Thursday, February 26, 2009

Eric comes to Durham tomorrow!

Yay, only one more day until Eric comes to Durham! Not for good, but hopefully that won't be too far off. :) That will make me a happy wife.

In other news:
1--The bar is over, yay. I'm very worried about how I did, especially after the afternoon MBE section yesterday. But it's in someone else's hands now. I did the best I could under the circumstances (working 50-60 hour weeks until Jan. 31, then packing up our house and moving to a new state and getting settled...all without my husband being around for most of it). If I didn't pass, I'll have a much better plan going into July's exam.

2--My final for corporate tax is next week. I need to get going with studying, but am taking a bit of a break from studying until later this evening. I've spent the morning getting caught up on e-mails, reading blogs, straightening up the house, doing laundry, making a shopping list (Target, grocery & Barnes & Noble on the agenda in a few minutes), and generally hanging out. Feels good to have put my bar/bri and PMBR books in the guest closet, where they will stay at least until the first week of May.

3--My big fall marathon decision has been made! Marine Corps Marathon is a race I have wanted to run since my first year running Chicago, but I've always decided to run Chicago instead (they're always two weekends apart). This year, there are a couple of things working in MCM's favor.
A) Driving distance! Arlington is only about 5 hours from us, instead of a 2.5 hour plane ride and a lot of train time into the city and back.
B) Team LUNGevity has a team for this race now!!! I am SO excited to be able to fundraise for the LUNGevity foundation again this year. They are really the major charity that Eric and I support, as their sole purpose is funding lung cancer research, and the money they raise is matched, dollar-for-dollar, by other foundations, so that for each dollar we give or raise for them, they fund at least $2 in research grants at major universities and cancer centers across the country.
C) At least one of my online running friends is coming from Canada for the race! As many of you know, I'm an active member of Running Mania, an online running community...that's based in Canada. So I have lots of virtual running friends, but have only met about five (Tori, Rob, Andy, David & Kimberly...am I missing anyone?) in real life. So, Andy is coming to MCM, and I'm expecting that a few others will, since there always seems to be a good maniac representation at major races, both in the US and Canada every year. It will be great to catch up with him and the others that come down!
D) Finally, as all of you know, my little brother is a Marine. I'm so proud of him for serving our country both in Iraq and other stations around the world. He's been on inactive duty for a few years, and I think it's time we all say thanks to other Marines (those whom we know and those who will be in Arlington for the race) for their service. This race is a great opportunity to do that--tons of military personnel and their families come out for this race every year, and the course is lined with Marines.

That's it for now! Next week after my final is over, I'm going to start looking for employment, even though the bar results don't come back for quite some time. I hope I'll at least be able to get a feel for what the market here is like.

UGH the cats need to stop throwing up. Snowflake is at it again now. We've decided to change their food to this starting next week to see if it helps with the whole barf thing.

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Poor, Poor, Burnt Tiger Tail

Well, poor, poor, burt Tiger Tail is an appropriate name for this...since our condo smells like burnt tail right now. Poor Tiger learned his lesson about swishing his tail too close to a candle today! He singed about 4" on the backside of his little tail :( At least I noticed when I did, I don't think he had noticed yet, poor guy!

Otherwise, the bar is 60% done. 12 essays done, 200 multiple choice to go tomorrow. Off to bed in a little bit so I can wake up early for a last look at the outlines. Eric is coming to visit on Friday for a long time! Yay! Here's hoping for at least a week, if not until the next weekend, that would be great! I'm so ready for him to be here full-time. Living alone is really boring and not much fun. (Don't get me wrong, I love the cat time, and the ability to study all day and entertain myself...but geez, I would love some company once in a while!)

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Busy morning

So today I decided to test-drive to the new places I have to go this week for bar-related activities.  First stop was a law firm in downtown Raleigh for my bar interview on Monday at 10.  Took about 30 minutes to get there.  If you blink, you totally miss downtown here!  I think there are three skyscrapers.  Very odd, coming from Atlanta, San Diego, Chicago...  It was also odd that 40 going into downtown (that's Interstate 40, btw) only has two lanes most of the way.  What is that?!  Crazy, I think.  Even Louisville (other small city I can think of) has three all the way through, if not 4 in places.  I'm getting worried that I should leave at 8 for my 10am interview Monday!  With 2 lanes, traffic has to back up all the way to Greensboro, right?  

