Land of Mirrors

Hm.

2008-08-20T05:50:06Z

The stream of constant bitching on this thing lately has probably gotten a bit tiresome to read. It's been more than a bit tiresome to live, to tell the truth. My loan stuff all worked out fine in the end, but it was a lot more stressful and panic-attack-inducing than it needed to be. But, I don't want to talk about that anymore. So, a quick update, including mention of only things that made me happy.

I got more ink! A couple weeks ago I finally went and got the acorn tattoo I've been wanting on my ankle for ages. I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

Canoe trip with my sister! Not only did we not suck at canoeing, we were actually pretty good at it, if I do say so myself. We got lucky and it was overcast about half the time, so it wasn't nearly as cook-an-egg-on-the-shore hot was I was expecting, so that was nice. It really was quite beautiful. I need to spend more time in West Texas. How anyone can pass through there and not see some truly beautiful country I'll never understand.
I'd post pictures, but, I'm lazy. Also, we had a waterproof disposable film camera, and even though the prints look good, I'm less than impressed with how they scanned. I may try to get them scanned with a better scanner.

Birthday! I had a really great time at my bday/going away party. I'm going to miss the hell out of everyone, that's for damn sure. But, party was fun. (Lori, do you have pictures? I saw you whipping out your camera a couple times. Sendy please!)

Holy shit, I'm leaving for school tomorrow. I mean, later today. Is it strange that I should be more nervous about this than I was about going to China? I think I sort of dove head first into that with my eyes shut. I don't know why I wasn't nervous, but I wasn't. Law school ... well, it matters a hell of a lot more, and I really don't want to screw it up. Here's hoping I don't.

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-08-11T11:59:00

2008-08-11T16:59:10Z

At this point, going back to school does not seem worth the hassle of dealing with NYU admin. They send out emails with incorrect URLs to their own fucking website; they take nearly a month to respond to queries (during which time I get my questions answered via phone); they spell my name wrong when they do finally respond to queries; and, oh, they royally fuck up my loan applications.

DO. NOT. LIKE.

Livid.

2008-08-01T15:46:44Z

Am I the only person who didn't know that NYU was going to apply for loans for me? I just don't understand this confusion and I can't figure out where I went wrong on this.

Because I don't want the Stafford loans, but NYU already processed my Citibank loan under the assumption that I did want them, I now have to apply for a second loan to make up the shortfall -- and at a higher rate of interest because Citibank raised their rates. It just seems to me that it can't be the case that a lot of people are having to do this. I just really don't understand. I applied for my loans early, and it's not just biting me on the ass, it's taking chunks out of it. WTF happened?

I just really want to scream at someone right now and there's not anyone to scream at.

::sigh::

2008-07-22T14:13:58Z

If anyone's interested (I suspect this is only of great moment to me), I've worked out wtf happened with my financing: I applied for my loan too early.

NYU assumes that you will be getting Federal loans. They do NOT, as Joe/Joel/Mumblefuck told me, apply for a loan on your behalf, but they do work under the assumption that you will apply for one, and that assumption affects the amount they approve on private loans, if you happen to apply for one early in the game.

But here's the thing: I didn't KNOW I was applying for one so early in the game. They send you your financial aid information in two parts, and don't tell you either that that's how they've done it or when they will be sending you the rest of your info. So, back in early June when I got some of the info, I thought that's all there was and went out to go apply for a loan. (Incidentally, it's a good fucking thing I did that, because Citibank raised their rates starting in July of this year.)

It wasn't until July 19th that I got the rest of the information from NYU -- which, incidentally, contained nothing particularly new, except for the letter about Federal Loans, which I'm uncertain why they couldn't send earlier. So I was finally able to email them and say, "Hi, the reason I applied for a private loan in the full amount of the budget, is because that's what I want. I'm not interested in these other loans, and please to stop trying to help me out by assuming I want to do things I do not want to do. You're making this harder on both of us. Also, fire Joe/Joel/Mumblefuck. He knows not of what he speaks."

ow

2008-07-18T13:47:47Z

I came across the website hundredpushups.com from a link in something on my RSS reader -- it promises to give you the ability to do 100 pushups in 6 weeks if you follow their schedule -- and I decided to do it. Once upon a time I had some moderate upper body strength, and it has completely disappeared since I quit rowing, and I don't like it.

