I have very little of substance to say (has that ever stopped you before, you ask - to which I say, well, no) - work continues to display an impolite amount of interest in kicking my ass, dating is no fun, and my sweet little old-lady neighbor is being replaced by a tacky insurance agency - but I can't seem to put my new toy down, so I keep trying to find more things to do with it - SO FUN! If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up...(bueller? Bueller?)
I'm reading a defense medical expert's report on a plaintiff in a personal injury case - normally, the doctors will give you a quick run-down of the plaintiff's weight, height and general physical appearance ("appropriately dressed," "appropriate reactions to social advances" and that kind of thing) before getting down the nitty-gritty of Babinski-reflex responses and range of motion. It's pretty boring, since they all generally say the same thing - "Plaintiff weighs 150 pounds, stands 5'5" tall and was appropriately dressed.")
Except this guy. This guy feels it is essential to note (on a neck-injury claim, mind you) that the plaintiff was both well-dressed and had remembered to shave her toes this morning. (Literally. He actually wrote "the subject's toes were appropriately shaven." Is there such a thing as "inappropriately shaven"?) Creepy!
Can someone please explain to me why people think widescreen TVs are oh-so-super-fabulous and just the last word in "I'm cooler than you"-ness? they're AWFUL. Every actor looks bizarrely bloated, and it's harder to read the text on the screen because it's all stretched-out and a hereto-fore normally sized taxicab looks like the Cab That Ate New York City, and so I spend the whole time trying to re-size everything in my head and totally miss what's happening in the show/movie I'm PAYING TO WATCH. And yet, my good friend's obnoxious, smacked-ass of an unjustly self-aggrandizing husband spent the entire time I was (very uncomfortably) visiting twittering about how "RAD" his new widescreen panel was and how it's "MAD" expensive and only those people earning "MAD" bonuses could possibly afford them, so I shouldn't feel bad I don't have one... um. thanks, but I really don't feel bad. not one bit.
But should I?
So, in continuing the trend in which I am always the last person to learn about the "hot new thing," (and thus, ironically, the one trend at whose forefront I appear) - I just found out there's this magical place called Steve & Barry's where they sell fabulously cheap (like, nothing over $10) clothes that are, allegedly, NOT going to shred off your body in the first five seconds of ownership -- HELLO. Why did I not know about this sooner? And, in the perfect happy accident, I'm headed to NYC this weekend and can experience the mecca for myself! I mean, what better place to find cute going-out clothes whose price doesn't make you feel guilty about the fact that, at the end of the first night you wear them, they're irretrievably reeking of cigarette smoke, covered in spilled liquor and usually torn in some place or other? Yay!
And also, what better way to celebrate the fact that this is apparently my 200th post, according to Typepad? (Let's ignore the fact that it took me three years to get here and instead just applaud the fact that I arrived at all, k?)
It's that time again (well, okay, fine, it's about three months PAST that time, but I was slow this year) -- the time for the annual (or sometimes semi-annual) hiring of the law clerks -- the time most likely to drive me to drink. Honestly, it's about my least favorite thing to do -- it not only requires that I talk for, like, twenty minutes straight, but also that I find things to talk about while not accidentally biting my tongue, stuttering, saying anything inappropriate,and otherwise maintaining a professional appearance - plus, there are all those writing samples to read, transcripts to review, resumes to frantically scan two seconds before the interview so I have something to ask them about - EXHAUSTING.
But worst of all is the hiring decisions themselves. I mean, yes, sitting there with yet another over-eager law student with the fresh-out-of-the-box-with-the-pins-still-in button-down shirt and his dad's blazer (not that I"m knocking that, since I wore my mom's skirt suit from about 1987 to my first interview!) is not my favorite way to spent a perfectly good morning. But trying to figure out the right combination of physical presence, verbal ability, writing ability and law school bona fides is practically impossible. And that's where I'm stuck right now. I've gone through about fifty applications, and of those, interviewed the top fifteen. Of those, I kept the five that were standouts (which did not include the one poor kid who could not for the life of him recall the name of one single class he was taking this semester. Not a good sign, really.)
Unfortunately, I can only hire three. Two of the candidates were perfect - good grades, fantastic writing samples and good personalities - so they're already in. But I still have three people for the last spot, so two have to go, and I cannot for the life of me decide who. It's impossible. On the one hand, we have the kid with an excellent writing sample of exactly the length we requested but who, in person, didn't have the greatest people skills, was sort of repellent in appearance and appeared a little shifty-eyed - he seemed more likely to sell you a used car with a rolled-back odometer than to safeguard your interests. On the other hand, we have the very tall, very attractive guy who was sort of verbally awkward and robotic in that way that just-out-of-the-gawky-stage high school boys are before they figure out that they're actually cute and girls are interested in them (and become cocky asses, generally) - his writing sample was good, but shorter than we wanted, his grades are good but the awkward thing is likely to drive people up the wall -- he kept sort of just looking at me for awhile when I asked him a question, and then gave short, monosyllabic answers -- except when I asked about his outside interests and then he got all chatty. Finally, there was the guy with a very professional appearance, fabulous people skills, clearly likely to make everyone love him - but whose writing sample was just adequate, although his grades were excellent. The job is mostly writing, obviously, but with quite a bit of partner-contact and some client contact, so both the people skills and the writing skills count. HOW TO DECIDE? Do you go so-so on both counts, or fantastic on one and hope they learn the other? If the latter, which one is someone most likely to learn? gaaaaaaahhhh......
Seriously, the universe is TRYING TO TELL ME SOMETHING. I just came across this article - which basically says, GET MARRIED NOW OR YOU WILL DIE ALONE AND MISERABLE. Could I perhaps borrow someone's gun for just a second? Thanks...