From there, I drove over to the North Carolina State Fairgrounds.  This is where the bar will be held on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Today they were having a flea market and a cat show.  I didn't go in, just drove past the entrance for parking this week and turned around.  Looks to be about 20 minutes (without traffic) from our house.  

Finally, I drove to my favorite place so far in Raleigh, and someplace I had been dying to go since my last visit 4 weeks ago...Archivers! :) :) :)  This was their make & take weekend, so I made two cute cards, and got some cut studded stickers to match our honeymoon papers (for free), plus some cardstock in a nice almost-neon green (free).  Then, shopping the sales I got 5 yards of velvet scalloped ribbon in bright yellow (also for honeymoon pages) for half off, and I found some cute cardstock title cards for 25 cents each.  Good finds today!  I signed up for my first Scrap Mania here, on March 13.  Table 4, which is otherwise empty right now.  It seems that their Saturday nights fill up far in advance, but their Fridays seem pretty tame.  After Eric gets here for good, I won't be able to do Fridays anymore since we'll be synagogue shopping, but it will be nice to have a whole day and night at the store, it will be my first in about seven weeks.  Much needed by that point!

On my way home, I stopped at PetSmart to buy some necessities for the cats.  Today they got cat wipes, which are like baby wipes, but fragrance-free and hypo-allergenic.  This was to wipe off the little spots on their necks where I put their flea treatment (that they keep licking, which is the cause of all the vomit over the last two days).  I also got them some new flea treatment, which is all-natural and purportedly "gentle." Hah, I'll believe it when they stop throwing up after they get the treatments!  I also picked up some sparkle balls and catnip poufs for Tiger, along with a little tin of Pit'r Pat, in fish flavor.  Apparently, these little fish-shaped things are supposed to freshen a cat's breath.  They resemble cat altoids, really.  Except they smell like fish, bleh.  So far, Tiger loves them, and Snowflake tried to eat hers and gave up.  Then Tiger took it upon himself to eat 1/2 the little container of them.  Chowed down like it was dinnertime!  I guess he does like them.  He also tolerated the mom-bath better than Snowflake.  
Back to studying...got a lot to learn!

Friday, February 20, 2009

How many times can two cats vomit in a day???

So far, we're at 9 times.  After the four yesterday.  All on white carpet, all orange in color.  Hope our landlord doesn't read this blog, because damn, Resolve sure doesn't work as well as it's supposed to.  I'm at the point that I just want to lock them in the (tiled) bathroom until they stop.  They didn't vomit at all the first 2.5 weeks that we've been here, and all of a sudden, barf city.  I can't wait for Eric to get here, I already told him I'm never cleaning up any more barf until I die after this week!

My run today didn't even help my foul mood.  Although it was a fair run, easier pace than my last, which helped.  Forgot my inhaler again, but don't know if it would have done much good since I was only out for 5k.  I wish I could just escape my life right now.  Run away, have the bar be over, have my final and the MPRE and my outline be taken/turned in, and just spend a few weeks at the beach.  That would help out pretty well, I think.  Oh, and having a great job to come back to would help too.  I miss being in the office with all of my work friends lately.  So even though I still work there, it's getting old not being in the office.  I'm sure it will be better once Eric moves up here for good, but right now it's not such a good week.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

One Week from Today

The Bar will be OVER for now!!! Just thinking about it makes me SO HAPPY.  I've about had it with studying, even though I don't know even close to what I need to yet.  But as Eric says, I will get through it and move on.  For now, I have to do the best I can until it's over.  