So, yesterday morning, I did day one on their little routine. And I thought, "Rest days are for wimps! I'm totally hardly even sore from this! I will do day 2 tomorrow."

... yeah, it caught up with me today. My arms twinge a little bit, but that's hardly enough to bother me. What hurts is my abs. WTF! I had no idea you used your abs so much doing push ups. So much for forgoing the rest days.

But! Soreness is good in a way I suppose, and I intend to keep with this routine. I want muscle definition!

I am miffed.

2008-07-16T16:42:22Z

I called the NYU Financial Aid office yesterday, and of course now I'm more irritated than I was before.

First of all, the guy on the phone mumbled so badly I had to keep asking him to repeat himself. Then, possibly because of all the repetition, he started to get irritated with me. He talked to me as though I'm a retard, and interrupted me a couple of times. Customer support at its finest! His name is Joe, or possibly Joel, and I do not like him or his stupid face.

It turns out that the reason my loan award is so low is because NYU applied for a Federal Stafford Loan on my behalf without telling me about it. WTF?

Here's what the website says about it:
Once NYU receives your FAFSA information from the federal processor, your eligibility for federal loans will be determined. If you are eligible for federal loans, you will receive instructions from the New York State Higher Education Services Corporation (HESC) about how to complete the application process on-line at www.hesc.com.

Not only did I NOT follow through with any such instructions, I never even received them. How they managed to get a loan for me -- one I don't even fucking want thanks ever so much for ASKING -- without me even knowing about it, I don't know. But I'm kind of pissed about it.

According to the asshole on the phone, I can turn the loan down once it's finalized, and then adjust the amount upwards for the loan I actually applied for. But since I haven't received any of the paperwork, this will all have to wait.

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-07-15T11:46:00

2008-07-15T16:52:12Z

You know, I was shocked and almost appalled even by how easy it was to apply for a student loan online. Without even any contact with an actual person. "Wow," I thought, "that was ridiculously easy. Perhaps my loathing of bureaucratic processes was unfounded after all!"

I should have known nothing could ever be that easy.

My understanding of the way student loans are meant to work is thus:
Your school publishes a budget. You take out a loan for anything up to that amount, and the school signs off on it. Anything over that amount is not allowed.

So, WHY, I'd like to know, is my loan approval amount two-thirds of the published budget? WHY?

I look forward to learning the answer from the Mensa candidates at NYU admin. Really, I expect fun and games. Already I've called them and left a message and they've done me the simple courtesy of calling me back.

Wait, no they haven't.

What an awesome way to spend my lunch hour.

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-07-10T16:46:00

2008-07-10T21:47:32Z

blarg... When my alarm went off at 6:00 this morning so I could get up to work out, I said "hell no" and rolled over and went back to sleep for an hour. Then, I ate a donut and two (smallish but still) pieces of cake over the course of the day and now I feel GROSS.

I've been trying to get up every morning before work and get in some exercise, but it never quite works out. 3 or 4 days a week is all I seem to be able to manage. I feel like crap when I don't work out, because I get NO exercise from anything else. I sit on by butt all day, staring at a computer screen -- I NEED that 45 minutes of rigorous activity. I know this, and yet, some days, the knowledge is just not enough to pry myself out of bed. I'm a whore for sleep, what can I say?

I will do better next week!

No seriously, I will damnit.

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-06-26T11:36:00

2008-06-26T16:37:35Z

So, those ads for weight loss programs on Facebook really irritate me. They purposely put up tummy shots of people who are 10 lbs overweight at a maximum, and they're like "Lose weight with us!!" basically purposely making everyone who has a little tummy (which would be, in effect, everyone) feel like shit about herself.

I try so hard not to be obsessive about my body and to get over my stupid image issues, because they ARE stupid, and it's nigh on fucking impossible with all this bullshit WEIGHT LOSS CRAP FOR SKINNY PEOPLE in my face all the time!

Don't make a move without your papers!!

