Once again, I’m sitting in my room at the Holiday Inn, ruing the inevitable, waiting for the Tuesday morning sun to come and rear its ugly head. For me, this is Episode III: Revenge of the Bar Exam. (Hopefully, I have a better fate ahead of me than Anakin Skywalker, who turned into a lava-baked Krispy Kritter because he went over to the Dark Side. Which I’m doing by becoming a lawyer. Shit.)
The day didn’t start off too bad. I woke up, read some of the newest Stephen King novel, washed clothes—you should always face your darkest fears in a clean pair of underwear—got everything packed up (I hope) and headed out of the house. I went to Rainbow Foods to pick up some supplies and decided to grab my dinner at the Lee Ann Chin’s inside. What I discovered there was that whoever makes the bamboo chopsticks for that place needs a copy editor with some marginal English skills. Here’s what it said, errors and all (I split it up into columns with breaks between each line, since some of those breaks kinda make sentences).
FRONT: Welcome to Chinese Restaurant.
Please try your Nice Chinese Food With Chopsticks / the traditional and typical of Chinese glonous history / and cultual.
BACK: Learn to use your chopsticks
Tuk under [blank space] thurnb / and hcld firmly
Add second chcostick / hold it as you hold / a pencil
Hold tirst chopstick / in originai position / move the second / one up and down / Now you can pick / up anything:
PRODUCTOF / CHINA
I’ve made jokes about using those chopsticks to pick up women before—”Hey, c’mon baby, I can pick up anything with these things, so why not you?” Given the spelling and grammar on the wrapper, I’m not sure if I can accept their claims as legitimate anymore.
So I got supplies there, though I learned my lesson after last time: I bought an eight-pack of Gatorade bottles along with the usual Mountain Dew. As much as I can use the caffeine, it’ll be good to have some non-diuretic stuff to drink so I won’t get dehydrated and almost fall asleep during the exam again. After Rainbow, I made a quick drive-by at Subway for a foot-long sub that’ll suffice for two lunch breaks and hit the road.
I got to the hotel with no complications, checked in, brought my first load of two up to my hotel room and found a large bunch of flowers sitting on the desk. My first thought was how it was such a nice gesture and wondered who would send it to wish me good luck. Then I looked at the tag. Yes, the tag had Room 422 written on it. The tag, however, displayed the name “Carol Hanks.” I’ll admit, I’ve been called a lot of names in my life, but Carol Hanks has never been on that list. Not even close.
I was a little confused, so on my way back to my car, I stopped at the front desk to tell them about the flowers. The guest services guy looked in the computer and saw someone named Carol. He also saw that Carol had a reservation sometime in March. Woo hoo! Premature delivery = free flowers for me! (Unfortunately, it didn’t work out that way—I guess there was a name screw-up or something, so someone came and took them away from me. I didn’t even think to take a big sniff before they were gone… damn.)
So now I’m at my desk in front of my laptop. And the room’s mirror is right in front of the desk, so every time I look up from the computer screen, I see a familiar scowl. (Yay! I’m not a vampire yet! I may stay up at night and be on the verge of becoming pure evil, but I still have a reflection!) And seriously, what kind of expression would you expect? Ecstasy? Joy? A level of happiness so high that I can’t help but drool all over myself? I’m taking the bar exam tomorrow!
Hopefully, that scowl will be gone in half an hour or so. I promised myself I’d get more than five hours of sleep, a bad trend that’s continued through the ages (see: a year and a half). Thus, if I get ready real quick, I’ll fulfill that promise. By getting six hours instead of five. Time for bed, kiddies! Story time will continue tomorrow as usual. Until then, sleep well and have lots of happy dreams—I’ll try to follow your example.
