So long as I'm not a lady-in-waiting...

There is a fun game that I sometimes play when I don’t have anything particularly pressing to occupy my mind. I’ve nicknamed it “The Medieval Profession Game.” Basically, I imagine a fully-functional medieval kingdom, with knights, lords and ladies, bakers and carpenters, potters, artists, and abbots and clerics. Then I go through people that I know and try to figure out what sort of profession they might find themselves in (by birth, apprenticeship, or choice) if they were all native to such a world.

It is an amusing foray into the realm of type-casting all of my friends into easily cognizable stereotypes. Don’t you all just love being pigeonholed? Unfortunate, I know.

At any rate, I was playing the game this afternoon and came to a startling realization. I’ve never really bothered to come up with an occupation for me. So I want input from people who might have a small grasp on the nearly unfathomable awesomeness that is embodied in my form.

So who would I be? Would I be the village drunkard? The destitute leper? The quiet monk contemplating his existence while observing the peas in his garden? A blacksmith, tailor, or farmer? A mighty King? A maker of finely-crafted wooden toys in a bustling city? Would I be a successful merchant or would I have been burned at the stake as a heretic? It’s up to you! I’m interested in feedback.

Shocking discovery

Early this week when Professor M. sent out his call for Research Assistants, he suggested that any individuals who wished to apply present a transcript, cover letter, and CV to his mailbox. I went to the Dean's office and requested an unofficial copy of my transcript. The lady at the desk told me that it would be a few hours before my request was processed, but inquired as to whether I would be around later that afternoon to pick it up. Chafing at the delay, I decided that I would hang around the law school and wait for it to be completed so that I could turn in my application (as the professor had indicated he would only consider the first 10 applications).

While I waited, I began to worry that perhaps the professor wanted an official copy of the transcript. I went down to his office to ask, which is when he told me that if I wanted the position, I didn't even need to apply. Much relieved that I wouldn't have to wait around the law school for a few hours, I went back to the Dean's office to cancel my request.

When I arrived, just for grins, I decided that I would accept the copy of my transcript anyway, just in case it came in handy elsewhere. I told the lady at the desk that I regretted that I would be unable to pick it up today, but informed her that I would pick it up later in the week.

I left and promptly forgot about ever having ordered the unofficial copy of my transcript. This afternoon, right after Environmental Law, I remembered and went and picked up my transcript from the office.

Lo and behold, there upon my transcript were a couple of startling revelations.

Somehow, without my knowledge, I had earned 'Top Paper' in a couple of classes through the current course of my law school career. You'd think they'd tell you that sort of thing or something, but I guess they leave it as a little surprise for later.

Go figure.

Absurdity of the day

There are times when my tax class makes me laugh. The curious thing is that I appear to be the only one in the class who finds these bits funny. One piece particularly caught my eye today, though.

When computing the gain or loss made in regard to a sale of property for a business, say, one might expect to use a particular section that tells you how to compute gains and losses (which we've studied already). However, in applying that gain/loss computation section, you modify it using a regulation which we learned today.

Calculating a gain or a loss is pretty intuitive. It comes right out of basic elementary school level arithematic. If I buy a truck for $20,000 and sell it for $15,000, I have sold it at a loss of $5,000. If I buy the truck at $20,000 and sell it for $30,000, I have sold it for a gain of $10,000. Simple, right?

Why this came out as absurdly hilarious in my mind is that when calculating a gain or loss under this combination of a statute provision and a regulation, it just so happens that you can end up calculating for a gain or a loss and end up with neigher occuring. We literally had on the board a set of subtraction problems where we were subtracting a number from another non-identical number and getting an answer of zero. And even more perplexing to anyone with a background in elementary school level math, when we reversed the order of the numbers (subtracted the first number from the second number) we still came out with zero.

That, people, is not the way that numbers work. Anywhere. Ever. If I subtract 1,000 from 4,000, I do not expect to get zero. If I subtract 4,000 from 1,000, I do not expect to get zero. Why?

Because numbers follow particular rules, and the application of those rules is universal across all times and spaces. That assumption is the only way that arithematic can be understood as having any validity. To an income tax lawyer, though, the universal principles of mathematics can simply take a flying leap out the window.

Hilarious.

To allay the worries of friends

I’ve often reflected that there are three different versions of me that run my life. One version of me is the version that people see most days. I’m generally quiet, fairly dependable, not easily excitable, and relatively boring. That said, I’m relatively content with that version of me, although it is not the incarnation of me of which I am most proud or in which I would like to spend most of my time.