2008-06-23T18:34:24Z

This scares me. The TSA has been eroding our right to privacy for years, and it's just infuriating. In particular, I find this bit troubling:

A TSA employee said to the guy who wrote in, "these new regulations must have been as a result of someone trying to get away with something, because there's always a reason for these thing but they don't always know what those reasons are."

That is frightening. The whole "government knows best and will protect me from fears I do not even have" mentality just really scares the crap out of me. That people are willing to embrace this kind of thing on the strength of such diaphanous reasoning ...

I agree with Chris Soghian, quoted at the end of the article.

"The change of rules seems to be a pretty obvious case of security theater. Real terrorists do not refuse to show ID. They claim to have lost their ID, or they use a fake.
TSA's new rules only protect us from a non-existent breed of terrorists who are unable to lie."

Cry for me!

2008-06-19T02:11:44Z

I just signed my name to a student loan in the amount of OMGALOTOFMONEY.

Did you know that the expected repayment period is 240 months?

OW. My sense of frugality and my general dislike of debt! They hurtses me!

Unfunny business.

2008-06-15T20:26:40Z

This is hilarious in a way that isn't.

You choose a picture of Clinton's chest as the accompaniment for an article about sexism in campaign coverage? Really? That's what you thought would be appropriate?

Though I suppose it is quite apropos.

Why you shouldn't talk on your cell phone while driving:

2008-06-15T16:17:49Z

Because you'll end up with the head and shoulders of a cyclist smashed through the back window of your car.

My mom and her friends were out riding yesterday morning in a big pack of about 70 people, going their usual speed of 30 mph. They were on a road with no stop sign, coming up on an intersection where the cross street did have a stop sign. This woman, who was talking on her fucking phone, rolled through the stop sign into the intersection, THEN turned her head to check for oncoming traffic. She saw the pack of cyclists coming, freaked out, and stopped. Right in front of them.

My mom's friend smashed through the back window of the woman's SUV, and there was a huge pileup of people as some of them smashed into her car and the rest of them tried to avoid it. The guy who went through the window broke his collar bone, and his bike snapped in half. Another cyclist plowed into my mom, and his sprocket went about 1/2 an inch into the meat of her left calf. The cut was about 3 inches long and half an inch deep and, if I may say so, it was really gross.

She called my brother and I to come get her, and then ended up riding to the hospital in an ambulance before we got there. Once there, they told her that since it was such a deep, jagged cut, she'd be wise to get a plastic surgeon to sew it up, otherwise she'd have a huge and very ugly scar. But, they said they didn't have one on call that morning, so she'd have to go somewhere else if she wanted to do that.

So we took her to another hospital, and waited and waited and waited more than 3 hours, and the surgeon finally showed up. In the course of sewing her up, he asked how it had happened etc, and it turned out that he worked at the first hospital she went to, and had even been there that morning. WTF!!! He told her he was going to make a complaint to the administration to find out why no one called him in, and I freaking well hope someone gets chewed out over it.

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-06-13T10:19:00

2008-06-13T15:32:44Z

I finished Iron Council and Blackpool last night. The first was as amazing as China Mieville always is, the second ... hm.

::sigh:: You know how, when you finish a really amazing book, you feel just a little bit sad that it's over? I feel like that right now. Mieville's books are so transportive for me. They draw you into his (really quite fucked up, because so very dystopian) world, and they're so intense. I LOVE them. His characters never quite seem to accomplish what they set out to do -- or at least, not in the ways that they wanted -- but somehow, I always feel sort of hopeful for them at the end anyway. Iron Council was more of the same, and I mean that in a very positive way.

I want to go back and reread Perdido Street Station and The Scar, but my bookshelves are currently in the attic, buried behind piles of my brother's crap, and I don't want to reread them enough to climb over it all. =/

Blackpool ... I liked the first five episodes, but was really not down with the finale. It felt rushed and oddly cut to me, for one, and for another, WTF CHARACTERS?? What man reacts to his wife cheating on him by giving them his blessing? If they were trying to show that Ripley Holden had just changed that much over the course of this debacle, well I for one didn't buy it. Nor did I particularly buy Carlisle's threats to his partner. For someone who claims to have been a straight arrow for his entire life, that was pretty fucking dirty. And, if Danny actually did kill whatshisface, why didn't his confession match up with whatshisface's injuries??

