Wrapping It Up

So the advent of March has made me aware of just how lazy a blogger I've become. The hiatus has also made me decide to revamp the blog a little bit - after all, mikeandlashel.blogspot.com should really be about more than LaShel complaining about her homework once every several weeks. So stay tuned for new content and, if I can talk my techie brother into donating an extreme blog makeover, a snazzy new layout as well.

But first, before bringing in the new, we'll wrap up the old. It always makes me sad when I'm reading a random person's blog and they describe a conundrum or an exciting upcoming event, and then never mention it again. So I'll comb through later entries looking for hints on whether their dog ever came back or they got the big promotion at work, but to no avail. My own life is not nearly that exciting, but here are some random updates just in case there's a stranger out there wondering:

I did end up dropping a class - the one taught by the "greatest living legal philosopher" which turned out to be a fortunate choice because he retired a few weeks before the semester started because of health problems and the class wasn't offered after all.

My summer to-do list was semi-successful. I did the write-on and ended up on the Journal of Law, Ethics, and Public Policy, we enjoyed the swimming pool at our complex twice before moving to our new, deluxe apartment, and we traveled everywhere on our list except Washington DC. The writing a novel, watching movies in French, and getting ahead on coursework decidedly didn't, but it was a great summer nonetheless.

The British Museum collection was amazing... Victoria is a beautiful city. In fact, I was so enamored that it was disappointing to find out my legal education is not transferable to Canada.

The Venus Fly Trap, as predicted, died a hasty and inglorious death. I'm pleased to announce, however, that our marriage somehow managed to survive.

Luckily, the IRS, after months of investigation and endless letters, concluded that Mike and I were truly poor enough to not owe them any money. Yay!


Long story short, the special meeting called by the journal wasn't about my lack of morale, but because the elected leader of our journal was suddenly no longer a student at the law school. Speculation as to why continues to abound.

And there you have it! Stay tuned for further exciting adventures :)

Discover an Amazing Brownie Recipe? Check!

So ages ago, I posted a list of things I wanted to accomplish over Summer Break. Surprisingly, I did almost all of them - the Law Review writing competition, interviews, travelling, moving, reading, swimming. I failed at writing a novel (the three sentences I jotted down before realizing my plot premise was more than a little creepy* were definitely not sufficient to count), and my new apartment, while adorable, is generally less-than-clean. But for the most part, my summer was a success.

Except for the brownie recipe. I tried at least five different brownie recipes over the summer, but none of them were as good as the box kind. Except for the kind made out of a box mix, with some coconut and sweetened condensed milk thrown in (sweetened condensed milk has a magical way of making everything taste even better). When the summer ended, however, my quest did not. Rather, the cooler fall temperatures, along with the apple harvest and sales on pumpkin puree, pushed me into a baking frenzy. And then, last week, I found it - the brownie recipe I've been hunting for. They're quick and easy to make, have a texture at least as good as a boxed mix, and are a great way to get rid of the lonely, browning banana that is inevitably left on our counter after his friends were all devoured. I bring you deliciousness.

BANANA BETTER-THAN-BOX BROWNIES

1/2 c. margarine (or butter, if you're richer than me or feeling fancy)

2/3 c. semisweet chocolate chips

1 egg

2/3 c packed brown sugar

1 medium banana (overripe is fine)

1/2 t imitation vanilla extract (or the real thing, if you're richer than me or feeling fancy)

1/4 t salt

3/4 c all-purpose flour

More semisweet chocolate chips (1/2 c. is good)

Grease an 8x8 pan, and preheat the oven to 325. Put the butter in a small saucepan, and melt over medium heat. Remove from stove, and stir in the chocolate chips. Set aside. Beat the egg lightly in a medium bowl. Add the brown sugar, and the banana. Mash the banana up fairly well as you stir things together (it would probably be easier to do this before putting it in with the egg and sugar, but that would require getting another bowl dirty). Put in the vanilla and salt, then dump in the butter/chocolate chip sauce. Stir everything together, and gradually add the flour. Dump everything into the pan, and add a generous sprinkling of chocolate chips on top. Bake about 30 minutes, until a knife poked in the middle comes out mostly clean (some moist crumbs are fine). Wait to cool a little bit so you don't burn your mouth, and enjoy with lots of cold milk.

