"In vacant or in pensive mood..." I am: Bekah; 24; Law Student / Favorite Things: Carbs (so there!), Johnny Damon, Smiling at babies, Grilled cheese, Comfortable silence / Favorite Supreme Court Justice: Brennan / Favorite Wilson: Owen by an inch / Today's Special: Song: Elliott Smith, "Bled White"; Quote: "You know, there's like a butt-load of gangs at this school. This one gang kept wanting me to join because I'm pretty good with a bowstaff." Please love me: mmbekah@yahoo.com


February 2003 March 2003 April 2003 May 2003 June 2003 July 2003 August 2003 September 2003 October 2003 November 2003 December 2003 January 2004 February 2004 March 2004 April 2004 May 2004 June 2004 July 2004 August 2004 September 2004 October 2004 November 2004 December 2004 January 2005 September 2005

 
I have gotten a few emails from people inquiring about my wellbeing--thank you. I know very few people even come to this site anymore, but for those who do, I graduated from Tulane in May and happened to be out of New Orleans at the time of this tragedy. I'm living in Ann Arbor, MI now. My extended family who live in New Orleans are all ok in terms of physical wellbeing, though I can't even imagine what it is like for them to go through this. My grandmothers are living with my parents in Florida for the foreseeable future. My cousins are all having to start school somewhere new.

I encourage everyone in the various law school communities to go to the wonderful blog set up by Professor Eric Muller at www.isthatlegal.org/tulanelaw and offer any help with housing, etc., that you can manage to displaced TLS students.
posted by Bekah at 11:05 PM :: |

 
Going Gentle into that Good Night...

I might change my mind about this later, but right now I'm pretty sure that I've outgrown this blog. It's been just about 2 years, and I think I've hit a little bit of a wall. And it's not fair for me to hold myself out as an active blogger when the truth is I'm just not sure when or if I'll post again on Mixtape Marathon. I do want to keep writing though, so chances are I'll start a new blog pretty soon. Something in a different color, and with a slightly different tone. Maybe something that doesn't rely so heavily on the use of the word "poop." So please stay tuned and don't forget me. (And Annabreviation, enough with the waterworks! This isn't the end; it's the beginning.) So let me contemplate what I'm going to do, and I'll make my new whereabouts known when I figure something out.


posted by Bekah at 8:46 AM :: |

 
Just resurfacing for a quick update. After a few days of shameless stagnation (which I could get away with because J is out of town and I haven't had to pretend that I'm a motivated and productive "human being" and have instead spent the majority of the past few days in my running clothes, soaking up a good avocado mask and reading The Corrections), I've decided to turn on my computer. Incidentally, I don't pretend to be a human being around J because I feel that I have to; the presence of another person is just generally enough to motivate me to, say, cleanse myself, or get out of bed before 11. I sometimes worry that if I didn't have relationships with other people I would just cease to exist. Because other people are pretty much my reasons for doing anything at all. It seems. Anyway, I also did some shopping, and even remembered to wash the avocado mask off before I left the house--score! Shopping during the holidays is stressful for me because I get pissed off at myself for buying gifts for the sake of having something to give, and not thinking hard enough about what each person would really like. I think it would be so much better if everyone was required to get people a holiday present each year, but they could do it any time during the year when they happened to see something that the person would really want. Ok, yes, I guess people could do that anyway, and save the gifts until the holiday season. But that would be so contrary to our innate tendencies to procrastinate. Anyway, today I'm cleaning the apartment because it's still in finals mode and I can't take it anymore. The Swiffer is beckoning, and so I must leave you.


posted by Bekah at 3:37 PM :: |

 
Done. It's a little bit like trying to wrap three unweildy presents that you're not really sure were right for the occasion. The wrapping is a little ripped and might not be that pretty, but you think you have at least something inside that the recipient will like. I just hope one of them doesn't turn out to be poop in a box...I don't think they give you good grades for that.

