If my career in law fails, I'll be a homemaker

It occurred to me suddenly today that no fewer than THREE of my favourite people have the initials MM. Is this statistically unusual? I don't know. If there is a statistician out there who can answer that question for me, I'd be interested in knowing the answer.

The one male MM of the group came over for lunch today. Threatened with the prospect of having to live up to AHC's standard, I made peach crisp for dessert. Luckily MM is a recovering country boy from Out East, and lived a childhood replete with every variety of crisp baked by his mother. I'm sure he was saying it just to quell my insecurity, but he said mine was better than his mother's.

Take that, AHC!


(Sadly, this picture would be so much better if I had my dad's Nikon. Will somebody please buy me a digital SLR and put me out of my misery??)

Attack!

On the long weekend, the fam and I went to O-town to move some of my stuff. Within five minutes of arriving at CFO's house, the kids managed to break a lamp (that's one in 100% of the places I've lived in Ottawa). After moving, we hit the Children's Museum, the Dinosaur show at the Imax, a Tex-Mex resto with TF&C and Partner, and, on Sunday, a friend's cottage near Arnprior. We had a great time. AHC actually picked mussels out of the Ottawa River and cooked them up just to try. I think we all only had one, so probably not enough to kill us with whatever pollution or toxins lay within.

The Big Boy got out of the River with a little friend attached to his little toe for lunch. Now, I sort of regret not taking a picture of it while it was still attached. After all, I don't think leeches are life threatening. My mothering instinct was more intent on getting it off. Which is why I would have failed as a papparazzo. I did take a pic afterwards now, with the wound. And you can't even really see the yucky bruise! Eek!

Why are women always looking like idiots?

I'm not the first person to notice this, but I'm having a surge of "pissed off" about it right now:

Why is it that commercials always make women look like dumb freaks on any kind of cleaning product ad? Seriously. I just watched two Febreeze ads. One of them actually had a female psychiatrist lying on the patient couch sniffing like a fool. The patient says "Doctor, shouldn't I be on the couch?" and she snaps back, "No!" So, presumably a woman who has spent thousands of dollars and years on her education lacks the capacity to maintain professional behaviour faced with a sweet smelling cleaning product.

This is but one example of any number. It disgusts me. I'm going to start buying lemons and vinegar to do my cleaning because I'm offended by it.

And yet in December 2006 , our friends in Canada's New Government thought it was a good idea to remove equality from the mandate at Status of Women, close SoW offices and cut funding to advocacy programs.

Don't think these are unrelated in the grand scheme of things.

Eat Your Greens

Just a quick note to point out that AHC has started posting on his recipe blog again after a bit of a hiatus (could it be that he was a single dad with two kids for eight months? I'm not going to hold it against him...too much). His recent post on cooking vegetables reminded me of the fact that when he started studying culinary, he hated vegetables. I always bugged him that it was not going to be acceptable for a chef to not eat vegetables. After a short time at cooking school, he realized that, in fact, he did NOT hate vegetables, just that his mother had been overcooking them for his entire life.

(It also amuses me that she likes to take credit for his cooking ability: "I taught you everything you know!" whenever he has suggestion (like, for example, the right way to cook veg). It's like that scene in Dirty Dancing where Baby's mother says something like "I think she gets it from me." On the bright side, she's really good at refried beans and other southern fare of her youth.)

Being that I am the beneficiary of pretty much every recipe on the blog, I can certify that it's all pretty damn good. I highly recommend reading and cooking from it.

The Facebook Dilemma

PRIVACY: I've spent considerable time this year studying privacy at school, for my research job and for my own personal interest. I've spent the past several weeks reading numerous SCC judgments on the "reasonable expectation of privacy," a standard (if you can call it that) underlining a person's s. 8 Charter rights. I worked lengthy hours on a report about digital rights management technologies and the privacy concerns surrounding them. I've got a continuing project about health records and privacy. I'm all over privacy.

Which is why I have a Facebook dilemma. I've resisted thus far. I do not have an account, though I will admit to hypocrisy: When I came back from school, I logged on to AHC's account (with his permission) and nosed around. Found some people, sent a couple of messages and even re-connected with a couple of people from the past. Otherwise, it seems kind of freaky to post stuff for the world to see. I know you can fix your privacy settings, but I have concerns that there's insidiousness just below the surface and I don't want to get sucked into it.

This is mostly a problem right now because I am in Toronto and many of my friends are not. But many of them have FB accounts. It seems like one way to keep in touch. Scanning someone's FB page seems kind of like passing them in the hall, or chatting for a minute by the lockers after class.

In truth, I'm one of those people who thinks you can't really replace face time with a person. I'm against living online. It would drive me crazy in class that people would be posting on people's walls in the middle of class to people who were three rows away. Seriously, wait until after class and talk to the person! It's a whole confluence of elements in our culture, I think: our sharing culture (guilty! I have a blog!) and our soundbite culture (not exactly guilty, but I do have a past in journalism, contributing to the phenom), to name but two. Oh, and I should add our simulacrum culture, just to shout out to Killingsworth. [On a weird note, I just pulled out my Canadian Oxford to check the spelling of "simulacrum" and I opened it on exactly the right page.]

What to do?!

US Supreme Court

The Sunday New York Times (from July 1) had an interesting article on the session of the US Supreme Court that just closed. By the way, why is there only one woman (and only one visible minority) on the US Supreme Court? Not that Canada is the shining paragon of equality, but at least we've got four women sitting in our highest court. Though we're a little slim on the minorities ourselves. Unless you count the French.

Curse Selection

Have you ever noticed that dropping one little letter turns a "course" into a "curse"?

That has meaning at so many levels, but I am referring in particular to the selection of these courses/curses, which is happening as we speak. My dear, dear university posted no fewer than 10 documents pertaining to selection, with over 100 classes to chose from. Luckily, my scheduling requirements are very specific, so I was able to eliminate most of them, so my choices were more limited.

I hope it all works out.

'Fraidy Cat

I was reviewing a number of judgments late into the night last night, long past dark and long past the kids and AHC went to bed. The judgments pertained to a variety of unsavouries, including murderers and drug dealers.

The house was very quiet and very dark and I fairly expected someone to jump out and harm me as I went up to bed. I checked the doors were locked twice.

It's like watching horror movies and being too scared to sleep (which I don't do because I'm a suck). I totally managed to psyche myself out.

TCO Reads

Isabel Allende, Aphrodite. (June 2007)
Ahhhhh, food. And love. Or lust. Hot stuff. It's a book all about aphrodisiac foods. It was great. Funny and amusing. And thank God, it didn't take itself too seriously. Plus, good recipes. Or, I assume they might be good. I might even try some of them. I need to cook more to get in touch with my inner creator.

Scott Turow, One L. (June 2007)
I picked this one up at CFO's house, when AHC and I stayed there last week. The infamous law school book! I expect I would have had a different reaction had I read it before or during school. As it were, I recognized the sentiments and laughed at some of it in solidarity. But the utter confusion is passed (gone since Poa On in the first semester of contracts). And I didn't have any of those Perini-type crazy Socratics. I did have one really crappy teacher, but that is another story.

Batya Gur, Murder in Jerusalem. (June 2007)
It was alright. A murder mystery. Another pickup from the guest room up north. Passes time in the summer.

Wayne Johnston, The Colony of Unrequited Dreams. (June 2007)
This was quite beautiful. I visited St. John's last year, so I could picture the places in the book, which is something I tend to love when reading a book. Plus, I remember writing an essay on Joey Smallwood in grade 8. I don't remember what I wrote at all, except that Smallwood was a personal hero of my teacher (so I imagine it was glowing). I love the humanity, foibles and weaknesses of heroes. It reminds me of my grandfather, who was a great man and loved by many (known to many in his capacity as a United Church minister), but with undeniable shortcomings in some parts of his life. And yet we love and idolize him all the same. I tend to love him more because of this humanity, by which I mean to indicate his capacity for mistake, poor judgment, weakness. Even the great men and women are touchable.

Michael Cordy, The Messiah Code. (May 2007)
Urgh. Don't read this. It was weekend reading from the guest room at my parents place. I picked it up for something to do. It was even renamed to sound like The DaVinci Code to capitalize on the popularity of that book. Which it needed, because otherwise it sucked, even worse than DaVinci Code.

Nicola Kraus and Emma McLauchlin. Citizen Girl. (May 2007)
Okay, for a summer read. But perhaps slightly depressing given its take on the job market, on women in the job market, on young women and the need to sell out in the job market, and on the feminist job market. Maybe not the way I needed to start my summer after spending the previous eight months increasing my student (and personal) debt by several thousand dollars just for the privilege of studying law. May my future not be hers, but I have at least a shadow of a doubt about that.

Between the Covers

A while ago I heard or read an interview with a woman (I can't now remember who, but I think maybe it was on CBC) who kept a journal of all the books she read. This sounds like a fascinating idea to me. I used to read a lot more than I do now (other responsibilities in life have reduced my overall reading time), but I still manage to get in a lot of reading compared to some people. Anyway, I'm going to start just such a record. See the menu for the link to the list...