So good! My quest was definitely worth it (ignore the crazy hair... today was just one of those days).

*Turns out a story about a 16 year old who gets into law school but doesn't tell anyone she's 16 because she wants to be treated normally and then starts hanging out with a twenty something classmate she has a crush on who is weirded out when he inevitably finds out how young she is and then causes a huge scene in criminal law while the clueless professor is lecturing about statutory rape, while it makes for an entertaining daydream in Crim Law, had probably best be left unwritten - there's just the little plot problem that 16 year olds, prodigies or not, really shouldn't be going after 23 years olds.

("Evan stared at me icily as he raised his hand.

'Yes, Mr. Jasper,' the professor said.

'What if the girl mislead everyone into thinking she was older than she really was?' My heart sunk to the pit of my stomach. 'What if this wasn't a situation where the defendant took home a girl from a bar, but one where the girl deliberately crafted a false identity and exploited the trust of people she pretended to befriend? What if," he spoke slowly and deliberately, his eyes continuing to drill into my soul, "she was a fraud?'

The professor blinked several times, as though he realized Evan hadn't actually been talking about criminal law, but he answered the question. 'You should read the Lafave hornbook more closely, Mr. Jasper. The intent of the victim would be relevant if this were a crime of scienter, but such details are technically irrelevant in the context of a strict liability offense. Of course, they might sway a sympathetic jury, but juries are unpredictable, as Texas v. Scott makes clear. Mr. Hensley, will you please recite the facts of that case?'

Class continued for another 45 minutes, but my notes stayed blank. I felt too guilty to concentrate, and was too angry to care...")

Math I Can Handle

900 sq. ft. apartment with a deck, vaulted ceilings, a huge kitchen, and an in-unit washer and dryer - 400 sq. ft. studio with 18 inches of counterspace, an insect problem, and no internet = an indescribable amount of awesomeness.

In other words, our new apartment > our old apartment. By a lot.

Pictures may follow shortly, presuming I'm ever able to get all these boxes unpacked.

Summer!

After 2 semesters as a lowly first year student, I'm now officially a 2L.  Unfortunately, unlike levelling up in a video game, this hasn't appeared to give me any special powers or even made me aware of any previously-locked secret areas.  I guess that must not happen until you become a 3L...

My exams went alright(ish).  As mentioned earlier, I forgot about the First Amendment during my Con Law exam.  My Torts exam was so severely word limited that I couldn't really explore any nuances.  The exam I'm most worried about, though, is Property - I started getting a migraine half an hour before the exam, and even though I loaded up on Excedrin when I realized what was happening, I know the first third of the test was consequentially a probable disaster.  But enough about that... there's no point in obsessing now, considering that I won't get my grades for at least 3 weeks (some rumors have even suggested that they won't be in until late June!  I don't think my sanity is that patient). 

Almost as predictable as my impatience for my grades, the end of the semester has also filled me with grandiose plans for this summer:

1. Do the law review write on (of course, this goal might be a little bit easier to accomplish if they actually gave us the packets with our topic assignments - we were expecting them 62 hours ago).

2. Assuming I make law review, start working on research for a note topic

3. Travel (visit Utah, Chicago, Michigan City, the Amish, Canada, and hopefully D.C.)

4. On campus interviews

5.  Try to get a jump-start on coursework for semester

6. Move to a bigger apartment (meaning one that actually has a bedroom).  Furnish/decorate it adorably.  And keep it clean.

7. Write another novel.  Maybe actually let someone besides my mom read it this time.

8. Find a recipe for brownies from scratch that I like as much as the box kind (a surprisingly difficult struggle, to be honest... I've already been working on this one for several months)

9. Read something literary.  I'm not sure what yet... any suggestions?

10.  Watch all my DVDs with the French dubbing on, in a probably-too-late attempt to remember the language.

11.  Start hitting the gym again.  Law school killed all those good exercise habits I built up in grad school.

12.  Actually use the pool at our apartment complex, at least once

13.  Get caught up on movies and TV shows.  Especially want to see Benjamin Button.

14.  Write letters.  And actually mail them.

15.  Take pictures of me and Mike doing all these fun things.  Maybe even blog about it.

And, of course, (16.) work.  This summer is going to be epic.