Have to say, my tax final seems like chump change in comparison to this 22-subject monstrosity.  What's a little §§ 351, 357, 361 compared to con, crim, crim pro, evidence, property, nc property, sales, torts, agency, partnership, civ pro, commercial paper, corps, equity, family, mortgages, suretyships, liens, professional responsibility, secured transactions, trusts and wills?  Seriously, and the MPRE seems like a little waft of a fairy tail nonsense thrown in for good measure.  Sure, take a 2.5 hour exam on ethics and co-mingling client funds after taking two bars, 3 master's level finals, and oh, the same test three years ago? Sure, why not.  For good measure, right?

Also, the 2009 homebuyer tax credit was signed into law today by our new great President.  $8000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers who close before December 1, 2009.  No pay-back over 15 years, just credit on the 2009 return with possibility of a huge refund as a result.  Buying a house just jumped to second place on our life-event to-do list this year.  The only thing on top of it is...get a job.  Funny how those go together.  I told Eric I was going to look for a job VERY HARD as soon as bar/final/mpre are over so we can buy a house.  So that I will.  Look VERY HARD for a job.  Just have to get through the next 7 sleeps first.  

Now, back to studying.   A night full of sales, suretyships & liens is fun for everyone!  Although for some reason, the cats are avoiding the subjects...

Monday, February 16, 2009

Studying is a painful occupation!

So, I've painfully figured out that typing does not compute in a cat's small-but-very-cute brain.  To cats, typing is a game we play with them where we move our fingers back and forth really quickly and they're supposed to see if they're quick enough to catch up.  What do cats do when they catch something?  They try to eat it, of course.  Well...kill it first, and then eat it.  My fingers have been caught many times today and yesterday, thanks to Tiger...and they were successfully killed, I think.  

Studying otherwise is going slowly.  I'm extremely worried that I'm going to fail the bar and turn around and fail my corporate tax exam.  Although I'm less worried about tax...my brain seems to remember it better than the 22 other subjects on the bar.  And I'm crossing my fingers that this will be the first year since the 1970's that North Carolina tests on a tax question!!! It's been so long since they tested it (although it's still listed as a tested subject) that the outlines don't even cover the topic anymore.  

So my short list for "hoped-for essays" is:
1.  Tax
2.  Family law
3.  Wills
4. Professional Responsibility
5.  Civil Procedure

That's it.  Too bad there are 12 essays.  In that case, I add the following:
6.  Secured Transactions
7.  Commercial Paper
8.  Real Property
9.  Sales/UCC Article 2
10.  Mortgages
11. Corporations
12.  Agency & Partnership

And I hope all the questions of 6-12 are ridiculously hard.  That way I'll get points for making something up! :)  

Otherwise, I can't wait for Eric to move here already!  The cats and I are both ready to see him all the time again.  He had a hard day today, so hopefully he's back at Michael's relaxing with some good dinner by now.  Sucks that a hard day has to come AFTER his defense is over.   Ah, things will improve once he lives here, of that I'm sure!

Thursday, February 12, 2009

We are now DOCTOR and Mrs...

So, Eric's defense was yesterday, and he did wonderfully! He's now officially a Ph.D., so you can all just call him Dr.!

I drove down on Tuesday morning, and we had a chance to hang out before his parents got into town on Tuesday night.  We picked up our (now-framed) Ketubah, went for sushi at Aqua, and just enjoyed seeing each other for the first time in 8 days.  We stayed at the Marriott Towne Suites in Buckhead for two nights...neither one of us slept well on the horrible bed (and then horrible couch bed).  Not a great start to defense day, that's for sure!

Defense day started early, with breakfast at 8 at the hotel.  We got to Tech and got everything set up for E's presentation, and then just waited for people to come.  All told, there were about 30 people present--labmates, E's reading committee, and friends from around campus.  A good turnout!  

Eric did great with the presentation--he talked for about 1:15, and never lost his flow, even when people were interrupting him for questions.  He sounded like the expert on everything he was talking about.  After his presentation, he and his committee discussed things for about another half hour, and then they met privately to deliberate.  Apparently they had good things to say, since the end result was the title of DOCTOR!  (Er, Ph.D. to be technical...)

After the defense, some of his labmates joined us at Gordon Biersch for lunch.  We finished the day by celebrating with more friends (Ryan, Michael, Connor, Rachel) at LongHorn.  

