Law prom 2008

This weekend was the Barrister's Ball, a.k.a. "law prom," and since I forgot to post yesterday, I'm posting the photos now!

Aren't I all fancy.

This year the dance was held in the Cadillac Club at Soldier Field, which was a cool venue. My only complaint was the music, which was beyond awful, but I won't get into that or I'll start to get mad again for spending so much money on a dance where I couldn't even get up and dance. (Urrgh.)

At any rate, I got to hang out with the law people, and re-use part of a bridesmaid dress! (The mint skirt was part of our get-up for Amanda's wedding, and it was actually one of my favorite bridesmaid dresses to begin with.)

This is my law buddy Ed, who is in a weight loss contest with me right now. I hope Ed ate a few steaks at the ball.

Anyhow, it's a week of celebration for Dave and I - everything seems to be coming up for us.

In the past month, Dave got a promotion, a raise, and two As in his master's classes!

On my front, I lost six pounds, was made an editor of next year's law review editorial board, and my article is being published in the first issue of Volume 58 of the DePaul Law Review! I can't wait.

The worst of ourselves

Why have religion and race been brought so much into the presidential primary? More importantly, why have people not noticed that criticism of Barack Obama's religious beliefs been so uneven?

First, he was a Muslim radical who was sworn into office on the Quran. (Note: This is utter bullsh!t, propagated by xenophobes and racists.)

Now, he is a Christian radical who follows the beliefs of his racist pastor. (Note: While the pastor is an anti-white racist asshole, Obama has repeatedly spoken out against racism - and don't forget, Obama is half white, for god's sake.)

I guess Obama-phobes can't really figure out their stance on this one.

Attacks on a person's religious beliefs disgust me, and the fact that Jeremiah Wright continues to be in the news baffles me. If you don't like Obama's politics, that's one thing. But when some people continue to suggest that he harbors racist beliefs, especially after statements he has made on the campaign trail, it makes me want to come to their homes and shake them really, really hard.

Racism has come out in this campaign in interesting ways, and apparently the only way for a small portion of anti-Obama critics to attack him is to project their own racism onto him. Obama didn't give his speech on race out of the blue - it was a reaction to the suggestion that he mirrored the racist beliefs of his former pastor.

Aside from this issue, Obama has tried to keep race and religion out of the primary. Let's all do the same.

I want one.

Some people may fear three and a half stone bunnies, but I do not.

I want to own a bunny this big, throw huge heads of lettuce at it, and run away before it gnaws my leg off. Awesome.

Apparently this woman owns the two largest rabbits in the world - what is she feeding them, radioactive carrots?

Happy bloggiversary!

Today is the second anniversary of this blog! Yay for me, for quasi-consistently maintaining a blog for two years!

My first post was just an introduction, followed by a tribute to my recently dead hamsty, Bismarck. Ironically, in that first week, I noted the third anniversary of the Iraq war. Now it is the fifth.

And last year around this time, I posted about (1) a severe case of the flu I had, (2) the death of an old coworker from the Vidette, (3) a volunteer outing to help some troubled bunnies, and (4) the sale of "Deep Purple," our old van.

Oh, how much changes in a year!

Exorcise the '70s

My past few days have been devoted to rehabbing our kitchen cabinets. Most people who are reading this blog have been to our condo, so you have probably noticed these monstrosities.


See that dark wood? See those huge knockers in the middle of the cabinets? Ugghhhh. (Thankfully the wallpaper was removed shortly after these photos were taken.)

The dark cabinets make the already small kitchen seem smaller than it really is, and extremely dark wood has never really been our thing, at last as far as kitchens are concerned. Thus, I have wanted to paint them for a while.

Before & After

Dad came up yesterday and we popped the cabinet doors off, so we could clean, sand, and paint the cabinets more easily. So, I cleaned, Dave and I sanded, I painted today, and here's the result (sans cabinet doors):


Dad and I bought an off-white paint called "Star Dust," which is a shade somewhere between the off-white walls and the beige counter tops.

Each door will have brushed a nickel knob in the bottom corner, too!

Hopefully this kitchen will feel a little less like a dungeon. I will definitely post pictures in a week or so when the doors are attached - I'm so excited!

"My life is defined by awkward moments."

Remember when we were kids, and you felt very weirded out to see your teachers in normal public places, such as the bank, grocery store, or restaurants?

I was at the grocery store this afternoon picking up some food for the bunnies, and who do I see but my gynecologist. Umm...yeah I ran the other way. The woman has seen, well, plenty of me, and I like to pretend that she lives in the gynecologist office and never enters the real world where I might run into her.

This could only happen to me.

Birds and fishes

Ate myself silly with sushi with the C7 folks tonight. I didn't go too nuts on the volume of sushi, but some certainly did - I'm looking at you, Andy, Alex, Joker, Jamison, Ed, and Burt.

We still managed to go for ice cream afterward, but they didn't have my favorite, cinnamon. (I think Sweet Occasion's cinnamon ice cream may have become my favorite ice cream, especially after the fall of my old favorite, Baskin Robbins' daiquiri ice.)

On our way back home, we saw one of these. That's right, a big ol' pheasant. We think it was a ring-necked pheasant, which is native to Illinois, but it was very strange to see it strumming along next to the Palatine expressway!

That makes the second strange bird I have seen by the Illinois roadside, and I hope the pheasant fares better than the dead peacock I saw on the way home from work. Ahh, suburbia.