Racism

Why is it that some African Americans (to be politically correct) assume that everybody hates them because they’re Black, and is offended just by the way you look at them?  See, today I was at a coffee shop studying with my friend… when she sat down next to me the guy sitting at the table next to us was up getting something to drink.  As he was walking back to his seat, she scooted over a little bit so that he had more room to get past her and he says (in a rather unfriendly tone of voice), “just because I’m black doesn’t mean I want to abduct you or something!” to which she explained that she was scooting over to be nice, to let him have a little more room to get by.  He didn’t apologize for being rude or say anything… after a few minutes he picked up all his stuff and moved to another table before leaving the coffee shop a few minutes later.

People need to understand that the whole world is not out to get them… yes it is true that in the South there may be some people who are racist but just because you are African American does not mean you can assume that everybody is racist against you and is therefore afraid of you.

How weird.

On another note… I was talking to Ken about affirmative action and it’s funny… I feel like I’m almost speaking out of both sides of my mouth when I try to explain my position on affirmative action.  I feel like in the case of education (like in a high school or a college), it’s perfectly fine to give people who belong to a minority group a leg up in admissions because they are “historically disadvantaged” and they deserve a little bit of help in order to help them overcome that historical disadvantage.  BUT when it comes to certain positions or careers where the individual will be dealing on a daily basis with issues of life or death, I feel that it’s not okay to give people a leg up just because they are a member of a minority group.  What I mean is that I don’t want people who will be in charge of saving people’s lives to be less qualified than others in their profession just because they are a member of a minority group.  I want my doctors, firefighters, nurses, police officers, etc. to be qualified to save people’s lives.  I don’t want to worry that they were admitted to medical school or that they got their job just because of the color of their skin.

Does that make sense?  Does that make me a racist?  I hope not.

Thoughts?

Winter Fest

On Friday we went to Winter Fest at Das Deutsches Haus and it was kind of awesome.  Basically it’s a German Cultural Center kind of like a JCC only everything’s German.  They have German food, German beer, German paraphernalia, German music, German classes, German movies, German classes, etc.  (I know what you’re thinking… isn’t it kind of weird for two Jews to go to a German Cultural Center?  Well you’re right, it is kind of weird, but it’s fun.  You should try it.)

Anyways- we went and they were having this Home Brew Festival where basically people who brew their own beer bring it to share with the people who attended the event.  Ken (who’s really into beer) really enjoyed this because he got to try a bunch of different kinds of beer.  Some day he hopes to learn how to make his own beer.  The only problem is that you kind of need a place that’s cool and dry to keep it and New Orleans is neither cool nor dry so that poses a bit of a problem.  They also had a whole German feast with sausages, sauer kraut (sp?), cabbage and German potato salad.  And of course they had music (though for some reason it was not German music like they had at Oktoberfest–that was kind of disappointing) and they played the Chicken Dance which, of course, we danced to.

our trip to Baltimore

so we got back this morning from baltimore… had a great time!

Friday: we got in to BWI and went to dinner at the Broadway Diner (Ken has been craving a good tuna melt for months).  Then we went to check into our hotel and we went to the Philpy-Johnson dessert reception.  It was nice cause we got to see Kevin & Beth, meet their families, and I got to meet for the first time a bunch of people from band who graduated in 2004.  I had heard a lot about them from Ken and other band folks but I never had the chance to meet them until now.

Saturday: in the morning I went to Kappa’s initiation while Ken & J-Lieb went to Pete’s Grill for Breakfast.  They talked med school (J-Lieb’s in his first year at JHU Med).  I finally got to meet my little-little-littles & I got to hang out with Romy!

After hanging out for a bit and walking around the Hopkins campus, we went to lunch at the Ambassador Dining Room with Romy, J-Lieb and Praem.  For those of you NOT in the know, the Ambassador Dining Room is THE best Indian restaurant on the Eastern Seaboard.  No joke.