Today, we took Eric's parents to the airport, and then hung out until after lunch.  It was really nice to just be together after so many days apart.  After lunch at CPK, I headed back to Durham!

A great week!  I'm so proud of Eric, and I know he's so happy to be done with the defense and that he can stop worrying about it and just accept the title now :)  

Next goal:  Get Dr. Eric to Durham for good!!!

Monday, February 9, 2009

D-Day is almost here!

I'm almost packed for my trip to Atlanta tomorrow--just a few things left to do before I leave:
-Bake cookies;
-Put clothes in suitcase;
-Take out the trash;
-Finish cleaning up the house.

I'm really excited to see Eric tomorrow, and am so happy that his defense is almost over!

We miss Eric :(

The cats and I really miss Eric today.  I don't feel like running, but it's so nice outside (65 and sunny) that I wish he were here so we could go for a walk or spend some time just being outside.  It's going to be a nice night to grill too...except he's the griller of our family.  Can't wait for him to come here for good!

At least I get to see him tomorrow!!!

Report from the Cats

Hello, these are your blogger-cats, Tiger and Snowflake.  Mom just told us about her last post (she was REALLY excited, geez!), and we wanted to tell you all this:

WE AGREE WITH HER.

We spent most of the day today running from open window to open window, savoring the smell of the outdoors.  We also thought it was great to be able to sleep in the sun with a breeze blowing on us.   Although, if mom would just let us outside to...play, yeah that's it...we wouldn't have to be so excited every time there was weather good enough for mom to open the windows.

Although who are we kidding.  We want to go out and attack small, ground-dwelling animals and birds.  I mean, we really miss our chipmunk and squirrel "friends" from Atlanta!!!  

We hope she opens the windows tomorrow too.  

Snowflake here:  At least I haven't tried to escape out to the balcony yet!

Tiger here:  You just don't know the right time to run!

Cats, out!  Time for a nap!

Is SPRING here???!?

Well, I'm going to go out on a limb here and report that SPRING HAS COME!!!!!!!!  The 10-day has a few days of mid-50's with showers, but the bulk of the days are above 65 and SUNNY!!!

The past two days have been mid-70's and not a cloud in the sky.  I was afraid to get hopeful, just in case mother nature had a cold shock in store...but I'm hopeful now after seeing the forecast!  

I always hate winter, and living in the south for the past four years (and San Diego for 2 1/2 before that...) has allowed me to escape most of the winter, with the exception of COLD December/January each year.  But I always look forward to the day I know that the next 10 months will be warm!  

TODAY IS THAT DAY!!!!!  

Plus, there's a really pretty tree out front of our building that has started to bloom.  It's just confirmation :)

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Defense count down--3 Days

First of all thanks to my lovely wife Mary for adding me as an author to this website. Second, thanks to you for actually reading this. Now that that is done, let's get down to business. I am exhausted. I have been working like a madman so that I can get my butt up to Durham so that I can be with Mary.

To bring you up to speed let me tell you what the score is. I am defending my thesis in 3 days. Things are going pretty well as far as that is concerned. My thesis is submitted to my committee (check), the talk is written (check), and all I have to do now is practice it some so that I can get the transitions down ( ). Hopefully on Wednesday I will be a Ph.D. with everything but a diploma in my hand. Unfortunately that is not all that it takes to get this over-worked student up to Durham. I also need to have all of my papers submitted.

My advisor wants me to have all of my manuscripts accepted for publication before I can leave. This actually isn't such a big deal because one of the two that I have submitted was just accepted (with revisions) to The Journal of the American Chemical Society (yay!). So I am working on revisions for that paper as we speak (type....whatever). The other manuscript we sent to Nature and it was rejected on the basis that they thought that it was not good for a broad enough audience. Lame. So we are sending it on to Science instead. For the past day or so, my advisor and I have been emailing back and forth with revisions for this second manuscript and hopefully we will send it out today.