Basically, what I'm saying here is, way to ruin an awesome mini-series with a completely inexplicable and stupid ending there guys. GAH.

My life sucks.

2008-06-09T21:39:23Z

I think I'm lactose intolerant :-(

Ever since I got back from China I've had an increasingly strong negative stomach reaction to milk, cheese and cream. Somewhere along the line I lost the ability to digest dairy and I am seriously depressed about it. I LOVE milk and cheese y'all. Dairy was the one thing I had this constant craving for when I was in China, because it was expensive and hard to get so I almost never had it. And now I can't eat it anymore.

I keep thinking maybe it'll go away, or maybe if only eat just a little bit it won't be so bad, and I'm wrong every time, and it sucks. Plus I keep forgetting. I've been eating dairy in large amounts my whole life, and it's so natural for me to eat it without thinking about it that I keep doing it and then realizing 1/2 an hour later, when I'm miserable, that I'm not supposed to do that anymore. I did that with a bowl of ice cream last night and it sucked.

And coffee with soy milk is really gross. Also it costs more.

Did I mention that I can't eat cheese? And that I fucking love cheese?

This really blows.

In no particular order:

2008-06-09T06:05:25Z

Went to a wedding this weekend. It was beautiful, and I enjoyed myself. Abi and I proved that neither of us knows how to lead, and then she bailed before the ceremonial mortification of the single women, aka bouquet tossing. Because she's MEAN.

After dinner with my 'rents on Wednesday I put left-overs in the backseat of my car and forgot about them, then failed to make the connection between said food and the funky food-rotting smell in my car for two days. The light finally flipped on and I chucked it on Friday night. I am really very dumb sometimes.

David Tennant makes me drool. Especially with his actual accent. Also, regardless of the presence of one slightly goofy looking & really far too skinny man who I unaccountably find insanely attractive, Blackpool is amazing. There's singing and dancing! And murder and love triangles! Why, WHY are there only 6 episodes of this deliciousness? And there won't be a fifth season of Who until 2010! Someone hates me and I'd like to know who.

Ho hum.

2008-06-06T14:18:43Z

Work has been ... interesting this week.

We have this huge case a number of attorneys are working on, and there's this subpoena for records. So we have to review literally tens of thousands -- if not hundreds -- of documents to determine if they're responsive, and if so in what way. I haven't been involved in doing any of that because, hi, that's what document review attorneys are for.

But, apparently, things are not proceeding at a satisfactory speed, so, guess who graduated from law school without noticing or being offered the customary salary bump? That would be me.

It's not rocket science, what they want me to do. This much is true. But, it doesn't at all follow that I know what the fuck I'm doing. For instance, I have already fucked up by mis-marking everything I looked at yesterday. In my defense I marked it as I was told to, but it turns out that wasn't what I was supposed to do, according to an email I got this morning. Had I a) known what the hell I was doing or b) been involved in this case earlier, I would not have made the mistake I did.

The nature of the database we're using is such that, since I already changed the tags on all the files I coded yesterday, I can no longer search for them using the search I used to find them in the first place, and it is now going to be an enormous pain in the ass to fix this. In fact, I anticipate many hours on the phone with the help desk. I am most terribly pleased.

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-06-04T13:57:00

2008-06-04T19:00:42Z

It's interesting to me to note that not a single person of the male persuasion has asked me what happened to me. I'm still covered in bandaids/bandages and still running into people I haven't seen yet this week, and most of the women ask me what happened and if I'm OK. Guys just look me right in the face, blink, and say nothing.

Is this because men are afraid to say, "OMG what happened to your face?!" or similar? I am puzzled, and a bit intrigued.

Owwwww

2008-06-02T13:52:22Z

I went for a bike ride last night, and through sheer stupidity, ended it by flying over my handlebars and getting up close and personal with the pavement. Fortunately I took most of the impact helmet first, but I am still a mess of ow. I have a big strawberry on my left cheekbone (and some seriously sore teeth from same, though none are loose), and my whole left arm is a mess of roadrash. It feels awesome.

I don't know whether to be pleased or offended that I've been here at work for 20 minutes and seen 1/2 a dozen people and not a single one has asked me what happened. Maybe it doesn't look as bad as I think it does?

