I have just discovered that my local grocery store sells butter sculptures. Turkey-shaped butter sculptures! Lamb-shaped butter sculptures! Christmas tree-shaped butter sculptures! I kinda wish I'd brought a camera with me to snap a photo of the butter turkey, but I have no real desire to actually acquire one.

In other news, I keep getting these sharp, stabbing, burning sensations in my left jawline that flare up and pulsate quite painfully for several seconds and then vanish as quickly as they came. Mysterious! Also obnoxious and, well, painful, so here's hoping it's just some random, temporary Phenomenon of the Week.

THANKFUL THURSDAY
(because when I post mopey bawwww-fests like yesterday's entry, it's important to remind myself of the good things in life)
* the LSAT is over and in the past
* so is Mom's oral surgery, which she had done the day before my test. She's still in pain, but I'm so relieved that there weren't any complications!
* caramel brulée frappuccinos from Starbucks, which provided some much-needed brainfuel while I was studying
* my boss, who gave me pie the first day I was back at work after the LSAT
* my workplace in general, for being so chill and drama-free
* random conversations with my mother, such as yesterday evening's exchange:

Me: Bye, Momfer! I'm going to the library after I pick up one half of your Christmas present.
Momfer: Bye, Jen! Wish your father a happy birthday before you go.
[Ever year, on Dad's birthday and the anniversary of his death, Mom sets up a shrine in the living room with his picture, candles, and several of his favorite items]
Me: *leans into living room* HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAD! *leans into Mom's bedroom* Hey, uh, I see that you've had this set up for a few days now. Didja get his birthday mixed up with Pearl Harbor again?
Momfer: *guffaws* Yes. Damn, I was hoping you wouldn't notice!
Me: Faaaaail.
Momfer: *blows raspberry* "Faaaaail" your own self!
Me: Love you, Momfer.
Momfer: Love you, Jen-fer.

Heh. She was always getting Dad's birthday (December 9) mixed up with the day of the Pearl Harbor attack (December 7) while he was still alive. I'm glad to see that some things never change!

A short time before 9:00 AM, there was a booming sound like a thunderclap close by that was loud and forceful enough to make me jump and the windows rattle, but when I looked outside, there was nothing but clear blue skies as far as I could see. 30 minutes or so later, we get this phone call from the city of League City (my new hometown loves its automated messages, what can I say) informing us of a massive plant explosion nearby, warning all residents to take shelter indoors, turn off their AC and/or heat, and not venture outdoors until the all-clear was given. Lovely. I still had to go to work anyway, of course, because hey, who cares about potentially toxic fumes in the air? (Okay, I'll stop being snippy. At least I don't live in Seabrook or Pasadena, or I really would be cross)

So the LSAT, er, happened this past Saturday, and I should have known that things wouldn't go so well after the rather inauspicious start to the morning. For one thing, Houston had been hit with its earliest snowstorm in over a century the day before, and as much as I would've loved it under normal circumstances, the prospect of driving into the city in icy conditions, on a highway packed full of drivers who'd experienced snow maybe once before in their entire lives = DO NOT WANT. It usually takes me around a half hour to get to downtown Houston on a Saturday morning, but I left at 6:something to give me more than enough time to get to the test by the 8:30 check-in, and I was really cruising along for a while there...until I made it past the 610 Loop and everything immediately came to a dead halt. There had been a multi-car pileup on the overpass ahead, so the police closed that entire section of the freeway and diverted us to the feeder road. By now, an alarming amount of time had elapsed while the cops were attempting to herd everybody in the right direction, and as I was still four exits away from what would have been my exit to the University of Houston, I was starting to get anxious about how I was going to get there without the usual highway route. "Well," I said to myself, "going this way will certainly take longer, but if I stay on this feeder road, at least I know a way of getting there eventually!"