All that being said, things are feeling like they are on the upswing. I have a good job waiting for me in NC (postdoc at UNC) and I am successfully rapping things up here in Atlanta. It is tough living away from Mary though. It's really different not cooking for two, not getting groceries for two, etc. Therefore, I really can't wait to get my butt up to Durham to be with Mary. But until that time I am staying at Michael and Connor's house, which is fun but different from what I am used to (living with my wife).

I hope all goes well over the next few days. I will keep you posted. Thanks for listening (reading) me Rant

Saturday, February 7, 2009

First long-ish run in NC

So today I headed out for my first long-ish run since the move (and since Goofy in January).  

Some background:  I'm down to 8 toenails, and my broken rib still hurts.  Yesterday was the 9-week mark since I broke it, and generally I don't notice it, but it still hurts to lift things with my left arm, still hurts (excruciatingly, actually) to lie flat on my back, and you wouldn't believe how much it still hurts to sneeze!  I read that although the bone should be healed by the 8-week mark, there can be residual pain for up to 5 months after the bone has healed.  Have to say, I probably didn't help things along by running a half and full back-to-back at the 5-week mark.  Oops.  I can't even say live and learn to that one...I would do it again in a heartbeat!  Generally, I will take a couple of ibuprofin for rib pain, but I've been off it completely for about 3.5 weeks now, and I haven't felt the need to medicate since just after the races last month.  I was also prescribed an inhaler for difficulty breathing associated with the break, but haven't taken the inhaler in about 3 weeks either, since I a) haven't been having trouble breathing, and b) haven't really been running so much.  

So today I set out for what I expect to be an hour (or less) run, 4-5 miles.  It's 70, sunny, beautiful day.  Except I had only eaten a bowl of frosted mini wheats and a couple handfuls of sunflower seeds...and a few handfuls of Lindt snowman truffles (YUM, my favorite!).  Thankfully (you'll hear why), I dressed in a fuschia top.  I also took a water bottle with me (can't find my fuel belt, it's still packed somewhere...)

My main goal today was to figure out the RTP trail system.  I had looked online yesterday, and it seemed easy enough.  Except there is crazy construction going on around here, which doesn't bode too well for existing trails.  Well, I found the trail system.  My thought was to run down Davis, to 54, Alexander, and then Hopson--making a neat loop in my neighborhood.  I made it to 54, and then to Alexander, and then Hopson.  And then 20 minutes of Cisco campus, followed by trails that were either mud-covered, torn up (really, they had huge chunks of asphalt on top of the trail), or non-existent (I had to do a tick check when I got home!!!)  Turns out my nice loop is about 8.6 miles of loop, and I took a wrong turn somewhere in there.  When I finished, I was hurting everywhere--hips, quads, hams, and TOES.  My poor toes will never forgive me for taking up this hobby, unfortunately :(  The toes that don't even have nails got blisters today...I really feel bad for doing that to them, but ah, life goes on.  I just know that I may never be able to get another pedicure again...ever!  (I do remember the first time I went for one after losing a nail...I can't ever forget the look I got from the pedicurist! It was a look of questioning, then realization, then disgust.  Poor lady!)

That all said, now that it's been a few hours since I got back, I've had some time to think about other things related to the run.  

First, North Carolina is so much more rural than I'm used to.  I started running in San Diego in 2003, and I lived downtown.  So when I'd run, I'd run in Balboa Park and around the streets of downtown.  Very urban, cars and palm trees everywhere--I loved it!  Even when I started biking on Fiesta Island, you still saw the city and the homes all around, even though there were none on the island itself.  Then I moved to Atlanta.  The bulk of my long runs were on the Silver Comet trail, which is very suburban, but it's lined with houses and subdivisions on the stretch that I ran over the years, and there were always tons of runners or bikers out with me.  Now we live in North Carolina, where I ran along a 4-lane road and saw no cars, no stoplights, no houses, a few businesses (but very far between) and no other people.  I was shocked at the amount of green that I saw today--fields of tall grass, what appeared to be forest areas...all very new as of late.  The bulk of the run was along low-populated areas where I saw nobody else.  The entire run, I saw NO other runners...hard to imagine, even after it happened!

