in a month. Yeah, he knows some Chinese. And he speaks Korean and German. And he's a molecular biologist. Have I mentioned how wicked smart he is?

Anyway, my point is, he and I don't have to be joined at the hip the entire time we're together. Only 2/3 of the time.

Denise Austin Rocks My World

I have finally come to the terms with the fact that due to my lack of morning person-ness, and the utter failure of the Jason and Kelly Need to Get Off the Phone Before Midnight Campaign, I am never ever ever going to be able to get up every morning and exercise before work. It's just not going to happen.

So I have a new plan of attack. Every morning from 7-8 AM, Lifetime (Television for Women) shows 2 episodes of workouts with Denise Austin. I have now begun Tivoing those episodes and will be working out after work. Last night was my first night.

At first I thought Ms. Austin would annoy the crap out of me, frankly. Who wants a perky petite blond in spandex telling them to get up off that couch and exercise already? But I wound up liking her. She seems very sympathetic and I have a sneaking suspicion we could be friends. We could share smoothie recipes and such. She is WAY too upbeat for 7 AM, but at 7 PM she's just great.

And she doesn't mess around. I can already feel inklings of the inner thigh pain that will come to full fruition sometime tomorrow. But it's like she knew that inner thigh pain was exactly what I was looking for in a workout routine. Lots of squats and lunges and things.

**********

On another note, I am so excited about this big blizzard thing!* According to the weather folks it's not supposed to start snowing hard in either DC or Boston until tomorrow, so my flight should go out tonight. Which means that not only will I be able to play in a blizzard**, but I'll be able to cuddle with a boy during a blizzard, which I've never done before, but it sounds like ever so much fun.


* Kudos to whoever gets that movie reference.
** I discovered last year that walking around in the crazy whited-out world of a blizzard is really fun.

Advise Me

I am by no means giving up on this whole attorney job search thing. But the truth is, unless you have real experience OR did a 2nd summer associateship OR found something before you left law school, finding a job afterwards is hard. There just aren't a lot of positions out there and it takes a lot of time to search all the job boards and do the extensive networking that is necessary to learn about those top-secret hidden positions. It's hard to dedicate the time when you also have to work a full-time job of some sort to pay for rent and food and silly things like that. If you're in law school, I say do all you can to find a job now.

Anyway, I'm still looking. I haven't exhausted all of my resources yet, not by a long shot. But here's my question: when do I give up and look for something different, admitting that the legal profession has beaten me? What if in a year I still don't have a job as an attorney? What are my other options?

When I was deciding to go to law school and when I was in law school, many people made comments to me to the effect of "Law school is such a great move because there are so many things you can do with a law degree."

Like what?

I am absolutely serious. What do you do with a law degree if you're not a lawyer? I suppose there's consulting if you can get hired. OK, so you can be a lawyer or a consultant. What else? What are my options if I just cannot get anyone to hire me as a real-life lawyer? Also, what are my options that will allow me to pay off my student loans at some point in my life?

Also, why do some people get so fired up about being called an "attorney" versus a "lawyer?"

Exercise and the Bar

I did it! I got my lazy butt out of bed this morning and exercised. And it only took, um, about 5 weeks from my original planned start date of January 1. I didn't go swim because it was really cold and I am really flabby. No swimsuit for me right now. All my hard work from last summer is gone completely. I am flubbery and soft.

However, I do have a Bar pass to show for all my hard work last summer. Lately some people have been getting here via searches about the Bar so I'm going to tell you all what an attorney told me before I started Barbri and which I totally believe kept me from completely freaking out: work out every day. I usually made it 4-6 times a week during June and July. I would wake up, go swim 60-100 laps, come home and eat breakfast, go to Barbri, come home and eat lunch, study, eat dinner, study/watch TV, sleep, begin again.

My other tip: eat well. Don't eat crap, people. Lots of fruits and veggies, lots of protein, complex carbohydrates only.

I truly believe that taking care of my body primed my mind to take in all the information it needed and to endure for the 2-day test even though I had 2 hours of sleep the night before the MBE (I passed for Massachusetts and did well enough to waive into DC). Not only that, but swimming like a banshee helped me work out the stress that accumulated in all of my muscles during the course of the day. Plus I looked hot when it was all over despite having just taken the Bar.

Thinking

This post over at Feminist Mormon Housewives on prayer really spoke to me because of how I myself have been struggling with the idea of prayer and answers and such. I've always understood prayer like I think most Mormons are taught to. You pray about something, you get your answer (burning in bosom or stupor of thought), you move forward in your life based on that answer.