Closetfill

For some inexplicable reason, I had a strong urge this weekend to clean out the closet of my childhood. And that's not a metaphor for anything. I mean the actual closet of my childhood, which has been accumulating stuff since I moved to that house in 1983. It's been cleaned out a variety of times over the years, but not so much since 1996 when I graduated from high school and moved to Europe. Since then, my room ceased to be mine, and all my stuff got boxed up and closeted...until now. I took a couple of antihistamines and dug in.

I found a lot of good/funny stuff: tons of ridiculous and hilarious stuff from old boyfriends (including a cool pair of socks from one of the Italians which I still could not part with), a picture of ACH and me on the night that began it all, a letter dated 1992 from the uncle who has had an undeniable impact on my present path, some of my old art (I hope I don't regret tossing it out, but it's not that good), and all manner of photographs from every stage of my life.

One of the most fantastic things, though, is the collection of cassette tapes accumulated over my life. The last time I was in that closet, people still listened to cassette tapes. In fact, I am listening to some of my old tapes right now. Talk about flashback. Anyway, here's my collection, because it's seriously making me laugh:

• All manner of mixed tape, including *'s Happy Fun Tape (punk tape made by my best friend from grade 11-12), my dad's Oldies but Goodies mix with the Bobby Fuller Four version of "I fought the law" which I LOVED when I was a kid (and still do), and at least a couple of boyfriend mixes (Seany's Noisy Mix comes to mind)
• A whole series of The Solid Gold Collection which was this series published by Esso or Shell in the '80s. You got them when you filled up. Gas stations never do that any more.
• Butterfly Plague and Imp, both bands with people I knew in them
  
• Debbie Gibson "Out of the Blue," Olivia Newton John, "Greatest Hits" (none of which I recognize), Paul Abdul "Forever Your Girl" (apparently not enough to ruin her life forever), Madonna "Like a Virgin", Salt n Pepa "Very Necessary" (not the one with "Let's Talk About Sex")
• Jimi Hendrix "The Ultimate Experience," Christopher Cross, Lenny Kravitz "Are You Gonna Go My Way," Leonard Cohen (still a fan, but now I'm old enough to appreciate him),
• Smashing Pumpkins, the Flaming Lips, Enigma "The Cross of Changes," 54-40, Nirvana "Bleach," Red Hot Chili Peppers, Genesis "We Can't Dance," Snap "World Power" (?), The Beatles, Beastie Boys "Licensed to Ill" (a tape which got stuck in the the player of my LeBaron for several months one time), Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Arrested Development "3 Years, 5 Months & 2 Days in the Life Of", Nine Inch Nails (yeah, that one), USA for Africa "We Are the World" (back when MJ wasn't a total freak yet), Technotronic, Breakdance (a compilation of break dance music), and C+C Music Factory ("Everybody dance NOW..." oh, the good old days!)
  
• A ton of stuff from my dad's collection, including lots of classical music, Bellafonte, Liberace and the Dueling Banjos
• There's a tape labelled "Elvis Presley - LIVE (Taped in Denver-11/77-Gramps) Merry Xmas to Ricky 1977"-there's no one that I can think of in my family named "Ricky" so I'm going to have to find out who that is. Also, Elvis didn't perform after June of '77, but it definitely sounds like him on the tape...maybe it's his ghost.
• And, my personal favourite, from 1984, published by K-tel International Ltd: The Minipops "Let's Dance"!!!! I'm embarrassed by it, but Hsuan (our billeted harpsichordist from the TBSI) and I kind of got down listening to this tonight. I have to say, they do a pretty good "Our house [in the middle of our street]."

There is a ton of stuff without labels, so I'm going to have to go through and check it out, just for old time's sake.

Okay, time to bust a move.

Okay, Now I'm Done

When I got into the car this morning, The Beatles came blaring at me, to the tune of "Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da," with the meaningful refrain: "Life goes on." Yeah. I took that as a good sign. And The Beatles was fitting music in some ways, being one of the all time favourite groups of the professor of my property law class, a class in which I managed to pull off a minor coup on my final grade. A rather unexpected pleasant surprise. So, I thought, it makes sense to listen to that music if it, in some cosmic way, connects me to the brain waves that got me such a gift in my property class.

No car accidents, no infections or diseases (or infectious diseases), no fire alarms or bomb threats (or fire bombs). For better or for worse, that exam is now done. Just getting it written feels like a minor coup. I'm happy.

AND, I am officially done 1L.

Seriously, I Still Have One Exam to Write

Me and exams? We've got issues. And it's not that I can't write them, either. I do just fine on exams, thank you very much. But last semester it was ear infections before Crim (and throughout the rest of 1L). Then, on the first day of exams I had to attend a funeral, so my K exam was deferred. Which I promptly rescheduled. And then promptly got a strep infection the day before I was supposed to write it.

I'm fairly convinced that I'm going to get into a car accident or something on the way up to Osgoode (that's where I'm writing the exam, so I don't have to go back to Ottawa) just because things happen in threes (don't they?) and because it would just sort of be funny if it happened. Again.

The Sour Cream of Wit

AHC and I spent dinner last night teaching the kiddies about sarcasm. They hear us use it all the time, but I'm sure it's confusing for them, especially the irony part. Cognitively, kids can't get their heads around this linguistic device until a certain age. The Girl, at 5 3/4 years, got it once we explained it to her, but Big Boy, at 3 3/4 years, just couldn't think up one sarcastic thing to say. I suppose I should be grateful for that. I should perhaps hold off this type of teaching until they get through their teens, but I've really never been smart that way.

We played this game where we'd give them a phrase and they'd have to say whether it was sarcastic or not. TG was right 100% of the time and BB was mostly just perplexed (Me: TG just loves it when we make broccoli for dinner, TG: That's sarcastic, BB: But I like broccoli!). AHC gave her this one: "It makes me so happy when [the neighbour's dog] pees on our lawn." To which TG deadpanned:

"That's definitely sarcasm."

Love on the Internet

Some days, I love the internet. I just had a live chat with a librarian from Glendale in Los Angeles County, California who helped me locate a state bill in Oregon which I could not find.

Librarians are fantastic. Some days, I wish I was one.

Radio Silence

Sorry for the long absence. Between the never ending exams, deferral--part one, immediately driving to Montreal for CFP only hours after finishing my last exam, the long drive back to TO from MTL after 8 long months of law school, strep throat, deferral--part two, two days in class for a summer course, and the job interview...you get the picture.

Anyway, I'm back. My law peeps are scattered. Or maybe I'm the one that's scattered. We're probably all a little scattered right now. Praise be that I never have to do 1L ever again.

Stay tuned for a series of post-1L reflections, just for the hell of it.

Big Boy Joy

Conversation with the Big Boy this morning, who is with the Grands this weekend while I finish up IL:

BB: Hi Mummy [resigned voice]
Me: Hi Big Boy!
BB: Mummy, I miss you A LOT. [matter-of-fact voice]
Me: Oh, I miss you too.
BB: Where ARE you? [confused voice]
Me: Ottawa, at school.
BB: Oh, yeah. Now you've got 'zams. Lots of 'zams. [sympathetic voice]
Me: Yes, lots of exams.
BB: And lots of reading. Lots of reading. Are you coming home on Monday?
Me: Not Monday, Friday. Five sleeps [I count the sleeps with him]
BB: YEEESSSSSSSS!

He's starting to sound a lot older on the phone now. Like a little adult. I don't think I could take this much longer. He makes me too happy. I'm totally selfish for his love, his little kisses, his hysterical sense of humour, and his good company. Even if the Big Boy weren't my kid, I think we'd be friends. I mean, how can you not be friends with someone who adores you?! Aside from the adoration, there are definitely less than 10 people in this world who crack me up like he does. There's lots of other good things about him too, but if I get into them all, I'll just sound like one of those biased mothers (which would be true, but he's actually fabulous).

Rituals

It finally feels like I'm writing spring exams and not winter exams. Snow storm on Monday, but yesterday it was 18 degrees or something like that. Actually warm. I've been studying steady (almost) for the last 10 days, however, and I notice my exam rituals. I think I have three fairly reoccuring ones:

1Rroom cleaning. At the beginning of exams I always to a major clean up and then I basically have to start every day after tidying. Because by the end of a day of studying there's paper, coffee cups, glasses and the detritus of brain junk all over the place.

2) Music. This semester it's Arcade Fire, Modest Mouse, Count Basie and a little Bob Marley (because the sun finally came out). Last semester it was Chris Isaac, Sarah Harmer, Hawksley, Cat Power. Apparently I needed mellowing last semester.

3) Junk food. I bought Coke last night. This is almost the only time I drink pop. I'm not even a mixed-drink kind of pop drinker. There will probably also be Pizza Pizza, M&Ms, chips. It's kind of like an act of desperation. I have no good excuses for this one!

Anyone got good exam karma for me?

Hitched!

Wow! I've been married to a nice guy for six years today. SIX YEARS! That's pretty good, I think. And what's really good is that I'm more sure today than I was eight years ago (when we got together) why we're great. It's a bit of a comfort to know that things have actually improved in our relationship over time. None of that post-honeymoon let-down. We're still getting better!

Anyway, to AHC, it really sucks that I'm not home today with you and the fruits of our (*my*) labours, but soon we'll be through this most difficult of years. History tells us that we keep getting better, so there's no reason to doubt that now...

