April Came Early This Year

In law school I used to joke that the only time it is really challenging is in November and April (the month before exams) and the rest of the time was just one big party.  I may have exaggerated a little, but for the most part it is the truth.  Well, I didn't put in enough effort in January and February and my classes are extra challenging this semester, so my April began last weekend. 

During my exam cram sessions, I actually live a rather healthy lifestyle.  You will not find a dirty apartment or takeout boxes everywhere at my place during this time.  I actually cook healthy meals, workout once or twice a day and clean the apartment religiously.  If you haven't figured it out, I am a huge procrastinator while I am cramming.  I am not a marathon studyer.  I can sit down and work for 20 or 30 minutes and then I need a break.  Fortunately, I don't let these breaks consist of tv or nap time, so they only thing else to do is clean, workout, cook, or read.  I surprisingly can finish a lot of books during exam time.  I always take 10-15 minute (sometimes longer if I am working out) break and then get right back to the books.

As you know from the last post, I am starting to get really frustrated and down on myself about being unemployed, so focusing all of my time on studying right now is definitely helping keep my mind off of my job status.  Unfortunately, it also means that I have become really lame and missing out on fun weekend activities.  Last weekend I missed out on St. Augustine, and then this weekend I will probably missing out on some florida baseball tailgating, so come summer and the end of exams, I am going to be ready to cut loose and make up for some missed time. 

What a Let Down

Last week, I interviewed for a job in Greenville.  Only three people interviewed for the position, and I thought that my interview went well, so I liked my chances.  I mistakenly got my hopes up and started picturing myself spending a long time with that firm.  Well unfortunately, I got a phone call from one of my classmates that he had gotten and accepted the job.  I was crushed and felt defeated. 

At first I was just really sad.  Then I lost my appetite and threw my dinner I had prepared in the trash.  I thought nothing good will come out of this day so I decided to go ahead and go to sleep early.  Well that was a mistake thinking I could sleep.  I just kept thinking about what I could have done wrong, what else could I do, why am I not getting a job, and where am I going to go next.

I can't help but think that my gender stereotype has something to do with it.  It is not just that I am a female, but that I am a young female with long blond hair who cares about her appearance.  Last night I was so close to taking the scissors to my hair and then tomorrow buy hair dye to turn me mousy brown.  At my age and in the profession I am seeking, it is as if you have to choose.  Do I want a good job and look that part (i.e. gender neutral) or do I want to attract the opposite sex and hopefully find someone to spend my life with?

So after I had my legally blonde moment, I started to feel cheated.  I was always under the impression that if you worked hard and make good grades, you will be rewarded.  Well I seemed to have missed that reward.  I graduated at the top of my high school class.  I graduated with honors from college with a bachelors in Finance and minor in Accounting.  I graduated in the top 20% of my law school class, and I currently hold a 3.5 in my master tax program.  And yet, I can't get a job!  What else am I supposed to do.  I am so tempted to just give up, move back home, work retail or bartend, barely live pay check to pay check and hopefully find some guy that might be willing to take care of me for a little while.

Yes, I am throwing myself a pity party on this post, but I needed to vent because I am feeling pretty lost these days.  Thanks for listening.

To Go or Not To Go?

I was invited to go to St. Augustine's this weekend.  I haven't been to this place since I was in 5th grade, and I am pretty sure I would have a completely different experience this time around.  We would get there friday night and probably go out pretty hard.  Saturday would potentially be a beach day, and then Sunday we would spend all day at some thing called Reggae Sunday.  Sounds fun right?  But I am hesitating going.

