Sometime it rains

Ramblings Post #81
Sometimes it rains. That was the title of little story I sent my friend today when she got some bad news. Because sometimes it rains, the wind howling and the cold and damp get into your bones and all you want to do is crawl under the covers and hide. Yes, sometimes it rains, but always remember: It never rains forever.


This has been a week that started off so good, but ended up so...well, it's kinda like the karma that was 2009 hasn't washed off yet. That stink of not quite getting it is still with me.

My career in "chicken plucking" that I had planned to end sometime early this year as I transitioned into law just got the "hold up for second" signal, along with about half a million other plans. Sometimes it rains. At my current employ I enjoy a bit of seniority and other respects, but I'm ready to give all that up for something more mentally challenging and a better future...even with a modest pay cut.

Then Sporty hit me with the news she didn't get the job she had already got. Yeah, read it again because I wrote it right. Technicality. Which kinda shocked me, even though I was expecting it. I just knew something was taking too long. And if it hit me, I think it shell shocked her. She tough, but inside she's ...well, inside she isn't as tough. I wrote her encouragements a off and on all day, text - email (that sometimes it rains thing) - chat and she hasn't responded since noon. I'm about to call her because I'm a little worried.

Sometimes it hurts a little bit when I realize I can only do so much to help her. But I'm between a rock and hard place myself and taking another pay cut, when I am already taking a pay cut where Iam just to go to school, will put me a position to help her even less. Yes, that means what you think it means, but only in emergencies. If you can't do it for those you love, I mean really.

On a good note, my pushups are going well. That said, tonight I will probably hurt my wrist.

That say that just because you made the plan, that's not always how things go. I've known that for years [see my life in toto], but sometimes knowing she's in these "less than stellar" times hurts in ways... well, it just hurts. Real, real bad.

Barkeep...a tall glass of kool-aid and a little quiet.

And like that, it was done...

Ramblings Post #79
We have to remember that milestones are just that...milestones. They are rarely the goal, and if they are they are but stops for a moment to get our bearings for the next. And because the walk is usually so much longer than the rest, we might think about learning to enjoy the journey between life's milestones. But then I just think I said that better in the stuff I learned last year, so this year's first note should be...um... wear clean underwear. Yeah!

Another weekend with no classes and nothing to study passes, well, not really, but I'm gonna ride this pony as long as it will let me. I've been on the upswing for the past few days and hopefully I can max out before the inevitable dip that follows shows up and drinks all the beer. A fast recap...

Pre - NYE..

The day before New Years and Sporty calls. She's so excited she's out of breath. We'd talked a couple of days before when she'd dutifully reported it was snowing in Dallas, and I suggested she go outside and try to catch a snowflake on her tongue. In case you don't know, each snowflake is a blessing, but only if you catch it on your tongue. Well, she did and two days later a recruiter calls her and after three hours on the phone she's launching her new career! Disclaimer - Snowflake blessings only work if the story is told to you by someone who loves you...and you just happen to be perfectly qualified for the career in question.

It's not completely perfect, as she's gonna have to get to DC to make it all work but we'll manage. Note how I made that "we"... I so special. I hit her up with a list the next day of concepts just so she doesn't get her expectations out of proportions. She's an optimist to the core and occasionally needs a bit of grounding in reality, but she's gonna be fine. Her start date is the 25th, so she's got to get cracking.

So that's working itself out.


NYE...

New Year's itself was a bit of bust. Not my worst by a long shot, but not one of my stellar performances either. My RP and I have started to eschew the big parties - like the one at the Crown Ravina with the seven ballrooms - and go for smaller fare. This year it was a small function on the Southside. Which was to take place at this swank crib sitting on acreage. I mean the house was so fly, it had a pool on the second floor. Upscale.

I break out around 9:30 so I can get there and be cool and all is well until I make that last left, about a hundred or so yards from the subdivision. Because there is a road closed sign. I go past that to second sign and give up at the third. I end up catching my RP on the road and take the thirty minute detour (none of the damn roads connect) and when we finally reach the house, there is no telling how many folks got to that road closed sign and just turned around. So the party never really takes off. Except for the drunk chick in the corner who puts on the strip show around 1am.

Further, because of complications, I end up driving my RP home and don't make it back to my crib until 5am.

Post NYE...

So Friday...I chilled.

Saturday night is a hot little card party at this brother's house who knows everybody. And I don't mean like my RP knows everybody in Atlanta, I mean like he's got photos of himself with Presidents and Senators lining the crib - while we're in his living room screaming at each other about the rules of a ghetto card game called Tunc (a modified four handed version of gin rummy). It was to say by an understatement, a vast contrast. My brother accompanied me out and had a good time as he ran into some guys he knew from our hometown (small world!) and ended up talking to them about old times. Sometimes you just need moments like that...

Sunday was my RP's last football/card party gathering, as he has to go back to work hard on Monday after a lax few weeks. We watched the Falcons game and as it was men vs. the women in the various card games, we all took much heart in the many victories of the men. Using what I consider the ultimate karaoke machine in his living room - a complete DJ setup - my RP kept announcing victories and losses to the whole house as the afternoon went on. The women were not amused. I saw more than a few folks I hadn't seen in a minute, and now, as the new year looms...I can go forward knowing I still got it.

As what "it" actually is...I have no idea.

I also know that the Cowboys kicked the daylights out of the Eagles.

Barkeep...just the orange and cranberry, I stopped drinking December 31.

What I learned 2009

A lot of folks start the new year with resolutions, personal promises to do that or accomplish this, but because of little things like oh, say.... life, bills, and the spin class starting at 5am it usually ends up in the "well that wasn't such a good idea anyway" category. Instead, because I know I mean well, but don't always follow through - loser - I stop and take a moment to reflect on life's lessons for the past 12 months. The wise know that we're learning all the time, every day a new lesson, every week a new test, every month a new Spring Break. Some things we have to re-learn because cynicism has beaten it out of us, others are ideas we finally comes to grips with after hanging on to outdated thinking way too long, and some are revelations on the order of finding out you really can deep fry a Twinkie or a little something on a alluring body actually is better than naked.

Whatever.

In any case, all of us learned something this year. And if we're smart, we use that bit of knowledge and make our own personal little worlds a little better. Or, if we're not that smart, we'll re-learn it next year and act all surprised for no reason.

