PT-LawMom

So we’re trying to find a nanny to live in and help out with Pumpkinhead during the week, figuring this will relieve some stress and help him get on a more regular sleep schedule (right now he’s up at the crack of dawn with me and waits until I get home to go to bed). I thought I’d found a great candidate. She’s 51, retired, and taking undergrad classes online and just wants a quiet place with Internet access to live while she’s in school. She’s bilingual, friendly and has a cute puppy. I thought she sounded perfect. Until she didn’t show up for our interview today.

Her e-mail:

I am not able to come out today and meet you–the instructor in one of my classes dropped a bomb on us–extra assignment, and I’m nowhere near done–deadline is tonight.

Mine:

I’m sorry to hear that. I also have a major brief due (my entire grade for the semester) this week but instead spent the whole morning cleaning in preparation for your visit. Please let us know if you’re still interested in coming by another time. The only time both my husband and I are at home is on Sundays.

WTF?!?! Think my message was too bitchy? I am so pissed! It’s almost 1 p.m. and I seriously scrubbed my house all morning. What a damn waste of time!!!!!

Working on my summer/fall schedules. Every time I think I have it planned, a new wrinkle pops up. Just found out that I have to take tax (despite my every intention to avoid it completely!) because it is a prerequisite for 22 (yes, 22) classes at school (i.e., Business Planning, Estate Planning), some of which are important for my career. Oh yeah, and it’s also a bar course. Bleech. It is only offered in the fall and then not again until the year I graduate. So, damn it, I am stuck!

Next question is whether I should take a seminar (50-page paper, no exam) this fall with a great teacher or a regular course in an area of law that is interesting but not applicable to my career path?

Finally, if you had a choice between a six-week summer course that was wicked hard but necessary and a six-week course that was much easier but had fewer people so the curve is sharper, which would you take? Is it better to take the harder, necessary course over a full semester while balancing two other courses or to concentrate on that one course for six weeks and get it over with? The hard professor is the only one who teaches it and it’s offered regularly both in summer and in the fall/spring so I have a choice. The “easy” course has a lot of role playing and oral argument and might actually be hard for me with the way my doped-up brain is right now. Bleech. What to do, what to do?!?!?

Spent all weekend trying to work on a paper that I have to present in draft form to my professor today during conference. Encountered multiple roadblocks, including a school festival at Pumpkinhead’s Montessori that we *had* to attend, multiple calls/crises from my parents, and drama with my husband (not to mention, yes, the f^(*5ing pain). Finally got it together yesterday and was on a roll. Then at 6:32, my printer stopped dead. Little orange light blinked “Toner”.

So I looked up “Office Depot” only to find it shut at 7 p.m. Grabbed the toner cartridge out of the printer and raced to the store. Nope, they were all out of the brand name toner and the store brand but their other store had six. Raced a few miles up the road and got there with 5 minutes to spare. Threw the old toner in the recycling bin, commented on how light the new toner box was compared to the one I had just recycled [Hmm, wonder why ], paid and raced out the door with the manager locking it behind me.

Get home, unwrap the toner, pull the sheath off and… wait a minute. Why is there this black roller strip of nasty toner dust staring up at me?!? And why is it too small for my printer? Every HP laser printer I’ve ever used, at home and at work, you just pull out the toner cartridge and pop another in. Wait… Think dopey brain, think… Wasn’t there something weird about this new Brother laser printer you got last year in the middle of all the BIG PAIN DRUGS? Oh yeah, the drum unit.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I win the prize for best act of self-thwarting the night before a paper is due (although thank God it’s only a conference and it’s not actually “due”). I recycled the $200 drum unit into which my toner cartridge fits. In my defense, the whole thing really is the same size as a full HP cartridge and if any of you know what those look like you will know I’m not completely crazy. I was just so rushed and panicked trying to get there before the store closed and get out before they kicked me out that I didn’t look closely. My brain just needs a bit more time these days to think through things — perhaps I would have realized my error if I’d had a bit more time to ponder the serious lightness of the box versus the weight of the part I had just put in the bin.

Good news is that after calling the store 10 times in a row, security finally picked up and took a message. Fifteen minutes later, a manager who was doing paperwork called me back and said he had gotten the message, retrieved my cartridge and has it at the front waiting for my mother to pick it up. Thank God!

WARNING: This is another one of my depressing health-related posts. Don’t read it if you’re sick of hearing me whine.