Reasons why I am hesitating: I am broke.  I am worried about how I am going to pay tuition this summer, and then if I don't end up getting a job, how I am going to pay to live/impending student loans.  Undoubtedly, I will probably be spending a lot of money this weekend.  Speaking of spending money, I would have to board Tillie all weekend.  Because we will be getting back late Sunday night, I would have to board her for 3 nights.  Plus, I would miss her and I hate being away from her.  This is a superficial reason, but I don't exactly have my body bikini ready just quite yet, and while I don't mind lying on a beach chair in a bikini, frollicing around on a beach is a completely different thing.  Things tend to jiggle on the beach.  Another superficial reason is that the guy that invited me likes me, and I like him as a friend, but I don't think there is anything else there.  Currently, there are 3 guys and 3 girls on the trip.  I don't want him to get the wrong idea that this is a couple trip.  It may be best not to put myself in that situation.  But...most importantly, I am waaayyyy behind in school this semester.  I had planned on getting it together this week, but it is Wednesday and I have still not done any school work to make up this week. 

However, there is the you are only young once, must take advantage of chances to do something fun argument.  But is this arguement enough to weigh against all the others? 

Adding Hours to my Day

I had a job interview last week.  I really liked the firm and the job and crossing my fingers that I get good news in the next two weeks.  However, I will likely be having to work 60-70 hours a weeks, which will be a big difference from me attending class 11 hours a week.  I am so nervous I am going to get a lawyer(pudgy) body and a flat butt.  So I know I will be too tired to work after work and can't guarantee what time I will be getting home from work, so I need to set a morning workout routine.  The best way to set a routine apparently is to do it over and over again until it is something that you do automatically.  So I am trying to start my routine in March, which gives me 4-5 months to get ready for a potential work schedule. 

I tried to start this morning.  I attempted to go to bed around 9:30 last night. Tillie was not ready to go to bed yet and wanted to play instead.  I think I finally dozed off around 10:15, but of course she woke me up at least once during the middle of night.  It was our first night back in the apartment and she never sleeps well in her first night in new place.  I set the alarm for 5 am.  In my mind I knew that I really didn't have to get out of bed until 5:30, so when the alarm went off, I already had the snooze button on my brain.  Unfortunately, I snoozed until 6:15.

I planned to give myself the 6 o'clock hour for workouts.  However, instead of working out when I got out of bed, I ate breakfast, drank coffee, surfed the internet, watched Full House on tv, and started blogging.  Basically, I was doing anything other than popping in my P90x dvd to power up my arms.  I even declared it a two cups of coffee day rather than my usual one cup. 

So what do I do?  Should I look at it as a good start that I got out of bed at 6 instead of 7:30?  Should I deactivate my snooze function?  How do I just get out of bed and immediately start working out and ignore my email that has come between the hours of 10 pm and 6 am (the daily online shopping emails from gap, jcrew, banana, etc.)?

Cable Free

I have decided that once I get back from my spring break that I am going to cancel my cable.  One of my biggest hobbies has been watching tv.  I follow a ton of tv shows, and if I miss one live, I make sure to catch up via the internet.  I have found that I have the ability to spend an entire day watching one show after the other.  Well, I have decided enough is enough.  I need to cut this nasty habit of mine.  Now don't get me wrong, I will still follow all of my tv shows, but all of  the tv shows can be seen on my laptop.  I can't wait to save those 65 dollars a month.  Plus, I will never have to watch another rerun again and I can watch all of my shows when I am available. Fortunately, my apartment complex comes with free basic cable such as nbc, abc, cbs, fox, cw etc. so I will still be able to watch the today show in the morning.

Happy Birthday to my Best Friend

A year ago yesterday, my best friend was born.  I didn't actually meet her until 7 weeks later, but I loved her since the moment she was born.  My best friend is my puppy Tillie.  She has saved me in more ways than one.  Before her, I was pretty cold, loved being alone, and spent a lot of time being sad.  But for the past year, she has warmed my heart and helped me to become open and eager to enjoy the company of others. 

Miss Tillie has the best personality.  She is very sassy and not afraid to tell you exactly what she wants.  She is a little boy crazy and loves her treats.  She is also very protective of me.  She lets me know when someone may be getting too close to our apartment, and she is willing to take on small dogs, big dogs, and even cows in order to protect me from harm.  She loves to nap, and while I normally make it a rule never to be the back spoon, she is just so good at being the front the spoon. 