Second chances are worth their weight in platinum. Priceless really.
-- the trick is to not do the same thing with the second chance you did with the first

When you don't play the hand God gave you, don't wonder where all your chips went.

Real true love never goes away. I learn that every year.
-- You can suppress love, hide it, deny it. But it's still there.

Achieving your goal is a brief and temporary condition, so learn to appreciate the getting there, which usually takes much longer.
-- Win. Celebrate. Start getting ready for next game. - Old southern football saying

When you think you're good enough, you need to still try harder.
-- because if you got it, you can get even more

Self improvement doesn't happen overnight, it comes in small increments that build mountains.
-- One push-up. Two push-up. Three push-up. Day by day to a hundred push-ups.

Everyone is important in someway.

The camera really adds 10 pounds to your appearance. Which is your actual weight, and not what you thought you it was.

A good mirror can make you feel better about yourself, or spur you start working on things. Either way, it takes the surprise out of photographs.
-- Yes, that really is you in that photographs. It was me too, and buddy I wasn't happy.

Reading really is fundamental
-- This was relearned. Again. Again.

Life is too long to try to keep cutting corners.
-- Most of us will be here a while. We need to take our time and make it quality

Cultivate small pleasures
-- They're great little kicks for good times, and they make bad times more bearable

Try to do one thing on your "bucket list" every year. And then add something else.
-- well, first you need to have a bucket list...so do that too

The Holiday Season amidst

Ramblings Post #78
Life is like a cookie. Or like a cheese log. Or like an oyster. Or a box of chocolates. Or maybe even like a ice cream sundae with caramel and whipped creme. Well, not really, life is like life...and that about sums it up. There you go, reality for Christmas. And I didn't even wrap it.

I've calculated that over the years, since I've been working at my present job, I've not used upwards of 90 vacation days allotted to me, out of the possible around 120 or so I should have had. To put that in context, if the days rolled over - which they do not - and took them all starting in January, I would have to come back to work until the second week in May. It maybe for this reason, people think of me an a workaholic. Or at least Sporty used to.

These holidays are no different. The, for lack of a better term, gentleman who fills in for me when I'm out is off and so I'm stuck. In the office, watching the hours flit by I wonder how soon it will be before my brain turns to mush. They've unblocked Youtube, so when it gets really boring I watch British comedies I would much rather buy on DVD, but that they don't sell in this country. Right now it's Hyperdrive with Nick Frost of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. It's Star Trek if the Kirk were an idiot, Spock an psychopath, and Star Fleet were run like a real government agency. Really a good show.


The holidays went well. Family is all well, and life is well, lifing right along.

My time with Sporty was short, but lovely. Sunday, my RP hollers at me that right after Christmas he's having a Sunday drop in, a little food, a little drink and some folks through to watch the Falcons game...or rather, let the Falcons game play in the background while we play cards (spades, bid whist, whatever). A little earlier that morning however, Sporty hit me that we'd get together as soon as she is out of church, so I'm planning on doing two great things - seeing her AND having brunch, my favorite meal. But she hasn't hit me by eleven, so I figure I'll run over and show my face at my RPs, and then roll out to see her when she calls.

The drop in doesn't drop, but rather avalanches. People just keep showing up, and instead of the 10 or so folks I thought would be dropping through, it's 35 or so people. But I'm a romantic (or sucker, your call) and although there are plenty of women there, I hit up Sporty around 2pm and tell her to "remind the Reverend that she is going to church again next week, so he doesn't have to explain the whole God thing today". I thought it was funny.

So she invites me over to where she is right then. And in the midst of a party, a nice little set where the ratio of men to woman is heavy in my favor and everyone is festive...I get my coat and walk out the door.

Life is about Priorities.

Over there me and her talked and talked and hung out and watched the game and got accosted by small child and, well at least for me, basked in the personal warmth of seeing someone you wanted to see. She liked to little book I bought her for Christmas, and the little book that I made and it was as an enjoyable a two hours as I've ever spent. As we hugged in the street saying our good byes it was like we didn't want to let go. And she told me love me...or rather she shouted she loved me from the curb as I got into my car, as though she'd forgot to say it and was making sure to get it in. I shouted it back. We're out of sync...but apparently both want to get back. So it was a Merry Christmas.

I rolled back out to my RPs spot where the party was still in full swing. A head or two missed me, but most hadn't realized I'd slipped out. Spanky noticed and because she didn't know where I'd been, Serve was non-committal (for the record, Serve does not like even the idea of Sporty). Then the day just kept getting better, as the Cowboys beat the dogsnot out of the Redskins! Oh, how I need the Cowboys to end up with a No. 2 seed to end the hate, er...piss off the Cowboy haters. *insert snide cackle here*

Soon school will start again - one of my professors was nice enough to send the reading assignment the day before Christmas Eve - and work will continue as, well, work has a tendency to do. It's the end of the year, start of a new decade, a start of new...something.

By the way, I'm not really a workaholic, I'm quite the hedonist. Well, maybe I used to be quite the hedonist, but I'm hedonism semi-retirement. Or so I like to think. Maybe. But that's not important right now.

Barkeep, that really was rambling...wow. Something strong, I stop drinking on Thursday and I need to get my last licks in!

Christmas in the City/Country

Ramblings Post #77
It's Christmas time, oh, sing the joy of the holiday and let us rejoice in the company of men as we celebrate the birth of Jesus. Or...it's Christmas time and there is a sale at the mall, my list is long, my money short and let us come together to shake our booties, get bent on good liquor and get one last shot of freaky sneaky before NEXT year, when we'll never do something like that again...again.

It's Christmas Eve, and I'm broke. I spent my last few pennies on my Grandmother, my mother and Sporty. The last one of these had an emergency and I came through for her, but that means as one of my facebook friends put it..."due to the recession, the period for Christmas gift giving has been extended to Easter." I cut it close, but not so close as I forgot family. You gotta take care of family.

In a few hours I'll gas up the Pacer, pack up the gifts and head down to South Carolina for two days of holiday cheer. My mother is gearing up for her hip surgery, so other than the one trip to see my Grandmother, I might not have to spend the holiday in the car! Yay, me!

And if I'm really lucky, when I get back all my stuff will still be here. As I've mentioned several times before, I live in a neighborhood in "transition"...with no real neighbors. Which seemed like a brilliant concept when the transition was actually in progress, but now with it stalled, it just makes the house a tempting target. Oh well, you roll the dice.