The second version of me is the one which I find to be the best version of myself. Sometimes this version controls me for days, sometimes for weeks, but while I am in this particular incarnation, I only need about 4 hours of sleep per day, my mind races faster than can anyone else’s, and I am filled with not just good, but I’ll say it, brilliant ideas for solutions to a wide variety of problems. When captured by this persona, I speak quickly and my hands are quite animated while I talk. I’m filled with boundless energy and I feel like I could be a god if I tried.

Unfortunately, aside from the soaring of me #2, there is the crippling me #3 which is the one currently dominating me. I feel that I need to explain this because of some… irregularities… that have been going on for about a few days, and to put at ease the mind of a friend who seemed worried about me.

When I was an undergraduate, I used to be a double-major in biochemistry and microbiology. I frequently tell people that the upper level chemistry classes bent me over and had their way with me violently, and so I found it prudent to re-evaluate what I was going to do for a living. What I don’t usually tell people, though, is why this was the case. For almost a complete year, the third side of me was the one that people saw.

I slept all day. When awake, I couldn’t concentrate on anything. My speech was slower than usual, and I would play video games for hours on end when I could rouse myself from my bed. On the few occasions that I could manage to work myself up to go to class, I barely paid attention to the professors and instead wrote out and solved long division problems where I would divide a thirty-five digit long number by seven or something. I spent my nights wandering campus alone in the dark, sitting in the Chancellor’s cemetery, or doing things that I probably oughtn’t to have done in retrospect. One of my usual haunts was a fire escape at the hall that I lived in. I would ascend to the highest point on the fire escape (at the top of the third story) and then just climb up on the railing and stand there looking out. It never even occurred to me that a stiff breeze could send me plummeting three stories down to the cement below.

When I’m the third version of me, I’m distracted, absent-minded, and oblivious to dangers, and I don’t know why. Well, those things caused me to gradually stop going to classes in one semester as an undergrad, and as a result, my A’s and B’s becomes something substantially lower. I didn’t even show up to take my physics final for the class. Instead of being eloquent and impassioned, my writing becomes more like this, and a reflection of my mind – disjointed and rambling. It's a huge effort right now just for me to write this.

I operate mainly by intuition, which may sound surprising to many of you. I’m the classic INTJ for that famous psychology profiling system, though. I just know what the right answers are by feeling them, and then when I stop to think about it, I come to understand why my feelings were right. Unfortunately, the third incarnation of my persona doesn’t really seem to have any intuitions. Nothing seems particularly important or urgent. I could have likely roused myself to go to class, but it just didn’t seem all that important to do so, even though I have now missed two classes in a row in a class that I enjoy, with a professor that I enjoy, and where we discuss material that I generally find engaging.

So whatever it is that makes me into this completely unmotivated, apathetic, and sleepy version of me is here. Hopefully he won’t stay for long.

Brand New Day

Do you ever have one of those days where everything seems to be going well? Despite waking up sleepy this morning (blasted DST), everything today seems to be falling into place.

I got a phone call from my brother.
I was able to (sort of) save my friends in Evidence class.
I was able to answer Jimmy C.'s questions in a manner which suggested that I understood what I was saying.
I bought 13 books from the Law Library's book sale (11 hardbound law textbooks and 2 soft-cover textbooks) on a wide range of topics.
I bought all the textbooks (with a retail value online - I've checked - of almost 1,000 dollars) for just under US $50.
The aforementioned books look really nice on my bookshelves.
I'm on top of my singing voice today.
I deposited a check to my savings account and discovered that I have 300 dollars more than I thought I did in there (due to an addition error in my checkbook).
I got a job.
And some really great music is playing right now on my custom radio station through Pandora (Pandora.com)

Fantastic! Can today get better?

Thoughts about DST

Daylight Savings Time began today. Each Spring, I curse the practice of setting clocks ahead by an hour. Most people would agree that losing an hour isn't all that pleasant a practice, but most people say things like, "It deprives me of an hour of sleep." Well, it doesn't deprive me of any sleep, since I will just sleep to an hour later than I normally would have. For me, I despise the changing of the hours for one simple reason: I have a LOT of clocks.

I hadn't realized precisely how obsessive I am amout time until I had to set my clocks. My apartment is decently sized, but isn't a mansion by any means. Yet, when I woke up this morning and went around my apartment to set my clocks forward by an hour, I realized that I have more clocks than a normal person probably ought to need.

The grand total? There are sixteen timepieces in my apartment. Now, given that I only have 4 rooms (not counting my short 6 foot hallway or the bathroom), that's an astounding 4 clocks per room.

And to think that just the other day, I was wondering whether it would be too ostentatious for me to check on prices for a stand-up grandfather clock (which I think would look fabulous with my furnishings).