And Like The Sands of Time So Are Our Law School Years

I finished my environmental law final this evening, and with it my second year of law school. I happy.

Whiney McWhinerson

So, I should be in class tonight. Instead I am surrounded by used tissues on my couch. I managed to catch this cold Friday morning just before I had to go to a class entitled Visual Metaphor that lasted all through the weekend. It turns out that it isn't a smart move to choose a class based solely on the date it is offered without reading the details.
Had I read the details I might have realized Visual Methaphor means "acting out fairy tales and fables in funny handmade masks." It also meant lots of work with scissors and construction paper, as well as, "Now everybody stand in a circle, squat, growl like a bear and stomp around the room." And then we acted like frogs. And then like royalty. And then my soul died.
Let me just say that there was no part of this class that made me happy except that it only lasted three days. The fact that every time I growled like a bear I then coughed and hacked for a good ten minutes only made it more awesome. I spent yesterday trying to sleep off this cold, but between you and me, I think I needed some of that time to recover from my weekend.

Picture below: This is the mask I made in class by smearing vaseline all over my head and then having cold, wet plaster stuck to my face. After that I added more plaster to the nose, cheeks, eyebrows, chin, and jowls to make it look like a grumpy old man. I think I succeeded at making it look like an old woman two weeks dead.Edited to add: This was a class I took for grad school credit with other adults, not something I did with my seventh graders. There was some confusion on that point.

Review of the Gospel

I'm so fully engrossed in my finals this week that I managed to finish this book today. A short review is in order. I liked it, not because it was a good book, but because it was about an interesting topic, the religion of the founding fathers and by proxy our country. How's that for short, anyways it's worth a read, if your interested.

Memorable quote
"As in so many things, the wise American president can learn much from Lincoln, who once told some visiting ministers that he did not worry whether God was on his side or not, 'for I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right.' It was, Lincoln said, 'my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation should be on the Lord's side."

My Administrative Law Final is Over

Two down, one to go. Meanwhile Dawn made a paper mache face mask today. She also learned to do improv, and if you know Dawn you realize how much worse her day was than mine.

My Criminal Law Final Is Over

I got to school at 8:00 AM and I studied till 12:00 PM, then at 1:03 PM I checked out an exam that had to be back at the registrars office at 4:03 PM. The test was the only grade I would recieve in a class that lasted 17 weeks. Boo. I say Boo.

Abuse? Perhaps

This is what happens when your dog can't reach the peanut butter on the top of his nose. The sad part is he doesn't even really like peanut butter.

Baracky

So this is worth a look, though I'm sure Dawn will be torn.

Phallic Food = Family Friendly

Good morning. A quick Portland story to get you started today. Sergio and I finally went here on Sunday morning. It is a Portland landmark of sorts. A donut shop that is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. My guess is that it once catered mostly to drunk people stumbling from club to club in Old Town. Why do I think this? The menu includes not only donuts with coco puffs and cap'n crunch on top, but also the Nyquil and Pepto Bismol glazed varieties. Mmmm! It has, however, become one of the top listed places in every travel book or magazine article written about Portland, guaranteeing that it will be swarmed by suburban family crowds on the weekends.
As Sergio and I made our way to the teeny shop situated next to an adult movie theater and up the road from many strip joints, we passed one such family. The young son (let's say ten yrs old) was struggling with an oddly shaped donut the size of his head. We were mildly curious about what he had found. And then we saw it. What we can't decide for sure is whether the parents realized what the kid ordered and didn't mind (very Portland attitude), or if they just didn't notice at all. Either way, I will never forget the image of a ten year old boy walking down the street eating a very large donut replica of the male anatomy.

Spring Break Part Three

You might have thought I got lazy and abandoned the Spring Break posts, but in fact I simply got lazy. I never abandon a post! Actually, nothing about that last sentence is true. I start posts and delete them all the time. You would thank me for that if you ever saw them. Anyhow, I was going to make this the final spring break post but then I saw the number of pictures there would be if I put California, Nevada, and Arizona all together. The page might never load. Instead, this is just Arizona. Everything but the Hoover Dam is from Petrified Forest National Park. That picture of the old dead log? It's a rock! It was a tree several million years ago, but now its a rock that people sometimes make jewelry out of. Also, old women jump out of their RV's to steal some. Not Allowed. The rocks on the ground in the square formations, along with the rock drawings are leftover from a settlement. All in all, a really cool national park. We had heard from multiple sources that we should take the Hoover Dam tour if we had time and I was really looking forward to going. Unfortunately, we got there pretty late and were way behind schedule already for that day. We jumped out to take a couple of pictures from the Arizona side, and then saw all we could see from the car while we waited over a half hour to get across the dam. Sometime soon...hopefully...Vegas and San Francisco...maybe.

Think About This Next Time You Get Into An Elevator

A lot of people have been linking this article and accompanying video so I'm not being original, but this is worth a look. Dawn and I talked about it and the video made us both very uncomfortable, very sad. Anyways, watch it, enjoy.