Now that everything's reasonably calm around here, I thought I'd post this for your amusement. A slightly edited version of an e-mail I sent today:

The Top Ten Things That Are Annoying Me Today, In No Particular Order

1. Massive zit on forehead
2. Massive zit on chin
3. Pants that were slightly too tight at beginning of June when purchased are now slightly too loose and edging further into looking-silly territory (this in itself is not a bad thing but still means my meager supply of pants is dwindling)
4. Something wrong with my phone (alerts me when I have voicemail but not when people actually, you know, call)
5. At work - enough said
6. Senior attorney thinks he can just walk into my office when the door is closed to borrow a post-it note and pen (why his secretary is unavailable to provide these, I have no clue), and then walk off with my pen. At least I chewed on it.
7. Boston landlady still being incommunicado
8. Tired of usual lunch options/companions but forgot to bring my own lunch today, necessitating a trip to the other office building's food court in a huge pack of interns
9. Other interns (except for my roommate, she's cool)
10. Not in Boston yet

As it turned out, several items on that list became non-annoying over the course of the day. I don't know what I did to it, but I fiddled around with my phone and now it rings again. I got in touch with my landlady and everything's a go for me to move in on the 12th of August (!!!). All the other interns mysteriously disappeared off to some lunch thing involving lasagna, so I had a nice peaceful lunch alone. Plus, other good things have been happening, which I will not go into detail about here, but suffice it to say I am now looking forward to getting to Boston even more.

I only have six more days at this job, one big project and three small ones to finish up before next Friday, and then I'm done! Heading back to Cleveland on the 3rd after work, hanging out there for a week, and then off to Boston... I'm hoping the weather stays nice and cool like it has been so I can drive George instead of a rental car. I know the rental would be perfectly fine, and in truth, the loading/unloading would probably be easier, what with having a trunk and all (plus, easier on the cats), but dammit, I want to drive my car on such a momentous occasion! We'll see how it goes. Either way, I'll have to start making my driving-to-Boston playlist soon...

Maybe I'm just out of sorts today because I feel sick as hell from yesterday's rabies shot (last one! yay!), but now that I'm a week in, I can safely say that I don't like this job as much as the last one. It's a perfectly fine job, don't get me wrong - the people here are nice, and I can't deny that it's nice to have my own office (I kind of get territorial about office/desk space). The legal issues I've been working on are interesting, but all I've been asked to do is research, research, and more research, despite the fact that I'm the only legal intern here who has had a) more than one year of law school and b) actual labor law education/experience. Doing nothing but research on one small issue does nothing to help me understand what the case as a whole is about, and that bothers me - it's a lot harder to stay motivated to do actual work rather than dick around on the Internet (and blog). I'm not really worried about coming out of here without a writing sample, since I got a great one from job #1, but one of the other interns here has expressed concern to me that she won't have one, so I know it's a problem.

Plus, this is very much a sit-in-the-office-9-to-5 job - there's no going out to meet with clients, attend hearings, etc., which was one of my favorite parts of job #1. I'm really glad that this is job #2, because if I'd done this one first, I think I'd have had a very warped sense of what law practice is actually all about. Again, it's not a bad job, and maybe once I've been here a little longer I'll feel comfortable asking for more challenging assignments. Right now, though, I just get the distinct feeling that that's not the Way We Do Things around here.

Fortunately, things are much better jobwise today - I think the weirdness yesterday was just due to half the office being on vacation and the general unease of settling into a new job. I got formally introduced to everyone today, and several of us are going on a picnic tomorrow evening to watch Pittsburgh's (reputedly) incredible fireworks display. Plus, I got some more helpful information and was able to finish the assignment I was so unsure about yesterday (no idea if it's what the big cheese really wanted, but it's done!).

So far, everyone in the office seems really nice, and the work's definitely interesting. I don't feel terribly connected to the cases I'm dealing with yet, but I think I'll be able to get a better overall picture as I continue to work here. It'll be nice to have a day off tomorrow, though, so I can sleep in and explore the neighborhood some more.

I also forgot to mention the weirdest thing I saw on my drive down here on Sunday. Somewhere in rural Pennsylvania on Route 22, there is a drive-through strip club. I can't decide if I'm really impressed by American ingenuity, or just plain disturbed.