Aaaand then the cops shut down the feeder road and diverted us across the highway to some other street that I've never even seen before. At this point, I honestly thought I was screwed and would have to come home and register for the LSAT in February, because there was no way on earth I'd make it to the test on time -- and if you are unfortunate enough to arrive late, they turn you away at the door. To my immense relief, I somehow managed to navigate through unfamiliar roads and still find my way there by 8:30, where I was joined not only by all of the other folks who'd registered for the LSAT at the University of Houston, but by an anxious throng of people who'd registered to take the test at Texas Southern University. Apparently the LSAT at that location had just been canceled (!!) due to the inclement weather, so all of these poor guys were waiting on standby to see if there was any room for them to take the test with us. Needless to say, the general atmosphere while we were all waiting in line was pretty damn jittery, and I was still reeling from the bizarre emotional yo-yo'ing that had just taken place over a relatively short period of time.
"YEAH, IT'S LSAT DAY! LET'S GET THIS GOING!"
"OH GOD OH GOD, I'M NOT GOING TO MAKE IT IN TIME. I'M GOING TO HAVE TO COME HOME AND EXPLAIN THIS TO MY FAMILY, AND THEY'RE GOING TO BE FURIOUS, AND I'M GOING TO HAVE TO KEEP STUDYING INTO FEBRUARY. AAAAAARGH, WHY DID I EVEN BOTHER PREPARING?"
"HOLY CRAP, I MADE IT! I ACTUALLY MADE IT IN TIME! I'M SAVED!"
"...oh god. D: The LSAT is really happening now, isn't it."

I say with complete confidence that I did far, far worse on the actual LSAT than I did on any previous practice test I've taken. I mean, I never get to all of the questions in the Logic Games section, so I wasn't thrown off by that, but...I didn't even get to the last passage in the Reading Comprehension section! Reading Comp, for god's sake! Reading Comp is like money in the bank for me; I always, always, always get that section 100% right, and I can always count on it to help offset the shit I screw up in the Logic Games. I don't even want to know what happened to my score after having to fill in straight D's for all the questions about the last passage, which I was forced to do once I realized with horror that the proctor was about to call time. Logical Reasoning, too, has usually been reliable for me, but I had to pull the same "fill in all D's" routine for the last three or so questions on two of the Logical Reasoning sections because I simply ran out of time. Uh, here's hoping that one of those was the experimental section. Really, though, it's the Reading Comp business that embarrasses the hell out of me, because: it's fucking Reading Comp.

I'll get the results on January 4, but regardless of how poorly I did, I highly doubt I'll be taking this again; whatever score I get, I'll take it, move on, and see what schools will have me. I just don't know what the heck went wrong on Saturday, but hey -- c'est la vie.

Oh, sleep: you elusive thing, you. Was still up at 5:30 in the morning and finally managed to catnap until 8:00 AM, at which point I figured it wasn't worth the effort anymore. So I made myself some coffee, drove over to the bank to deposit yesterday's paycheck, and decided to do a test run to the University of Houston to see (a) how long it would take me to get there, and (b) find the building where I'll be taking the LSAT this upcoming Saturday. The good folks at LSAC recently changed my testing location from the law center to the business school, which wouldn't have presented much of a problem if Mapquest weren't a lying liar who lies; I don't know how keeping straight on University Drive, which is how I eventually fumbled my way towards the correct location, got twisted into "turn right on University Drive and then left on Calhoun," because -- hahaha, no. There were signs everywhere directing me towards the law school and the x school and the y school, but there was absolutely no signage whatsoever that pointed me towards the Bauer School of Business, and when I finally managed to find the place, I didn't actually realize it was the Bauer School of Business, because all the signs proclaimed it to be "Melcham Hall" and it somehow never occurred to my sleep-fogged brain that the Bauer School of Business was, y'know, inside the building called Melcham Hall. Cue more aimless circling around the university's sprawling campus, and...yeah.

So that was swell!

Since I was starting to get hungry and was already kinda-sorta in the area, I figured it would be as good a time as any to check out this Hobbit Cafe that I'd heard about in Upper Kirby. Apparently it has some pretty kickass vegetarian offerings, but since I took one look at the menu and went, "Sweet, they serve buffalo here?", I wouldn't know. The avocado buffalo burger that I ordered, by the way, was by far the most gargantuan burger that I've ever laid eyes on, much less attempted to consume; how it's all supposed to fit into a human stomach, I have no idea. All in all, the parking lot was a hot mess (it looked as if it had sustained heavy earthquake damage, honest to god), the ambiance of the place was charming without going overboard with Tolkien kitsch, and the food was tasty -- if not quite as rave-worthy as I'd heard. Then again, I didn't try one of their famous veggie dishes with a Middle Earth name, so maybe I'll give that a go someday.

Then it was off to Starbucks for MOAR LSAT STUDYING and thence to work, which is conveniently situated several yards away. And now I'm nibbling at my leftover burger & greens and attempting to unwind with a cup of tea, waiting for the thoughts in my head to stop chasing each other 'round and 'round so that I can catch up with some of that sleep I missed last night!