I hollered at Sporty, and when I asked if her schedule while in town would permit any hang out time with yours truly (I'm fairly certain her girls have got her booked up trying to catch up) she said she would make time. Which means to some degree she thinks I'm important. Which felt good. And it will give me a chance to give her the book I made for her as her Christmas present, although she says I've already done too much for her already.

We'll see.

But the next week is looking right, come payday I'll be straight, I got a NYE party already lined up thanks to my RP, and I might have to start throwing out food I've got so much.

Barkeep. Give me some of that Eggnog Alizè!

Just like riding a bicycle

Ramblings Post #76
If you've been doing something for a while, you tend to get good at it. I've been at the current job for seven years and at this point, I can condense five or six hours of work into two intense hours. You do learn it and know it. But I've been hanging out since I was ...well, let's just say I've closed out my second decade. I've had my good time, some of your good time, and I'm borrowing against someone else's good time. And so though I've been away from the "game" for a minute with school, when we lace'em up and hit the hardwoods, I'm still hitting three's from the top of the arc. Rebounding still not so hot.

I hadn't been out and about in a long time. With work, school, studying for school, sleeping and the occasional bathroom trip, I really haven't had the time. I'm guessing Sporty and I would have been Monday night or Sunday night regulars had she still been in town. But with three weeks of the kicking it until I head back to the legal gulag, it was amazing how fast it all came back to me.

Friday night at 5:30, I'm still at the office messing around when my RP calls from 5 years ago. By that I mean: There is a party happening somewhere in Atlanta right now or in the next hour, this is the host, here is the address or some directions and... go! We hadn't saddled up and rode like that in a while.

So I run by the house and spiff up a touch then roll out to the Christmas party for an Atlanta law firm being held in the event space on the 50th floor of 191 Peachtree Tower. Which means things haven't changed all that much. Back in the day the invite would be a mansion somewhere or an invitation only spot where my name would somehow end up on the guest list, so the only thing that has happened is that we've gotten older.

The spot is nice, the usual crowd is in attendance and apparently women can smell the legal on you. I wasn't there 10 minutes before I'm chatting with a few chicks and getting the look from a few more. I want to say I worked it like the smooth player that I am, but the reality is I'm so out of the game I put myself on the bench a few times that evening, not sliding in like I know I can when confronted with a possibility.

Saturday Sporty hits me and surprise, she's going to be in town the week of Christmas. Which is like WOW. I'm not sure what's going on. But I do know it means I have to clean up the house like for real. And just when I was going to break out and do the little bit of shopping (I'm a college student, and I'm broke so the operative word was little) .

Saturday night was....how can I describe this? Long? Tiring? Interesting? Saturday night we had the annual "Come as you are" Cocktail party. We invite our folk, we gather some toys for children and have a nog to celebrate the passing of another year. Okay, we gather up as much alcohol as we can, crank up the beat and let it all hang out until we can't take it no more. We're closing in a decade with this party, and it just keeps getting bigger. Then the Cowboys beat the Saints and the night is just looking all spectacular! I also broke a personal rule and went out for the third night in a row. I'm getting too old to keep doing this, and a while back I said that three nights in a row was just showing off...but here I was again.

Out at the "Mansion", we set up the DJ booth, iced down the drinks and got started around 8pm. I was still serving at 3am. I know we don't do it as often as we used to, but I need to talk to RP about the good ole days when we'd shut it down around 1am just because.

At this point I'd like to ask God why he sends them all at once.

So I'm at the party and who should pop up by...let's call her Swift. I've known Swift for a while, about my age, from NY with a noticeable accent, and apparently...really into me. I ran into her last summer but we were just passing ships in the night. So she pops up a Christmas time. She and her buddies stayed until long after the set was over, hanging out and dancing and all the other after party futzing around that happens when the party's over but you want to play that one more song, or do that dance you hadn't done in a while. Swift seemed like suddenly she was interested instead of our normal flirting and then "see ya" we normally do.

So like, what's going on? I mean really going on...

I think I'm reading way too much into anything right now. I'm suddenly missing the mindless intensity and attention to detail of law school, and that's saying something.

Barkeep...Tall glass of Ice Water. Make it a double.

The Record Report

Ramblings Post #75
The year 2009 draws to a close, and I'm slowly coming to grips with not being a kid anymore. Don't get me wrong, even in my lumpy form in ill fitting clothes driving my Road Hazard Turbo 05' I still am the recipient of the occasional glance of the young chippie. That or they've mistaken me for their father. In either case, it means age is just a number. A big number, but just a number.

One of the many signs of old age is when you think the current music is horrible, and that they they don't like they used to "back when I was growing up" . And this may be the case for me, as lately music...well, the more popular rap music of today, seems to have taken the term "quality control" to new heights, or lows depending on your point of view. This little tirade was prompted when listening to the radio this morning on the way to work, Jay Z's new single, the one about New York, came on....so I changed the station...and then Jay Z's new single came on...so I changed the station, again....and then Jay Z's new single came on...so I changed the station, again again....and then Jay Z's new single came on...so I turned to the gospel station.

As you may or may not have guessed, I'm not a big Jay Z fan. I think the last song of his that I liked was "I Just Wanna Love Ya" in 2000.

Don't even get me started on the mess that is Lil Wayne.

And if I as a consumer have no interest in the two "hottest" rappers in the game, then maybe it's just that I'm getting old and this is just a sign of the times.

And you would be wrong.

I like a lot of "new" rap. Atlanta's own Gucci Mane's "Wasted" I found catchy before they played into oblivion. Kanye's "Big Ego" was quirky but likable, I just got turned on to Fred the Godson (though he is a little gangsta for my usual tastes) and Blitz the Ambassador , so I do like some of the new stuff. Even Officer Ricky (Rick Ross) is okay. But these guys? Well....

Jay Z lucked out, then I guess worked that good fortune to his benefit. That good fortune being that the rap game was bereft of any talent or heat in the late 90's. And Wayne gets by on image and inertia. He has the prototypical "rapper" look that makes us mad when suburban white kids emulate it, yet "we" celebrate it. The thing about these two "rappers" that bothers me the most is that according to them neither can be bothered to put pen to paper prior to walking into the studio. And their songs sound like it.

