Life is a Cabaret

The Georgetown Gilbert and Sullivan Society hosted its Fall Cabaret (AKA come watch us sing and dance and then audition for our shows) on Friday. The day before, Davia had asked me to be the MC, so of course I agreed because who wouldn't want to run their own personal Cabaret show? You get all the perks of being on stage with none of the responsibility of actually performing! Everyone seemed to have a good time and I think it went very well. As per usual, Goo and Ben and Noah did a medley of songs from SNL that was my very favoritest act. 

Also this week, Jeff and I realized that we own the same pair of gym shorts. Normal people would recognize this fact and move on with their respective lives. Not us.

Not us.

Not. Us.

 You will also notice (I don't remember whether I already posted pictures of this) that there is a refrigerator behind Noah. This is placed into the hollowed out space that used to be a closet in the front room. You can't even tell there WAS a closet in the front room now. Carpentry success! Also, our kitchen has expanded out so we have double the size of kitchen. I am indifferent to this. Noah, predictably, is super psyched. He assures me that I will reap some sort of benefit from his cooking. I look forward to that.

While we are on the topic of the house, I am pleased to say that my room is finally complete! Thanks to a generous amount of furniture lent by Jeff, I have everything that I need: dresser, bookshelf, and...

Desk. (With shelf-seat. It's better for my posture than a normal chair and I don't need a chair because I do 99% of my work in the library anyway.

Okay, to be honest- Kels set up the entire desk and arranged most of my room while I was in another room, so she deserves some credit for the room being finished.

One part of being in law school that I don't enjoy is that I've made a lot of friends who were 3L's last year and who are now leaving us. One such 3L is our dear Dan Snow. We had a party for him (not in our house, but nearby) this weekend. The title was "Dan is Making us Snow Sad." I suggested the title, because that's a good name for a going-away party, right? Anyway, I suppose it is nice that all of my graduated friends are finding lawyer-jobs across the country. I just hope they come back to visit.

And I suppose I can't be down about people leaving while Micah is telling me jokes.

Beyond that, things are going well. Very very busy, but in a good way. Except for Journal. That was a terrible mistake. I feel like I'm going to be glad later on that I did it, but if there were a law school equivalent to eating your vegetables, it's Journal.

Rule 402- All Relevant Evidence is Admissible

This past week was spent doing more moving. I am now a moving expert, and so I was naturally Kelsey's first pick to help her move her things from Virginia to her new apartment in DC. 

Her things and Rupert, who does this whenever you bend down even a little. 

If you accept him, he will jump off after a moment.

If you react with fear, the claws come out.

I learned that today.

When we arrived at the apartment, we found some cupcakes that her landlords had left.

They have a one-year-old who happened to have a birthday party the day she moved in. I don't think we would have gotten cupcakes with sea creatures on them otherwise.

In the meantime, I have continued to move things in to/upgrade my room.

Look! I put up a picture from Curtains.

And I put up a wood engraving I got in China!

And I installed everything in this closet, including bar, shoe shelf, and side shelf.

Kels and I weren't the only ones moving things and remodeling, though. The much-loved Fort at Steph W's place has come back as Fort II. 

And again I only got a picture of it from the outside. There is seating for about ten inside, though. And a TV and food. It is great.

Classes officially started this week, and I think I'm really going to enjoy what I'm taking. Evidence should be good because the two judges teaching it seem like they really know what they're doing, and Professional Responsibility will be fun because Ben and Davia are in the same class. A lot of work, of course, but fun.

Today I'm teaching a class at my high school about the exceptions to the warrant requirement. I feel as though I can do anything after this morning, when I woke up early to go on a run with Kelsey that ended up being an extreme run of doom. The idea was to just run around what we thought was a small gated cemetery and what ended up being an enormous retirement home for veterans that shot us out onto a highway with no sidewalk where we had to off-road for a while. 

Only four miles, but it felt like a LOT more given the off-roading and fear of death. And it was raining. And uphill both ways.

"Necessary and Proper"

The first week of teaching went really well. The kids are exceptionally smart (which I already had a feeling they would be) and very engaged (which I was not expecting). Keeping up their level of engagement will be tough, because I can already tell they get bored easily (which fits with their being smart kids).

On the very first day, when I had them talking about contract consideration and Hamer v. Sidway, they had a hard time reconciling the idea that there was no necessarily right answer to the question as to where the line should be drawn for "enough consideration." I started with consideration and contracts because it's an issue that none of them would have had any preconceived notions about. When we move on to more contentious topics, I want them already understanding that they can make arguments for both sides without compromising their values.