Happy Thanksgiving to all the other Americans on my flist! It's been beautiful outside -- blue skies and a pleasantly cool 63°F/17°C -- and we've had a delightfully low-key holiday over here. Momfer and I threw together a tasty array of rosemary & garlic rotisserie chicken (no turkey for us, plz), cornbread stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, green beans, and cranberry sauce, and had it all whipped up by 1:00 in the afternoon; we just got through nom nom nomming on an early dinner so we could spend the rest of the day unwinding and enjoying ourselves.

All things considered, I have so much to be thankful for in my life, and it's always worthwhile for me to stop and take stock of the many ways in which I have it good. Grazie to all of you fine folks for making my life just that much brighter!

Went to see Neko Case at Warehouse Live on Sunday night, after no shortage of difficulty in finding the damn place; really, it was my own fault for not seeing the sign for my exit in time, which led to countless failtastic attempts to backtrack and get going in the right direction. What can I say? If I were on The Amazing Race, I'd probably be one of those loser racers who can't navigate her way out of a paper bag and gets unceremoniously eliminated after aimlessly circling the freeway for the entire leg.

In any event, I still managed to get to the venue early, and who should I spot but an old coworker from my last workplace? During my final week there, just before my return to Bryn Mawr, I distinctly recall her telling me that she was going up to Austin that weekend to see The Decemberists and Neko Case perform, and our shared taste in music was one of those nice points of commonality in a work environment that often made me feel quite alien. So it really wasn't all that surprising to see her again in this context, and I might have gone up to her to say hi if she weren't with friends...or maybe not, since we weren't particularly close and it could've been potentially awkward. I'm not exactly savvy at the whole social thing even in the best of times.

Deer Tick, the band that opened the show (with a bass player who looked just like Hetalia's Estonia, if he were an actual flesh and blood being and not a 2-D character), was okay but seemed to go on forever, and sweet baby Jesus, I thought my eardrums were going to explode. I can't believe I'm the only person who showed any signs of discomfort whatsoever, although perhaps the people around me were better at hiding it.

Fortunately for my hearing, the decibel level was just right when Neko Case took the stage, and truly, there are not enough superlatives in the English language to describe just how incredible she sounds live. As irrationally guilty as I felt for taking the time to do something fun for myself ("OH MY GOD I'M NOT WORKING OR STUDYING FOR THE LSAT OR DOING SOMETHING PRODUCTIVE I AM A FAILURE OF A HUMAN BEING"), all of my weird hang-ups evaporated when the music started. She even began with one of my favorites, too: "Things That Scare Me," which was an absolutely perfect way to get the concert started. I am so, so glad I went.

And now it's back to life as usual! I am literally the only member of the host staff who hasn't taken the entire Thanksgiving week off (I...suppose they're all traveling? Or something?), but I don't mind working more hours than usual, and I do at least have actual Thanksgiving Day off --- something I never had when I worked in animal care, for obvious reasons. I'm looking forward to a good holiday.

Whenever I make tuna fish sandwiches, I always squeeze the excess fish juice into a cup to pour over Mitzi's kibble for later -- an extra little treat she always enjoys. I also have a daily habit of drinking at least one cup of white grape juice, which, coincidentally enough, is the same color as the aforementioned fish juice and which happened to be in an identical cup on the same counter this evening as said fish juice.

Guess which cup I drained in one gulp? BRB WASHING THE TASTE OF PURE, UNADULTERATED TUNA JUICE OUT OF MY MOUTH.

In other news, I'm pleased to report that I did finally get everything sorted out with the Registrar, so Operation Graduation is indeed a go next spring. Thank goodness.

Since the weather yesterday couldn't have been more perfect, staying cooped up in the house on my day off had zero appeal for me, so it was off to Walter Hall Park for a good few hours of ambling beside Clear Creek, taking photos of my surroundings, and playing with other people's dogs. As an additional bonus, I could see fighter jets flying in formation and doing stunts overhead for the Wings Over Houston Airshow that was some distance further down the road; I'd actually forgotten till then just how close Ellington Airport actually is, especially to this particular park.

