Hey Ladies (and others),

I'm not sure who knows, and who doesn't...but I am officially employed for an attorney position in Minneapolis, MN!! They are a small patent firm in downtown Minneapolis.

I know Urs has recently dealt with this, and I have an inkling that it will take me a few years to come to terms with this, but I am actually going to be in a financial situation where I can own a car and not stress over it breaking down on the side of the road at any given moment. I've never owned a car with that understanding. And if my car does happen to break down, I don't have to call various towing companies while on the side of the road to get the best price. I can purchase healthy food and not have to worry about whether what's in my grocery cart will deplete my bank account. I can pay rent and be convinced that the landlord I'm supporting is not, in actuality, a slum-lord. I can start paying back my $100,000+ in debt. I can go to a doctor's office and know that I will be able to pay a bill that I get back, if I get one at all. I can afford a couch that I didn't collect from the side of the road with a "Free" sign attached, or pay $15 for at a garage sale (after I talked them down from $20). I can put furniture in a place that I can call home and live there for more than nine months. I can thrown out my socks with holes in them (although I'm not sure that I will). A parking ticket will not be as devastating as it once was. I can afford more than two bras. I can travel without feeling guilty about the debt I am incurring. I can pay Planned Parenthood back for the years of free services and products they have given me. And give them more to help out women who are in the position I was in.

I cannot fathom this sort of luxury that will become my life.

Holy shit.

Jon's Step Mom: "Where does your family live?"
Me: "Wisconsin"
Step Mom: "I've never been there. I haven't been to many of the states over in the Northeast."
Me: (Trying very hard not to say "Neither have I.")
Step Mom: "Charlie's family is in New York, and I visited Connecticut once, but I've never been to any of those other little states over there."

Did she mishear? Does "Wisconsin" sound similar to a Northeastern state that has slipped my mind? Or is this woman just stupid? The sex must have been good, because I certainly wouldn't have left my wife and my four kids for an imbecile who resembles a drowned rat.

I was ready to give this lady a chance because all of Jon's comments (and his siblings' comments, and his mom's comments) have been incredibly cruel. I assumed this was fueled by "my dad cheated on my mom with you" feelings. As it turns out...not so much.

My paranoia is getting the best of me.....

Can I change the blogger settings for this blog so that only registered users can comment? This is the best way I can see to ensure that no anonymous commenters start defecating all over this blog. It hasn't been a problem before... I just get paranoid.

Also, Sig asked me how to keep the robots from her blog. I don't know how to keep robots off of a blogspot blog. The way to keep them off of a website is to make a robots.txt file with this in it

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

At least, I think that is how it is done.

With blogger, there is an option to take the blog off of blogger's public listings. I don't like this option, but we have an internet that either allows any yutz to see everything, or forces us to employ heavy and time consuming moderation. Of course, we're also using a free service.

Hello everyone, I was just checking to make sure I can still post to this thing. I also wanted to take this opportunity to acknowledge the existence of all the people who I have not spoken to in some time. Being a grad student made me a busy, and socially irresponsible person. Congrats to those of you who also have finished up school this year. I hope all is going well, and now that I am no longer bound by the chains of graduate school I hope to regain some of the human characteristics I once had. :)

Dan Savage says it like it is.

And up to now the mainstream media have refrained from calling the right's
opposition to the HPV vaccine what it is—delusional, psychotic,
homicidal—because up to now only women's lives were at stake.
That's about to change.
Here's the headline from my morning paper: "HPV Factors in
Throat Cancer: Study Could Shift Debate About Vaccine." You bet it will. Up
to now, the HPV vaccine—which, again, has proven 100 percent effective against
the cancer-causing strains of the virus—could merely prevent 10,000 cases of
cervical cancer in American women every year, along with 4,000 deaths. But now
the debate could shift—it will shift, it already has shifted—because it's no
longer "just" the lives of 4,000 American women that are on the line, but the
sex lives of 150 million American men.
"If men got pregnant," goes the bumper sticker, "abortion would be a sacrament." Now that straight men can get cancer from eating pussy, the HPV vaccine is going to go from controversial to sacramental faster than you can say, "Suck my dick."

Amen, my brother.

Ok, so this is the only blog I can post in where I think I won't be found out too easily.

We went to the most Wisconsin Redneck Baby Shower/Welcome to the World party ever on Saturday. First of all it was invite by word of mouth/email and it was held at a night club inside of a bowling alley and advertised as free food, beer, and bowling :) All of Appleton is smoke free, but this bowling alley was in Menasha ... so smokey/loud bowling alley + baby! Nice! Anyways, we made an appearance and Jacob bowled a game and it definitely was the oddest baby shower/welcome to the world party (the baby is a month old) I've ever been to. The grandpa is hanging out bowling with all his racing buddies and dropping the f bomb every other word ... I'm not a prude so much as there were lots of little kids running around and I would hate to hear fuck come out of a 4 year olds mouth. Although, these kids are probably the kind that tried beer before juice ... The food was from subway and a cheese tray of course :) They kept the baby in the bar area where there was less smoke and a little less noise, but too funny ... it was a beautiful day outside and we're in a bowling alley for a baby shower!

Anyways, thought you girls would get a kick out of this and hopefully I can remain somewhat anonymous in this post.

Based on Erica's latest blog post, I propose a Girlz Shopping Extravaganza to help us all dress like super powerful, intimidating, competent, beautiful businesswomen. Thats right....

It's MAKE-OVER TIME!

Urs can share what she knows about make-up for the professional, social, and trampy scenes, incorporating parts of counter-culture into your wardrobe and office setting
Sig can explain dress and suit pants and what looks best with blond hair and pale skin
Rock can tie everything together to made Erica a wardrobe that would make any colleague shit a brick

What else can we provide? I would thuroghly enjoy making Erica into Super Entomolgista, able to detect bug species with only a leg and tell Monsanto and Dow to listen to her, and only her. - She's got the attitude and the smarts, now she needs the look!

Assuming I do not fail more than six credits this semester, I am officially done with law school! Hooray!