Jigga is at least practiced at freestyle to some degree, but his rhymes have a Flavor-aid feel to them, as opposed to authentic Kool-aid. Instead of the complex construction that is the NY norm, this Rockafella original comes across as light in the cookies, but with good production. In a subgenre that places heavy emphasis on wordplay, Jay to me appears to be a really popular middleweight, and not a heavyweight.

Wayne on the other hand, just needs to stop. That latest thing currently in heavy rotation for no reason in which he laughs between lines is so bad, it's gone on through back around to good and then back to bad again. At least that Jay Z song I don't like has a loose theme - very loose - but Wayne just appears to be in the studio messing around. The single is almost like one of those old time skits rappers used to put on the albums to deflect all the gunplay and being black angst they displayed. Not that I'm hating that you can just throw something together and get paid, but as the theoretical consumer, I don't appreciate being insulted either. And that's what that is...insulting.

For the record, the last Lil Wayne song I liked was "Stuntin' Like My Daddy", although his wordplay is horrible there as well, the beat is killer.

The occasional one off that is nonsensical or just pure braggadocio is okay, even expected in the rap game. A continuing series of them quickly becomes tiring. Over several years it becomes wearisome. In a four minute song we're talking about roughly two minutes of rap...or three scores of sixteen bars, not including chants and general screaming into the microphone... not a whole lot of writing. And it's not like either one of them are "battle rapping", so I don't really see the big thrill.

Maybe I'm just getting old. But more likely, I'm not.

Barkeep. For old times sake, a Schlitiz Malt Liquor Bull and bag of pork skins...

Nights out in SPACE...

Ramblings Post #74
They don't miss you until you're gone, and you don't realize how much you had until you've wasted it. None of that applies here. After a long semester, and a longer final (Ha!) I'm back on the scene with a gangsta lean...temporarily. Until January I'm back in the game, just hoping to get in a few reps and maybe score a TD or two without having to resort to the trick plays. We'll see. Until then...here we go!

So, for the first Friday in three months that I don't have anything to do, I put on my spiffy and head out to Serve's birthday party. She's holding it with S-to be-named at a little spot on the Southwest side of Atlanta called SPACE.

It's the Space in SPACE...which isn't all that much.

SPACE is one of those spots that frequently pop up in Atlanta. I'd been to Rathbuns and Krog bar and a host of other spots that 125 years ago, or 5 years ago, used to be something industrial and so it has lots of raw space. And if you polish the concrete floor, seal the windows and put in some heat and A/C, then stick in a kitchen and bar and you turn around and you've got a restaurant/lounge. SPACE is exactly that. All that's missing is the "authentic" Atlanta Heritage Building concept, in that it "used to be" this specific historical spot. That and it's missing decent parking.

The evening starts off funny. I'm picking up Slim, who suddenly no longer is. We spend fifteen minutes at her house because suddenly nothing fits anymore. Then because the eVite says the party starts at 7pm, we breeze in at 8pm...and are an hour early because the party doesn't really start until 9pm. No worries, the spot has food and bar so I figure we can amuse ourselves for an hour. So I ask the waitress if the bar has any whiskey worth talking about. She doesn't know but goes to check. There selection is piss poor, so I order the basic with some Sprite. Then, she looks me dead in my eye and asks seriously: "Do you want them in separate glasses?"

That became the joke of the evening.

Slim and I argued over her bad instructions until S-to-be-named showed up and went over what the evite was supposed to have said. We then all decided that somewhere else in Atlanta there was a birthday party happening that Slim had agreed to be at, and that they probably were very salty with her for not showing up.

Then came the next great joke of the evening. SPACE was hosting three seperate events that evening, the birthday party I was attending, a second birthday party in the back room and what I guess was a third birthday party. There may have been a fourth event, I really wasn't paying attention. But what are the odds, as it turns out the party in the back room: I know those guys. And the chicks with the third birthday party: I know them too!

I go to one spot and run into three events where I know someone? The term Atlanta is too small quickly comes to mind. That or I know entirely too many people. So I spent the evening bouncing back and forth from party to party, seeing a great deal of folks I hadn't seen in ages. The space, as most spaces are, was laid out improperly to maximize the crowd flow, but then that's great for meeting people. It was a pretty fun night.

I almost got my swagger back. Then i remembered I hate that term, so I decided to get something else back.

Barkeep...first, I want the liquor and the soda in the same glass....okay? Now....

The Office Moguls...the continuing saga

Ramblings Post #73
There are some people who, when you think about it, don't really know. You know? I mean they really don't have a clue about how the world works outside of that insular little bubble they've somehow managed to construct. Sometimes it's because of money, sometimes it's ideals, and other times it's just they're completely oblivious. And then sometimes, it's because you're a Mogul...even though you work with the rest of us.

Naive Mogul is back at the stocks. Apparently his father has given him a few more dollars to play with. He asked one of the actual learned and disciplined investors for advice, and because neither of them do any real work I half listened to them discuss strategies for like Chatty Mogul was there (thank God he wasn't). It's funny because the actual investor, who has dedicated money from each check going to an investment account he manages using tools he actually paid professional investors is being talked down to by Naive Mogul, who uses USA Today and Yahoo to guess at investments.

Daddy Mogul is experiencing the joys of contracting. He getting some work done on the house and his contractor, like every other contractor who doesn't have his own television show, hasn't shown up. He's spending more time "working from home" waiting for the contactor to show up than seems logical.

Chatty Mogul is...indecipherable. Chatty Mogul spent the last 24 months as the, hum...er.... "Head of Chicken Plucking Knowledge", the job he wasn't doing when he was doing everything else. Recently, at his own requests because the one monthly reports were just too much pressure, he was moved back to plain ole' "Chicken Plucking", something he did for two years before his promotion. Now of course, he's forgotten how to hold a chicken, how to pluck a chicken, and how to tell if a chicken has been plucked. A few days ago he spent the better part of hour avoiding his job arguing how he doesn't avoid doing his job.

And just when I thought it was over, because to do the regular "Chicken Plucking" your desk has to be much further away from mine and you actually have to pay attention to what you are doing and so where I thought I wouldn't be inundated with updates of the dear boy's life, management wants me to train Chatty Mogul on my job as a third tier backup person.

Oh joy.

If you see a news article "Man beats coworker after repeated dumb questions", that will be me.

Pray for me.

Barkeep, something to numb the pain.

And With A Gurgle of Frustration, It is Done. For now.