Lately things aren't so cut and dry for me. I question the answers I thought I had received a lot lately. Other times I don't feel like there's any dialogue going on at all and that it's just me throwing out my hopes and needs to God without feeling anything in return.

There are several things that I'm not really understanding and am mulling over right now.

One, moving to DC felt so right. I really wanted to make the right decision. I made it with a lot of earnest prayer and a lot of looking in all places for answers to be sure it was right. Then I met Jason four days before I moved here. After our marathon first date when I recognized the connection we had and couldn't wait to see him again the next day and was already trying to figure out how to make that happen and wondering how desperate I would seem and deciding whether I should email him or call him, I remember saying my nightly prayers and asking God, "What EXACTLY am I supposed to do with this?"

Last Spring I felt like if I stayed in Boston I wouldn't be happy in a year. I felt like my future was in DC and I didn't plan to look back, except to keep in touch with friends, of course. Now I just wish I was back there so that Jason and I didn't have to play "normal couple," but could actually be a normal couple. I can come up with a couple of reasons why it's good that we've been long distance for some of this time, but it doesn't make it any easier. It also doesn't make me feel like less of a flake when I email all the attorneys I know in Boston and say, "Yeah, so remember how I was all excited about moving to DC and exploring health law and policy down here and I was so ready to leave Boston? Yeah? Just kidding. I want to come back."

Two, I received a blessing from my bishop after I decided to move to DC. In it he said that I had absolutely made the right decision to move to DC. He also said that I would have multiple job opportunities to choose from and would be greatly blessed with this decision. Well, maybe moving to DC was the right decision for the moment, but I went for 6 weeks without work after I got here, dragging myself into more debt. So far I've only had various temp assignments that I feel like I've had to fight tooth and nail for. I am finally doing something interesting and attorney-like, but it's still just temporary, and there aren't other jobs making themselves apparent. I'm extremely grateful to be working at all, even though I'm not making enough to make payments on my student loans. But what does it mean?

Three, on a less personal note, a girl in my ward passed away recently. I didn't know her, but a friend of mine is dating a guy who was pretty close with her. While she was in the hospital there were some pretty specific blessings given to her pronouncing that she would recover. What happened? According to my friend, her boyfriend is having a hard time dealing with that.

So in addition to prayer, I am also wondering about the nature of Priesthood blessings. Are they supposed to be soothsayings? Are we supposed to believe that the men in our lives who hold the Priesthood are transformed into fortune tellers for that brief period? Are specific predictions merely the vanity of mortals hoping they know the mind of God? I think I'd almost feel better if blessings just offered comfort rather than any specifics because that seems more likely to be what we will get.

I still pray all the time. At night, in the morning when I remember, before meals, when I'm worried or concerned about someone or something. I still pray for particular things. I don't know if the answers will come, but I'm slowly learning not to freak out about them as much if they don't. I try really hard to let the big things go, and trust them to God. Like worries I have about my family. I have no way to help those who are hurting or struggling, but I can pray for them and recognize that God wants the same peace for them that he so often gives me.

And I do feel that I get peace so often, even when nothing else seems to come together. When I open myself up, when I loosen my stranglehold on my need to control things and to have a plan, I often feel that peace come rushing in, almost like it was just waiting for me to allow a place for it in my heart. So maybe it's not about the concrete answers. Maybe, like one of the commentators to the Feminist Mormon Housewives post said,

"while God is present in our lives, the main offerings are support, peace, and understanding. I just think that our lives are journeys and God is there to provide support, not necessarily direct solutions."

You Know You Need A Job Bad AND You're A Total Geek When...

I'm applying for an attorney opening at a certain department that works with health publicly in Boston and I'm all excited about sending out my resume to an actual open position in actual health law.

Legal Writing

Anyone else remember their legal writing professor explaining how formal they needed to be and how you needed to sound all official and junk? The partner I'm working with just told me that I need to develop my own voice, and criticized another attorney's writing that is very official and cold. Okey-doke.

Touring

When I moved here I thought that one of the bonuses of living to DC was the easy access to national treasures held in museums and monuments. However, I have fallen victim to the "you never visit when you live there" syndrome and had not even set a toenail in one of the Smithsonians. The last time I set foot near a monument was the day after my friend Liz and I drove here from Boston.

All of that changed on Saturday. Jason has been on my case for some time about how we need to DO something during his visits here. I know he's right, but somehow amid running errands and important things like watching The Simpsons we can be pretty lazy when he's here. I am now determined to go to a museum each time he comes.