Alas, my camera battery chose to die on me just as I was attempting to snap a photo of the jets doing their thing, ( but I managed to take plenty of pics before said battery went kaput )

I went to check out a local coffee shop of the non-Starbucks variety on the way home, only to find it completely dark when I peered through the door. As it turned out, though, my timing wasn't too shabby, because a young woman who helps run the place with her mother pulled up only a minute later and invited me in, apologizing for closing so early on Halloween and calling for "Moooooooooooom" who was somewhere in the depths of the shop. Nice Mediterranean decor, from what I could see in the dark, and they apparently sell hookahs in addition to coffee and tea; that should appeal to Momfer, no doubt. Oh, and they make truly glorious cupcake balls, as I discovered when they offered some to me free of charge. ("Do you like nuts?" "I love nuts!") I will certainly come back when they're open, hopefully some time later this week; if nothing else, I'm curious about what the place looks like when the lights are on!

Then I went home and shared the cupcake balls (red velvet cake covered with fudge and pecans, mmm) with Momfer, and we ate sushi together, and I tried eel -- for the first time, since I'm a fail!Japanese -- and loved it, and we watched border collies on Animal Planet and laughed together and waited for trick-or-treaters who never came. All in all, it was a rather sweet Halloween, even if there was nothing particularly Halloweenish about it.

Happy Lantern Night to all of my Bryn Mawr friends!

THANKFUL THURSDAY
* with the exception of yesterday and earlier today, every day since last week's Thankful Thursday has had clear blue skies and sunshine -- and most importantly, been cool and dry
* my workplace has been drama-free and hired two more people this week, which we desperately needed
* Auntie brought over a batch of fresh kolaches, which will take care of breakfast for the next few days
* I stumbled upon Discovery Green, a 12-acre park in the heart of Houston, entirely by accident while I was strolling aimlessly down Dallas Street, and I am thoroughly charmed!
* I have both Saturday and Sunday off, giving me the opportunity to catch up on sleep and run some much-needed errands

By the way, I'm pleased to report that calling in the exterminator has finally put an end to the fire ant invasion, and not a minute too soon. Apparently the main colony was located in the flower bed directly outside the study (which doubles as our guest room of sorts, and good grief, I wish we'd known about this before marbenais came to visit; we could've saved her a lot of trouble), so we were naturally more than happy to have the ant colony obliterated. I so wish we had gotten this taken care of by a professional much, much sooner, but better late than never, I suppose.

THANKFUL THURSDAY
* being in good health
* soaking in a mineral bath after a long day
* having a pretty sweet paycheck in store for me tomorrow, since I've been working more hours these past two weeks
* driving through Houston's skyline district with this song booming on the car speakers
* coupons for gingerbread lattes at Starbucks (I do like their seasonal beverages, not gonna lie)
* Shadow, Jimmy's newly adopted one-eyed pug, who greets me with kisses and a wagging curly-cue tail that resembles a helicopter rotor when she's excited to see someone
* my neighbors; for the most part, they are all people I like and respect, and with whom I don't mind socializing
* Auntie, for lending me books and being such a chill, nonjudgmental person
* FIRE ANT EXTERMINATION YAY

( I snapped some photos of the clouds at sunset, just because I could )

Paging all of you fine folks who are actually experiencing autumn at the moment: could I maybe, I dunno, borrow your weather just for a little bit? Please? I promise to give it back and everything! 'Cause I happen to be melting right now, what with it having been 95 degrees Fahrenheit (35° C) today...and with humidity factored in, the heat index was a balmy 107° F/~42° C. I wouldn't mind it if it weren't the middle of frickin' October.

(This is the time of year when I most resent living so far south. I miss my brightly colored leaves and increasingly frigid temperatures, dammit! If this year is anything like the last, our leaves won't change until January...and even then, they won't begin to approach the rich panoply of golds and reds to which I'm accustomed from the east coat. Yeah, I know, CRY MOAR and all that jazz)

ETA: Heh, I'm not a fraction as ragey as the "envious" kitty mood icon would have you believe, but yes: *envy envy envy*

Oh, for god's sake, the fire ants have now migrated into the kitchen. Again.

On the plus side:
"Now can I call in an exterminator, Momfer?"
"Absolutely."

Now, I do like bacon and have no shortage of love for chocolate, but color me slightly dubious about the applewood bacon chocolate bar that I just bought at World Market. This has the potential to either be awesome or completely retch-worthy, and I'm not yet sure which it will be.