And now that I'm in law school, I kind of love the fact that I got married in the Court of the Queen's Bench at Osgoode Hall. I loved it before, but my career path makes it extra-extra special (for the sentimentalist in me who likes tradition and lineage).

Home Stretch

It was rather anti-climactic, but my last class of 1L occured yesterday. There's a lot going on, so I failed to notice that I'd made it this far. "Made it" being a relative term. This was kind of a crappy semester, between the vertigo and the ear infections and the family strain (they are getting so sick of me being absent). Also, I haven't really made anything until I pass those final exams, which will hopefully be at least mediocre. You know it's been a bad semester when I am hoping for mediocre.

I have two papers and four exams to go. I already miss my friends. I'm a cocooner at exam time. I don't play well with others. I'm a study group failure. I kind of hate every person who ever encouraged me to go to law school. But it will pass. I hope. Since I really like some of those people.

Good luck to my prof who had to cancel class this morning. It's the best of times and the worst of times for awhile, but it usually gets better...

It's a Small, Small Wiki After All

I just found out that a guy I had a fling with in highschool has a wikipedia page. This is what living with your high school friend with a laptop and a highspeed wireless connection does to you.

Seriously, I should be studying.

The Riot Grrls Will Not be Happy

Argh! There's a porn movie on an adult channel (which, by the way, I do not subscribe to, I just see the menu) called "Grrrl Power!" Talk about co-opting the women's movement for the wrong reasons. And something tells me it's not of the feminist porn genre. Could it be that it's on the Hustler channel. Yup, that might be it.

Oops

I just dropped my cellphone into my coffee.

Opinions on whether that's bad?

This Week in Survival

I turned and faced the strain this week, which meant a return to the family in Toronto. It's been a long seven months of me being mostly gone and we're all feeling it.

This week I got by on:

• Loose leaf Earl Grey tea
• Raking the yard
• Putting air in the bike tires for spring
• After dinner walks around the neighbourhood
• Mommy sandwiches
• Picnics on the front porch (first one of spring) and on the livingroom floor
• Planning a feminist counter-culture bachelor(ette) party for a great friend
• Buying new mechanical pencils
  
• Hot butterscotch toddy before bed

Without classes to get in my way, I have actually been doing quite a lot of work, co-mingled with quite a lot of family time. Sometimes school is not the end all be all, and that's just the way it is.

Eat Your Heart Out

I love AHC. He is so delightful that he agreed to bring his chef self to Ottawa and cook for my small group. One of our profs is a sommalier and she agreed to do the wine pairing. And one of my colleagues (and his lovely wife) with a real house, including real (i.e. not student) kitchen offered to host us. I think there were 24 of us all together. Here's the menu, to set your mouth a-watering:

Smoked salmon on pesto-glazed crostini w/ drizzle of balsamic-soy reduction
*
Ginger-lobster salsa on Belgian endive with rice vinaigrette
*
Tequila-lemongrass broth
*
Lamb shank or chicken with shitake mushroom risotto and steamed bok choi
*
Watermelon-basil palette refresher
*
Chocolate mousse & flourless chocolate torte w/ sake flambéd berries.

Wines:

Quinta de Cabriz Vino Espumante Qualidade Bruto, 2004

Jean-Paul Godinat Quincy, 2005

Five Rivers Pinot Noir, 2005

Cuvee des Ardoises Chateau des Earles, 2003

Moscato d'Asti, 2006

Ho-ly Christ. It was a fantastic meal, if I do say so myself. Nice work, AHC, and nice work Prof. Sommalier.

Richard Posner, One Helluva Guy

I recently read the following passage in Solove & Rotenberg, eds., Information Privacy Law (New York: Aspen Publishers 2003) at p. 41. (Sorry if the citation is wrong. Where is my goddamned McGill Guide when I need it?!)

One economic argument for privacy is that sometimes people form irrational judgments based upon learning certain information about others. For example, an employer may not hire certain people based on their political views or associations, sexual orientation, mental illness, and prior criminal convictions -- even though these facts may have no relevance to a potential employee's abilities to do the job. These judgments decrease efficiency. Posner, in his book, The Economics of Justice, offers a response:

This objection overlooks the opportunity costs of shunning people for stupid reasons, or, stated otherwise, the gains from dealing with someone whom others shun irrationally. If ex-convicts are good workers but most employers do not know this, employers who do know will be able to hire them at a below-average wage because of their depressed job opportunities and will thereby obtain a competitieve advantage over the bigots. In a diverse, decentralized, and competitive society, irrational shunning will be weeded out over time..." [emphasis added]

Now, I'm as much of a fan of the law and economics perspective as the next person (*ahem*) but am I the only one who thinks that 1) the above statement is practically inhumane and 2) Posner is a blindly faithful fool if he thinks that irrational shunning will be weeded out in a decentralized and competitive society? Because, yeah, so far that's totally playing out. Or maybe when he says "over time" he means like a really really loooooooong time when we'll all be, you know, dead.

You Do It To Yourself, You Do

In a cruel twist, I am being punished for making light of dead grandmothers (who are not legitimately dead anyhow, so I don't know why I am being punished).

More or less 24 hours ago, I brought up "Dead Grandmother Season" and what happens to me? Struck down by dual ear infections. And when I say struck down, I mean it kind of literally, in that
my balance is all screwed up and I walked into a doorframe and practically knocked myself unconscious. [Stop laughing at me!]

Now the pressure in my ears is so intense that I can't sleep, which would be very nice, and I can't do anything useful, which would at least be productive. Poor poor me.

In lieu of useful or very nice, and in an attempt to distract myself, I just spend 5 minutes checking out Feminist Law Professors. This post positively made me cry, and not because of my ears. Ann Bartow is my new flavour of the month (and perhaps longer, but I won't know until I can spend more than 5 minutes at a time reading). Thanks to the CRCELT for pointing out this blog. Someday I hope to know as many cool things and people, but I doubt if I'll ever catch up now.

Pointless Law Question of the Day + One Embarassing Moment

I don't know why this thought popped into my head, but I was wondering what happens to all of the "R. v."s when we don't have a Queen anymore? When Charles takes over, will we call cases The King v. So-and-so, Rex Regis v. So-and-so? Someone, please clear this up for me.

My embarassing moment occured when I ran into one of my profs on the way out of FTX. He asked me how I was doing, and I replied that I was busy with school work and that it was getting to be "Dead Grandmother Season". He had this just absolutely horrified look on his face and seemed worried for a minute until I said that I just meant that it was getting to be that time of year where people start coming up with excuses for not getting their work done. As in "Sorry my paper is late, my grandmother died." As one former-prof friend of mine said, "they start dropping like flies this time of year."

I suppose I may have been a bit presumptuous - I just assumed he'd get that since he's a prof and I heard that expression from other of my profs (though not law profs). So wow, I don't know if he now thinks that I have really poor taste in humour or what, but the look on his face was kind of priceless (even if he does think I'm a bad person now for making light of poor dead grandmothers).

Train Etiquette

I've learned a thing or two about train etiquette since I've been taking the train about six times a month for the past six months. I'm a commuter on the VIA passenger service, so my perspective is a little more sophisticated perhaps, than someone who is just an occasional traveller.

I was mightily annoyer nearly the entire ride home yesterday morning with a passenger who was sitting behind me. She decided to share far too much information with the women sitting across from her. For example, I know that she's on her third degree (you'd think someone was giving her the third degree), and she's in teacher's college right now; she once took a class in which she had to learn all of the states and their capitals, as well as countries and capitals (or maybe she knows someone who was teaching that class); her boyfriend's name is Tom and he's a swell guy; they've had quite a lot of long distance in their relationship due to travel and school, but they talk all the time (like that morning and the night before); she was quite ill this fall and had to be hospitalized for a while; when she got out, Tom re-arranged his schedule so he could be in Ottawa with her and he had to follow her around for two weeks because she had some balance problem which could have caused her to topple over at any moment; she has a brother who is two years younger than her, who was put into a private school as a teenager because their parents were worried about his behaviour; said brother went through three post-sec programs in two years and couldn't decide on one until finally Dad refused to pay anymore; now Brother is working for Dad and he's turned himself around - all of the customer's love him because he's a real charmer and no one has a bad word to say about him; she struggled with the decision whether to pay for a cab to the train station in the morning, but she decided to in the end and she tipped the cabbie (who spent the entire time on the phone) because he was really friendly; she lives somewhere within a $12 cab ride of the train station in a first floor apartment with a few steps walk-up; I also know her opinions on the Children's Aid Society, manners and a general parental failure to teach them these days (as if, we get blamed for everything), friendliness, cleanliness and godliness. Okay, I don't know if she talked about godliness - I slept half the time. But the rest of it is true.

It's not that I care if she shares all sorts of personal and pointless information with strangers. It's really more that she did it in a carrying voice for all to hear. Talking in the train requires something akin to a stage whisper. Loud talking on the train is probably the biggest breach of etiquette. Forget the safety cards in the seats - print the rules of etiquette.

Buyer Beware

A bizarre catalogue arrived in my mailslot last week. For the life of me, I couldn't understand why I would have been sent the "Security Cameras Direct" catalogue, which contains interesting items such as the "World's Smallest Color Video Camera" (USD$125), the "Ultra-tiny Video Camera" (USD$89), and my personal favourite, the "Hidden Camera Inside Smoke Detector" (USD$79 for the wide angle model).