Ramblings Post #72
I'm trying to remember the exact moment I decided to go to law school. I haven't always wanted to be a lawyer. I remember the convincing argument that if I went in X amount of time I would be a lawyer, and if I didn't go in X amount of time I'd be the same age, but not a lawyer. It sounds a lot more convincing when you're tired of talking. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy law school, as it's nice to talk with people as smart as I or smarter - unlike the chikin' plucking job - but sometimes, I ask why did I do this to myself. And that sometimes is usually right around finals. Go figure.

A fast recap of my week of finals, for which I took an unprecedented week off from work to get ready for.

The first exam, a three hour lovefest which was open book, seems almost quaint looking back. When I got to a question on a case and I wasn't quite sure what the reading said, I actually looked the case up and reviewed it quickly for the answer! I felt confident leaving the room, taking time at the end to review my answers. A this point the test feels remarkably pedestrian for such an involved and in-depth subject.

The second exam I could still be working on right now. Three hours, no notes, you just had to know the material. Essentially one long fact pattern from which we had to discern the arguments and counter arguments - like say - actual lawyers who have to consider what the other side will say and be ready with a response. Because I'm part time, and just now finishing my first year, my class was split between actual first time law students and we semi-second year kids. I felt better about my response when I found out that most of the first year folks didn't bother to take the practice exam the prof was nice enough to give us, so I'm certain their responses weren't as crisp as they could have been. And in law school they grade on the curve.

Then, flush from my imagined success on two exams, mind still burbling with responses to the exam questions I could given, that Friday night right after the second exam I opened up the email from my last professor regarding his exam, my last. And, obviously a bit woozy and delirious from exam taking, I figured I had read it wrong and needed a quick lie down. In the morning it would all be clearer. And it the morning it was. Or wasn't depending on your point of view.

Now my first year of law school my profs would tell us about the test, but having never seen one I had no idea how to approach them. Then having seen them, it took a minute (a semester) to get my skills right. So looking at the instructions for this exam, and knowing how the prof phrased his questions I was - well, stunned.

The usual law exam is a few questions to check fact knowledge and a great deal of essay. Acres of essay. The second exam this semester was all essay. Lawyers are by in large storytellers, who weave a narrative of the facts into something persuasive for the best representation for their client. This semester, I had one professor that during class insisted our spoken answers have "a beginning, a middle, and an end" so that we get used to speaking in a narrative. A lot of our professors tell us they don't care what our final answer is as long as we can logically and persuasively defend it using the law, i.e, create a narrative.

I say all that to say that this was not that test.

This test had clear right and wrong answers. This final exam was black and white in field that specializes in shades of gray. I come from a small country town, and this exam when handed out was thicker than my hometown phone book. The questions just kept coming and coming. Page after page. And then essay questions that didn't really ask for a persuasive defense, but for specific terms and concepts. We had four hours to work on it, and I took three hours and fifty minutes.

Hopefully, I did okay. I hope.

Barkeep, the stuff you been keeping for a special occasion. Four semesters down, six to go.

Trippy

Ramblings Post #69
Sometimes bad things happen to bad people. But more often than not, good stuff happens to bad people, and then keeps happening and then continues on as long as you can stand to watch it. This is how some people get rich, despite certain personality attributes that would normally render them "beat down". Every now and then though, they slip. And it makes the world right again.

Last week, apparently upon his own initiative, Naive Mogul decided to hold a meeting. As long as I have been with my current "chicken plucking" firm, we've been trying to implement a system that eliminates, well, er...error in chicken plucking. The idea's been tossed around and put on the back burner more than a few times, but apparently it was time to drag the old beast out again.


It is Naive Mogul's plan to show he really should be management by implementing something.

The meeting was a rehash of old ideas, wasting a good hour and half of my day. We don't go through his printed agenda as it's unfocused, he leaves out whole sections of the process that we have to go back and fill in, he doesn't know what the new process will do the existing processes, he's not sure of the value of adding the new process and we spend the bulk of the meeting deciding which "chickens" to which we even want to apply the new process. Typical first meeting stuff, you know how it goes if you've ever worked in an office: You've hashed out some basics, everyone gets a few assignments to report back and we schedule the next meeting to work over them, repeat until you get something workable.

Naive Mogul then announces, as I start to get up to leave, "at the next meeting we'll talk implementation."

One meeting and implementation? Um...no.

There is a momentary silence.

There is that quiet, almost furtive look around that everybody does, because somebody is going to have to burst his bubble, and they don't want to be the one.

Then the tech guy, whom he invited because it's a "tech" process, starts into him. He's the one guy not in the usual chain. The tech guy basically explains how you have a complete and through implementation process. Tech guy goes over what all is required to fully document a process as it exists now, and how future changes will affect that process, the pros and cons of the changes proposed, value gained etc, and why certain people invited to this meeting probably didn't need to be invited (that would mean me!). Basically in front of four or five senior people, including Naive's boss (via conference call), he told him that he doesn't know what he's doing.

And then I got up and left.

Barkeep. A shot of the Russian vodka.

Sometimes I surprise myself

Ramblings Post #68
A few weeks ago, I hit the six month mark of time left on my cell phone contract. And those duffers at AT& Suckers are playing hardball. The little online thing I got said I could renew my contract and upgrade my phone for only $18. Apparently there was some fine print I did not read. I am less than happy about this whole affair. What does that have to do with post? Nothing. Just wanted to rant.

The many colors of my life...

For the second time in three years, I'm not heading home for Thanksgiving. Two years ago it was because my brother and I donned our painting togs for my new house and since we both had jobs, it was the only time frame we had to get the work done.

This year it's Law School finals, which happen the first week of December. Last year I believe I was a little too cavalier in my approach, believing that a single day of brushing up before the actual test would be enough. And since our program was broken into to two parts and we didn't get our grades until the end of spring, I had no real idea of how I was doing until grades arrived some many many months later. Now, I'm still in school, but let's just say I'm not in danger of knocking the valedictorian out of their spot. So this year, I'm stocking up on snack food and kool-aid and battening down the hatches.

Promises to be fun. Not.

Due to circumstances beyond my control, my usual last hurrah of the school semester didn't happen - the Halloween bash, so I've been dribbling out bits and pieces of social life.

Sporty and I are burning up a chat. I'm sending her email two or three times a week and texting all the time. I'm not sure where we're going, but I'm still down for the ride. I apparently have a bible to read...

