Yummmmm... Pancakes

So I woke up this past weekend and was craving pancakes.  Possibly because I was ridiculously hungover after have a 'date' with the Bf the night before.  He just got the new Mac (which I also have) and gmail has a new video chat program, so we had a dinner and drinks date.  We also had our Draft.  I am in one fantasy league, and it is for Top Chef!  Yes, not at all a real sport, but it is an awesome TV show and its fun to do, since Bf looves fantasy sports.  My team right now is Ashley, Ash, and Michael Voltaggio.  I'm pretty pscyhed and ready to kick the Bf's butt!  I haven't gotten to watch the episode last night yet to see how I did, hopefully it went well!

But I digress, I should get back to pancakes.  So I woke up craving pancakes, but pancakes have eggs and milk.  So I scoured various websites wondering if such a thing as vegan pancakes actually exists.  It does!!  Plus, I used whole wheat flour, which made it even healthier.  The recipe had whole wheat flour, rice milk, baking soda, baking powder, and a bit of maple syrup to sweeten it.  They came out pretty freakin good.  A friend came over and had them with me, and although he said they weren't just like regular pancakes, they were close!  

On the legal front, I had coffee yesterday with the partner at a law firm here in DC.  He is actually an alum at the same school I am at now, and was absolutely interested in helping me with my career.  He called me 'impressive,' which is pretty cool- it gave me a small confidence boost for the day!  He took my resume and is passing it onto people he knows are looking to hire.  He also offered me a job if I wanted it, but its not the type of legal work I'm looking for.  

So I've actually been working on this post for like 3-4 days.  This week has been crazy busy b/t resume building, coffee dates, and studying for school, but since its now Thursday I am super excited b/c Bf is coming tomorrow!!!!! :-D  I haven't seen him in two weeks so I can't wait!  I think I'm going to cook dinner for us on Friday night and then we'll go out Saturday.  The weekend is going to be awesome!  

Hope everyone else has a great weekend!! 

Pizza Paradiso and Other News

Tuesday night I was in pizza heaven, courtesy of my new friend Chuck.  Chuck is in my LL.M. program, just moved from Cali, and is also into exploring the District and checking out new places.  He has been talking about a pizza place called Pizza Paradiso so when we got out of class early on Tuesday evening we headed down to check it out.  Although I had already resigned myself to having a drink and nothing else since pizza is a pretty big vegan faux pas, they had vegan pizza!!! And I'm not just saying that it was pizza dough w/o eggs with nothing but vegetables on it.  They had soy mozzarella cheese also, and it tasted awesome!!  The pizza dough was also whole-wheat, making it even healthier!  

On a negative note, the pizza dough was made with honey.  Until about 24 hours ago I didn't even know that vegans don't eat honey, but I have recently been educated.  Unfortunately for my vegan diet, though, I'm drawing the line.  As a consequence though I am now a disgrace in the vegan culture: http://www.vegetus.org/honey/nomenclature.htm.  

To set the record straight on my whole viewpoint on the vegan diet I've been experimenting with, I am not doing this because I suddenly woke up one day and decided animals were treated horribly and I could no longer stomach the thought of meat or any type of animal product. Without a doubt, animals are treated terribly and the treatment is pretty flippin' gross, but that isn't why I'm doing this.  For me, this is a lifestyle change is more about being healthy than it is about protesting any person who has bacon and eggs for breakfast (quite frankly, I really enjoy bacon and eggs).  

I'm not sure I'm willing to fold on the vegan thing though simply because I'm not running around protesting treatment of animals and giving dirty looks to people who eat filet mignon for dinner (again something I really enjoyed prior to this new vegan diet).  I'm just switching it up and trying new things.  All aspects of the vegan diet seem extremely healthy, and I already feel more energized and awake during the days.  So from this point forth I am:

Meg-- Vegan Without A Cause

Or:

Meg-- Honey-eating, not really vegan, totally not true to veganism, wannabe vegan blogger.  

On non-vegan note, school already has me swamped, but it is definitely great!  Today I contacted a guy who graduated from my law school and now owns his own legal staffing firm here in DC.  Hopefully I'll have a chance to take him out for coffee and pick his brain on his life and how he ended up a founding partner at a DC law firm.  

Back to work!  Class in 2 1/2 hours!  