Tara's wedding is this weekend, so I'll be prettying up her pictures something fierce.

Whoops

2008-05-24T15:54:51Z

So, I went to dinner with Linda and Lori last night, and I intended to have a glass of wine, or perhaps two with dinner.

Yeah, I drank the whole damn bottle.

That was not cheap! My bank account, it burrrns. That overtime money I had intended to save didn't so much get saved as spent on shoes and booze. But what a way to spend it =D

Work post

2008-05-15T21:36:22Z

I got a letter yesterday in the mail about this pre-law program I'm doing at work starting in June. I'm kind of ... irritated by this whole thing to be honest. It's been rather disorganized, and I'm just really not even sure what the benefit will be, other than being able to put something else on my resume.

Even though I already frigging work here and have done for months now, I am required to re-attend orientation and computer training. Computer training had about 30 minutes of useful information stretched out over 3 hours the FIRST time around. I'm not clear on why I ought to waste time attending again.

Plus, they want me to switch to a different team. I don't want to, because as with all jobs of a clerical/peon level nature, it's taken me some time to convince everyone on my current team that I am in fact not a moron. People are giving me interesting things to do. Or, well, more interesting than "box up these here files please". Why would I want to spend another two months convincing a new set of people of my competence, only to leave at the end of the summer before they get around to actually involving me in anything interesting?

So, I emailed the coordinator and asked if I could just stay with this team. We'll see if they decide to let me do that -- for whatever reason they may not. MRG.

wtf?

2008-05-08T16:34:21Z

I don't understand hackers. What did epileptics ever do to them?

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-05-02T11:05:00

2008-05-02T16:17:01Z

I've been hella busy the past few weeks working on this one case, including like 20 hours of overtime over that period (paycheck = sweeeet; staying at the office till 9:30 =unsweet) and I'm beginning to be very very afraid.

See, the Legal Assistant who worked on this case originally was fired for incompetence, and she really really deserved it liek whoa. The thing about filing systems is that they require systemization in order to function. You cannot just throw shit in boxes, unlabeled, and call it a day.

So, in that sense, the massive disorganization that I'm having to deal with here and attempt to correct is probably atypical. I hope.

But, in many other ways, it's not. The firm I work for is huge, and cases get passed around as a matter of course. The partner whose name is on the docket gets sick of it, so he hands it off to a senior associate. He in turn has a dozen other cases he's working on, so he farms the work out to one or several junior associates. As people get busier with some cases, they fob their work for other cases off on people who are less busy. And that doesn't even count the minions who might be involved. So, for example with this case that has eaten my life, there are currently 6 people actively working on it and 5 more who have worked on it in the past, only counting those who are still employed at the firm.

The lack of focus is ... staggering. How the sweet holy hell does anything ever get done around here? Because I honestly can't tell. I dunno, maybe everyone else already knew this was how it worked (worked? Totally inappropriate word. It implies some level of functionality.) but I didn't.

It's making me really really not want to work at a big firm. I actually find all this legal crap interesting, so I'm not deterred from the field altogether. But I have this hope that at smaller firms this sort of mass chaos isn't the usual state of things.

Aw shit.

2008-04-24T13:55:49Z

So, there's some kind of "pre-law" program here that I'm not totally clear on the details of, but that seems to consist of me doing the same job I've BEEN doing, while also getting invited along to summer associate dinners and the like. I got a call last week asking if I was interested in the program, and yesterday they set up a "breakfast interview" for today.

Thing is, I've been so completely buried that I completely forgot about the interview the second after I put it in my calendar. So this morning when I got dressed, I threw on an extremely casual outfit: green cotton top, knee length skirt, strappy sandals, giant hoop earrings.

Yeah, this should be good.

_ladyshalott_ @ 2008-04-22T01:34:00

2008-04-22T06:34:50Z

Boy howdy it is a really bad idea for me to be awake right now. I should've been asleep hours ago.

Wedding season always leaves me vaguely ... not depressed exactly, but ... sort of melancholic. I've never been any good at dating or relationships and watching friends and acquaintances pair off around me is rather ... sharp.

I should make another attempt at this sleeping thing.