Our inspiration to get off of our butts and head downtown came in the form of his parents who were in town this past weekend too. How's that for good timing? So I met his parents and they were very nice. (I have yet to hear their reviews of me, but I'm hoping for raves.) Jason's mom loves museums so they spent 3 days in a row I think just wandering through as many museums as they could.

Saturday morning Jason and I headed into the District. We met up with his parents and then split up again so they could go look at some art and we could go the Air and Space Museum. Plus they had to get to their super-duper, doubleplusgood tour of the White House, including a visit to the Oval Office.

The Air and Space Museum was my first Smithsonian adventure. Because of my dad and my Papaw, I have lots of early exposure to airplanes and airplane museums. When Mamaw and Papaw came to Tucson, we all went to The Pima Air Musum where I remember being completely in awe of the huge planes. I adopted a gigantic cargo plane with a bulbous appendage on its nose and named it Goofy. Another time, we went to see the missile silos out in Green Valley. I thought of my dad a lot as we went through the museum, which was very appropriate since it was his birthday Saturday!

Highlights included:
- Recently declassified information on early spy satellites. Jason's favorite fact: before digital imaging, the satellite cameras took pictures and then jettisoned cannisters of film with parachutes that were snagged by airplanes. In one early picture of Red Square you can see the long line of people waiting to see Lenin's Tomb.
- Lots of stuff on the early space program. I've always been a fan of The Right Stuff and did a huge report on the Gemini Project in 5th grade.
- The World War One exhibit, which actually wound up being more about WWI than strictly about aviation in the war, but since I'm a history buff, I liked it. WWI was such a tragic war. My great-grandpa (Pop) was gassed in the trenches in WWI and lived to the ripe old age of 86. We're a hearty bunch.
- Jason's favorite, the aircraft carrier exhibit. I liked seeing the planes take off and land from the bridge.

Afterwards Jason bought me an insanely expensive soft pretzel (because I was craving one and he's nice that way) and we walked around a bit, enjoying the beautiful, very non-January weather. We walked through a sculpture garden where a hippie couple asked us to take their picture, and then took ours in return.

See the pyramid behind us? It's made of cinder blocks and goes up in steps, like something at Teotihuacan. I really wanted to climb it. Jason said no. Fine, then.


We met up with his parents at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. I'm always so surprised at how much I like some kinds of modern art because I typically think of myself as having more traditional tastes. But the giant circle of perfectly composed fragments of flint really grabbed me. And so did the faceless black head on the black piece of wood titled "Do Not Go Gently." And the giant swirl of wire dry cleaner hangers. There was a great Calder fish mobile that I'd love a miniature of.

Then it was off to Old Town for a seafood dinner and ice cream at an old-fashioned soda shop.

Sunday was busy as we went to church, drove Jason's parents to the airport, attended Evensong at the National Cathedral, and hung out with Jason's crazy friend Frank, his wife, and basically his wife's ENTIRE family. Good thing I'm not shy anymore, huh? I actually had a great time, especially watching all the little kids run around. And run around they did. I think I'd be very tired as a mom.

Working Girl

I'm working again. The little firm where I've been working told me on Friday that they'd like to have me back after the week I took off in Boston and turning in my DC Bar application. So I'm here now and apparently I'm sort of a lawyer. This morning the partner gave me some work to do on a few cases. About an hour later, one of those clients called the office and asked for the partner. When I called him to transfer the call he sounded surprised and said, "That's your case now" and gave me succinct instructions on what to do. I actually talked to a client and sounded responsible and together and told him I'd call him back later because I just got his file and I need to look through it. So I'm learning the delay tactics right away, which is apparently very important in the legal profession.

Anyway, I don't think the letter I write to the client this afternoon with all of his documents attached will be signed by me since a) I'm not really a lawyer at this firm, and b) I'm only DC bar-pending after all, but it's still cool to feel trusted and like they think I can actually talk to a client for 5 minutes without completely trashing the firm's reputation.

Guess Who's DC Bar-Pending?

That's right, baby!

Kelly Needs*

Kelly needs a quivering antennae.
For when the cable goes out and I've watched all my Tivoed stuff, I presume. Or to aid my sensory perception and help me keep away from predators. One of the two.

Kelly needs some editing
You tell me.

Kelly needs friction massage.
Mmm, yes, please!

Kelly needs to be part of a loving, committed marriage.
Don't look at me. Google said it.

Kelly needs to prepare and think about a hundred different things.
Always.


*Type "[your name] needs" into a Google search and let the hilarity ensue.