Starved

Today I fell victim to what I have already read about on multiple occasions - being hungry without vegan snacks on hand.  I headed down to school at around noon this morning with some sunflower seeds and raisins packed to eat throughout the day, but unfortunately I ate both snacks before 2:30pm (apparently I was hungry today).  Then suddenly at about 4pm the kid next to me in the lounge opened his chicken caesar salad and I realized I was starving.  And not only was I hungry, but I was about 3 seconds away from reaching across the table, knocking the guy unconscious, and running off with the chicken in his salad.  Once I realized I was about to commit battery I headed out in search of a snack and proceeded to strike out repeatedly.  A sandwich stand- can't eat there, a pasta place- can't eat there, pizza- definitely can't eat there.  Eventually I stumbled into an Au Bon Pain, which surprisingly had some options.  Fresh strawberries and vegetarian minestrone soup- yum.  Except there was pasta in the soup :( , and I only realized after I bought it.  I ended up eating around the pasta and considering it a job well done.  

I have got to remember to bring more snacks in the future.

Off to my second class-- advanced evidence.  Hopefully I won't fall asleep since I've had some dinner!

LLM etc.

Today's blog brought to you by the sponsor - Tyrese.

First day of of school and I am running all over the place.  Thankfully I finally finished all the errands I had and have been able to take a moment to sit down... inside the GW law library :)  Seems pretty nice so far, although the whole school is pretty confusing- it is three buildings which are all attached.  I also wore heels today, which isn't the smartest thing to do with a broken toe, but it looked nice when I put them on.  I now completely regret it.  

My first class isn't for another couple hours, but I'm already nervous!  It isn't even at the law school, but down at the courthouse because the professor is a judge.  I'm actually going to head out soon in case I get completely lost trying to get there.  I have no idea how I am going to stay focused from 6-9pm every night since I am totally not a night person, but hopefully I'll get used to it!

On a final note- to express my frustrations from running around in circles today on campus- some people suck.  

Update-- right before finishing my post I heard back from one person I needed information from, so one less person sucks.

Vegan - Day 6

I am officially a DC resident!!!  Moved in Tuesday morning and couldn't be happier.  My apartment is completely put together and I start classes tomorrow.  I also hung out with a bunch of college girlfriends who live down here, which has been great since I really don't know that many people.  Today D and Em (two of the girls I know) took me down to the Eastern Market.  I was in heaven!!  It is the huge flea market with tons of fresh fruits, vegetables, and flowers.  The market also has a ton of jewelry, glassware and furniture booths.  There were free samples everywhere, so I basically ate nothing but fresh tomatoes, apples, and other fruits and veggies all day.  

I have also been cooking a lot and eating a ton of fresh fruits and vegetables for the last week.  Going vegan in the summer/fall time of year is probably the easiest time, since almost all fruits and vegetables are in season and taste amazing!  My slow cooker just beeped with my dinner, which smells great.  It is a vegan stew with potatoes, mushrooms, peas, broccoli, onions, and garlic.  Being vegan so far has been pretty good, and I haven't strayed yet.  Hopefully I'll stay on track.

Tomorrow I start my first day of classes :-o!  I'm heading down to school in the AM to work on my resume and do some assignments.  My landlord, who is great, now wants me to forward her my resume so she can help me find a job, so I am definitely hoping something pans out.  

On a more negative note, I have a broken toe :(.  Last week while staying with Bf I fell down the stairs entering the subway (I am a h.u.g.e. klutz).  I thought I was fine, but my toe has been getting pretty swollen after walking around all day and hurts a bunch.  This puts a small damper on the whole working out/getting in shape plan, but eventually it will get better.  I'm having the greatest time in DC so far, a broken toe is the last thing that will bring me down!!

Time for some dinner!

Life as a brunette

With only two days left before I leave for DC (finally!!), I've spent the last few in NYC hanging out with the  Bf.  Unfortunately for me, the Bf isn't going to be living in DC for the year.  He is attending NYU for the year to become a kickass tax attorney.  Although this makes my life more complicated, hopefully it will mean I'll actually get work done instead of being lazy and laying around (which is, quite frankly, one of our favorite activities).  

I did manage to completely surprise him Thursday evening when I showed up at his doorstep with dark brown hair, which for the previous 3 1/2 years has been blonde.  Jury is still out on whether he likes it, although he did say he preferred the blonde.  Not exactly something I'm too worried about since I'll be in DC for the year and he won't even see it that often. 

Since I've been in NYC the past three days most all motivations have ceased.  I haven't quite told the Bf about my blog yet, or the fact that I plan to go vegan once I get to DC.  While I'm sure this is some huge relationship no-no, I would prefer to actually succeed in some manner before telling him.  There is a distinct possibility this plan will go down in a ball of flames - most likely due to my love affair with ice cream - so until there is some progress I'm staying mum.  Well, mum except for everyone reading the blog!