My head hurts and my eyes won't stay open. Later. Much. Later.


posted by Bekah at 4:15 PM :: |

 
Ernesto

For the past 5 minutes, rather than working on my Trusts & Estates outline, I've been constructing an elaborate back story based around the name I just gave my new computer: Ernesto. Ernesto is an attractive, slender Puerto Rican metrosexual who regularly applies product to make his hair firm and glossy. His jeans have the distressed look (though they cost $300) and his mock turtleneck is ribbed and fitted. He wears cologne, but not too much, and he has just the slightest amount of bling. He dates casually, but has a fear of commitment because he's been burned once before by a lovely young marketing executive named Angelina who has very long fingernails and meticulously plucked eyebrows. He is androgynous, but has a low, sultry voice and a large adam's apple. He listens very carefully when people speak to him, and only speaks once he's thought his words out very carefully. He is up on the latest technological trends, and calls his mother once a week on a videophone (he bought her a matching one for mother's day). He has a pet bulldog named Rocco. That's all I'm sure of for now. More on the life and times of my computer later.


posted by Bekah at 8:00 PM :: |

 
Exams are Here

Me: (holding up my green tea) See, this is the most economical thing you can get here. You can fill it up with water 2 or 3 more times. See how much tea they pack into the pouch? It's good. It's the best ever. I'm excited. Oh yeah. Rock on.
J: ...I'm in hell.


posted by Bekah at 7:14 PM :: |

 
Exams looming.

Computer broke.

Got new one because I am one lucky little wench.

Condensed versions of outlines are next on the agenda; then flashcards.

Must workie; no talkie.

No speaka in complete sentences.

Sorry.

Leave happy thoughts.


posted by Bekah at 1:37 PM :: |

 
Finding a Happy Place...

It's amazing when all the forces of the universe align for one spectacular moment. Like when you don't want to take any of the classes offered by your school, but you wake up at 7:00am to register anyway, at which time your computer decides that it doesn't want you to take any classes offered either and promptly stops working, so then you call the registrar to register over the phone, at which time you realize the school doesn't want you to take any of the classes offered because the entire registration system isn't working. So you've spent over an hour trying to register for classes you don't even like, and now it's too late to go for a run.

I understand that technical issues are impossible to completely control, but it would help if a law school that takes hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars from its students every year could have some accountable person ALIVE and AWAKE during the registration period to do a little bit of damage control. A lot of my friends are really pissed because they couldn't get into classes they wanted to take. I don't really have that problem because the "caring" switch in my brain has been flipped off for the duration of exam time, but I'm outraged on principle, because that's what I do.

Now I'm sitting in a coffeehouse trying to outline and watching a man bathe in front of me. (He disappeared into the bathroom for about 20 minutes, after which period he emerged holding reams of paper towels and sat down in front of me). He is now rubbing said paper towels all over his body. This process results in loud scratching and grunting sounds, but does not result in the cleansing of his person, largely because there is no soap or water involved in this process. Just a lot of grunting and staring at me.

I will miss this city.


posted by Bekah at 4:08 PM :: |

 
Today's Worries

That the old woman who constantly wanders around my neighborhood picking up leaves and trash out of the gutter will break into my apartment and attack me in my sleep. Morbid, I know, but you haven't seen this lady. She really freaks me out. I had a nightmare about it.

That the recent surge of totally random childhood memories I've been having (coming to me without any provocation or triggering event) is evidence of some evil plot that my subconscious is concocting without my knowledge.

That the new REM album has this gorgeous song with some really beautiful imagery--it's track three if you want to listen--but at the end of it, just when the music should be fading out, rapper Q-Tip makes a most unfortunate appearance for absolutely no reason and ruins everything by making me either laugh, squirm uncomfortably, or, worst of all, fear for Michael Stipe's musical judgment.

That Felicity Huffman may be the one to die tonight on Desperate Housewives. Not that I think the producers would ever pick her to be the one to go, but the option is there and it worries me.

