Done.

I have more to say (I always do, right) on this subject, but after typing for three hours this morning I am rather tired of my keyboard. So I will just report that provided that I pass my classes, I am officially finished with law school ...

A letter about my lotion ...

Dear Bath & Body Works:

I am not a member of PETA. I am (generally) a (relatively) sane person. And I want to know why you include the following sentence on your labels:

This finished product is not tested on animals.

If a product is finished, as I assume the products for sale in your stores are, the testing process must be finished, too. So when you tell me that you do not test your finished product on animals, I assume you do test your unfinished product on animals. That seems more likely to make PETA mad. And frankly, I would not want PETA to be mad at me. Just saying.

Sincerely,

Callie

P.S. Perhaps the law requires you to insert this exact sentence. I suppose I could discover that for myself. But I still have two finals. And as neither of them involve animal rights (although you better believe we do have such a class at my school, where the priority list places animal rights near the top and the rights of unborn children near the bottom) I think I should save my legal research for classes I am actually taking.

Finals, hula hoops, etc. ...

Carly and I like to make each bout of finals delightful in its own special way. One time we decided to spend the week coughing, sneezing, blowing our noses and hearing buzzing noises. Another time we watched an entire season of the Office during finals week. Then, being me, that one time I thought it would be a good idea to simultaneously experience finals and a break-up during the same week. Another semester I attempted the opposite. Yet another time we decided to have double car trouble, when Carly got in a car accident (totally not her fault) and I got a flat tire (totally my fault) on the same day, three days before the end of finals. This semester, though, we have outdone ourselves and adopted the hula-hoop-dance-party strategy ...

Done. Almost ...

Today I attended my last law school class. Which makes today my last day of school EVER. Unless I go back to school. Which I will not, I promise, and this time I mean it. Seriously. When I was little and being tickled, if I just said stop, well, that gave the tickler permission to continue. But if I said "stop it and I mean it," well, I meant it. And I mean it when I say I will never go to school again. I also mean it when I say I will miss law school. (Although I will not miss law school ruining regular stories, like this one, because now when I hear that someone does not stop when another someone says stop, I think of my criminal law class, and how "no" really does mean no. Thank you, criminal law, for ruining this childhood memory for me.) I also mean it when I say I am rather anxious about the next few months of post-law school life: taking finals, studying for the bar and moving. Yikes. But, for today, I give you what I will miss most about law school (not D.C. in general, that will be another post, currently scheduled for sometime mid-July). In no particular order, well except for number 1, which really is number 1. But for the rest, no particular order ...

1. Carly. I have loved having someone to study with, someone to share the law school gossip with, someone to commiserate with, someone to go to lunch with after class and dinner with after finals, and someone who can explain to me exactly what the professor meant.

2. Potbelly's. I go there on Mondays. I like the walk there, where I look one direction and see the Watergate Hotel a few blocks away and look another direction and see the Lincoln Memorial a few blocks away. I also like the sandwich I always get -- turkey with provolone on white -- and the free Washington Post I read while I eat.

3. Professors. We have some characters. And they have some interesting ideas. They say interesting things. Like this: "So we have established that Boy Scouts do not do a lot of talking about sex," and, about the preschoolers playing on the quad, "So adorable and so happy, just like they're naturally stoned." And other tidbits that make me stop shopping online. (Note to future clients: Of course I never shopped online during class.) I am glad I got to listen to them.

4. Free stuff. I am pretty sure no one will be giving me iPods just for doing research after law school. Well I guess technically my future clients will be doing this, but it seems different. (Note to future clients: I will use the money you pay me for rent and food and appropriate business clothing, not for iPods and vacations and movies.) And yes, I am trying to slip it in by just putting it on this list, but I will confess, I will soon join the iPod age. I am a sellout. But it remains to be seen whether I can stand having things in my ears ...

Back in the day ...

I know, I know. Enough posting already. But I just read this article and I just had to share it. If you did not read the Baby-Sitters Club books, do not bother. But I did. By the dozens. And I totally remember Claudia's outfits, even though yes, I was Mary Anne or Mallory ...

Right now ...

I am sitting in class. Right next to a whole wall of windows. It is 80 degrees outside. Yes, I just checked weather.com, and it really is 80 degrees at 6:22 p.m. on April 5th. And did I mention that I am sitting in class?! And that I have another two hours and 38 minutes of sitting in class, right next to a whole wall of windows that look out over the quad?! The quad being the only patch of grass on campus. The quad being the place where the people go when the sun comes out. But the girls in bikinis on blankets have dispersed for the day. I suppose they know they will not improve their tans after 4 p.m. Although I think the laying (or lying, I never mastered this feat of grammar) on blankets in bikinis is only partly about attracting the sun. This is what happens when you go to school outside of Provo. You get girls in bikinis on blankets. You also get Michelle Obama to speak at graduation. And people smoking on the terrace. So, to review, outside of Provo, you get two ways to get cancer and one First Lady. So there is that.

Right now, from my window seat, I can see one shirtless guy talking on his cell phone and leaning back in his chair the way my mother always told me not to do because I would fall and also because I would ruin the chair. To be honest I want him to fall, partly because I am annoyed at his freedom from class and partly because it would make the next thirty seconds of window gazing more interesting. Also, he is already tan. It is only April 5th, he should not be that tan. He also has a little swagger going on. Not sure how exactly he manages to swagger while sitting, but he is. And yes, I suppose I am judging him, which I probably learned yesterday that I should not do. But I can only work on so much at a time. And right now I am working on the following: a) surviving class and b) figuring out my life, which I apparently need to do by tomorrow morning. So I am going to just let myself silently judge for a minute as respite from my work.

Wait. Wow. My powers are stronger than I thought. Mr. Tan Man just put on a shirt. So I suppose I should stop the judging and start using my powers productively. I will start by a) surviving class and b) figuring out my life ...

My daffodil patch ...

I should preface this post with a confession: For the past few months, our backyard has been a bit of a mess. More like a lot of a mess. And I have done absolutely nothing to remedy this. The snow melted. The grass grew. The weeds grew. And I merely looked out the window. And then a patch of something else started growing, too. Something that looked like daffodil leaves. So I watched and I waited. And sure enough, three days ago, I noticed the first daffodil blooms. Vindicated (not everyone believed me when I had previously proclaimed the greenery to be daffodils in waiting), I cut some and put them in a vase, with lofty plans to repeat the process every day. Except that yesterday someone came to mow the lawn. And he mowed the flowers. The flowers that no longer looked like weeds. The leaves and stems with yellow blooms.

True, I did not plan, or plant, that daffodil patch. I never did anything at all except watch and wait. Those flowers just sprouted in the middle of the lawn, without any help. But if given the choice between a pathetic patch of grass and a patch of daffodils, I choose the daffodils. Except maybe sometimes I do not. Maybe sometimes I just go right ahead and mow down those daffodils that sprouted in the middle of the lawn without any rhyme or reason or plan at all. Maybe sometimes I had a different plan for that patch of grass. Maybe I had a better plan. I do like plans, you know. But maybe I like daffodils more ...

Cherry blossoms ...

I live in Washington, D.C. It is the first week of April. Thus, I give you the annual cherry blossom photos ... and some quality D.C. Carly-Callie time, which has an expiration date of April 28th, so I better enjoy it while I can ...