BAR NUMBER!

Freakin' &%#*@#*@!!!

Sorry.

I just discovered that I'm still missing one little thing from my DC Bar application. My bar number. I just emailed the nice lady at the Supreme Judicial Court to ask her about whether it actually is the number that was on my swearing in materials because if so, then no problem. If not, then I need to find out how to get the number and I'm really hoping there is some magical way I can get it tomorrow so I can turn in my DC Bar application, which turned out being the ONLY reason I went to Boston this week (as you all may remember) and didn't try to get any temp work and why after I pay rent next week I'll be eating Mac and Cheese with Tuna for awhile.

The Interview That Really Wasn't

As I told Jason, apparently the reason I came to Boston was to pull together the materials for my DC Bar application. I didn't really have an interview it seems. Oh sure, I put my suit on and had the jitters and took the T down to the firm and met with one of the partners. But as soon as we sat down in her office she basically said that she saw my resume and thought it was interesting and wanted to meet with me, but who knows when they'll be hiring again, but it's good to have resumes on file.

Um...K.

So we chatted for 20 minutes or so and I told her about me and my experience and she told me about the firm and said she'd pass on my info to the health care people too.

Afterwards I stopped by the office of the attorney I interned for last year to say hi. When I explained the not-so-much interview to her she looked flabbergasted and said, "Are you kidding? They had you come up for that? That's bizarre." After a pause she said, "Well, maybe they're going to be hiring someone in the near future and wanted to get you in to talk to kind of feel you out." So that's a thought I suppose.

I'm trying not to feel too discouraged. I liked the firm a lot from their webiste, and everything the partner told me today just confirmed my initial impression. It sounds like they would be a great firm to work for. But that hopeful, maybe they'll hire me feeling is obviously gone since, you know, they're not hiring.

On the other hand, right now I have about 27 resumes out there and I've only heard back from 5 firms. I know one firm that I sent a resume to in DC is actually hiring because the HR person called me asking me to send them a transcript and writing sample too. And next week I'll get on the job boards again and send out some more. One young attorney I was talking to who did this process not too long ago told me that she set a goal for herself to get out 3 resumes a week. Since January 1 I haven't had a problem meeting that standard, so I just have to keep it up.

It's been great to be here this week though. I turned in my swearing in materials and am officially a barred attorney in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts! I got my law school certification and my certificate of good standing from Mass to turn in with my DC Bar application, which is complete except for entering in the date that I was admitted to the Mass Bar. Tomorrow when I get home I'll print out the DC Bar app and Friday I'll head down to the DC Court of Appeals and hand it in, thus making me eligible for contract attorney work and maybe I'll be able to not drain my bank account in between every paycheck for once.

I also got to have lunch and dinner yesterday with 2 different friends. If anyone is wondering, the Sesame Shrimp Salad at John Harvard's is excellent. I'm also a big fan of their chicken pot pie.

I've also had a good time with Jason. It's almost like we're a normal couple, hanging out every day, running errands together, being all, well, normal. Like last night he had a choir practice so I went to dinner with Santa Cruz Jenn (who is Cambridge Jenn while doing a post-doc this year) and then met up with him afterwards. We came back to his place and watched a movie (Shaun of the Dead. Hilarious! I was only too grossed out when one of the cast was, um, disemboweled. Ewww! But they're zombies, so that's to be expected). Normal is so nice when it's just been a weekend here and a weekend there for the past 5 months.

So, Um, That Was Kind Of Weird

Something weird happened today as I was sitting in the dining room of my new hair stylist getting my hair cut. I was checking out the titles of the books on her bookshelf as she trimmed away when suddenly the room went kind of skewed. It was only for an instant, but for that instant I had a full sense of what people are talking about when they say "the room was spinning." Weird, right?

When I was younger I remember family members talking about how Nana had vertigo. When I looked it up in my Funk & Wagnalls (yes, I owned my very own Funk and Wagnalls) it only confused the matter more because I got the idea that it meant you get sick because things seem to spin around when you're up high. So could Nana not stand on stepstools or ladders or what? At 5' 10" Nana was a giantess in her small Missouri farming community, but I don't consider 5' 10" to really be a high place. So why did she get vertigo?

Of course seeing the Alfred Hitchcock movie several years later just confused the matter for me.

I think what it means is that things just spin, period, without you necessarily having to be up high. So is my spinning head this morning a touch of vertigo? How do you know if you have vertigo? Do I have a propensity for vertigiousness because my Nana had it?

