A White Easter?

On Monday it was 80 degrees. I was all excited to wear skirts, tanks, and flip-flops.

Oh DC weather, how you tease me. Throw in a few really nice days to make me think that winter is over, then bamn, snow. In April.

It snowed last night and the low was some 20 degrees. Back to wearing jeans, wool socks, and fleece pullovers. Weatherman said that we might have a new record low for this time of year.

The last time it snowed on Easter in DC was in 2001. That year I actually did have my own White Easter in Minnesota. The whole concept just doesn't seem right to me. Easter is about springtime, pastels, egg hunts on the lawn (and of course the religious significance). Not snow.

I guess the same way I feel about snow on Easter is probably the same feeling people have about no snow on Christmas, which I've just gotten used to. I have gone Christmas tree shopping in my shorts.

Coldness aside, I'll be happy to see my Aunt and her family tomorrow for Easter. And on a final note, what's Easter without Peeps? Ok, I think they're gross but they appear to make wonderful art. Check out the "Peep Show."

Final Fishy Friday

Although Good Friday is supposed to be a day of fasting, I thought that God wouldn't want me to get really bad headaches. Instead, I opted to wrap up my "Fishy Fridays" with fish for lunch and dinner.

So to recap, I decided to overcome my fear of the sea and pledged to start eating fish on Fridays, as many Catholics do. I started off on February 23 with tilapia, and while I have mostly stuck to preparing white fish (because it looks the least scary to me), I have ventured out a bit.

While home for Spring Break, I tried sushi for the first time. I mean, sushi is a "so LA" thing right, so when in California, eat a California roll. And yes I did get more bold than that and even tried raw spicy tuna, which was actually quite good. My dad was in sheer disbelief, and he called me a "born again eater." A fitting description since I did do this during Lent.

When I visited Alex in Syracuse, my sea odyssey expanded a little more as I tried a crab cake (good) and a crab claw (not so good).

All in all, I think it was a pretty successful run; I even found myself eating the fish that I had on non-Fridays. Though I'm still a little wary about all types of fish and seafood (squid = nasty), nor would fish probably be my first choice at a restaurant, I do think I've made much progress. I think gone are the days of ordering teriyaki chicken when my family or friends go out to sushi. Plus, I think I will continue to cook fish because it's healthy and I love experimenting with new dishes.
For my final "mandatory" fish meal, I pan seared a breaded tilapia filet (coming full circle), topped it off with some tomatoes in balsamic vinegar and herbs, grilled up some eggplant, and made a brown rice and orzo pilaf. Did I mention that the procrastination measures I take in law school has made me an even better chef?

Some Cheese With that Whine?

Everyday this week, I've been or will be going to some kind of event. In addition to learning about interesting or at least useful information, a nice side benefit was getting free lunch. Although most of us were happy to be fed a variety of non-pizza lunches like wraps and empanadas, there are always the whiners. Very vocal ones.

Example 1
Girl: Did you hear that they're serving f*cking empanadas at the HPV panel? Why would they do that? I could understand serving empanadas if we were talking about...like Nicaragua, but just give us some pizza. [My friend just wanted to know when HPV became just a US issue or why you can only serve empanadas at events relating to South America.]

Example 2
Bunch of students complaining about the salad, fruit, and matza spread that my criminal law professor nicely arranged for student celebrating Passover. [Some girl turned around and politely noted that they should be fortunate that they're the only group of people that the cafeteria makes special accomodations for.]

You know, catered lunches aren't always the best but they're still a courtesy. Despite our high tuition, we did pay it as tuition, not a meal plan. The school doesn't really have an obligation to feed, let alone feed us exactly what we want. From my experience event planning, I say that the school does a pretty good job offering decent crowd-friendly food with some options and always a vegetarian option. They should satisfy the "reasonable" person.

Moreover, there's never a consensus on what people want. Get pizza, people complain that we always have pizza and that it's unhealthy. Serve really good empanadas, people want pizza. Order Thai food, smells too much. Put out a burrito bar, people say that the beans look funny. Offer subway sandwiches, people say that we have that too much too.