I'm currently sitting in his apartment and contemplating the fact that I'm hungry and we haven't eaten dinner yet.  It is now 9pm on a Saturday and he's already doing schoolwork.  He is quite possibly as smart as Einstein and works 10 x harder than me (evidenced by the fact that he's studying as I'm blogging).  Maybe I should get to work...

yuck- school.

DC in T-48 hours!! 

PS-- I realize blogs without pictures are uber boring, hopefully this will change in the future :)

PPS-- Having 'followers' of my blog is a.w.e.s.o.m.e.  I haven't even met you yet Aliya and I already love you!

Packing :-\

Lesson learned today:  Going from a one bedroom unfurnished apartment to a fully furnished one room studio leads to a serious consolidation of belongings.  When I moved back from Miami I packed 19 boxes, not mention four massive suitcases of clothing.  Clearly that amount of stuff is not going to fit into a 450 square foot apartment with one closet.  Unfortunately, even after going through and 'consolidating' my belongings, I still have nine boxes.  Nine flippin' boxes of stuff and no idea where it is all going to go.  And this isn't even including clothing, which I haven't even started to put together.  Tomorrow is round two: Meg v. Boxes.  Hopefully I can knock out at least 4-5 more, but I doubt it, I'm far too attached to stuff.

I also updated my resume yesterday, although the idea of getting a job in DC is frightening.  My LL.M. program has only 18 people in it, more than half of which are practicing attorneys.  And I'm not positive, but I have a gut feeling the mock trial I did my second year of law school is going to pale in comparison to the work these attorneys have done.  The idea of having a job while trying to compete with my more experienced classmates is a little more than daunting.  However, my classes are from 6-9 every night, and if I feel lazy now, it is only going to get worse if I have nothing to do all day in DC.  

Plus, in the long run, when I have nothing to do I snack, and snack... and snack.  As shown by today when, as I stayed home and packed all day, I proceeded to also snack all day.  The vegan plan was clearly not on my radar most of the day as evidenced by the cheese and crackers I had as a snack and the chicken tortellini my mom made for dinner.  Tomorrow is another day though, and I've already started to print and save recipes for when I head to DC.  T-7 days till I will be moving into my new apartment!! Can't wait!

P.S.  As if it weren't obvious enough from this post- there is n.o.t.h.i.n.g. exciting going on in my life at this moment.  While I am moving to DC in one week (that is decidedly exciting), my day-to-day this week is about as exciting as a three hour french film when you don't speak french.  Hopefully future posts won't continue to bore your face off.    

And so it begins...

Ok, so I'm not quite inside the beltway yet, but I did find an apartment, so consider this the inaugural post.  A little bit about me: I just graduated from law school in Miami and miss it more than anything.  I also just took the bar exam, and I'm pretty sure I'll be taking it again next summer (but that's another post).  So here I am, post-bar exam, without a job, and moving to Washington, DC in less than two weeks for even more school.  And as I mentioned, I found an apartment!!

So now that I have an apartment, I've turned to what exactly I'm going to do for the next nine months while I'm in DC.  Studies show that people remember things in triplicates*, so hopefully that theory of three will transfer to goals - because three is what I've got:  

1.  I'm moving to DC to get my LL.M. in Litigation and Dispute Resolution, and hopefully figuring out some sort of life beyond being a student between now and the end of my twenty-second year of school (and I'm only twenty-five).  

2.  I've also started to feel lazy, reeeallllly lazy.  And although I've become extremely out of shape, I have yet to get off my ass and work out.   So maybe writing about it and documenting my laziness (or hopefully lack thereof) will get me moving.  

3.  Finally, I made the mistake of reading the book Skinny Bitch after I took the bar this summer.  If you ever want to thoroughly enjoy filet mignon again, I don't recommend it.  Needless to say, I have decided to explore other, meatless options.  That is not to say this whole plan has started quite yet, being that I had chinese food for dinner.  But, I'm still in Jersey and I can guarantee that if I mentioned going vegan to my mother, she would laugh and stick a steak in front of me.    

So, to sum this all up, I had chinese food for dinner.  Prior to dinner I was on the phone with K discussing blog titles and explaining my plan.  Along with my chinese food was the usual fortune cookie.  Normally fortune cookies say random things which, quite frankly, make little sense.  My cookie tonight was not one of those cookies.  The fortune is now taped to my computer, along with one other fortune (but that is for another post).  Tonight, my fortune said, "You identified the issue, now bring the attention to it."

How ironic.  And so it begins...

I think I'll have some fruit.

*I have no clue what studies, don't ask.