march 2007
march 31 2007 20:57 pdt pollen count is down. it was warm enough last night for the frogs to start chirping again, but it cooled off over the course of the day so they're all quiet again tonight. the threshold temp seems to be somewhere above 55 degrees: it's 50 right now, and it's silent outside.
we don't have spring peepers here. if the frogs we've been hearing are the same ones i saw in the yard during the fall, they are pacific tree frogs, little green ones about the size of the last joint of my thumb. our neighbor to the north has some kind of pond or fountain in his backyard, and the frogs seem to like it just fine.
forecast says it might get down below freezing tomorrow. i don't have anything to speak of growing in the garden yet, but the green beans are just starting to poke up through the soil, so maybe i'll have to cover them up just in case.
march 26 2007 21:04 pdt we've been trying to get back in shape after a (mostly) sedentary winter. i've managed to go snowboarding only once this year, and so i've been missing even the limited anaerobic exercise that a hard run down the hill provides. but since the weather has been warming up, and since we've been playing on this soccer team, i've been trying to run more often, and she's been going to swim practice, and we both are starting to feel just a little more fit.
and a good thing too, because we're both entered in an event at the pacific crest weekend sport festival on june 23. right now, she's signed up for the olympic tri, and i'm entered in the 10k. we did this race last year as a prelude to house-shopping... i did the 5k, and she did the 10, and i ran with her uncle who tried to pass me at the end with a sprint to the finish. afterwards, we talked ourselves into doing it again this year, and now the pressure is on to get into race form.
last time i stepped on a scale, i weighed over 200 pounds. 5'9" / 200# is not the kind of body you want to have if you're trying to run six-minute miles. let's be honest here: it's not the kind of body you want if you're trying to run eight-minute miles. i figure i really need to drop 20 to feel good, and i could probably lose 30 without missing it. i don't think i've weighed 175 since my junior year of college, so i'd be pretty happy if i could get back down to 180.
this week is spring break. instead of snowboarding in tahoe, this year i'm concentrating on getting ready for exams, trying to nail down a summer job, and going running often enough that i can tell people i'm training for a 10k with a straight face.
march 25 2007 20:31 pdt the jehovah's witnesses knocked on my front door yesterday. i gave them your phone number.
march 23 2007 00:32 pdt starting to think about which classes to take for next year. we had our second quiz in conlaw this week, and the consensus is that i got the first three questions right, and the fourth one was a toss-up becuase all of the smart kids in the class came up with different answers. if the prof's objective was to provoke conversation about which approach was the correct one, he was successful. if he was trying to test our knowledge, it's not clear that the question was an effective one. i'll be very interested to see if he shares the statistics with us when he gets the scantron scores back. in any case, it does seem a little preposterous that a third of our grade in that class depends solely on our scores for a grand total of nine multiple-choice questions. but there it is.
it's been sunny, but colder this week. people were saying that march weather is a tease, and then it gets cold again in april. the cold came a week early. it was 35 degrees last night... we've got the heat on again, even though we had it off all last week.
i'm still working on finding a summer job. couple of things in the works, and might hear back by the end of next week. but then again, everything school-related might be on hold until after people come back from spring break.
it's difficult for me to put into words how disappointed i am that the annual glista brothers ski trip didn't happen this year. we had a good run going, and i'm sorry to see it come to an end.
march 18 2007 15:51 pdt for the last two weeks, all the cherry trees have been in bloom. big sprays of pink and white flowers all over the place. yesterday, for the first time, i started feeling some of the allergies- makes me wonder what else started blooming yesterday.
march 5 2007 22:19 pst yesterday crocuses and daffodils were blooming all over town. flowers everywhere at school. she mowed the lawn for the first time this year. we had the windows open to air out the house. feels like spring.
of course i spent almost all day today staring at a computer screen. my eyes hurt, my head hurts, my wrists hurt from typing. tomorrow i need to be at school at 8:45. the oregon supreme court is hearing oral arguments in one of our classrooms, and the whole first-year class is required to attend.
at least it's supposed to be cloudy again. both yesterday and today were gorgeous, sunny and warm. and i wasted both days, banging away at the keyboard.
march 2 2007 20:34 pst life accelerated this week. i had a conlaw exam on wednesday, so that ate most of my weekend and my study time on monday/tuesday. now i have a brief due on friday the 9th. and i have class all week again, and then at some point after the 9th we all have oral appellate arguments before a panel of 3 'judges' who the law school is bringing in from the community of local attorneys to give us all a feel for what the real world is like.
and it seems like finals are just a couple of weeks away. i feel exhausted, like i spent this entire week in a low-grade panic. partly, i guess, becuase i spent almost this entire week in a low-grade panic.
today the law school was taken over by the annual pielc conference: public interest and environmental law. hippies everywhere. we're going to have to spray the place down with industrial disinfectant on monday to make sure it's safe for humans again. ok, i'm kidding, but only about the spray. the hippies really were everywhere.
i'm thrilled because today i found something entirely new to read.