That Morris Bart is going to read my blog and sue me for libel. Note to all: the post below is a joke. Morris Bart was never actually Joe Bob's attorney, and I don't know anything about his professional life. Luckily he is a public figure so I definitely have some leeway under the First Amendment. Side note: I went to the Bartman's website just for fun and discovered that in addition to "One Call, That's All!" he also uses, in the internet context, "One Click, That's It!" Catchy, right? Unfortunately, it doesn't rhyme. I may contact him and tell him that "One Click Does the Trick" would be better. Easier on the ears.


posted by Bekah at 1:26 PM :: |

 
Thanksgiving Day Race Relations

This morning I ran the 5 mile Turkey Day Race with my dad, who is in town for the holidays. (I should make it clear that my dad is an actual runner who used to race quite frequently. His PR for a 5 mile race is 27 minutes. Twenty. Seven. Minutes. That's what you might call obscenely speedy. So needless to say I didn't really run the race with him, so much as in his dust). It was actually very cold this morning and made for great race weather. I was the 91st woman, with a time of 42:38. My dad ran it in 35:42--not bad for an old dude, huh?

The best part of the race was my celebrity encounter. I was running along in mile two, not pushing it too hard, and suddenly out of the corner of my eye I saw Morris Bart. For those of you who aren't from around here, Morris Bart is the lawyer who holds the license to the phrase "one call that's all" for this particular area. He has no fees or expenses unless he collects for you. He got Joe Bob $500,000 for the stubbed toe he suffered while robbing your aunt Mae's house. Anyway, I saw him run up next to me and immediately said, "Oh no no...I'm a 3L in law school--I can't let you beat me!" He just laughed and we chatted for about five minutes about where I was from and what kind of law I was interested in, and then he sped up and was gone. He was actually quite nice. Good runner too.


posted by Bekah at 12:01 PM :: |

 
What I Thought About this Morning on the Drive to Campus to Drop off J's Time Sheets at the Student Employment Office Because He Forgot to Drop them off Before he Left to go home for Thanksgiving and I Am Nice

…I can’t believe I forgot where I parked my car last night after class. Legitimately forgot. I mean, I actually got to the spot where I thought my car was parked and panicked because I just knew it had been stolen and I was standing there for an entire minute before I put it together. Man. It’s not even exam time yet...Maybe I need to take some vitamins or something. Garlique perhaps. Wait, isn't that like Beano? So Echinacea then…or the Flintstones vitamins. Or did they stop selling those in the 80’s? Are the Flintstones even on TV anymore? I can’t remember ever watching the show really, but I definitely took the vitamins because I remember liking the orange ones best….Orange flavored things have a storied history with me. I liked those orange vitamins, but then I went through a period where I hated orange juice, but now I like it, even the pulp, if it's not too chunky....and I think I always liked the orange tootsie roll pops...Hey, nice blinker, ass. Thanks for the warning there. And nice W sticker, too...figures...Yeah, I am really liking this posthumous Elliott Smith album. Track 7 is good. And 3. Some really atmospheric stuff. Poignant. More so because of that article I read that said the coroner ended up ruling his cause of death inconclusive...Everyone just assumed suicide because he was a sad person but there were two stab wounds and although they say that suicide by stabbing often involves hesitation wounds, the angle of these wounds was inconclusive. Creepy…Ugh, why won’t that image of the U2 iPod commercial get out of my head…I don’t get U2 worshippers. I want all of these people to clear their minds and really think about “Vertigo.” The song is mindnumbing. Trite, boring, and loud…I don’t get it. Oh, and they were really gross on SNL the other night—Old Bono gyrating awkwardly and shaking his greasy hair—this is Rock and Roll? Still, they were probably the highlight of the show because it really is almost impossible to watch SNL now. It’s completely reduced to the “let’s take one thing that isn’t funny and do it 50 times in a row” motif...not effective...and Horatio Sanz is still not funny, only fat, and while fatness can sometimes be paired with comedic talent, it is never, ever, indicative of it on its own…oh, and to make things worse, U2 and Macintosh are forming the evilest of the evil corporate conglomerates known to man and it is terrifying…personalized U2 iPods? The world is ending…but I feel guilty because I really want an iPod anyway, just not the U2 one because that is fascist...you know, I think I should have read Madame Bovary at this point in my life, but I haven't…I wonder if it's any good…I don’t read enough. I am stupid, and getting stupider by the day. I can’t have intelligent conversations with people anymore, about Chaucer or Heidegger or Mary Kate's latest struggles and heartaches...Law school is sucking my will to live…I think Tom Wolfe looks a lot like Mr. Burns...I wonder if that's on purpose...not on purpose like Tom Wolfe is trying to look like Mr. Burns...but maybe on purpose like Matt Groening has something against Bonfire of the Vanities...another book I haven't read all the way through...and...yes, it is in fact raining now just in time for me to get out of the car...