After lunch, it was time to head back to our hotel to get ready for the wedding of Beth Johnson and Kevin Philpy.  The ceremony was in this beautiful Lutheran Church that they belong to.

Then we all went over to the reception at the Old Savage Mill which has been turned into a cute little area with shoppes and restaurants.  The reception was in a big and beautiful ballroom.  The wedding colors were kind of fall colors– the centerpieces had fruit, twigs, pupmkins, etc. The tablecloths were brown and blue.  The bridesmaids wore chocolate-brown dresses and the men were all in Brown tuxes.  It was a beautiful wedding and we really enjoyed ourselves.

We were at one of the Band tables… see, Kevin & Beth met during their freshman year at Hopkins, when both of them were playing in the band.  So at our table there was me & Ken (both of us played in the band), Irv & Cathy (who both graduated in the 70’s–he from Hopkins, she from Goucher–and have been playing in the band ever since), Kelly (who played in the band) and her girlfriend Mara, and Brian Drake (the former band director) with his wife, Kim.

Oh–also since they met at Hopkins and were HUGE fans of the Lacrosse team, their cake reflected that (and it was DELICIOUS, by the way!)

After the wedding we were so exhausted so we just went back to the hotel to go to bed… we also knew we had a big day ahead of us.

Sunday morning Paige (Ken’s cousin) came over to our hotel and the three of us drove down to Alexandria where we met up with Holly, Lisa and Matt to watch the Patriots game at Murphy’s, a bar that Ken & I went to a bunch of times when I was still in undergrad.  Basically it’s an Irish pub where EVERYONE is a Pats fan.  Each week for the games they draw about 150 people who are all REALLY into the game.  They have their own cheers (like “Fumble on the Kickoff!” and “Another New England Patriots FIRST DOWN!”) and the atmosphere is just so celebratory.  So we watched the game there (yes, the Patriots won, beating Miami) and then walked around for a bit before having dinner at Chipotle and then heading back to the hotel to pack up to come back to New Orleans.

So now we’re back in New Orleans and waiting for Tropical Storm Ida to dump a ton of rain on the city.  It’s supposed to be really rainy and windy tomorrow so I’m hoping that somehow, miraculously, classes might be canceled.  Somehow I kind of doubt it but it would be really nice.

Thank goodness the semester is almost over– I don’t know how much more of this I could handle.  Good thing we register for classes later this week–it’ll give me something to look forward to.  Also I need to remember that as soon as this semester is over, I’ll be HALF DONE with Law School!

Now that’s something to celebrate!

law school

So law school kinda sucks… for many reasons… but the #1 reason it sucks is that they don’t really teach you how to be a lawyer.  as a lawyer you end up going to court to file documents, you have to draft pleadings, you have to do document review, etc. and they don’t really teach you to do any of those things unless you take clinic.

med school on the other hand, teaches you to be a doctor.  you have 2 years of classroom instruction and 2 years of clinical rotations.

i think they should make law school more like med school.  they should let you do rotations in all the different areas of the law so that you can actually learn how to be a lawyer.

on another note, we are planning a trip to DisneyWorld!  We are going in December, right before we meet up with the Ken’s family near Ft. Lauderdale.  We are going to drive all the way from New Orleans to Disney World and we will be at the park on Christmas day!  I think we will try to take a picture with Mickey Mouse while we are there.

On yet another note, today is the 40th anniversary of Sesame Street.  HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO SESAME STREET!

Obama won a Nobel Peace Prize & we bombed the moon!

So this was kind of a crazy week in current affairs… they bombed the moon to try to find water and President Obama got a Nobel Peace Prize.  Both are kind of strange, and both got a lot of attention in the media.  I’ll give you my own take on the whole Obama thing… I’m one of the most liberal people you can find and I love Obama for a number of reasons but I certainly don’t think he deserved a Nobel Peace Prize.  I mean that’s a HUGE honor that’s given to people who have a whole lifetime of achievements, not to someone who’s as young as he is and who has done as little as he has.  Someday he may deserve one but so far he hasn’t really done much of anything.  They said it was because of the hope he inspired in people but usually it’s given to someone who has sacrificed their life for the sake of peace and for a certain cause that they believe in.  Obama hasn’t sacrificed his life and he really hasn’t done all that much to achieve peace in the world.  But that’s just my take on it.