On the upside, my hair is cute again! I am so thrilled. I haven't had my hair cut in 8 months. 8 MONTHS! For the past few years I've been getting my hair cut on average every 3 months. Then right before graduation I got my hair cut, dyed and highlighted, which lasted me through the graduation celebration, the Bar and my post-Bar trip. I fully intended to get a trim before heading to DC in the hopes that I would look stylish and impressive for any potential interviewers, but it didn't happen.

Days, weeks and eventually months passed with my hair getting longer and more scraggly. I sent an email to the ward listserv and got several hairdresser recommendations, but I just never got around to it/didn't want to fork over the money. It occurred to me last week that I should probably get my hair cut before my interview on Wednesday so I at least feel confident and pulled together. And lo and behold, this week a girl sent an email to the listserv advertising her sister's hair styling services. She just had a baby and is working out of her home and is super cheap.

Sign? Why, yes, I think so.*

I went over to her apartment this morning. When she opened the door I was duly impressed by her cute haircut and sassy highlights despite having given birth a mere 7 weeks ago. That's dedication to style, people. I knew I was in good hands.



* I'm just going to say everything that happens in my life from now on is a sign. It's more fun that way.

I've Hit the Website Wall

I was going to write an entry last night, but I was just too darn tired and wound up dozing off in front of the TV watching a Tivoed episode of Waiting For God at around 10:30 PM. Some of you may say, "Why, Kelly, 10:30 is a perfectly respectable time to be dozing off." And I would reply, "Yes, that may be true, but I'm usually a night owl who goes on 6 or 7 hours of sleep and I don't need to be up until 7 AM because I have fine-tuned my morning routine so that I can shower, eat breakfast, and catch some Headline News and my daily Weather Channel report all before I catch the bus to get me to work at 9. Plus, I usually wind up talking to Jason at 11 or 12."

Last night I had a feeling reminiscent of hitting that wall last July when I was studying for the Bar. That wall where no more information can be crammed into my head and all further reading and lectures are just clicking sounds. See, I've been writing a website. No, not this website, the website for the firm. (Huh, I never put that whole "this is a website and that is a website and maybe that website is the reason I'm not writing much lately on this website" thing together before). I did some writing for the firm's website before Christmas, but the majority has been done since the holidays. Right now the website document is 104 pages, and I think I probably drafted at least 60 of those.

Basically over the past month or so I have had a crash course in elder law, trusts and estates law, and disability law. I knew some of the trusts and estates stuff from the Bar and from the class I took last Spring, but in a more general sense, not in the detail that is needed to fully explain the concepts. This is the way it's gone down: the attorneys give me a topic, I research it for a couple of hours, and then write write write some little synopsis that is client-friendly. I've learned a massive amount of information, but as of last night, my brain is full. One of the attorneys and I were making final edits to a section last night and as she was explaining a fine point that needed to be added, I realized that I no longer had any idea what she was talking about. Good thing it's almost done.

My one consolation is that unlike the Bar, I don't have to spew all of this information forth on a 2-day exam in the next week or so. I just tuck it away and hope I can sound smart if someone in a future interview should happen to ask me about it.

Should I Feel Bad About My Illegal Car?

Or reasons why it's good to be a sweet-looking girl with a nice smile and the ability to make her eyes look very big and pitiful.

I took my car to get inspected on Saturday. It didn't pass the safety inspection, but I got the sticker anyway. My car has had a light on on the dashboard for, oh, about a year. I've read on some message boards about it and apparently it's rather common in my car and often ends up being nothing more than a short and not a real indication that there's a hazard. I've had oil changes and been on road trips in the meantime and the car is ok. The ONLY way I can get it checked out is to pay $80 to the dealer so they can hook it up to their extra-fancy, super-secret Ford machines to diagnose the problem. $80 bucks! And that's not even to fix it or anything, but just to hook it up. Those of you who've been reading for awhile know I've never been what you'd call "well-to-do" and $80 seems rather extreme in my mind for not even fixing the problem.

So Saturday the guy came into the waiting area at the gas station and told me that the light was on and asked if I had a place where I could take it because that was a problem for the safety inspection. I'm sure I must have looked pitiful as I told him that when I was in Massachusetts I was told that only the dealer's special machines could figure out the problem and it would cost me $80 just to get my car hooked up to the machine. He said, "Hold on" and went out to try to hook my car up to their machines. No go. So I sat there waiting for him to finish the emissions check (which I passed fair and square) wondering where I was going to come up with $80 to get the light checked, not to mention whatever it cost to fix the thing if there was, in fact, a problem before January 31st.