While Tillie is very needy and ended up being close to the equivalent of taking care of a baby, her companionship has been invaluable.  I am so grateful that I get to associate the holiday of love with my loving puppy's birthday.

Wiiiiii!

So I made an impulse buy last week.  I purchased my first ever gaming console.  Yes, we did own the first nintendo when I was little, but that was my brother's and I got limited use, so it doesn't count.  I got the urge after I spend evening at a friend's house play Just Dance 2.  For those of you that know me, you know how much I like to booty shake, so I had a blast!  Not to mention, I definitely broke a sweat and burned some calories.  So I decided it was time to take the plunge and give in to the gaming world. 

I purchased my Wii and then immediately purchased the Just Dance 2 game.  Unfortunately, they were purchases from Amazon so I had to wait a week to get them, but they finally arrived yesterday.  I have already mastered the choreography to 6 of the dances.  I can't wait to bring my new moves to the dance floor this weekend.  Well I don't know if XS is quite ready for the dances, but I will try to blend my old moves with my new moves. 

The Wii also came with Wii sports and Wii sports resort.  There are a ton of games on here that I can't wait to try.  The only one I have done so far is sword fighting, which is a great way to get out a little aggression.  Highly recommended.  The only problem is I live alone.  So playing by myself doesn't help me bring out my competitive side.  I wish I could teach my westie how to play. 

The Wii also came with Netflix access.  But I have cheap internet which is not compatible, but as soon as I move up and out of Gainesville, my return on the Wii investment will be much greater. 

I have decided to limit myself with the amount of gaming I do each day, even if it is a good workout.  I don't want to be one of those "video game people".  But for giggles you can think of me dancing and sword fighting alone in my apartment for around 45 minutes each day.

Loving the Public Library

When I was little, my mom and I would spend hours each week picking out dozens of children's books each week.  In Elementary school, I was a top accelerated reader and always got my free pizza at Book It.  I used to volunteer in my school library and when go through the stacks of novels and make a long list of books I wanted to discover and read.  However, when I went to middle school, because I was reading so much earlier, I couldn't keep up with my accelerated reading goals and started to get punished for not getting enough points.  Needless to say, once your punishment is to read more, you stop seeing it as something you really want to do everyday.  I started back reading a little bit over the summers in college, but once law school started, the casebooks took the place of those novels and pleasure reading. 

Well I have rediscovered my love of reading.  I guess it started when I was told that on my long 6 hour drives back and forth between SC and FL that audiobooks make the time go faster.  Well after listening to these wonderful stories in my car, I realized that I could be reading outside of my car as well.  I went downtown to go get my library card.  There were soooo many books there, and I had forgotten how overwhelming it would be.  So I just went to a standby authors name and got two books from her.  However, the internet has made things much easier since the last time I was a public library customer.  Not only can I search for good books on the catalog and find out whether they are available, I can renew books I have out, I can place books on hold and let them email me when they are available, and I can also download audiobooks to my ipod for my car trips.  It is so great to finish a book and then get an email saying that your next book is ready to be picked up.  I didn't even have to go searching in the stacks for it.  They had it ready for me at checkout.  Also, thanks to the good reads website, I can get book ideas from my friends based on their recommendations of the books that they have read.

I have just started Phillipa Gregory's queen books, and I think I am going to go read a chapter before I go to class, and maybe another chapter while I wait at the bus stop.

A New Book Obsession

I have never perused the self help aisle of a bookstore, but recently I made an exception.  I purchased Bethenny Frankel's book Naturally Thin.  Let me just say that I have really liked this book.  It is not a diet book, but a way to put yourself into a new mindset.  It is supposed to be a mindset of how naturally thin people think when it comes to food.  Basically saying, naturally thin people don't really think all that much about what food they can have or can't have.  If you binge for a day, don't beat yourself up about it and stop eating healthy because you are ruined.  Just be better the next day.  Don't not eat foods that you really want to eat because you think you are not supposed to have them, just eat them, taste them and then you are satisfied.  And...don't worry, you will always have a chance to eat fries so don't think you need to eat every last one. 