Alright, I don't want to stereotype, but it all seemed so American to me. Which is why it didn't take me too long to recall that I bought AHC a pair of opera glasses for Christmas. We like opera. It was also kind of a joke because AHC needs new glasses and he keeps putting it off. (Seriously, man, just go get the damned things!) Anyway, I was having some trouble finding them (not helped by the fact that I left it a bit late in spite of having this good idea for at least a month before the holidays), so I turned to the world wide web for a little shopping. Practically the only place I could find the ones I wanted was on this American website. In spite of my trepidation about turning my credit card info over to a US company (as if they don't have it anyway), I clicked my way to a pair of opera glasses for AHC.

Is there some correlation between opera glasses and security cameras that I am unaware of? It just seems so unlikely to me. God only knows what mailing/marketing list I've gotten myself onto now. It's my own fault, I know. As TF&C put it: "if you... don't want your personal information collected by retailers and data munchers, don't buy so much crap and quit putting pictures of yourself on the internet."

Marriage v. Marriage

Lest anyone be confused about the marriage I was referring to in my last post, it was my marriage to law school and the law in general. I realised post-post that it was not exactly clear that I was referring to my law marriage, as opposed to my actual marriage to AHC. That marriage is fine. In fact, who knows where I'd be without it?

In fact, it is my pining for that marriage (among other things) that is making me a bit annoyed with law school. I really like AHC and the kids. We have fun together, so it sucks that my focus is elsewhere for significant expanses of time. But, like my parents before me, the two significant relationships in my life are destined to be with my family and my career. They will forever compete and will frequently be spitting at each other, I'm sure. Sometimes it will be okay, and sometimes I will disappear into my job, partly by virtue of who I am (ambitious, dedicated to hard work, and hopefully loyal to the job), and partly by nature of the work. Lawyering and law is not necessarily a 9-5 gig. I accept it; it suits my character anyhow.

All marriages require commitment, dedication, hard work, love, fun, humour. Marriage isn't easy, but it's worth it if you're in the right one. I'm lucky that both of the marriages I'm in are right.

Honeymoon's Over

Law school is annoying me right now. The only reason we're not getting a divorce is because of the offspring of this relationship (TF&C, Trixie, indiglo®, et. al.), the cost of a divorce (tuition, living expenses, year of lost wages), and because I'm not a quitter. I believe in marriage counselling. At least three years worth. And by that time I'll have graduated, so I might as well stick it out, at least for the sake of the children.

Existential crisis anyone?

Time: Marching On

Holy! It's March 1! I'm in shock!

Those extra 3-4 days in the month (i.e. the ones between 29-31) are sure useful. Why does February only have 28 days? I can't really remember. Please enlighten me.

The Beaver: Not the Only Clichéd Canadian Symbol

My friend, who works at Heritage Canada, was rather frustrated at the use of the beaver for the PIPWatch toolbar. Because, as she said, there are more clichéd Canadian symbols out there than just the beaver. For example:

The moose
The lumberjack
Igloo (can you imagine? The privacy igloo)
The Bluenose
The Rocky Moutains
Tuques
Hockey, hockey hair, hockey players
The Great White North
Northern Lights
Mounties
The maple leaf

Anyhow, you get the idea. It's hard for me to know whether those PIPWatch people were being deliberately funny when picking the beaver, or just kind of lazy. Post it in comments if you have other fine clichéd Canadian symbols.

Conference Fun

I spent the day at the Internet Privacy Symposium, hosted by uOttawa's Law & Technology program and the Privacy Commisioner of Canada. All quite interesting, but we still managed to have some completely distracted fun, which I've received permission to blog (all anonymously, as usual, but anyone who actually knows who I am will be able to guess who the culprits are. I officially have to come up with blog names for all of my friends who appear).

So there was once session that talked about the PIPWatch toolbar. It's kind of a long story, but it's a Firefox extension that essentially has to do with rating the privacy policies of websites. And one of their symbols is - I'm not kidding - the privacy beaver. It shows green, yellow or red as a quick visual indicator of the "acceptability" of the privacy policy. So my small group friend Vimutra (he picked that name for himself, not me!) leans over to me and says, "I thought everyone's beaver was private." Except maybe Paris Hilton on the Internet, so I wonder what colour her privacy beaver rating would be? Ok, I apologize immediately for that, but I'm not retracting.

At some later point, during the post-lunch attention span lull, I'm sorry to say that we devolved into a bit of note passing. In our defence, this did honestly start out as academic discussion ("What about the potential privacy apps that are counter to corporate interests? Are they funding that?"), but it degenerated into a very short game of primary school check box and "Who would you do?" (listen, it's not that I engage in this kind of behaviour a lot, but we all do it so stop being so judgmental already). I did have a couple of good ones, but the only one I'll admit to is "The PIPWatch beaver or the Greyhound dog". Once again, I apologize, but I think this is maybe the kind of behaviour the emerges at conferences for short 10 min periods.

The rest of the time I was totally focused and learning really interesting things. For example: Some company called Citywatcher.com was requiring some employees to implant RFIDs in order to enter into a secure data centre. Did you all get that? Some job is requiring their employees to implant RFIDs in order to carry out their duties. As in your boss requiring you to implant a device into your body. Wow, I can't imagine I'm the only one who's a bit spooked by that. As I said to TF&C, "But can't you see how secure that data site is now? Someone would have to hack off their arm to get into that place." A real victory for secure data. [sarcasm]

Then there was this cool guy, Yves Poullet who spoke on the subject of third generation privacy laws. He's not a native English speaker (though, like many Europeans I've met, totally competent) and his Power Point slide had this sentence:

"Governments have lost the control"

To which TF&C immediately deadpanned:

"It's between the cushions of the couch."

Am I the only one who thinks that funny? TF&C also brought up the notion of being a data terrorist. The fact that I've written the word "terrorist" on my blog will probably have me indexed somewhere now, but anyway, I think it's kind of an interesting concept. What exactly would a data terrorist do, and would one be considered to work on the side of good or evil? (Good and evil being quite subjective notions in the realm of privacy. Please discuss.)

Also totally fantastic is the fact that Yves Poullet's bio says that, in addition to having a PhD, he holds a "License in Philosophy". Holy Christ! Some university (in Europe, I suppose) grants a license in philosophy. As TF&C said (ok, he's everywhere in this post, but we were sitting beside each other), it's harder to get than a license to kill. Oh my God! Could you imagine if it was a "License to Philosophy"? That would be the cat's meow. Then, afterwards, I actually chatted with Poullet for a minute and he said I could come see him in Belgium. I am SO into that.

Also on the subject of "Poullet" (and this will be my last point because this post is becoming unwieldy), at some point I had to notice that in English, you don't find anyone with the last name "Chicken". You don't even find anyone with the last name "Chiken". Why do you suppose that is???

I Eat Food Yum Yum!

A Humble Chef has started a recipe blog. Apparently one of my lady friends tried out the brownie recipe he posted and brought them to work and they sort of, ahem, went down really well. So her colleagues been asking where on Earth did she get that fantastic recipe. So I made AHC make a new blog.

Prepare to be impressed!

CHALLENGE: Whom among you is astute enough to catch the reference to Canadian children's lit? Show me the reference, and I'll show you the delights of AHC.

Don't Let The Catty Out of the Bag

So my roomie had to call the landlord to come in and fix the faucet of our bathtub because it was leaking to the point that it could practically run the shower. The following exchange took place between Roomie and the Landlord between 10:00 a.m. and 10:01 a.m.:

Ll: Ok, I'll come tomorrow. You have any pets?
Rm: No, but my roommate might be there, so just knock.
Ll: Your cat? You have a cat?
Rm: No, a roommate.
Ll: Ok, you don't want me to let the cat out.
Rm: I don't have a cat, I have a roommate!

Now I can be catty but not, you know, literally.

From the Margins

I've taken to scribbling "blog this" in the margins of my text books when I come across funny, profound or egregious statements. Here are some from Contracts: Cases and Commentaries:

• "[...] but in my opinion such a person must bear the consequenses of his own exceptional ignorance[...]" Mellish LJ in Parker v South Eastern Ry. Co. (1877), 2 C.P.D. 416 (C.A.). Tee hee. Sometimes ignorance is less than bliss and not equal to a defence. And such a nice example of the business efficacy argument.
  
• "Without knowledge there is nothing." Lord Devlin in McCutcheon v MacBrayne Ltd. [1964] 1 All E.R. 430 (H.L.). You can't get much deeper than that, inadvertent as it may have been.
• "And some people would sign a contract even if ' THIS IS A SWINDLE' were embossed across its top in electric pink." ("Contract as a Thing" (1970), 19 Am. U.L. Rev. 131 at 157). If only that were a statutory requirement for contracts, I could at least have a sense of humour about the really horrible ones, instead of getting my indignant self in a twist.

Egregious will come later, don't worry. There's no shortage of that in the courts.

Welcome New Baby!

This morning around 4:30 a.m. my Big Sister brought into this world her fourth beautiful baby! So welcome New Baby to the world and to the family. NB weighed in at 9 lbs 1 oz (which is, according to our mother, the exact same weight as my sister was) and she is 23 inches long. So I'm resisting the urge to call her Big Baby, instead of New Baby.