The guy pulled my car out of the garage and I went out to meet him. He leaned in and said, "I'm going to pass you. But you have to get that checked as soon as you can." I nodded dumbly and thanked him profusely and drove off with my happy little inspection sticker on the windshield.

I'm feeling a little bad about this now. Like it was ok when I knew the light was on, but I still had a passing inspection sticker and knew I was fine according to the state. But now I've been told it's not ok, not really.

Here's the thing though. Last year the light was on and the Massachusetts gas station people had NO problem with it. I thought for sure it would come up, but they didn't mention it. Now, Virginia and Massachusetts have some sort of reciprocity going with their inspections so I figure it's not a huge deal if the Mass guys didn't even mention it. Of course, there's also the slim chance that my boys at my gas station in Cambridge let it slide because I always went there for gas and such. Hmm....

Well, I'm going to try not to feel too bad about it and just as soon as I am making a decent amount of money such that shelling out $80 for nothing more than hooking my car up to a machine doesn't make me choke and sputter with indignation, I'll get that light taken care of.

The Firm

It seems rather unfair that just as I'm getting really comfortable at the firm where I'm working, my last day is Friday. I've enjoyed being there, even though the atmosphere is pretty stressful at times. Not only is the workload crazy busy, but they just fired an attorney who basically didn't do anything for the four months that she worked there and they're trying to clean up her messes. A couple of clients have already terminated the firm because of their frustration with her.

Everyone else is great, though. We can be sassy and sarcastic and be appreciated for it - in fact it's encouraged, as long as the work gets done. The partner is from Newton, MA and thinks it's great that I went to BC. When we were writing up the employment manual he said that the inclement weather policy was whatever they said in Newton, MA. I replied that they never close the schools in Newton, MA and he said, "Exactly." So I typed up "Please refer to school closures in Newton, MA to determine whether the office will be open or not." My alternate policy was "The office might be closed due to inclement weather, but I wouldn't bet on it." He thought that was hilarious.

He can be a protective dad-type. On Friday he asked me if I was going to Boston over the coming weekend and I told him no, but I would be going in a couple of weeks. He looked concerned and asked me if Jason ever comes down here because it's not very fair for me to be the only one schlepping myself around (he sprinkles Yiddish words liberally in his conversation). I assured him that I go up to Boston one weekend a month and Jason comes down here another weekend. He looked satisfied and said that was alright then.

And here I have to say good-bye and start somewhere else. It's too bad they're not hiring another attorney because despite the stress and the craziness I would so apply for that job.

Knock On Wood and Don't You Be Counting Any Chickens

I got an interview. At a law firm. In Boston.

OK, now that I'm home I can tell the story. No names will be used, because I have learned much from Dooce. Actually it's not so much a story as a narrative sentence. Last week I sent out about 9 resumes to some smallish firms in Boston and today one of them called me to schedule an interview. Hurrah!

But here's the thing. It's like I was getting prepped for this starting yesterday. Yesterday I started emailing all of my temp agencies to let them know that my current assignment ends on the 20th. I got the impression from all of them that I should keep them posted but they'd really like to know when I get my DC Bar application in, and to be sure to fax them the stamped copy of the DC Bar application, and, oh yeah, how's that DC Bar application coming.

Yesterday afternoon I met with a woman over at the temp agency I'm working with right now. They place legal support staff, no attorneys, but it worked out pretty well this time. Originally I was hired to be the secretary, but after they hired their new secretary, they kept me on to do deeds and research and write articles for their website. Anyway, the temp agency lady seemed all hot and bothered about TWO prospective positions, both permanent. One was for a paralegal, one for a research assistant.

I told her that was great and all, but I would still be looking for a job as an attorney and I don't know if these people would want some sort of set commitment. She asked me if I would consider being hired on in this other capacity, if they could then bring me on as an attorney within 6 months. Yeah, ok lady, you go tell the law firms who they're hiring as an attorney. I'm sure they'll love that. I told her I was looking for a job as an attorney and that money was a factor as well, explaining to her how much I could potentially make once I get my DC Bar application in and that I have loans, etc. If she could work something out, fine, but I left there thinking, "I'm not holding my breath."

So I got back to work feeling kind of discouraged about my future in the DC legal scene. Basically I came to the conclusion that I need to get this DC Bar application thing done already. I started thinking about my options and concluded that maybe I could come up to Boston for a few days the week of the 23rd and show up at my law school and the Supreme Judicial Court to get my various certificates that I need for the DC Bar app. Just before I left work I emailed a woman at the SJC to find out how quickly I could get my Certificate of Good Standing if I turned in my swearing in materials in person.

