The List

If the point of this blog was to document my reintroduction into society after law school, I'm afraid it only demonstrates my love of the snooze-bar. By the looks of this blog, it looks like I slept through 2010. I wish. Unfortunately, 2010 turned out to be a colossal waste of time. And this is coming from the person who thinks Hurricane Katrina ultimately turned out to be a real gift. There is nothing good to say about 2010.

But, hey, I don't dwell. I'm starting 2011 off with THE LIST!

Here are my goals, large and small, for 2011. I'm afraid that if I don't publicly announce them on this page, they might never ever happen. Here goes:

Back up my computer

Learn Spanish

Make croissants from scratch

Make cheese

Visit 3 out of state friends

Sell something on E-Bay

Sell everything on E-Bay

Run a half-marathon

Train for a tri-marathon

Run the Mt. Washington Race, and survive

Take Lagniappe on one more really good mountain hike

Knit the yarn I have

Pose nude for my painter friend

Write one really good email a week to a friend or member of my family

Take a class in something, anything

Start volunteering again

Find a job

Obtain perfect ass

Not fall in love with the wrong person

Read at least one novel a month

Pass the Louisiana Bar

Pray or meditate daily

Learn how to identify birds

Learn the names of all the former PODUSs

Listen to a lot more Motown

Take up the guitar again

Buy a harmonica

Learn to play said harmonica

Try Bikram yoga

Go rock-climbing

Blog at least once a week

As you can see, I have neglected a lot of things over the past few years. I'll keep you posted on how it goes. If you have suggestions for something I should do, learn, try, please don't hesitate to suggest it. Hell, make your own damn list.

Sexy (medical) Boot

I fractured my toe the other day. I've lived through a few decades of serious accidents and injuries, but I've never broken a bone before now. Not the time an 18-wheeler crunched up my Toyota Corrolla on the I-10. Not the time I fell face first onto the pavement in 1985 while doing ballet...on my Schwinn. You heard me. Not the time, at 7 years old, I was lifting weights and dropped the dumbbell on my toe. I didn't even break bones when I flew out of a moving school bus into a shopping mall parking lot. I'll bruise if you look at me wrong, but, until now, I thought I was unbreakable.

So when I barely stubbed my toe the other day, I was surprised by the huge crack and blinding pain. I either hit this thing in the sweet spot or my calcium is depleted to nothing and I'm crumbling away.

Everyone always says that there is no point in going to the ER because the doctors can't do anything for you. I hate those people. Those are people who like to suffer. If I'm going to suffer, I at least want it to be at the hands of a medical professional. I got my wish when my X-Ray technician turned out to be a closet dominatrix. When a doctor came in and told me my toe was fractured, I half suspected she did it.

I was disappointed when he didn't show me the picture. I mean, it was my first broken bone, the end of an era. I wanted to take it home and put it under my pillow. The X-ray, not the toe.

Now my toe is now taped to his neighbor, the little one that goes wee wee wee all the way home. So that's kind of a drag for him. But otherwise, he's happy not to move. AND he's happy that his brother, the one who ate roast beef, is bruised instead of him. He takes it as some sort of sympathetic gesture for never sharing; or it could be attention seeking behavior on his part. I don't try to understand what's going on down there.

All I know is that I'm now stuck wearing this hideous medical boot for the next eternity. It's equal parts robot and chuck taylor. Which is ok if you're my friend Andrew Walsh, but my entire wardrobe, such that it is, is thrown off now because I can't wear high heels.

So in the meantime, I'm drinking milk and looking ridiculous.

Say CHEESE!

I always hated when photographers pulled that crap as they snapped my school picture. Just when your face was getting comfortable, where you got a happy thought and braced for the damn flash, some hammy jerk would hold the picture hostage until you said the magic word. Say cheese! As you can see, what he managed to capture was one-part worry, two parts pain. But I digress...

Since finishing law school, I took a job at a wine and cheese shop in town while I study for the bar. I could seriously work there forever and never touch the law again. I loved law school and I really look forward to being a lawyer. So that should tell you something about how I feel about cheese. And wine. And cooking in general. I'm pretty stoked about this job and tend to act a little bit like a pusher whenever I don the apron. Here try this, no really, try it. Try it.

See that picture of cheese? The other cheesy picture? That's the Spring Brook Tarentaise and it is breathtaking. Nutty, sharp, and firm. mmm...