Curiously, her name is spelled with the first initial of Big Sister's* other three kids first names (in order of arrival), plus the first initial of the Big Boy, and it is the Card Shark's** middle name, so it is like a little homage to the all of the kids in our family so far. Also curiously, it is just a weird coincidence that the initials form a totally normal name. So don't worry, my sister hasn't saddled the poor child with some made-up name that will get her beat up in school. I will have to figure out blog names for all of the kids and then re-name NB with whatever word the inials form when she is no longer a new baby.

Congratulations, we're all so happy :)

*It would just be wrong of me to refer to her by the initials "BS" because that is so not her. That would actually make it ironic, and therefore funny...
**Fiorellina has been renamed, at the urging of AHC, who never liked it in the first place. I'm not sold on CS either, but we'll see.

Incentivize: Most Certainly A Word

Re: This comment

Oh, Aitch, how could you doubt my vocabulary?! I have the Canadian Oxford Dictionary beside my bed. Which is both a badge of honour and total nerdiness, but I have that thing about language. You know, I dig it. And I have a girl crush on Katherine Barber, because she gets to edit (in chief) the Canadian dictionary. Wikipedia calls her a lexicographer. That sounds so exotic. Or is it just me?

Well, to be sure I wanted to actually check the COD, but it had to wait until I returned to Ottawa. And indeed, incentivize (or incentivise if you prefer the British spelling) is a word. You can find it on page 713 of the 2001 edition.

Why would I need to make up words when there are so many good ones we so rarely use?

The Doctrine of Estates: Make. It. Stop.

It's taken me six days to read 40 pages on estates. I find it to be exceptionally dull, and yet it's one of those things that rips families apart. Lesson learned: Make sure you get a damned good lawyer to write your will, for crying out loud. Mercifully, there's only one class on this before we move to aboriginal property law, a far more intriguing proposition.

Poor, poor property law, keeps getting interupted by my afternoon naps, the February issue of Vanity Fair, Margaret Atwood, The Children of the Lamp (book three), jaunts to Chinatown, cards games, and the occasional trip to the drug store for Advil and Buckley's cough syrup. Because no vacation is complete without a wretched virus. No vacation is complete without a little LOTR, either. I myself am partial to The Return of the King, because Viggo is all over that movie. I don't get tired of LOTR, though I do tend to skip a lot of the hobbity parts, except when AHC is around. He makes me watch the hobbits, even though I would rather skip ahead to the world of Men.

What was I talking about? Oh, right, property law.

A CHALLENGE: Draft a clause for your will guaranteed to confuse and dismay your heirs! Surely you don't need to know anything about the doctrine of estates to do a bang up job of this. The courts are filled with the confusing self-written instructions of people now dead. But I'll expect a little creativity from my law peeps. Impress (or confuse) me and you may be rewarded.

Comment And You May Be Rewarded

I'm feeling kind of lonely here on my blog. I hear from people that they read this, but who would know it? So I've decided to incentivize the Comments in order to reward you for posting.

What does that mean? It means that if you post funny, witty, thoughtful, intelligent, and/or clever comments you may be rewarded. Doing good deeds such as this is its own reward, but maybe you'll get a TCO t-shirt, or maybe I'll make AHC make you soup (it's worth it, believe me!), or I'll buy you a beer sometime. If it's really good, maybe I'll get AHC the cook you an entire meal. I don't really know for sure, but there will be something commensurate with the relative merit of your comment. I will make all decisions. No time limits, comment as often to any and as many posts as you like.

Come to think of it, why don't I post more comments on the blogs I read? I should think about that.

P.S. No names, please. Mine, AHS's or the kids. Don't feel obligated to post your own name, either, but if you want the goods, you'll have to identify yourself to me at some point.

Good luck!

Best Judgment Today

From Wickman v Shuler [1974] at the House of Lords (the court not the hair salon), judgment by Lord Reid:

"But on any view the interrelation and consequences of the various provisions of this agreement are so ill-thought out that I am not disposed to discard the natural meaning of the words which I have quoted merely because giving to them their natural meaning implies that the draftsman has forgotten something which a better draftsman would have remembered."
...
"The contract is so obscure that I can have no confidence that this is its true meaning but for the reasons which I have given I think that it is the prefereable construction."

I love it when the judges are funny, intentionally or not.

Funny. Very Funny.

This blog has been cracking me up lately. It's worth the trip, especially since the iTunes EULA has this disclaimer:

THE APPLE SOFTWARE IS NOT INTENDED FOR USE IN THE OPERATION OF NUCLEAR FACILITIES, AIRCRAFT NAVIGATION OR COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS, AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL SYSTEMS, LIFE SUPPORT MACHINES OR OTHER EQUIPMENT IN WHICH THE FAILURE OF THE APPLE SOFTWARE COULD LEAD TO DEATH, PERSONAL INJURY, OR SEVERE PHYSICAL OR ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE.

That's not a joke. I copied that from the agreement (which I felt compelled to read, now that I'm a law student).

Genetic Mutation: Card Shark

So last night I had all of these really weird dreams about sharks. There was one in my mother's kitchen and it didn't like me very much, though my mom didn't seem worried about it, and the giant shark kind of laid at her feet as she made dinner.

I couldn't really figure out the significance of the sharks at first, until I realised that I've spent a lot of time losing at Crazy Eights to my 5-year-old in the past few days. She now officially calls herself a card shark, with pride. I'm thinking of teaching her how to play poker or something and letting her loose in an online casino (easier to fake her age in front of a computer!) to pay for my tuition.

She's an incredible strategist, though she needs to work on her game face a little. I can't even beat her when I try to cheat. I'm actually trying to cheat in order to beat her!

When I told my mom about the sharks, the first thing that came to her mind? Law firms.

Law Student Fun

As expected, the details of the Tremblant trip are better left in the fond memories of the participants. This may be because it was a totally rowdy affair, or I could be trying to conceal the fact that we're just pretty tame. Which is it? Only precious few will ever know. I will say that we had the best food and the best drinks in our room and so we had some good times and I met a few people by name who'd I'd only known by face in the past. We did come up with a new drink (more out of desperation than of good planning), so here's the recipe:

The TreMMbling
1 shot vodka
2 shots Alize Red Passion (I think...but it might have been Sunset)
Mix in cocktail shaker with ice, pour into handpainted Dollar Store wine glasses
Top up with Pink Lemonade.

No kidding! It was pretty good. And it was more or less the colour of that text.

Also, last week at dinner with law friends, there were a couple of non-law partners and I felt bad for them (all the law talk can be such a bore for others), so I suggested we play a drinking game where every time you talk about law you have to take a shot. We'd be drunk all the time if we played that game. But seriously, kudos to partner of my TF&C, who is an exceptional cook. I'm a total food snob, and I was duly impressed.

For Fun, I Wrote Myself an Obituary

The Closet Optimist, wife of A Humble Chef, mother of Fiorellina and the Big Boy, died last night of a fatal attraction to the law, which eventually broke her heart in spite of its - and her own - best intentions. Throughout her early life she was prone to melodrama and confusion, until she met AHC, the love of her life; after their fated courtship, TCO's life had new happiness and meaning, though she maintained a flair for the dramatic, and a proclivity for stupid mistakes, throughout the rest of her life. In a perfect world, TCO would be remembered for the unending love she had for her family, for her sharp sense of wit and humour and for the fact that Ian Kerr gave her a job in her first year of law school (which hopefully indicates a reasonable level of intellectual curiosity and decent intelligence). She will, however, probably most be remembered for talking a lot - the uncomfortable silence left in her absence will forever remind us of her.

Amusing AND Justifiable

A shout out to my property law professor who put me on to two law blogs, which he quite correctly predicted I would enjoy, while I was in his office getting peace of mind on the issue of joint and common tenancies. There it is: my peace of mind now depends on the law.

I haven't had much of a chance to read them, but based on his description and the stuff I read today, they look both amusing and a justifiable way to pass the time. It's not a waste of time if it's law- related!

Above The Law and Precedent are linked to the left in the Law Links section.

Best Roommate Ever

I am pleased to announce that I have the Best Roommate Ever. Well, we all have our flaws (I'm sure living with me has its moments), but since no one is perfect, she wins the award for:

• Letting me take a substancially full bottle of Tanqueray, an unopened bottle of Absolut, and a bottle of creme de banane (in her defence, this was left over from a former roommate of hers. And I googled it and found some recipes that sound not half bad) for my weekend in Tremblant. This appears to be a no strings attached kind of deal. She's not using it due to unfortunate circumstances, so she is unselfishly letting me have it. I told her I'd take picture so she could live vicariously through me.
• She totally has a great CD collection. She pulled out a dozen+ CDs for me to copy to my computer in order to make my ears happy during the cocktail party that will be happening tomorrow evening at the hotel (in my room, which I will share with three other fantastic ladies). This is not the first time she has done so. Eventually I will have her entire collection and I will cease to be a music loser. The process is already happening. I knew who George was talking about tonight on The Hour. You know, George formerly of The New Music? It's a miracle that I understand anything he says about music. And it's all because of my roommate.

Cheers to you Roomie!

Neglect! Dereliction of Duty!