On another note… Ken & I have to pick the photos that we want to put in our wedding album and I’m finding it to be much more challenging than I ever thought it would be.  Why? you might ask… well because we have a maximum of 30 pages with a maximum of 4 photos each which means we can have at most 120 photos but we have to pick from about 1000 photos.  We don’t need 100 photos of the same people but the problem I keep having is that as I look through the photos there are too many I want to include in our album.  I think I just have to realize that we can always print out 4×6 prints of the ones we love but don’t necessarily want in our album.

My parents are coming to visit next weekend so maybe we’ll have a chance to get my mom’s input.  In addition to that I know for sure that we are going to be eating well next weekend… one of the nights we are going HERE and one of the nights we are going HERE… should be yummy!

Well I guess that’s all for now.  Time to get some work done!

jobs

so today this attorney came to speak to the Health Law Society at my law school.  he was fabulous but he kind of scared me a lot.  he said that when he was applying to jobs for his first year out of law school, he sent out 400 applications.  400 APPLICATIONS!!!  he heard back from only 45% of them and he said the majority of those he heard back from were flat out rejections.  the rest wanted more information like a transcript or something, and he got 5 interviews and one job offer.  how ridiculous is that?  i mean really.  he kind of scared me so right after his talk i came home and started working on cover letters to send out to places for summer jobs for the summer of 2010.

so my challenge is that this summer i have to make a decision between civil law and criminal law.  for the med students who might read this, that’s like choosing between medicine and surgery.  the difference is that there are some medical specialties where you do both medicine and surgery (OB, ENT, urology, etc.) but there are almost no legal specialties where you do both civil and criminal law so it really is a decision i have to make.  the other thing is that it’s not easy to go back and forth between the two because when you really learn the law is when you start your first job and if you’re learning civil law–statutes, codes, regulations, etc.–you don’t then want to go back to learning about criminal laws and how to represent criminal defendants in court.  there’s a big difference between the two and i think i have to make that distinction this summer.

well i sent out about 6 cover letters this afternoon… i guess i still have about 394 to go to match that guy’s 400.

Pigs

So I saw this article today… about how in Britain people are buying these pigs for a whole bunch of money and are keeping them as pets and I think it’s really weird.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/unleashed/2009/10/teacup-pigs-micropigs.html

I was also thinking… what is it about pigs?  I mean seriously… they’re really cute.  But the Jews don’t eat them and the Muslims don’t eat them.  So what was the deal way back when?  Why pigs and not like chickens or something?  I mean chickens seem a lot more strange than pigs if you ask me.  Plus they say pigs are really smart but I’ve never heard of a really smart chicken.  I really don’t get it.

And on another note, I have the song “Back in the USSR” stuck in my head!

blogging

It’s kinda weird that people blog and put their lives out there for everyone to see but it also seems like it could be a really nice way of venting and just getting things off my chest that are really bothering me.  Plus it’s a way to share photos and other interesting tidbits and information with people that I find interesting so I’ve decided to get started with one.

So for my readers (since I’m sure I’ll have a lot), I should probably introduce myself… I’m Anna.  I’m 24 years old.  I was born and raised in San Francisco, went to undergrad in Baltimore, and now am in law school in New Orleans.  I just got married to the best husband ever (who just cooked a fabulous new chicken recipe for dinner) and since he’s in medical school, we really don’t have time to do much other than study.  But when I do have free time, I enjoy reading, watching tv, taking long walks, working out, and pretending I know how to take really artsy photographs.

Speaking of getting work done… I should probably get to it.  Hope you enjoyed my first post!

this is me & my husband on our honeymoon

wedding day