Second, North Carolina has CRAZY killer hills!  I thought the hills in Huntley Hills were challenging, these are like Mount Kilimanjaro in comparison!  Not one place on my run was flat--I was either going up a sharp hill, up a gradual, long incline (worse than short steep ones!) or down a sharp hill.  I have a feeling this loop will make up the bulk of my training for the Boogie Marathon in June.  That course will be the first race I do that has "rolling" hills with a net even finish--meaning you go up and down, for the duration.  Given that it's a 4-loop course, it should be pretty comparable to what I was running today.  But, I'll need to pull elevation charts in the weeks to come, just to be sure.  Another good thing about the hills is that they will help me build strength--leg and core--since I don't have a gym membership.  (I also can't do true core yet b/c of the rib issue...).  I sure will have great-looking legs when I get the hang of these hills!

Finally, Looking back, it was a great run.  I was utterly exhausted by the hills, walked a good chunk of the last half, and was petrified that I was lost for the last hour of it, but overall, it was great to get outside and just run.  When I first went outside and started running, I actually thought to myself, "There is nothing better than this"--clear blue sky, warm weather, light breeze, and me and the road.  It's been a long time since I had a run that started so well (thanks to injury (insert mad smiley here)  ).  

I can't wait for Eric to get up here for good too.  He has been working really really ridiculously hard on his defense presentation, his papers, and work generally in the past few weeks.  We'll both be glowingly happy once his defense is over on Wednesday afternoon, and I'll be happier still once he can move to North Carolina to be with the cats and me.  He's having a good time living with Michael and Connor, especially given the copious amount of wii time he gets to have...but nothing is as good as being home with the wife and kids! :)

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Getting Settled...

First, happy year-and-a-half wedding anniversary to us!  It's been an incredibly fun year and a half, and neither of us would trade being married for anything!  

So, it's been six full days since our stuff and I got to North Carolina.  Eric was here until Monday, and then had to leave to go back to Atlanta and prepare for his defense.  While he was here, he really helped me get the major construction-type projects done.  But because he was doing those (important projects), it left all the unpacking to be done...after he left...by moi!  Needless to say, I haven't made as much progress as I'd hoped to have made by now.  

Why?  Ah, because I'm hopelessly behind in both studying for the bar and studying for my class.  I've only done about 300 MBE practice questions, and have only outlined three subjects.  There are 22 subjects on the bar, yikes!  Tomorrow I should get another three out of the way, and hopefully maintain that pace until the end of next week, when everything will at least be outlined, so I can start on my practice essays.  I'm about two chapters behind in my class studies (doesn't say much, since we've only covered 4 so far...) but I'm working on that tonight.  

As far as the condo goes...I've gotten most of the bedroom unpacked and put away (Target needs to get more over-the-door shoe racks in already!), the bathrooms are done, and that's about all that's finished.  The kitchen has pots and bakeware covering every square inch of (granite) counter space, and the living room has piles of books stacked everywhere, waiting to be put on the bookshelf.  I don't know what it is that makes me so non-committal with deciding where our things are going.  It's not a life or death decision, it's just temporary...but I think it would be much easier to decide these things if Eric were here for some input :)  

Oh, last but definitely not least:  I finally got out for my first NC run today.  It was 24 degrees and windier than I've ever felt in my life!  I wore tights, wind pants, 2 pairs of socks (one was double-layered), two base layers, a third shirt, and a windbreaker with my hat and gloves.  Barely kept me warm.  I think I need to look into bun warmers and thicker tights to stop the wind that my Canadian friends seem to have.  And a face mask/hat combo!  At least tomorrow it will start warming up (oh, I mean today...midnight already!)--50 Friday, 64 Saturday, and 68 Sunday.  CAN'T WAIT FOR THE WARMTH that is supposed to come with the sun!  I only went about two miles, but it felt great to get back out.  I suppose next on my list will be to a) figure out the RTP trail/path system that I've heard of, and b) work on my training plan for Boogie in June.  And maybe put a half plan together for myself...we shall see!