By the second day, when I was explaining how I had taken points off of a lot of their homework because they failed to explain WHY they had made any decisions, they started to get it.

On Thursday, just for fun I threw up a question of the day that mirrored the facts in McCulloch v. Maryland, the landmark 1800's case that gave the government wide power to do what it wanted after the Supreme Court justified the establishment of the Bank of the United States using the necessary and proper clause of the Constitution. I had made them read the first three articles of the Constitution for homework.

"So," I said, "is there anywhere in the Constitution that gives the power to Congress to establish a national bank?"

A girl raised her hand.

"It isn't directly in there but they have the necessary and proper clause."

At which point I should have just ended class. To be fair, it was just one student and no one else came up with the exact idea on which the Supreme Court relied, but clearly I need to find more challenging materials for these kids.

Thursday night I went to a retirement party for someone at Street Law. I didn't know the retiree very well, but it turns out the party was at the house of one of the original founders of the Street Law clinic at Georgetown. We talked for a while and then he leaned over and said "so I hear from Lee that you're good with technology." Then I fixed two TVs in his house. I figure it's the least I could do for someone who indirectly gave me a job over the summer and a clinic to work on all year.

The Return of Teacher-Mike

The past week has been very productive. My room still is not quite ready, but it is very, very close. 

See the green thing? It came with the house. It's about 400 pounds. 

It took six people and rope to move it from the kitchen to the basement.

My bed is going to go in the corner and that is my reading light.

Most of the week I spent in orientation for my teaching clinic. We learned all the ways that you can lose control of a classroom by making even the slightest of mistakes. So, you know, fun. The school that I will be teaching at (starting today in a few hours) is one of the best in DC, so I won't have to worry about discipline problems (as my clinic fellow told me, it is my fault entirely if I do). Just to start them off scared, I'm making them read part of a case opinion from the 1800's as their first piece of homework. The first sentence is "Appeal from an order of the general term of the supreme court in the fourth judicial department, reversing a judgment entered on the decision of the court at special term in the county clerk's office of Chemung county on the 1st day of October, 1889." I just don't want them starting the year feeling like this is going to be an easy elective class, you know?

On Friday we had a surprise birthday party for Ben. How much of a surprise? Well, we made sure that he came to see the house when it was a total wreck and then spent most of the day on Friday putting into operable shape. Then we made sure that Ben was going to be at another party nearby (one that had nothing to do with him). Then Jeff called Ben and asked him to come over for five minutes to help get the refrigerator in place. When he arrived, grumbling at the prospect of having to move a fridge while he should be at a party, everyone jumped out at him in their finest 50's garb yelling "surprise!" Josh then volunteered to start up the car to take Ben to the emergency room, since he looked to be having more heart palpitations.

This surprise party brought to you by the house at North Carolina Ave. and 

Emily Goo, posing (I think purposefully) with her head cut off in the mirror.

On Saturday Kels and I helped Goo with another birthday party, this time for her fiance. He was sent on a scavenger hunt to find his presents in what seemed to be The Amazing Race meets Carmen Sandiego. We hid mysteriously in a bar and handed over a clue within a crossword puzzle when they arrived.

Afterwards we went up to Fort Totten, where Kels found an apartment! It is in the basement of a house near the metro owned by a very nice couple with a baby. Now the only thing she needs to find is a gym that she likes and operation #getkelstoDC will be 100% complete.

Oh, and we went to the portrait gallery, too. She insisted on posing with Uncle Stonewall.

Hammertime

The past week in the still-under-construction house has been full of fun little challenges. One day I got it in my head to install a washer/dryer. My first move was to use a giant hammer to free the drain pipe of its cap.

I checked afterwards, and apparently that is the correct way to do this. Hooray for intuition.

(Note to self- might be best to check BEFORE hammering next time.)

And here's the (basically) finished product from behind.

I didn't get to turn it on that night, because our electrician, who said he was running to Home Depot and could pick up a power cord and who had left at noon with the words "I'll be back," did not, as it turns out, come back. I've been told this is normal within the contracting world so I suppose I have to accept that.

The view of all the new doors that I will springload to snap at intruders.

And my bathroom is almost finished.

But there are still a few things left to do...