I would've liked to have been able to sleep in this morning, considering that yesterday was pretty much a bust on that front, but I had to make an early trip to the doctor's office to discuss the results of last Wednesday's lab work. Three cheers for everything turning out to be okay! And throw in some extra cheers for an end to the fire ant invasion of my bedroom; they haven't reappeared since I damn near drenched the place with Raid. Here's hoping they stay away for good.

I went to bed relatively early and woke up from a sharp, piercing pain in my right hand that strangely itched like crazy as well. When I turned on the light by my bedside, I found two white dots near my wrist, and it began to dawn on my drowsy, slow-functioning brain that this stabbing, itchy, persistently painful sensation was awfully familiar. In fact, it was reminiscent of that time I got swarmed by fire ants when I was in Costa Rica, and of the time I got bitten during that unfortunate fire ant invasion of the kitchen this past summer, and-

-AND OH MY FUCKING GOD THERE ARE FIRE ANTS IN MY BED.

Not only were there two steady streams of fire ants down on the floor, having made their way into my room from two separate openings, they were crawling up the side of my bed in obscene numbers and milling about on my pillow and in the covers. I just. I just can't even deal right now.

So I vacuumed up as many of the little buggers as I could, Raided the hell out of my room, laid down the last Terro trap we have in the house, threw my sheets and all the other clothes they invaded into the washing machine, put new sheets on the bed, and am currently waiting for my heart rate to slow and the smell of chemicals to dissipate. God help me if there are still ants under the mattress.

I think I'm a little too freaked out to climb back into bed and go to sleep now, kthnx.

An oh-so-riveting account of what I've been doing this past week, work aside:

* Delivered a passel of cds and books to the used bookstore and got $40 in return, which is pretty damn sweet. Less sweet is the fact that almost none of the books I'd been hoping to pick up there were actually in stock, but I did manage to snag season 1 of BSG on DVD there and still have cash left over from earlier, so. ♥

* Got part of a thorn embedded in my right pointer finger while clipping roses in the backyard, 'cause I'm uniquely talented like that.

* Finally saw a doctor yesterday about the pain and hearing problems in my left ear, which has been causing me no shortage of grief for well over a year now. God only knows why I took such an absurdly long time to see someone about it, but when the pressure in my ear -- along with the high-pitched ringing and splitting headaches that came along for the ride -- became downright unbearable within the past several days, I decided to just bite the bullet already and get a doctor to look at it. Uh, yay impacted wax? Fortunately, the nurse was able to wash it all out, and I was sent home with an admonishment against using Q-tips for ear-cleaning (note to self: Q-tips just make things worse!) and a sudden bat-like acuteness in my left ear. It is truly unnerving how sharp my hearing is now; honestly, it's almost too sensitive, with even the most minor of actions (brushing my hair, removing the cap off of my pen, turning the steering wheel of the car, you name it) sounding amped up to infinity. I'll probably get over the whole sense of "AHH TOO LOUD TOO LOUD" once my ear grows accustomed to actually, y'know, hearing things properly again. In the meantime, now it's my right ear -- which I'd long considered my "good ear" ever since the left one became problematic -- that is markedly dull, and I'm not sure if it just seems that way in comparison to my newly-acute left ear or if I've also managed to fuck this one up with Q-tips too and just never noticed it while Left Ear was so severely compromised.

Since this was the first time I'd seen a doctor since coming to Texas, I figured I might as well get a physical while I was there. Yesterday was just a consultation and mostly involved filling out forms as a new patient; sometime in the near future, I'll be returning for a bunch of tests.

* Discovered that my boss has no problem with the hostesses bringing books to read when work is going slow. Why couldn't I have learned this sooner?

* Tried sake for the first time, just out of curiosity. We have wee bitty sake cups and a sake flask at home, and I even attempted the traditional method of heating the sake (or so says Momfer, in any case) by letting the flask sit in hot water for a while. I don't know what the heck I was expecting, but...damn, you guys, sake is vile. I mean, I get that I'm really not an alcohol person in comparison to society at large, for a whole variety of reasons, but ugh.

Hope autumn has been treating all of you well so far!

THANKFUL THURSDAY
* homemade fudge brownies
* a new haircut that I quite like
* a job that allows me to get sufficient sleep, since I no longer have to wake up before dawn to get to work
* compliments from friendly customers
* my first paycheck to look forward to tomorrow

And since I spent some of my free time ambling around the park in the center of my hometown, some photos:

( in the heart of League City )

Work continues to go exceedingly well, thankfully, and I have a new favorite coworker! The propensity for choral geeks to find each other in any given environment never ceases to amuse me.