Don't like something? Don't eat it then. You want to guarantee that you get a lunch you want? Pack one or buy something from the cafeteria. But alas, people just complain. I don't know if people feel more entitled to gourmet meals because they pay a lot for law school (working fundraisers with rich people, I've noticed the more people have the more they complain), or if it's just inherent in the personality of law students.

MyTube

Today I joked around that I was like Justice Sandra Day O'Connor because I was the "swing vote" in my friends' debate about mandatory HPV vaccines (yeah, we have cool discussions). Whereas one friend was skeptical about making the vaccine mandatory because he hates pharmaceutical companies, my other friend was all for it and admitted loving pharmaceuticals and big business in general. Although I have my natural biases, I definitely felt more in the middle and probably could have been "swung" either way based on information.

Few hours later, my uncle randomly sends me a video he posted online. Many have already seen this video of my third grade bookreport, but now I've hit the big time with this being on YouTube. I figure I should post it before it comes out at my confirmation hearing :)

For the Record...

Hate is a strong word. But I have disliked the state of Florida well before they crushed UCLA's National Championship aspirations...twice. Even though all of my UCLA brethren hate Florida now, I'd like to think I was a little ahead of the curve for once.

There was the 2000 election, there was the guy from Florida who asked me "how do your people dance...you know, Middle Eastern people?" there are hurricanes, there was Elian Gonzales, there are inferior avocados (see previous blog post). And more recently, there has been the Terry Schiavo case, Representative Mark Foley, etc.

I'd be interested in hearing the 303 reasons Mr. Finebaum has.

May It Please the Court...Part II

Last weekend I went to the Superior Court of DC and today the DC Court of Appeals came to me- and the rest of my law school. I guess the court is doing this "outreach" program where they are holding actual trials at satellite courts. Today they held 3 cases in our law school's ceremonial courtroom.

A bunch of people from my class went to the first trial of the morning, an appeal case regarding disbarment. Now people may think that real court isn't as interesting as tv court, but this is why the lawyer got disbarred in Maryland and why they were debating if DC should also disbar her:

The lawyer was disbarred after she failed to diclose that she had failed to ensure that her clients case was properly filed before the statute of limitations. The lawyer later dismissed the action with prejudice without her client's knowledge or consent. It gets better! Then she paid her clients funds from her personal account and told her clients that the money was from a settlement. And the kicker. She created and presented false documents to her clients and third parties saying that they settled.

Lying to clients saying you settled when you didn't, and then paying money and forging documents. In the words of one of the judges, even a lawyer fresh out of law school knows that this is wrong. Apparently this wasn't her first ethical violation either; I really wish I knew what she did before.

I think the best part of watching the case was watching the judges fire questions. They're just so smart and look so noble up there with their robes. Even though I hate making decisions, I'm starting to think that it would be a really cool job. Perhaps it is my calling, how many kids dressed up as Sandra Day O'Connor in 3rd grade?

March Sadness to April...Gladness?

It was like de ja vu last night. Except instead of sitting in Pauley Pavillion watching UCLA lose the championship game, I was sitting in my friend's apartment watching UCLA lose to Florida for the second year in a row. I just sat there mostly quiet for the final minutes of the game. No yelling at the tv, just staring. My law school friends asked me how I could be so eerily calm.

To be honest, I feel like I've been at this place so many times before. And I'm not just talking about UCLA v. Florida, or even UCLA v. USC blowouts. I'm talking about hardly being on the winning side ever. From sports to politics (the only races that I really worked on/raised money for in '06 were Phil Angelides for CA governor and Harold Ford Jr. for TN Senator: the rare losers in the Democrat's big sweep year). I'm used to being on the losing end.

This doesn't mean I've become any less passionate about cheering on my team or campaigning for my cause, I just think I've gained a lot of experience coping with competitive loses. And to also keep things in perspective, I know I'm a very 'lucky' person in all other aspects of my life (lucky as in fortunate and in the fact that I actually do have this long string of "good luck").

Though DC was gloomy today to mourn the losses of both Georgetown and UCLA, it is a new month now and it is supposed to be 80 degrees tomorrow. The month of madness- with trial briefs, and write-ons, airport layovers, and oral arguments, and applications galore is over. Time to enjoy April before May ushers in the finals.