I am now going to do something completely against my nature and try a homeopathic treatment that my therapist has recommended. Basically it’s distilled water with “frequencies” injected in that work against the bad stuff your body’s aura shows are out of balance. But the stuff that my aura gave off without her even knowing about it is very telling and interesting and I suppose it’s worth a shot. At least it’s something that won’t take time (whereas accupuncture appointments or other things would). And it’s not too expensive.

The rational side of me says this is completely nutso. But I’ve read up on this and a lot of people seem to think that this “healing” comes to the healers through God so the faithful part of me wants to believe that if this therapist has been put in my life to suggest this to me, perhaps I should be open to trying it. Have any of you ever tried this? I really do want to have more children sometime in the future and I really want to get off these yucky meds. The past 9 months of pain from the micronutrient-deficiency-related neuropathy has really gotten to me. The pain is just not going away, even with the latest increase in Topamax dosage a few weeks back, and I’ve been trying all weekend to get my brain to concentrate on this appellate brief I’m trying to finish and I just can’t wrap my head around it. This has to stop, so I’m desperate. Any thoughts or suggestions are welcome, from the WLS community or others.

The Weekly MILS (Moms In Law School) Roundup** is the brainchild of Saramel (retired). It is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom and A Little Fish in Law School blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday morning. Next week’s MILS Roundup will be hosted by Butterflyfish.

This week’s edition features a twist on Butterflyfish’s occasional theme, wherein I will now either quote or paraphrase a string of words from each blogger that will hopefully inspire you to go read them.

2L Wannabe gave great oral and got smashed

Butterflyfish got up in the middle of the night to redo her taxes

Dakota works full-time, attends law school and builds giant play structures in the freezing rain in her spare time! (Seriously, D, where do you find the energy? And this site looks like it has some fun dog play ideas.)

Kim at Diary of a Law School Mom is so going to dump me once I tell everyone she shares my love of country music

Citations has no idea what is going on and she thinks it is bad.

ProtoAttorney may be banned from ever leaving the house again after her wet and wild weekend.

LagLiv summarizes the posts that aren’t being written in the midst of all the baby trauma, ponders why women shy away from corporate law and reveals that she is a cottage cheese newbie

Law School Hot Mama has the wildest quote - “That night, my lips started to swell. I ran a mysterious fever. Then my husband found the FANG IN MY BACK as I was getting dressed for bed!!! It was like a curved tooth, but hollow and flexible. And gross. Despite mounting evidence that there was, indeed, a significant problem, I decided to say “screw it” and go to bed because the ER was way too much effort.”

Magic Cookie asks her son to forgive her when he’s old enough to read this particular blog post

GoogieBaba used to know that panty purchasing signified a hot date night; now it just means no time for laundry.

Andrea is on her way to do-gooder land

Cee confesses - “Every now and then the memory creeps up, gnaws at my soul, and makes me feel as though I have tainted all the beauty and purity of the world around me.”

If you’d like to have your blog added to the MILS blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup — Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Divine Angst

Totally stealing this one from 2L Wannabe (great idea!):

Things I do too much of in Law School:
Surf the web
Spend money due to lack of time or preparation (forget lunch/dinner or don’t have time to shop so buy online)
Worry
Read blogs
Drink coffee
Wonder why I’m inflicting this hell on myself
Get irritated with my fellow students (in my head)
Feel intimidated by my fellow students (in my head)
Stare at the pages of my casebooks, lost, uncomprehending, give up and walk away

Things I am ignoring, at the moment, and generally, since starting law school:
Cleaning the house
Keeping a schedule
Reading
Staying in touch with friends (kills me because I am usually really on top of that)
E-mailing
The speed limit (which reminds me that the 90 days the court allows for ticket-canceling defensive driving for the last ticket I got are almost up! )
My budget
Church
The news
The weather (won’t tell you how many time Pumpkinhead or I have gone out dressed inappropriately for the day!)
Family conflict that needs to be resolved

Things I am kinda proud of keeping in balance:
Putting my son to bed each night (bath, books, prayers) and driving him to school each morning
Time with my husband (we at least try to talk on the phone every day and spend at least 30 minutes of alone time together face-to-face each night). Doesn’t sound like much but I know couples who fly through their week and barely see each other at all.
Time with my parents
Making it to church occasionally
Work! I am sooooo on top of things right now - yay.