Slim and I hung out for a hot minute, but she still is in recovery from her accident. She did put me on this really live little chinese spot in Marietta which I should have reviewed, but I need to eat there again just to be sure. Okay, I'm cheesing, but I did like it.

And then while I was studying this weekend - my parents had traveled up north to visit my brother - another girl buddy "whose name hasn't been decided yet" called and invited me out to a bullfight. Like with matadors and throwing roses! I've never been to a bullfight. I really wanted to go. But instead, I took the practice exam under the actual conditions (3 hours - no breaks, no notes). I be a gud stujent.

Good ole Spanky is still mad at me for even going to Law School. She texted me from Orlando mad that I didn't make the trip. That and I am proud of her for deciding not to spend any money on her new man-friend. As opposed to all the other guys upon whom she was very generous, she's tightened up the purse strings as of late. But then I could have used some new shoes.

Schmoopy is out of town for all of December, on a month long vacation to Africa. We had our last little brunch, well, lunch since to me brunches only really happen on weekends, and caught up on the last few weeks. We've been meeting up every so often again for a while, between her training for a half marathon and studying for the GMAT and as she says, she talks to me more than most. I felt special.

That and, well, Schmoopy looked good enough to start a fight in church between deacons. She claims, or thinks anyway, I don't notice her a lot, but a lunch she had on these black tights and this fairly small top with the puppies out. We made it through lunch without me noticing her whole outfit because she beat me to the restaurant. But as we drifted into that comfortable lazy conversation after the meal that always happens with us, relationships, life, etc, my office called and she stepped away from the table. At that moment she stood up, I lost my train of thought. She looked like ...well, let's just not go there.

Trying to figure out again why I didn't marry that girl when she asked. Man running does a body good.

Then this weekend after my folks left town and the study session was over I ran by one of partner's house to check on him after his car accident. While there, and he had a house full of folk checking on him, another girl buddy of mine "whose name hasn't been decided yet" ran up on with a hug I took as more than friendly. Just all extra friendly. I have no idea what's up with that.

And I needed a haircut.

(that's not a metaphor, I really do need to see a barber)

So apparently despite all my efforts not to have one, the last little bits of my social existence do still carry on. Surprised me to.

Barkeep, some Bookers and a little Sprite. Apparently I'm doing good.

Thoughts on Things...

Relapse Post #5
It's been a long time since I've been down this road. And although I'm familiar with the trip, I get lost every time. It's scary, and searing, but just a little bit fun. Okay, a lot fun. The trip alone is worth whatever the destination.

I wish I knew where I got this...

Sporty and I have been chatting on IM a lot lately. And the frequency in which she hits me up tells me I might be on her mind as well from time to time. In what capacity I try not to speculate. She's making moves to try and get her situation straight and I keep hoping part of that plan involves me. Our conversations happen on Sunday mornings and after class and on slow afternoons at work, ranging from the philosophical to the mundane, from the silly to the almost serious and I'm like a teenager trying to pace myself and not appear to eager to hit her up every hour or so. I miss the nights we'd spend talking for hours after the dinner plates were cleared away. Her live "in concert" is so much better than digital.

Is this one of those life moments? And how would I know if it was?

She's on my mind a lot, despite my need to concentrate on law and my upcoming finals, and in quiet moments and during some of the slower periods of work I've managed to craft a second novella for her. It's in pretty much the same format as the previous work I mentioned last summer, in which I've mixed her love of travel and our relationship into what I hope is a cute little story. I include the poetry she's inspired me to write and some other things to round it out to 30-40 pages. She claims she loved the first one. We'll see with the second.

As of late I've justified the concept mentally of her NOT moving back to Atlanta with the idea that she would be a huge distraction from my career aspirations. [ Sidenote: Law school can make you see both sides of nearly anything ] I feel like I'm bracing for the hurricane of emotions that will come when she says she's heading to XYZ Faraway West.

Over the course of my life I've had good fortune, or God's blessing if you will, for the most part. My parents are still with me, and the grandparents I've lost I was too young to comprehend what I was missing. When things go badly for me, opportunity for redemption or rescue has a way of presenting itself. Even those things that end up really bad eventually reveal themselves to be object lessons that make me a better person.

But Sporty is that which didn't go well. Not as well as hoped anyway.

As you can see from earlier justification she really would be a huge distraction. Even though work and school and the life that's happened between now and then mean even her being back wouldn't be a return to the same ole same ole, but I want her in Atlanta anyway.

Barkeep. The good brown stuff.

Office Breaks and Gold Ping Pong Paddles

Ramblings Post #67
The office is a strange place. You go early in the day, sometimes before the sun comes up, meet and hang out with mostly like minded folks doing pretty much what you're doing for 8 or 10 hours a day and then....go home to real life? If I'm not mistaken, that job is your Real Life, and what you do at home is get ready for it, relax after it and on weekends recover from it. And yet it's taboo to try to pick up dates there. In the dominant part of your life. Go figure.
Sometime ago, while cleaning out her rec room, the director of the department I work in decided to upgrade their family Ping Pong table. And rather than throw the old one out, they took down a few empty cubicles here in the office (there seem to be so many lately) and set up the Ping Pong Lounge, complete with futon couch and chairs, so that we could relax. On Breaks, during lunch and when we weren't working.

This has resulted in sweaty Ping Pong players coming to my desk to ask about client questions.

If you ask me what I do, I am for the most part a professional chicken plucker. It's easier to tell you that than explain what it is I actually do with technology and client's and other people's time. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. So when the Office Moguls and the rest of the office gang aren't plucking chickens, they're playing Ping Pong. A whole lot of Ping Pong.

I knew it had gotten out of hand when.... a) they began purchasing new equipment...like the $50 Ping Pong paddle, b) they started to hang around on Friday night AFTER work to play Ping Pong and finally when c) they started a collection to purchase a NEW Ping Pong table. Yeah, they asked me for money for a game I don't even have time the play. I hear managers looking for people to get stuff done, knowing these fools are on the table. I'm certain in the team meetings "Ping Pong time management" has been discussed.

Sometimes as I'm creeping out on Friday night to go fall into a law book, I'll see someone who has been off for two hours waiting to play. Or someone hovering above the table waiting to return a tricky serve and I'll pass their waiting wife in the parking lot. Is there something about Ping Pong I'm missing? I hear "come and be graced by this whipping I'm about to give you" and other Ping Pong challenges and exhortations on the floor. Guys discussing serves and returns, angles and stances. I get the impression before long I'll get the email about a company "Ping Pong Tourney" complete with prizes.