I was very fortunate to be able to spend time with Absi, Brian, Josh, and Kayface recently. Absi was flying back from England and Brian and Kay came down to visit home and such, so it just happened to work out. We went to the zoo and saw some really cool animals and I learned the hard way not to lead Kelsey towards insect displays. Later that night we played a three hour card game with Davia and Dan Snow added to the mix. We also got donuts.

We also went to Josh's apartment, I think on Sunday, and he made dinner. Then we played bananagrams and I took cute pictures of his cat, Harper Lee. You know, like the writer.

This week I've been doing my Street Law Clinic orientation. The first two days they spent scaring us (rightly so) by feeding us an array of classroom management horror stories. We find out where we will be teaching tomorrow and we start teaching on Monday, theoretically (I am not ready for this, but I am very excited). 

Movin On Up

Well, it has been a busy week. For a better overview of the weekend than I can provide, please see Kelsey's blog here. Basically we did a lot of things with a lot of people over the weekend, one highlight being watching Emily Goo in Bertucci's, one of her favorite restaurants. Goo likes her favorite things and demonstrates her affection accordingly.

Like doing headstands in the middle of the restaurant. A waiter was walking by and I think pointed this out to the manager, who shrugged because he had some innate recognition that this was Emily Goo and she is allowed to do whatever she wants.

Another highlight of the weekend was watching The Last Starfighter, starring Norman Snow, with Dan Snow. Now THAT a good 80's movie. I've had the theme song stuck in my head for days. It starts off sort of like a derivative of the second half of the Indiana Jones theme, but around 35 seconds kicks in to the main melody, which is great. 

Also have been doing more work on the house. Every day it looks better and better- none of which is due to anything I am doing, but it is fun being there watching a lot of the process unfold. 

This is a drawing of my room. We're starting to figure out furniture.

At one point during the weekend we went to wish Jake and Marilyn a fond farewell. Jake is going to Duke for an MBA and so is leaving DC. We played one of my favorite games, called Boom, and this is all covered more extensively in Kelsey's post so I'll just stop talking about the weekend and post the pictures I have, which are different from her pictures mostly because they are entirely off topic.

This is a picture of the bookshelf in Jake's house. I have no idea why I took a picture of it.

This is what you get when you try to take a picture of me in the Botanical Gardens. A picture of you taking a picture of me. Meta.

What I REALLY wanted to say in this post is this: on Thursday Kelsey had an interview for an Academic Advisor position at a DC University. On Friday she was called back for a second interview on Monday. On Tuesday they offered her the job, and TODAY she started work. She now has her own enormous office with a window and high ceilings (not to mention a really awesome job that she will do great at), and I am jealous. 

Also, today I am moving (mostly) to the new house. I believe that Jeff will be staying there for the first time tonight as well, so it's a special day worthy of remembering in a blog post at least.

You Must Construct Additional Pylons

I spent most of my weekend time over at the new house. We have moved on from destroying to creating. This means that I had almost nothing to do with most of the new features. I have my fingers crossed that I will be able to move in sometime within the next two weeks, but if not I have an air mattress and I can sleep elsewhere in the house. I will not be homeless. Again.

This used to be a place for the washing machine in the basement (my lair). Before that, it was a shower. We removed the washing machine and put the shower back in. I sort of need access to a shower.

Look! This is the front of our house and we have plants!

There used to be a closet door here. Now it is a wall.

This is the other side. The wooden floor used to be part of the closet. 

We're turning it into a refrigerator alcove. 

The best part of the weekend was getting to hang out with our new neighbors, Jess and Greg. They were having a wine and cheese party at their house and invited us over. When I walked in to see them playing a game of Settlers of Catan, I knew that they were going to be our kind of neighbors. Indeed, they are the sort of neighbors that you would dream about if you were to dream about the exact kind of neighbors that you would want. They are super nice, give us food, and have a cool group of friends that I hope we get to see some more. What more could you ask for? Oh- they also have a sous vide machine, which is my new favorite techno-toy. It cooks food in vacuum packs and the food always comes out amazing. It turns flank steak into filet mignon, essentially. I was very impressed.

On Monday I had a mock interview at a law firm, even though I am not participating in law firm interviews (because I do not want to work at a law firm). My interviewer was a super nice guy (every law firm partner that I have met is super nice, weirdly enough...) and specialized in international project financing law. I brushed up on that field (more interesting than I had thought) and went in and had a nice conversation. He gave me some great generalized tips about interviewers, said he didn't have any critiques for me because I hit every point I needed to, and gave me a fake call-back. It was nice being mock-hired after my mock-interview. Maybe I should have gone into international project financing....