(Google says it's the world's only drive-through strip club. Apparently, it was auctioned on EBay in 2005. Clearly, whoever bought it was on board with keeping the drive-through concept.)

Office
Originally uploaded by kjoliat

Job #2 has thoughtfully provided me with a real office, and it has a computer so I don't have to bring my laptop to work every day. There's a great city view from my windows, and it's nice to have so much space to spread out.

I have to say I feel a little isolated, though, but that might be because a whole bunch of people were out of the office today. Because of that, it's been hard for me to figure out how I feel about this job so far. I was given an assignment this morning, and then left to do it with very little guidance (such as an indication of when it might be due), and since I'm sitting in an office by myself, I have no idea when people come and go. I realized at about 5:10 that it seemed awfully quiet, and a quick look around revealed that everyone had left for the day, except for one very nice attorney who walked me out and told me a little about the office. The general counsel (head attorney, for those of you non-lawyer types) also sat down with me for a while and told me about some of the current major cases we're handling, which was helpful - he's a really nice guy and I can tell I'll like working with him.

So far, though, I kind of feel like they've put me in an office and forgotten about me. Hopefully that will change once people start coming back from their long weekends. I'm pretty independent, but on the first day at a new job, I still like to have some help orienting myself, which I haven't had so far. It's definitely a completely different office culture here.

Cathedral of Learning
Originally uploaded by kjoliat

I arrived in Pittsburgh earlier today and I'm completely exhausted but liking the city so far! The drive down wasn't bad - I went from Kingston to State College yesterday, where I met up with my mom. Job #2 is providing housing in the Carnegie Mellon dorms, so no pets allowed, naturally, and my mom is nice enough to take Maddy and Mal for six weeks. Understandably, though, she didn't want to drive all the way from Cleveland to Kingston to pick them up (it's at least a ten-hour drive), and since George the Jeep has no AC, I didn't want to drive the full ten hours from Kingston to Cleveland with the cats in the car, so we met in the middle to do the handoff. I'll take a moment to plug the Comfort Suites in State College - very nice hotel, free continental breakfast, and an indoor pool/jacuzzi. It's been so long since I had the chance to go swimming that I'd almost forgotten how great it feels to get in the water - I think I might have to start swimming regularly once I get back to Ithaca. Mom and I also went to see Ratatouille, which was adorable and I highly recommend it.

The drive from State College to Pittsburgh is a little under three hours, so I got to Pittsburgh around 1:30 and stopped at the office to pick up the keys to my apartment. I had no trouble finding the place from the directions my boss gave me - unfortunately, he sort of neglected to give me any guidance about what to do when I actually got there. I circled the building a couple of times before locating the entrance to the parking garage, and when I went up and parked in it, I realized that there didn't seem to be an entrance into the building from the garage, so I came back out and parked on the street and rattled some doors until a nice resident came out and told me where to go. Apparently, the key fob I was given along with my keys is the actual thingy that opens most of the doors in this building, except for my apartment which has a separate key, and since it's a mixed residential/office building, some of the doors are open on weekends and some aren't, and there is an entrance from the parking garage to the building but it's all the way down on the first floor where residents aren't allowed to park. You can see why some instructions might have come in handy.

I finally managed to get all my stuff up to the apartment, with a little help from another friendly resident who saw me struggling to unload the car. On the coffee table, there was a note from my roommate (the other intern at this job) with my bus pass, telling me welcome and that I should help myself to anything that was in the fridge even though there wasn't much. She was right about that - there wasn't much - but what there was was beer, two bottles of Blue Moon to be exact. Since I was all hot and sweaty from the drive and from hauling my crap around, finding a cold beer in the fridge was like finding a winning lottery ticket on the sidewalk. That was when I decided that I love my roommate.

After unpacking and enbeerenating, I went out to explore a bit of the neighborhood, and so far I like it. This building is smack in the middle of the Pittsburgh university district, and from my bedroom window I have a fantastic view of the Mellon Institute and the Cathedral of Learning. The living room windows look out onto St. Paul's Cathedral, so I'm definitely pleased with the local architecture. I'm looking forward to exploring a bit more, but since I start work tomorrow, I'm going to have an early night.