Then things started falling into place. Last night I checked flights. Lo and behold Air Tran had just started a HUGE sale. It's the cheapest ticket I've seen in between here and Boston since Jason and I started with our bi-monthly trips. And it's only $50 to cancel. I figured if I got a temp job that week after all then I could cancel and it wouldn't be a huge deal.

This morning I had a reply from the woman at the SJC who told me I could get my Certificate immediately if I showed up and turned in all my materials in person.

About an hour later the firm called to schedule an interview.

Hmmm. I guess I'm going to Boston week after next.

Jason says I look for signs too much and I'm too fatalistic, but I just think that when everything falls into my lap in a tidy little package, it's not all happenstance. I'm not trying to decipher it really. I mean, maybe the firm and I will not click and it won't be the right job. But maybe this was the reason I needed to get up there to get the DC Bar app done. Or maybe the firm and I will rock each other's worlds. We'll see. Either way I'm excited that I'll be able to get the application done finally and I'm excited about the interview and I'm excited that I don't have to wait 3 weeks to see Jason after all.

Dance Dance Revolution

This is an awesome website, although if you're skittish about the booty talk, then I would suggest not clicking on any of the Booty Bass buttons.

It took me back to my days as a raver. Yes, your local good little Mormon girl has been to a few raves in her time. I was always the designated driver, but frankly I never felt like I needed any mind-altering substances to enjoy myself. In fact sometimes I would get so wrapped up in it that I think I would have been too overwhelmed with something else in my system. Just me and several hundred other people all writhing around to the beat in a huge smoky room (or one time on the fringes of the desert) with lights flashing everywhere. Soon it was 4 AM without me really realizing it.

There were also lots of good times in the Happiness Is Submission to God apartment* with me, Santa Cruz Jenn, a blue lightbulb in a ball-shaped Japanese lantern, and an Orbital CD.

I never dance anymore. Well, that's a lie. I dance in my bedroom. I dance in my bathroom. Just the other night I shook my booty a little to New Order when Jason and I were cooking dinner. I just don't dance so much in public anymore.


* On Euclid and 6th in Tucson there is a building with "Happiness is Submission to God" painted on the side. Jenn and I lived in one of the attached apartments. Yeah, how cool were we?**

** My apologies to Jordan for snagging her asterical comments, but they're very useful.

Will Work for Student Loan Payments

I was in Boston this weekend. I always feel so popular when I'm in Boston, and not just because I have a cuddly boy there who seems to think I'm neat. I go to church and I have friends. Check it out, I have FRIENDS! Friends who are happy to see me and tell me so. One said she always feels a little happier when I'm there at church with them. Yes, I'm sure she was exaggerating a bit, but that's not the point. It still made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

I'm feeling a bit more positive, probably partly because it's been less than 24 hours since I've seen Jason.* But there are a couple of other reasons.

First, in the mail today I received instructions from Massachusetts telling me how to get sworn in remotely. According to them I just have to get sworn in via a method recognized by the jurisdiction where I am getting sworn in. Anyone happen to know how you can get sworn in in DC? Do I have to go to a judge, a clerk of court, a notary?

I'm still waiting to hear back from Mass as to whether I got the requisite 133 on the MBE. It would be nice if they'd just TELL US how we did on the MBE. What's the big secret? Other jurisdictions give people their scores when they tell them whether they passed or not. I'd kind of like to know, since the MBE was FREAKIN' HARD whether I barely scraped by and my essays made up the slack, or if I surprised myself and got in the 150's or higher. It would also make this whole waiving into DC process less complicated. But then they couldn't charge me $25 just to tell me whether or not I got a 133. Not to give me my actual score, mind you, but to say, Yes, you did get above a 133, or No, you didn't get above a 133.

Anyway...

What was the second thing...? Oh yeah.

Second, the job postings are looking up, in that firms are actually posting a job or two here and there. A couple of them actually want entry-level type people. For awhile the job board that I pay a monthly fee for was chock full of volunteer attorney positions, but no real jobs. I don't think a board that charges you a fee should be allowed to post volunteer projects when you can probably google volunteer + attorney + boston and come up with the same thing. Maybe I'll write a strongly-worded letter telling them exactly what I think about that.