Hath the Ping and the Pong cometh for us?

If you are looking for a job and getting frustrated, you should be pissed. Because some of the folks still working don't appreciate what they have, and are mad they can't go to the office and just play Ping Pong all day.

Barkeep. A whiskey and soda for me, and round of beers for the guys at the Ping Pong table. They're not going anywhere.

Law School Tips #1

Something Else #1 - Law
I'm not quite sure which category this post falls into. It's not just general rambling, nor is it bar chatter or political. Maybe I had another category somewhere but I'm too lazy to look right this second.

First year law students, here is a quick bit of advice.


Start your outline now.
- Seriously. You need to do your complete outline, copying it over if that's all you do, but do it twice each weekend. Add in the little bit for this week, and then write it over from scratch. Your outline is your bible. And the more times you look at it, the better you will do. Law school isn't undergrad. I remember one undergrad class I only went to for the last review session before the for tests and the tests. You cannot do this in Law School. I know you're overworked as it is, but believe me, now is the time. Hell, now is almost too late! Start your outline now, even if you can't take it into the test with you. The repetition will ingrain it in your mind.


Read your professor
- Each professor is different. I had one prof who gave tests with references to the Three Stooges and German Opera, in the same question. I had another who sounded like a mix of Richard Pryor, Bernie Mack and old preacher. And yet another who was a good ole boy who mixed in jingoism and good old common sense. Each one's test was different, but looking back I realized that they telegraphed how the test would be during class. Some personality traits shine through. The good ole boy's final was straight forward, just like his teaching. The property prof with the Hawaiian shirt collection and the great stories, loved answers with great stories and odd references. Read your prof, learn what he likes. It will be on the final.


Supplements
- Some call them horn books, or treasties or whatever, but you need them. Reading cases cold is hard. You didn't get it. You know you did get it, but you're wrong. Go to amazon and pick out the matching supplements for your casebook and order it now. Then read the case - read the case synopsis - and read the case again. You'll be surprised at what you miss. Don't use the supplement as a substitute, ever...but use them.
- Sidenote: only take the supplement to class if you sit in the back.


Classmates
- Law is a funny animal. Sometimes I think some folks got out of law school only because they lucked out with a slow bunch. You're all in the pit together. The curve is set by whoever is best, so you need to get to running now. You want to do better than everyone else, but you need everyone else to assure your own survival. You need a "study group" and by that I mean you need another set of eyes, so one other person is enough. I personally don't have a "study group" but I do have folks I will talk an issue over with. And it's different people, so I get different perspectives. And different answers. And in law, the more answers the better. Most times.

A few quick one liners to get you through. Just remember you're doing this for the greater good of humanity. Besides, even if you quit now, you'll still owe the student loan.

Mickey and Jerry in for a visit

Ramblings Post #65
There are things I just inherently don't do. I do not do hot pants. Anymore. I don't do heights, but only because having to call the fire department to get a grown ass man off a one story roof is ridiculously embarrassing. And as you just found out, I don't really do cheese. But wait, there's more. Read on...

Slim called for the first time in forever. She's been on the down low for a minute, and still has a while to go so I wasn't expecting a word from her. She was in a automobile wreck a while back, totaled her car and broke her foot. She's in therapy and has been out of the game, but last night she called because she has a little visitor she can't get rid of.

She as a mouse.

And as a big strong he-man type, she over course called yours truly to handle the situation. And that would have been cool. Except I'm allergic to rodents. Small and hairy? My eyes will swell up, my body starts aching, I sneeze like I caught the bird flu. It's not good. But then that's how I would know if I've got a problem at my house. I start sneezing and aching for no real reason? Time to call my exterminator, because the furry ones have come to visit. But despite my allergies, after class I rode over to play Tom Cat to her visitor Jerry.

She's put on a few pounds, but then I always thought she was too thin, but it looks good on her. It's not often you meet a plump vegetarian. A pleasingly plump vegetarian.

I did a sweep of the grounds, she had already laid out the sticky traps so I put out the neck snappers (using her $8 brie cheese ) and afterwards we caught up. She's thinking about starting a blog, or a website since she's basically just chillin' all day and I gave her a few addresses and ideas. I admonished her for not having a lawyer (see legal mind popping out already). And before I ended up having to get doped up on benedryl and vodka to make to the morning, I skeddaled.

And when I got home, I marveled at my exterminator's prowess, because I need to clean up. Bad.

Barkeep. A little cleaning music and kickstart beverage.

So they loaded up the Truck, and moved...

Ramblings Post #65
A shrewd investor I read back in the day, when I read investment advice like some men read a sports page, advised that during a calamity, one needs to look for bargains. And if the current state of Wall Street isn't a calamity, I'm not sure what would qualify. The problem I have now is that my tools are so rusty, I can't accurately tell what's a deal and what isn't. Now I at one time had the skills....think about what the Moguls are up against.


"So I made $3,000 like a month ago. But then this month I've lost $4,0000. And I spent $2,000 getting my car fixed. But if this other stock ...."

And the moguls continue.

It still amazing to me that Naive Mogul still has a belief that he can beat the market. Listening to him and Daddy Mogul talk - and it's not like I'm trying to listen, he talks loud - the concept that maybe just maybe they can't win just has not occurred to him. At any point. Not in all the months he's been trying. Naive Mogul is afraid that at the end of the year he'll have to cut his losses and see if he can get some more money - cry to his father - so he can invest again. Actually, I believe the word he used was play.

Even in the worst of times, those privileged live in a fantasy world.

He hasn't realized that like in Vegas, the only way to win is if you own the casino.

Chatty Mogul has rejoined the general work group, and by his own estimation the days seem to go a lot faster as of late. Well, since he's working as opposed to sitting about and talking about his 1) house, 2) dog, 3) diet, 4) inventions, 5) his grand ideas for the future, or whatever other crazy thought strikes him.

Side note: Two weeks ago Chatty was considering law school. I advised him to get a study guide and maybe take a prep course before taking the LSAT, but he figured he would just go take it cold to see what it was all about, then if he felt he could do it, he would study and take it again. When advised against doing that, and why that was a horrendously bad idea (they would average the scores, not take the highest) he quickly lost interest.