THANKFUL THURSDAY
* steady employment with decent pay, the ideal location, and an understanding boss
* meandering walks around the lighthouse and watching the sun set over the water
* catching up with pfeif on the phone
* passing untold hours in the library
* fondue fondue fondue fondue fondue

And because I haven't done much photoblogging in a while:

( massive, massive photodump of Clear Lake and the lighthouse )

Tuesday was my first day at my new job, and apart from one coworker who has the potential to be kind of obnoxious (yes, I know you want all the customers to be seated in your section so you can gobble up all the tips -- now simmer down, son), it's smooth sailing. I'm not anticipating any substantial number of work-related rants on my LJ, let's just say, which is a tremendous relief. My last two jobs were high-stress, high-drama and low-pay -- or in the case of one financially irresponsible animal hospital that I worked for, "no-pay" -- and when I'm trying to get ready for the LSAT and put together my law school apps, the last thing I need is for emotional miasma from work to follow me home and infect the rest of my life.

It's a bit unnerving at times just how often my mother and I find ourselves on the same wavelength, thinking about the same random issue or minor something-or-other at the exact same time. Yesterday we were both puttering around the kitchen in the middle of the night, chatting and making midnight snacks as we regularly do, when I mentioned offhand how much I was craving some fondue -- something we haven't eaten in years, as our old fondue pot never made the trip from Maryland to Texas with us.

Momfer: *stares* Were you just on my computer?
Me: No, I don't go on your computer. Why? What is it?
Momfer: I was just looking up fondue pots online. There's one in particular that I want to get when I go to Target tomorrow with your aunt.

o_O

Things like this happen constantly. We'll discover that we'd just been mulling over the same obscure piece of historical trivia at the same time, or have been reading the same wikipedia article simultaneously, or we'll both make some joking, nonsensical remark -- word for word at the exact same time -- that's completely untethered to what we'd been previously discussing...it just goes on and on. Behold the mother-daughter hive mind! The eeriest of all was when she shared some of her old journals with me, because apart from the obvious fact that I was reading about someone else's experiences? They could have been my own writing. This just about floored me, especially since her e-mails and more official-type writing (which is quite familiar to me; Mom used to conduct interviews for college admissions at her alma mater, and I was the one who typed up all her handwritten reports) have such a different voice from my own, but when it comes to personal journaling, our writing styles are apparently identical. Cool, but kind of creepy.

Momfer did in fact get that pot, by the way, so fondue, heeeeere we come!

Went on a long, long walk around the lighthouse and the docks across the water one afternoon earlier this week until well past sunset, and as lovely as my surroundings were, oh dear god the mosquitos. My arms and legs, in Momfer's words, look "diseased." Seriously, I wasn't chewed up this badly when I went to Costa Rica one summer in high school and helped repair trails in the friggin' rainforest.

But my mood, it is good, for lo: I have employment. Starting on Tuesday, I'll be a hostess at a nearby independently owned Cuban-American restaurant that I can walk to in under ten minutes (saving gas = ka-CHING), and much to my surprise, my salary will be the highest it's ever been. Which is kinda bizarre, when you stop and think about it; the work I did as an animal care tech was infinitely harder -- mentally, physically, emotionally, you name it -- than what I'll be doing, but you'd never know it from looking at their respective payscales.

The owner of the restaurant had actually heard of my alma mater, which was gratifying and quite rare for a Texan, and as it turns out, his son just graduated from a local law school that I'll be applying to in the not-so-distant future. Coincidences, coincidences! So we wound up spending a not-insignificant portion of my interview talking about law school, he inquired as to when I plan to take the LSAT (December, I hope), and I just felt relieved that New Boss was super understanding and willing to accommodate me by not scheduling a ridiculous number of hours for me to work when the test is looming directly ahead.

(When I worked in animal care, shifts lasting from 6:00 AM to 7:00 PM were the norm. "Oh hey, the LSAT is in two weeks; may I have fewer hours over the next ten or so days?" would have garnered little more than a raised eyebrow, and while the folks perched atop the totem pole certainly have no obligation to throw me a bone, said bone sure is a nice thing to have)

I've wrestled quite a lot over the past couple of years as to whether or not I want to go to law school, and as much as I fear the possibility of flaming out in truly spectacular fashion...yes, this is something that I want, and dammit, I'm going to go for it. Of course, if I bomb the LSAT and don't get accepted anywhere, well, that will necessitate a change in plans, won't it? But I can't let my anxieties and doubts lock me into place, as they so often do, and there is something liberating in actually committing to a course of action and following through on it. Here's hoping I don't screw it all up.