When I said "A Flurry of Holiday Posts" in my Dec 28 missive, I guess I meant "flurry" in a way very closely related to the weather we've been having. So by "flurry" I actually meant "not so much at all." I had good intentions. I've got some posts in the works that require actual thought (I like to be pseudo academic at times). But January is a bit of a weird month at FTX (the "January Term") so my routine is off. Not that I've ever been good at routine.

Alright, I've been a little lax in the posting department. No excuses. Okay, well, there might be some excuses, but usually no one cares.

Coming up (as soon as Optimistically possibly) on The Closet Optimist: A Jane Doe By Any Other Name, A Short History of Skepticism, So I Gave Birth to A Card Shark, and my delectable recipe for Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy Crockpot Chicken. Also, the ridiculous (and quite possibly better-left-unsaid) details of my trip with The Law to Mont Tremblant this upcoming weekend. But I'm actually going to have to go before I can post that one.

2007 Firsts

First real negotiation simulation: We settled and our client was happy.

First time I've been on a school bus in Ottawa: From FTX to the Scotiabank Centre (if that's what it's called).

First professional hockey game: Sens v Bruins. Sens won 5-2.

First time at The Drink: Should do a study of female behaviour in bar toilettes.

First Scotch with my TF&C: I think I'm a natural.

Happy New Year!

Go Fish Smackdown

Fiorellina is at a great age (5). She's totally confident with her numbers and letters so she can play games now. We got a game box from one of the grandmas with some board games as well as Go Fish, Old Maid and Crazy Eights.

She's not fooling around with the Go Fish. We've been in a tournament since yesterday afternoon and she's really good. No need to let her win, since she beats me 1/2 the time. And she's so proud of herself! She gets a devlish little laugh when she gets the cards she needs and she's also figured out how be sneaky - as in when she knows I've got a card (because I've been asking for it) as soon as she draws it, she remembers to steal if from me! And she even looks sneaky when she does it.

The tourney recently had to close when one of the 9 cards went missing. It's around here somewhere, but we're going to move onto Crazy Eights. Let's see how she does when the stakes get a little higher and the game gets a little more complicated.

A Flurry of Holiday Posts, Part I

I guess I needed to be off the grid for a few days. I've spent most of my time since returning from Ottawa with the kiddies, getting ready for Christmas (which came and went in a hurry), and making up for some lost time. We spent two days up north at my parents house. A Humble Chef returned to T.O. on Boxing Day so he could go to work early the next morning, but the kids and got home yesterday afternoon.

My favourite thing at Christmas, except for watching the kids get whacked out on excitement, is sitting in my parents' living room in front of the Christmas tree and the fireplace. The snow was missing this year, but I read a good book - A Short History of Progress by Ronald Wright. It was with a bit of reluctance that I took leave of the couch in front of the fire and packed up the gifts, and the luggage and the kids and drove home. I think I may be a little less fond of the city after that book. The country makes me crazy for its own reasons, but it's hard to beat for pure relaxing.

unMotherhood?

Since September, I have dropped Fiorellina off at school exactly three times and all three times I managed to get her there late. Friday, her last day before Christmas break, was no exception. Apparently she also normally goes with a school bag, a snack, and a gift for her teachers. Am I supposed to know where her school bag is, what she eats for snack or whether anyone has purchased gifts for her teachers? Okaaaaay, being her actual mother, some people might expect that I'd know such things.

I sort of forget how long it takes to get two little children dressed in the morning, the negotiation and wrangling required. It takes longer than 20 minutes, so I really need to get them up before 8 a.m. if I want to get out the door by 8:25 a.m.

But I did alright when she started barfing this morning (without fail, someone gets sick at Christmastime). And I got through two entire hours of shopping on the last Saturday afternoon before Christmas with the Big Boy in tow, with nary a meltdown. Now that's parenting.

Now There Are No Green Speckled Frogs

Last exam done and done. Well, at least until I figure out whether I completely bombed it. In which case I get a do-over for this one because of a medical deferral which I could have taken advantage of. What's that you say? A medical deferral?!

Yesterday, I spent 3 hours in the clinic to discover that I have an inner-ear infection. That would explain the dizzy, stumbling around. I sort of temporarily wondered if I'd done some drinking that had slipped my mind. Nope! Turns out I have fluid in my centre of balance.

So that created a kind of unhappy exam situation. Didn't study much yesterday, but didn't exactly feel unprepared. I didn't want it hanging over me during the holidays, so I just got it out of the way. It wasn't the most pleasant experience I've ever had but exams never are, are they?

On the plus side, my true friend and colleague gave me a bottle of Scotch for Christmas. A bottle of Scotch! We have a pact to drink it together, glass by glass between January and April.

On the plus-plus side, I'm done my first semester of 1L. And I better than survived.

Feelings, Nothing More Than Feelings

I realised in my last post that I managed to be both abjectly apathetic and giddily excited. Somehow not complimentary feelings, and yet true under the circumstances.

And nothing says conflicting emotions like more youthful poetry! I don't know why, but I'm terribly amused by my youth these days (not that my youth is behind me...)

5-y-o rage, 2-y-o jealousy (Per E.) (Nov. 98 R.E.)
a description of your
five-year-old rage
goes like this:
frustration that hyperventilates
over nothing but frustration
and an inability to communicate,
hate that you cannot understand;
my bruised body on the brink
of alcoholism at the dinner table
and patience that exists
only in the imagination.

your two-year-old jealousy is:
blond, curly hair
and short, like silk
that demands attention
and curiosity,
a guttural laugh
and a giggle;
twice what you are
and yet not at all,
love and hate
and bittersweet,
that's all.

Now that I have kids, that has a bit of a new meaning, even though my kids totally love each other.

And Then There Was One

In spite of my more or less abject apathy towards the writing of exams, torts was quite amusing. Anything that involves James Bond with a tatoo across his muscled chest that says "Do Not
Resuscitate" is at least going to be amusing. Who can say "consent to medical procedures"?!

Post exam playlist: Chris Isaac, Hawksley Workman, Cat Power, Sarah Harmer, and Danny Michel all on shuffle.

I'm feeling giddy excitement at the prospect of only having one exam left. If only it wasn't going to kick my a**! But none of that matters now. Che sara, sara and this time next week I'll be sitting on the floor of our living room in T.O. surrounded by castle toys and wrapping paper and the three people that give me the best reasons for being in law school in the first place.

Brain Junk

I have resorted to Pizza Pizza, Coke and M&M's to get me through the next several hours of tort law. My brain is feeling cottony at the moment (and why I think junk food will help that is completely illogical). I've officially become bored with exams. There is nothing exciting about this process, unlike law school in general.

We're headed into week 3 of exams, most of which has been spent labouring over some form or another of summary in relative isolation. I'm feeling cut off from my peers and profs, which is what (whom, to be precise) I like the most about law school.

Isn't there some constitutionally protected right being infringed by this stupid process?????

Bruce Ziff, I Owe You A Beer

I might just pass my property exam tomorrow, thanks in no small part to Bruce Ziff, author of Principles of Property Law (Fourth Edition) and accompanying case book. Thank you, Ziff, for the following two sentences:

"In short, under Canadian property law all testators can become King Lear for a day!" (It would not be the same without that exclamation mark!)

"Until relatively recently, engaging in the Sisyphean chores of housework had not given rise to right to the property over which one laboured..." (Apparently, Ziff has feminist aspirations.)

And the following five words:

Hedonic 1 of or characterised by pleasure. 2 Psych. of pleasant or unpleasant sensations.

Fugacious 1 literary fleeting, evanescent, hard to capture or keep. 2 Bot & Zool. falling or fading early; soon cast off. I can't even believe this is a real word!

Chary (qting judgment) 1 cautious, wary. 2 sparing; ungenerous. 3 shy.

Otiose adv. serving no practical purpose; not required; functionless. He's not talking about property law is he...?

Hortatory adj. tending or serving to exhort. These words exist for people to use them. Good on ya!

No, seriously Ziff, I think you might be friends with my prof, so next time you're in town, I totally owe you a beer.

The Optimist Revealed

In lieu of sleeping (restless) or studying property law (cant...take.it...any.more.) I've spent quality time with PhotoShop (oh, how I've missed you). I could be drinking Scotch right now (nod, nod) but instead I shall write about why I am a The Closet Optimist.

Curiously, it all began in this very city at the piano bar of the Chateau Laurier...

There was a time in my life when I was a Millennium Scholarship Excellence Award Laureate (I am officially a nerd) and I was here for a conference. Typically, I was hanging out with the cynical do-gooders, the ones who skipped laugh yoga to go to the bar for a drink. We kept kind of making fun at the people who were really chirpy. On the last night, after the gala at the Chateau, the same few of us hit the piano bar. And we invited Andrew Woodall (director of the Excellence program) to sit with us. And we challenged him a little (but probably not much) on the relative merits of chirpy do-gooders. And he said to me, "I don't believe for a minute that you're really a cynic."

To which I replied, after a moment of thought, "Ok, I guess I'm a closet optimist." And they all liked it, so here we are today.

It's Back! The Recurring Exam Nightmare

It just happened. I just had a two-hour nap to recover from my constitutional law exam (Damn you, Law test! Damn you, remedies!) and while sleeping I had the recurring dream that I inevitably have during exams and when I'm under particular stress.