So I took my new knowledge out to a restaurant for the first time.  I did my best to follow her naturally thin rules.  The restaurant was a brewery where they brew 8 different kinds of beers.  There were four that I wanted to taste, so instead of ordering four pints, I opted for ordering 4 oz of each kind.  Also, I really wanted the calamari appetizer.  So I ordered it, had two or three pieces and then passed the rest around the table.  The menu was large so there were many options for my entree.  There were sandwiches, salads, pasta dishes, and what they are famous for which is their pizzas.  I could have gone the diet route and ordered a salad, but salads are not always that healthy, and it really wasn't what I wanted to eat.  So I weighed my options and I was down to a grilled chicken sandwich, shrimp tacos, and pizza.  The sandwich and tacos came with fries, and I honestly didn't really want fries, but if they were there I was sure that I would eat them anyway.  Also I think the pizza would taste much better than the other two options, so I went with the pizza.  I got the mini mediterranean that was loaded with good vegetables.  Because of the beer and the calamari, I got full really quickly.  So rather than stuffing my face with the mini pizza (which did happen to be mini), I ate until I was full.  I canceled my membership in the clean plate club, and didn't feel bad about not getting a box to take it home.  Prior to this book, I would have taken it home because I knew I was going out and would want late night food.  Instead, I offered it to a friend.  It didn't go to waste and more importantly it didn't go on my waistline. 

So even though I ate pizza and beer and calamari at a restaurant, I didn't feel bad about it.  I really like this new way of thinking.  I can eat whatever I want and that is kind of liberating.   I will admit that over exams and the holidays I did a lot of excessive eating, but since I have been back to Gainesville, I have gotten down to a comfortable weight and well on my way to getting back to where I was last summer.

Resolutions By the Way Side

I say by the way side because I feel like that is a saying, but if it is not, my bad.  I simply mean that I have discarded mine.  It is 16 days into the new year and my resolution is gone already.  Good or bad?  My resolution was to make better use of my time.  As you have read before, I don't have a lot of obligations on my time these days.  I attend class only 11 hours out of the week.  I don't have a job or kids to take care of (other than my oh so needy Westie), so it seems like I should be taking advantage of all this time and do amazing things.  Well to implement this resolution, I decided that I was going to stop taking naps, read my book alot more, exercise at least once everyday, and only watch two hours of television everyday. 

Well I changed my mind.  I don't know if it was because I wasn't following my resolution very well, or to the fact that maybe I have been thinking about this extra time all wrong.  Rather than forcing myself to do things that other people think I should be doing, I think maybe I should take advantage of this time to be able to do things that I actually want to do.  If I am tired, I have the ability to go lay on my bad and take a wonderful long nap (assuming Tillie is willing to let me do so).  If there is a good movie on the tv in the afternoon, I should be able to watch it.  If I don't feel like exercising everyday, I shouldn't have to.  Now don't get me wrong.  I don't actually plan on spending everyday napping and watching tv, but on certain days, maybe that is all I want to do.  And, after this first week back at school, I have already started to plan a few new experiences for myself.  I have signed up for a ballroom dancing class.  Ten of us from my program will be learning to waltz, fox trot, cha cha, rumba, tango, and swing dance.  I am super excited about this because I am head over heels obsessed with dancing with the stars and am still trying to come up with a way I can be famous so that I can be on that show.  I also have decided to join the coed softball team with the stipulation that my team members are not allowed to yell at me.  I played softball in the summers on the law firm leagues, but our team was pitching to us, and honestly, they were more about socializing than actually playing the game.  But, my pink glove and I will be out on the field giving it our best effort. 

So I guess, if I am going to say that I have a resolution, I plan to do what I want to do while I still can.