Things I hope I get better at next year:
Even more organized study time
Better health, off the dopey meds, to help with the above
Exercise plan (and a place for it to fit in the schedule)
Understanding the shit I am supposedly reading
Juggling! Hopefully the live-in person we’re trying to get will help make all of that 10,000 times easier. Hopefully we can find someone!!!
More sleep, somehow (maybe I need to hire someone to do that as well).

Following Zuska, Ana and Butterflyfish:

In my life, I have ….

( ) smoked a cigarette
( ) crashed a car
(x) got drunk with a good friend
( ) stolen a car
(x) been in love
( ) been dumped
( ) shoplifted
( ) been fired
( ) been in a fist fight
( ) snuck out of my parent’s house
( ) been arrested
(x) gone on a blind date
(x) skipped school
(x) seen someone die
( ) been to Canada
(x) been to Mexico
(x) been on a plane
( ) purposely set a part of myself on fire [who would do this?!?]
(x) eaten Sushi [Oh Yeah!!!]
(x) been skiing
( ) been moshing at a concert
(x) taken painkillers
(x) love someone or miss someone right now
(x) lay on my back and watched cloud shapes go by
(x) made a snow angel
(x) flown a kite
(x) built a sand castle
(x) gone puddle jumping
(x) played dress up
(x) jumped into a pile of leaves
(x) gone sledding
(x) cheated while playing a game
(x) been lon
(x) fallen asleep at work/school
( ) used a fake id
(x) watched the sun set
(x) felt an earthquake
( ) touched a snake
(x) slept beneath the stars
(x) been tickled
(x) been robbed
(x) been misunderstood
(x) pet a goat
(x) won a contest
(x) run a red light
( ) been suspended from school
(x) been in a car crash
(x) had braces
(x) eaten a whole pint of ice cream in one night
(x) had deja vu
(x) danced in the moonlight
(x) liked the way I look
(x) witnessed a crime
(x) questioned my heart
(x) been obsessed with post-it notes
(x) squished barefoot through the mud
(x) been lost
(x) been to the opposite side of the country
(x) swum in the ocean
(x) felt like dying
(x) cried myself to sleep
(x) played cops and robbers
(x) recently colored with crayons
(x) sung karaoke
(x) paid for a meal with only coins
(x) done something I told myself I wouldn’t
(x) made prank phone calls
(x) laughed until some kind of beverage came out of my nose
(x) caught a snowflake on my tongue
(x) danced in the rain
(x) written a letter to Santa Claus
(x) been kissed under a mistletoe
(x) watched the sun rise with someone I care about
(x) blown bubbles
( ) made a bonfire on the beach
(x) crashed a party
(x) gone roller-skating
(x) had a wish come true
(x) worn pearls
( ) jumped off a bridge
( ) ate dog/cat food
(x) told a complete stranger I loved them
(x) kissed a mirror
(x) sung in the shower
(x) had a dream that I married someone
(x) glued my hand to something
( ) got my tongue stuck to a flag pole
( ) kissed a fish
(x) sat on a roof top
(x) screamed at the top of my lungs
( ) done a one-handed cartwheel
(x) talked on the phone for more than 6 hours
(x) stayed up all night
(x) didn’t take a shower for a week
(x) pick and ate an apple right off the tree
(x) climbed a tree
(x) had a tree house
(x) been scared to watch scary movies alone
( ) believe in ghosts
( ) have more then 30 pairs of shoes
(x) worn a really ugly outfit to school just to see what others say
(x) gone streaking
( ) gone doorbell ditching
( ) played chicken
(x) jumped into a pool/hot tub/lake with all my clothes on
( ) been told I’m hot by a complete stranger
(x) broken a bone
(x) been easily amused
(x) caught a fish then ate it
(x) caught a butterfly
(x) laughed so hard I cried
(x) cried so hard I laughed
(x) cheated on a test
(x) owned a Britney Spears CD [seriously, am I the only one who will admit to this?]
(x) forgotten someone’s name
(x) French-braided someone’s hair
(x) gone skinny dipping in a pool
( ) been threatened to be kicked out of my house
( ) been kicked out my house
(x) had a fantasy over someone I love as a good friend
( ) sun-tanned naked
(x) ran naked in the rain

I’ve done a lot [naked]. And apparently I’m a pretty straight-laced person. Although I’d bet most of the law students answering this are. Still, I want to meet someone who has set a part of themselves on fire purposely and find out how and why!!