The dreams always change a little bit to fit the circumstances (for example, this one took place in my Ottawa apartment), but they always involve some or all of my teeth crumbling out of my mouth.

Who can tell me what that means? It's a recurring dream that I've had for many years now. I kind of have a thing about my teeth, I guess. My dentist likes to say that I won the genetic lottery with my mouth, so there's very little chance of my teeth crumbling and falling out, but apparently the thought horrifies me.

Norman Mailer, One Helluva Guy

The Proust Questionnaire in the January edition of Vanity Fair features Norman Mailer and he has some of the most fantastic answers ever!

Q: What is the quality you most like in a woman?
A: Beauty, mystery, wit, and the inner superiority to be above political correctness.

Self, let me be that woman!

Welcome to Ottawa, the Smallest World in the Town

Apparently Ottawa is the Capital of the Small World.

During orientation I met a woman at an event. We started chatting and turns out she's got a two-year-old son, so we jive on that. Turns out we have a couple of classes together and eventually we figure out that her husband grew up in the same place I did. He went to school a year ahead of my sister. Then, another day she tells me they were back there for a wedding. Whose wedding? A girl and guy that I went to school with (I was in school with the guy from the time is was in primary). Who was the maid of honour? Another girl I was friends with when I was younger - our dads worked together.

Then, one day I'm in line at the coffee shop (coffee is the friend of all law students). Another woman I have some classes with turns and says, "I know your cousin in Winnipeg, we worked together." Whatthe?! Then last night, I found out the same woman actually knows my roomie from when they were both at Glendon a year apart. So she was there when I was there (my brief stint at Glendon), and I totally thought she looked familiar, but I just thought it was from seeing her around law school. Maybe not.

It's a small world after all.

* I just met someone today whose husband is from where I grew up too AND she knows some people I know from the good old Awenda/SMATH/DiscoHarbour days. What a weird place this is...

The Official Last Post Before Exams

I doubt this will be the last post until Dec 21 (my final day of exams), but this is the last post until exams begin. Tomorrow morning at 9 a.m.

People are starting to go a little crazy. I'm either in a state of denial or sheer confidence (sure, I'll get all that studying done!).

Chris Isaak, for some reason, has become the music to study to. Mellow, but not too boring, and not too not-boring.

I need to go grocery shopping but it seems like the sort of thing I can't take a time-out for. Stupid! Since eating would probably be a good idea. So far I've survived on egg sandwiches, but there are only two eggs left, so that won't get me through today.

Okay, time to end this excessively boring post (you know you're avoiding when...). Contract law, here I come.

All I want for Christmas

Just in case Santa reads blogs, here's a random list of things I'd dig:

* Extra battery for my Dell Inspiron 9300. Long train rides. Short battery life. Two outlets per car. That's math that even I can do.
* Black's or Canadian Law Dictionary. I don't know if this will help me, but I have that thing about dictionaries.
* An iPod. Yes, I might be the only person who doesn't have one. AND I'm totally getting suckered in, but my current MP3 player is underperforming - my musicon has dramatically improved since moving in with my musically well-endowed roomie. I need something with some serious capacity.
* A digital SLR. Haha! No one's going to buy me that, but I thought I'd throw it in. Bizarrely, law school is making me extrememly creative while leaving me with little time to pursue and even fewer resources to execute. I'm trying to work that part of it out, to no avail so far.

This will all be moot if I fail to survive exams. Maybe that should be on my list too.

Our Children Are So Precious When They Are Young

Not that I'm having existential crises all of the time about the choice to live in a different city from my children in order to study law or anything, but I would hardly be human if I didn't occasionally feel a bit hard on myself. As a society, we love to love mothers and we love to hate them.

Anyway, occasionally my children affirm me. They still love me, apparently, in spite of the weekly abandonment. According to cher monsieur, our charming and adorable five-year-old said that mummy goes to a "special school only really smart people go to" and that her school is for playing and having fun but mommy's school is really hard but still fun.

Last week, she spied snowmen decorations on someone's lawn and said that we should get some too, but that we should get snow WOMEN. Awesome! She's a feminist!

That kid is smart as a whip. She's waaaaaay smarter than I am. And she's totally adorable. And I'm not just saying that because I'm her mother. I swear.

We Are So Precious When We Are Young

I half take back what I said below in the Wordsworth post about being poetic. Apparently there was a time in my life when I was poetic. Or at least I wanted to be. It coincided with the time in my life when I was living in Europe, riding a bike everywhere and drinking a bottle of wine per day (oh, shut your judgmental mouths, the wine was provided to me by my employers who still entrusted me with their little children and obviously realized that a bottle of wine would help in the rearing of their brood. When in Rome...).

This may be destined to be Awkward Web Moment Part II, when I reveal my youthful poetry, but it's so precious, that I'm going to risk humiliation.

Good Advice (Feb 99 R.E.)
Shed this agony of separation
and dance! Dance!
Dance as if you were barefoot
on the green grass of summer
Do twirly-whirls until dizzy
as you did when a child
And welcome back the innocence
of those pleasures
that's love's treasure map
has led you to rediscover,
Those treasures you once hid
from Pirates.

Just pretend it wasn't me who wrote that next time you see me. In truth I was a different person anyway, so that wouldn't be much of a stretch.

Ambiguous No More

Wow, the aforementioned ambiguity totally lasted as long as it took me to walk to the bus stop in the freezing rain.

Nothing says fun like a four hour train ride in wet clothes.

First Snow of Ottawa

Yesterday morning it may have been 10 degrees and warm, but this morning I woke up (after a night of unrest) to snowfall. I feel a little ambiguous about this new weather development. I hear it's unrelentingly cold in O-Town during the winter months. But I wore my real winter coat for the first time today, and I kind of liked it.

When I walk to the bus to go to the train station, I usually walk past this church on Wilbrod. All fall I noticed on the sidewalk these beautiful impressions of fallen leaves. I could never tell if they had fallen in fresh cement and left a sort of fossil, or if they were just fallen leaves that decomposed until they were a ghost of their past selves. They always always struck me as just so beautiful.

The smoke pluming from the chimney of the house below my window is lovely and rich, but the sidewalks are already dirty and wet. Will the ghosts of our past selves be lost in the mush?

Like I said, ambiguous.

The Law of Encroachment

Tomorrow is December 1 and I am three classes and five exams away from being finished my first semester if 1L.

Law school is encroaching on my ability to do laundry, or bake muffins (I need to invite people over for breakfast more often), of my budding career as a blogger (but what would I write about if I wasn't in law school); I've spoken to my husband for maybe 25 minutes over the past four days and I haven't seen my kids on the webcam since they dropped me off in Ottawa on Monday. I have spent more time in the library this past week than in my entire four (or five if you want to count it that way) years of undergrad.

But one of my friends said something to me tonight. She said she knew she would be at my funeral many years from now. It kind of surprised me, in a nice kind of way. I've met more people that I like personally and intellectually over the past 12 weeks than in my entire life before. These are the people who will be my friends for the rest of my life. I find this comforting since coming to law school was the first undamaged, real decision I ever made for myself.

It's overwhelming at times to feel as if I've found my way.

Food for thought (cliché but apropos)

There's this scene in the movie A Bug's Life where the praying mantis is doing his magician thing and he points to the Chinese takeout box and says, "Transformation, transformation, transformation..." and the butterfly emerges. That's kind of how I'm feeling right now about me and cooking.

This weekend I actually cooked a whole chicken! With creamy mashed potatoes and a really good looking mirepois and "the best tomato salad" one of my guests had ever had. That's pretty cool for me. I've had a complex ever since someone started baking brownies to win over my sister. And then went to chef school. And now cooks gourmet meals at home just for fun. How does one like me live up to that?

By moving to Ottawa. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. No money to buy take-out (and I just can't even handle that anyway, since living with a chef has made my standards a tad out of the ordinary), so it was either cook or starve.

It's pretty simple usually, but I'm up to a nice stew, chicken cacciatore, a perfectly rare pepper steak, and my whole chicken (rubbed with olive oil, coarse salt, pepper, garlic and rosemary, then slow-cooked in wine and chicken broth). Plus I'm pretty good at omlettes.

And this morning I even baked muffins. Muffins!

Transformation...

Awkward Web Moment, Part I

I don't know why we (as in my favourite partner and I) decided this, but Friday night we thought we'd leave the webcam running, I guess so we could just holler at each other across the ether.

Lesson #1 on why people on reality TV do really ridiculous things in front of a camera: it's easy to forget about the camera.

That's right. I forgot about the camera. I was getting ready to go out, and I turned on a little Hawksley Workman and, of course, I started to dance. Because you can't listen to Jealous of Your Cigarette and not. And then, bizarrely, I sort of felt like I was being...watched. And indeed, my charming monsieur, attracted by the loud music coming across the ether, came to investigate and saw me gettin' down. It was very similar to secretly watching children play acting - it's beautiful but they're frequently embarrassed when they're caught out even though they shouldn't be.

At least it wasn't his parents! That would have been the end.

Gotta love those judgments

This is the best line I've read all day (of course, it is only 8:45 a.m. and there's always a good chance that things will get better in torts):

"Such circumstances can easily be distinguished from those of a corner store that carries the odd porno flick among an othersiwe unremarkable video collection."