A big brown freckle has sprouted on my left cheek literally overnight, and to be honest, it kind of freaks me out. Momfer finds my reaction lulzy and has been teasing me about my hakujin genes (would that be "hakugenes"? HAHAHA I SLAY MYSELF) coming to the fore, but right on schedule, here comes my overactive imagination squawking about skin cancer and the like. Yes, I know I need to get a grip. Still, I've been wearing sunscreen and everything, dammit, WTF is with my face?

Attempted to find employment at a local office building over the weekend only to find it closed for the day, and since the back of the building faces out onto Clear Lake (quite a picturesque view, that), I spent a half hour or so walking alongside the water with a gaggle of Muscovy ducks and grumbling to myself about retreating to rural Vermont to spend the rest of my life as a goat farmer instead. One duck in particular was camped out on some boxwood-like shrubbery and seemed especially agitated at my approach, and it wasn't until I got super close that I realized it was guarding a nest of enormous eggs. Sorry to have alarmed you, mama duck!

Job-hunting is doubleplus unfun, but I suppose that goes without saying. I'm pleased that I at least don't give off a "shiftless student" vibe, if yesterday's efforts are any indication; something about me seems to invite people to confide in me their tales of woe about the lazy college students and recent grads in their employ who call in sick when they really just want to go partying and think they're too good to do menial tasks, and "have you had to deal with coworkers like that, too? Ugh, isn't it terrible?" and oh, wouldn't it be terrific to have someone more responsible and mature? None of which means they're actually going to hire me, of course, although it's gratifying to know that I come across as, well, not like the people they're complaining about.

THANKFUL THURSDAY
* last night's cathartic vent session with aurelia_star
* Auntie bringing over fresh kolaches first thing in the morning
* the chipper Starbucks barrista who gave me a grande strawberry & banana smoothie with a wink when I'd ordered a tall (sidenote: how bizarre is it that "tall" is the smallest size available?) and was quite a cheerful conversationalist to boot
* curling up in a fleece blanket with a good book and a cup of tea at the end of a long day

Speaking of good books, I was a bit groggy today from having stayed up till 5:00 AM to finish The Murder of Roger Ackroyd -- one of Agatha Christie's best-known and best-loved works, with a twist ending that I figured out halfway through. Cue smugness! Then again, if I hadn't been informed ahead of time that there was a "shocking" plot twist somewhere in its pages, perhaps I wouldn't have been mentally prepared to key in on certain irregularities. To be honest, it didn't come close to displacing Murder on the Orient Express as my favorite Christie novel of all time, but it's definitely a worthwhile read.

I'm hugely excited that David Suchet will finally star in a film version of Murder on the Orient Express, by the way, since he's pretty much THE quintessential Hercule Poirot in my eyes. (Albert Finney's portrayal in the 1974 movie was such a letdown!) For anyone who's interested, there's an audiobook version of the novel that Suchet narrates in his own voice, and he provides distinct voices and accents for each of the characters; listening to him as, say, Mrs. Hubbard -- an elderly American lady who talks a mile a minute -- is hilariously surreal, but he manages to pull it off flawlessly. Props to you, David Suchet.

I decided to go on foot to pick up the Chinese food that Momfer ordered this afternoon, figuring that it was a nice way to get some exercise before consuming mountains of deliciously unhealthy grub, and what did I spy on my way there? A flock of wild parrots with bright green and blue plummage, bouncing about on the ground before scattering into the air at my approach -- quite possibly Quaker Parrots (aka Monk Parakeets), which can be found throughout South America and the southeastern United States. That was certainly enough to make my trip worth it, oppressive heat be damned! Mom is on the phone with my aunt and smugging it up as I type, since she'd had to fend off Auntie's skepticism when she claimed to see a flock of those same parrots in the parking lot of Target some time ago; she's all too pleased to have been validated.

Anyway, while I'm on an avian kick, here's a set of photos from when marbenais and I went to Galveston last month. As you can no doubt tell, ( a ridiculous amount of my time on the beach was spent stalking egrets. )