posted by Bekah at 10:49 AM :: |

 
Apology to the Haiku Gods

First let me just say for the record that I was not really trying to compose legitimate poetry about the MPRE. I used the words "poop" and "trench foot" for God's sake. But, to appease the Haiku devotees out there, I will submit this brief statement of evaluation referring to each of Michael Dylan Welch's (what a poetry-drenched name!) 10 tips for writing Haiku:

1. I was wrong to use only the "Western convention" of 3 lines, 5-7-5 separated, 17-syllable formation. It's what I remembered from 4th grade. I think the ones I wrote then were probably better, though equally stifled, choppy, and Westernized I'm sure.

2. I didn't include a reference to the "season or time of year" in any of the "poems," so that's bad. Although they are all about MPRE time, so maybe that counts.

3. Only four out of five of my "poems" were written in the present tense. I now know that, for the sake of immediacy, haiku should always be in the present tense. Thus, the fourth one should read:

A pencil gently taps in autumn
as my brain
explodes

4. I think I might have gotten this one: I wrote about common, everyday events within the context of the MPRE. I never attempted to answer any questions about the meaning of life. But then I never raised any questions about it either. This is a failing.

5. I wrote all of these poems by channeling my personal experience. My personal experience with the MPRE. It doesn't get more viscerally personal than THAT.

6. This rule requires one to present what causes one's emotions, rather than to present the emotions themselves. Let's see...is trench foot an emotion, or the cause of an emotion? How about judges pooping? Hmm. No dice.

7. Haiku are supposed to be made up of two images together creating "harmony or contrast." Ethics and trench foot. Love and poop. Pencils and exploding brains. That's all I've got.

8. A continuation of the previous rule--one image should be in one line, and the other image in two lines (not three separate images). See above, I guess. This is getting a little deep for me right now.

9. No titles or rhyming. Check.

10. No awkward and unnatural line breaks. Yeah, I did some of that. Choppy, unnatural, even unfortunate run-ins with semicolons and question marks.

So, in conclusion, I must admit that none of the five "poems" I wrote is really a haiku. If I had to venture a guess as to which ones might pass for the most haiku-ish of the horrendously bad haiku below, I'd have to say:

Poem #1: Haiku-ish. No punctuation. Some imagery. Contrast. One of the better attempts.
Poem #2: As noted above, love and poop are two images that create an undeniable contrast in one's mind. Although not seasonal, the flow of this haiku is somewhere between distressed and disturbed--a much better effort than some of the others. What is more natural than judges pooping? Haiku-ish.
Poem #3: No imagery, no flow. Just a question that I've often asked myself split up in three lines. Not haiku-ish.
Poem #4: Would probably be somewhat haiku-ish if written in present tense to reflect the immediacy of the exploding brain in nature. See revised #4 above.
Poem #5: Also, just a random 17 syllable musing of mine. No imagery, seasonal emotion, contrast, or flow. Not haiku-ish.

Final Thought: It just occurred to me that the Law of Haiku may be too rigid in its application. As with Trademark Law, there is no real room for parody, or joking around, or being generally flippant. Any joking haiku-ish things are judged against the same strict statutory requirements as real haiku. This seems a little bit unfair, and a little bit dogmatic. Perhaps if the letter of the law will not pardon me, the Bard Review Board will come up with a remedy in equity?


posted by Bekah at 8:00 PM :: |