I feel the need to share that kind of line with those of you who may not spend any time reading case law. It just wouldn't be fair to keep these gems to myself.

Wordsworth Repeating

Okay, it's only barely like me to be poetic, but given the title of this post, I thought I should make an attempt at finding some actual Wordsworth. Here's what I've got:

A BRIGHT-HAIRED company of youthful slaves,
Beautiful strangers, stand within the pale
Of a sad market, ranged for public sale...

That part of it kind of made me think of law students and law school and my law future, but in the bad way. (The rest of the poem is here.) Sorry to the Wordsworth fans and scholars who I've insulted by totally misinterpreting this for my own selfish uses.

In any case, I’m going to deviate from the norm and post excellent words from the law paper of a true friend and colleague, instead of my favourites from judges. Anyone who can use these words in a criminal law context is okay by me.

conundrum n. 1 a riddle, esp. one with a pun in its answer. 2 a hard or puzzling question or issue. How law appropriate. And, if I could be defined in any way, I think it would be as 1, though sadly, I don't really think I'm that cool.

consternation n. anxiety or dismay causing mental confusion. Also conveniently law relevant.

surveil v. not technically in the dictionary, but clearly the verb associated with surveillance n. 1 close observation or supervision, esp. of an enemy or suspected person.

vestige n. 1 a trace or piece of evidence; a sign. 2 a slight amount; a particle.

contrite adj. 1 penitent; sincerely filled with guilt, regret, etc. and desirous of making amends.

trope n. a literary or rhetorical device consisting of the figurative use of a word or phrase.

Thank you for your most worthy use of the English language! You get an 'A' for awesome.

Counting sheep

I had a lot of trouble sleeping last night and not even reading about contract law could put me out at 1 a.m.

What kind of a sign is that? That I actually like contract law?! On the plus side, it may mean that I'm not going to fail (and I mean that kind of indulgently. As if I'd actually fail) and that law school is a good place for me (as if I had any doubt).

On the con side (ha ha, the con side of contracts) , how am I supposed to get to sleep now? It's tough being too interested in what I'm learning. I could try the property book next time, but I think my general resistance to the topic may just agitate me.

Maybe I'll take to singing Twinkle Twinkle, Stars Come Down, Suzanne and You & the Candles. Just like home...

This is what law does to you

The effects of law school on one's life are legend, perhaps.

This weekend I went home and I failed to pack any clothes. All I brought with me were 4 textbooks and my laptop.

Then, on Saturday, I visited my friends and their beautiful new baby boy, and I somehow got drawn into a discussion about prior conferral of benefit ("past consideration is [usually] no consideration at all" and following my Contract Law epiphany re: Pao On v. Lau Yiu Long) and how I could never claim they owed me any money for the baby stuff I gave them for free.

And then, on Sunday night about the time I'm normally getting anxious about leaving my family behind, I started to feel anxious about the fact that I wasn't studying or doing law stuff. Not that leaving my family didn't suck as much as it usually does, it was just a little overshadowed by the mounting anxiety of first year law exams on rapid approach.

And tonight, I started work on my first law resume and my first law cover letter and I have an appointment tomorrow to have them critiqued at the career centre.

I don't know what all of this means. I just felt I should get it off my chest.

Woe be the half-caf coffee

So, about a two weeks ago I was in the grocery store scrutinizing tins of coffee. Shopping always poses a bit of a dilemna for me because at home I don't normally do the shopping. I couldn't tell you what brand of coffee we drink if my life depended on it. (Well, I could now - I asked after this episode).

There I am, puzzling about which brand I should by when an older European-type man approached me. I thought he was asking advice (and I thought, 'woe to you, because I have no idea'). But alas, it was conversation he was seeking (and perhaps more, but I try not to assume these things). After a while, I just needed to go, so I sort of cut the conversation, picked up a tin without careful attention, and dashed.

This morning I was up around 6:00, had two cups of coffee and did some reading. Then I had to have a nap. I was lying in bed and, in the absence of any kind of caffeine kick, I thought to myself, 'Did I buy decaf or something?'

Lo and behold, it's a can of half-caf. This could explain why I've been feeling a little sleepy the past couple of weeks. And I thought I was coming down with something...

Baroque & spirit

I was back in T.O. this past weekend to see my family after two weeks without being home. After a while being away was just distracting, so I was happy to be home.

Mon bonhomme and I went on Saturday night to see Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra and Chamber Choir at Trinity-St. Paul's United Church. He's been taking girls to Tafelmusik since he was a teenager (though apparently the first concert he ever went to was with Uncle Wayne. He's such a sweet nerd at times!). I'm the only one who fell for this, of course, and Shakespeare in the Park. I like the intellectual boys, I guess.

Whenever I go to Trinity-St.Paul's I think of my grandfather, George, who was ordained there years ago (he passed away when I was 18 years old). There's something I like about the fact of being in the same place as my grandfather, but separated by years.

When he died, I remember one of his oldest friends saying that he moved spirits. He was that kind of man.

If nothing else, law will be good for my vocabulary

I'm not even kidding you! People (read: lawyers and judges) use these words! This is the problem with journalism - I'd never be able to use "exhortatory" in that field.

Exhortatory: adj. of exhort: to urge or advise strongly or earnestly.

Leitmotiv: n. 2 any recurring theme, symbol, image, etc. Any kind of appropriation from other languages is fine by me, ja doch!

Detinue n. 1 a. An action to recover possession or the value of property wrongfully detained. b. The writ authorizing such action. 2 The act of unlawfully detaining personal property. [gasp! Not found in COD, but from dictionary.com. How common!]

Tortfeasor n. Law a person guilty of tort. Obviously! But it just sounds so fantastic. If I could say this word every day, I would.

That's it for now. But don't worry, there's more where that came from. Next up (as in, sometime in the future): if I can, I'll mine the judgments of my in-law Sir William Buell Richards, first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada.

Kevin Sylvester, Where Is Your Wisdom Now?

Kevin Sylvester is, in my opinion, the best sportscaster in all of radio and television. I admit that I don't have an extensive knowledge of sportscasters, but the reason I say that he's the best is because he's the only one I don't have the urge to turn off when the sports news comes up. I'm not one of those people who is crazy about sports. Anyway, Kevin (who is on leave from the CBC for a year at U of T as a Massey College Fellow), is a serious cyclist. One of his major irritations is people who ride their bikes on the sidewalk. In Toronto, only idiots and children ride their bikes on the sidewalk.

Now, I'm not one of those stuck up Toronto-is-the-centre-of-the-world people. I like Ottawa. I'm enjoying myself here. But I have to say that there are a lot of adults riding bikes on the sidewalks here. Who thinks it's a good idea to ride a bike in an area with heavy pedestrian traffic, like on or near a university campus with more than 31,000 students (http://www.report.uottawa.ca/2005/en/facts_figures/)?

I've almost been run over like, once a day since I got here three weeks ago, trying to avoid bikes coming in both directions. I don't ride a bike in Toronto becaue I am sort of afraid of the cars (whereas I only rode a bike when I was in Italy and the drivers are crazier there but know how to deal with bikes). There's not that much traffic in Ottawa! If you're too afraid to ride with the cars, please get off the sidewalks. It's called a sidewalk because it's that part on the SIDE of the road where you WALK.

Idiots.

I Love Katherine Barber (even with a "K")

It doesn't matter to me if I sound like a nerd. I did get in to law school, after all, and that must mean something. So I don't care if I sound like a nerd when I say: dictionaries are wonderful things. I myself am partial to the Canadian Oxford and if you don't know who Katherine is, you can google her.

A list of the words I've looked up in the past 24 or so hours, pretty much in the order I found them:

Fiat: 1 formal authorization. 2 a decree or order. [Latin, 'let it be done']. I love this word for so many reasons (but I never fail to forget its definition)!

Vitiate: 1 impair the quality or efficiency of; corrupt, debase, contaminate. 2 make invalid or ineffectual. I looked this one up to confirm that the first 't' was pronounced "sh". I was right.

Blandishment: flattery; cajolery. Who knew? McLachlin J, that's who!

Buss: n. a kiss * v.tr. kiss. Is a kiss by any other name still a kiss?

Oleomargarine: N. American dated = Margarine. Apparently there once was (and probably still is) a Canadian Statute that dealt with oleomargarine productions somewhere in Atlantic Canada.

Lodestar: 1 a star that a ship etc. is steered by, esp. the pole star. 2 a a guiding principle. b and object of pursuit.

If I ever want to become a judge, I must absolutely start work now on my own collection of obscure-ish words. But welcome to this, the first ever post of Interesting Words I've Found In Case Law, a collection of other people's obscure-ish words.

What a law degree may get you these days...

I listened to The Rain Song on the way home from FTX. It was raining.

I stopped to buy coffee at the convenience store. The clerk, once it was established that I was a law student, told me that he too had a law degree.

I momentarily wanted to kill myself. A job in a convenience store is not one of the legal careers I have hitherto considered. And, frankly, a law degree to work in a convenience store seems a little bit like overkill.

The moment passed. I presume the fellow was working in the convenience store because his law credentials are not recognized in Ontario/Canada. I have been told already, by one professor or another, to never make assumptions. For the sake of my sanity I am going to assume that he got his law degree in some foreign jurisdiction, but when I see him again I promise to ask him where he got his law degree from.