After Naive and Daddy discussed their losses for at least 20 minutes - this stock won't move, this other stock took a dive, etc and so on, they started on Daddy Mogul's new health plan. Which is infinitely more interesting, as the man is actually losing weight. The point where their "boss" walked by and asked what they were doing. When the boss (and my boss too), who is only in the office maybe twice a week, and in our area away from her multiple meetings, for maybe and hour or so a day, can spot you're not really working, what's really going on.

I mean really.

Am I wrong for hoping Naive gets wiped out? And actually has to maybe, do his job to live? Then I guess I'll just have to be wrong.

Fill in the spaces

Ramblings Post #63
We all get busy. There's the thing, and then the other thing, and that stuff we were supposed to do but we forgot, and then that other thing and before you know you forgot something. And then you're really in trouble. Luckily for me, this a truly optional blog. So I'm not in trouble. I think.

It's been a minute since I blogged, well a few days or such, and well, nothing much has been going on.

Oh, I had a break in attempt at the house. And since I actually have something worth stealing at this point, that was as tense a few moments as I've had in a while. But once the villains had broken the window, they apparently couldn't figure how to get inside without gouging an artery or two on the broken glass. So, I'm only out a window and medication for high blood pressure.

And, the finals for this semester schedule is out, and my finals are back to back, well, there is a day in between but since the prep is so tight, that's the equivalent of back to back. For the first time EVER, I'll be out for a whole week either taking a final or getting ready for one. Either I'm about to prove my worth the company, or they're going to realize they really don't need me. The rubber meets the road.

And I'm worried about Sporty. who suddenly is a character from a Terry McMillan black chick lit novel. For the first time she showed and interest into returning to Atlanta (well, she announced she's looking for work here), and though our long IM conversations, I can almost feel a change in her. She's much more spiritual, and her outlook on certain aspects of life seemed to have changed. I do so wonder what the hell happened to her in Texas, because it seems it was a life changer. One day when she's ready, she'll tell me.

And I need to get back on salads. As I've explained before, although I'm lovable and huggable , funny and urbane, learned and generous....all of that goes by the wayside unless you possess six pack abs. And I'm way down as of late, I mean in the mirror I'm not looking too shabby. And that's with the glasses on! After school wrecked my workout schedule, I was on a salad a day for while. But that got real expensive - Chick-fil-et, Zaxby's, Wendy's and whoever else sold the leafy green stuff because I'm too lazy to toss some greens at the house. Maybe salads at night.

The moved the Moguls around at the job. Chatty Mogul gave up his cush job because it was, and you can quote me, "too much pressure". This from a man who worked maybe an hour a day. And after a shift in the org structure, it's just a matter of time before Naive Mogul talks himself out of a job, because he new boss doesn't like him as much as his old boss. Or sleeps himself out of a job. Or as Daddy Mogul put it this morning, "Migraine? Is that what they call a hangover these days?"

My days are wakeup, wakeup again, turn off the alarm while awake this time, get up when the alarm off again, morning absolution, go to work, avoid strangling anyone, go to class, go home study, sleep, repeat.

So , as I said. Nothing much has been going on.

Barkeep, B-12 and some powerade. Sporty really likes powerade.

Let's see, this weekend...

Ramblings Post #60
Every now and then, everything comes to a head. You have to go in for the interview, the test date actually arrives, you actually have to open your eyes who see who that is snoring, and so forth and so on. It's just generally unusual that all of it happens at once. And then there is that one instance that it does. And it's funny because it happens to somebody else. This is both not and is this case.


I got the TV guy coming Saturday morning, a seminar for law school from 10am to 4pm, my alma mater is playing in the GA Dome, a old partner of mine is riding in from out of town around 6pm or so, Schmoopy is having her birthday party, my old partner wants to go to Old School Saturday, the city will be on fire as everybody and their cousin will be throwing a party for the FAMU-TSU classic, and Sunday morning Shade will be in town...only Canoe (her favorite restaurant) got flooded so we're scrambling for a new spot to have her birthday party, my Civil Procedure writing assignment needs to get done, I still have my regular homework, and somewhere in there...I might want to go the bathroom.

Did I leave out anything?

Funny. Last weekend all I had to do was read my homework and eat every so often. Oh the difference a few days makes.

Barkeep, let me a Crunk Juice with a shot of Red Bull.

Old Age

Ramblings Post #59
We get little signs as we get older. A twinge where there used to not be a twinge. Somebody calls you sir or ma'am, for no reason. The first gray hair, I got that one at 25 for the record. Suddenly, ten shots of tequila has the reeling, where twenty used to just be the start. And you realize that cute little thing in the tight pants that you'd like to introduce to your "game" is young enough to be your daughter --- and she's drinking in the same bar you are. There are a lot of signs. Damnit.

Yesterday old age arrived. I noticed the beginnings of a double chin.

If there is anything that makes you suddenly realize you need to take thine ass to the gym, it's looking in the mirror and seeing the start of that extra little roll of fat under your chin. The roll of fat on your hips you're used to. You've learned designer camouflage. Now you're trying to figure out how you'd look in an ascot, and thinking it might not be that bad.

I had been waffling on tightening up my diet: Adding the salads I'd started skipping back into the mix, going back to the bran cereal, cutting way back on the carbs....but have you ever tasted fresh hot fries? Or had chocolate chip fudge brownies that a still kinda soft and warm? Well I have and since I'm not working out for the moment, those snacks are looking at condo prices in my love handles. And since some old acquaintances have started pasting old photos.. and I looked stuffed and bloated in a few of them... this is not a new problem. I can see why I've avoided cameras and pictures and all manner of preserving for posterity.

It is singularly depressing.

I've done short term adjustments before: The juice week, low carbs, brief diet changes... but short term isn't gonna get it.

As many times as I've complained - whined, lamented, etc - about how women are a lot more visual than folks want to admit I'm letting a situation I can control with a little will power slowly become a a real problem. I dream of one day taking off my shirt to get into the pool and having the women look at me like a fresh grilled pork chop. With BBQ sauce. That hungry look in their eyes, that says "I need to gets me some of that." And I may have to cut back a lot of things, but I will get there.

Salads. Cutting carbs. More fruit. Already cut out the sodas. Get back to the gym.

I is gonna make it.

And this time, I mean it.

Barkeep. Pear Juice. And two rolls of toilet paper and a good book. And a magazine.