Third, my temp job got extended until the 20th, which gives me one more week of a paycheck, which is always a good thing. I'm liking this job pretty well because they do a lot of health care and estate planning stuff. It reminds me a bit of what I did at my job while I was in law school. I'm researching and writing, but then they also have me drafting deeds and some other things that feel more useful. They got rid of an attorney at New Years (but they're not hiring another one), so I'm helping wrap up some of her cases. It's almost like lawyering! Sort of.


*Um, yeah, have I mentioned that I really like him? Oh, you noticed?

Blogging

I have come to the realization that there is a distinct lack of funny going on at Chez Blog Kelly. This time last year I had a couple of friends who told me they read my blog and it cracked them up and I should really write, which was my failsafe in the back of my head should the whole law thing not work out. Well, the law thing isn't working out yet, but I don't think I can fall back on my writing prowess since a) I don't think I can find anyone to pay me to write a blog, and b) my writing is dreary and dull lately.

I've come up with a couple of reasons why my blog is less lighthearted than it used to be.

1) I have a boyfriend now. I have to save all my funny for him so he will be continually entranced by my wit and think I'm the most interesting girl ever and, as a side benefit, not notice my expanding hips. He reads the blog too so I can't be all funny here and then go send him an email saying the same thing. I think he'd feel a bit unspecial.

2) Um, if you haven't noticed, my life just isn't really feeling all that lighthearted lately. I have student loans coming due that I have no possible way to pay and am sending off forbearance and deferment forms when what I really, really want to be doing is sending in payments so my debt will actually go away someday.

I'm making half of what I could be making because the freakin' state of Massachusetts still hasn't sent me the info on how to swear into the Mass Bar so I can send in my DC Bar application. I've called several times and have been told that it's coming. Never mind that I'm almost 98% positive that I gave them my new address so the fact that they sent my Bar results to my old address first and by the time it got forwarded to me I had missed the RSVP for the swearing-in ceremony is distinctly their fault.

My thighs and hips are expanding and I'm feeling like all that hard work I did last year was for nothing because I've basically gained it all back now. I'm not up to pre- and early-Boston weight, but I'm up nonetheless. And I just can't get myself out of bed at 5 AM to go swim, which is the best way my body loses weight, because I'm working all day and trying to look for a real job at night.

I'm really lonely here in DC. I talked about that before, but it's still true. However, I had dinner with a friend last week and got invited to a SCANDALOUS Adult Tupperware-esque Party (by a Mormon friend, no less) in a couple of weeks, so that has helped.

I'm continually discouraged in my job search. I get myself all psyched up, thinking I'm going to hit the job boards and send out resumes to firms and network with my contacts and SOMEthing will work out of course! Then I actually go to the job boards and realize that no one hires entry-level attorneys. I send out resumes and get a pile of thanks, but no thanks letters. I talk to my contacts and am told that the job market sucks (I'm paraphrasing).

This time last year I was stressed out, but I still had hope that I would find a job, that this move to DC would work out great. So I apologize for my blog being so bleh lately. I want to keep it going because it is a good outlet for me, but it's not as fun as it used to be for me either. I don't know...I guess I need to think about it.

Day 3 of No Sugar and Food Is Already Conspiring Against Me

Today at work we have a lovely selection of Ghiradelli chocolate squares, dark chocolate covered almonds, AND a Godiva chocolate selection. I curse thee, gods of sugar! Thou willst not tempt me with thy fine confections!

This has pointed out to me HOW MUCH crap I've been eating because there's always crap on the counter at work and why my hot butt pants officially fit again after being baggy for months. I draw consolation from the fact that even though this means I'm back up a size, at least my butt looks hot.

I discovered last night that the Gingerbread Cake on the stand right when you walk into Trader Joe's has sugar listed as the 5th ingredient! I figured that was good enough as I picked it up to take over to a friend's house for dinner. Step away from the Chocolate Midnight Cake and go for the Gingerbread Cake.

What the Neon Green Sticker On the Ford Explorer in Front of Me Said

"This car violates New York City parking laws. Your street was unable to be cleaned because of this car."

They don't kid around in New York. Not only do they give you a ticket, but they tag your car with a bright green, apparently unremovable sticker that tells the neighborhood why they have the dirtiest street in the city that week. Which sticker also explains why the anal-retentive neighbors have slashed your tires.

That's Right!

Your Nail Polish Color is Red

How you're unique: You have an incredible eye for style and art Why your style rocks: You are classic and classy - and that's hot! What this color says about you: "I'm smart, sassy, and sexy. And I know it."

What Color Nail Polish Best Fits You?

Here are a couple of pictures of the gingerbread house that Jason and I made in December.

I'm particularly proud of our cobblestone pathway of generic M&M's.