Thirsty Thursday!

So this is my first attempt at a blog link-up.  This is through Jenn at Going the Distance and Trish from Tales from Trish.  Let me tell you, here in the midst of finals week a Happy Hour is just what I need!

What's In My Cup?

My virtual drink of choice: Shiner Bock.  A nice easy, simple drink that requires no prep time (since I currently don't have any) and would allow me to return to my work after... lame I know but that's life right now.  Plus there are certain times when a cold beer just hits the spot and now would be one of those times. Maybe when I get home I'll have to crack one open.

What's On My Mind?

Well obviously law school finals, the bar application (which I have yet to print and mail in, that's my task for Saturday through Tuesday because apparently printing the bad boy is muy complicado), and my current state of unemployment for next year are weighing heavily on my mind but I don't want to be Debbie Downer on my first Happy Hour with y'all so here are some of the things I'm excited about:

Graduation! 

My Senior Year Apartment-mates at my undergrad graduation at this place 3 years ago.

Graduation is always a little bittersweet but this time I'm just super excited because it means no more school for this lady! EVER!

Babies!

I just found out that another friend of mine is pregnant, with TWINS! That brings the current count of friends with babies born (or to be born) in 2012 to about 6.  And I'm super excited for all the new moms but it also makes me super excited that I don't have a new life to look after yet and can be very independent in my job seach (I've been looking at some opportunities in Europe, but if I do ever have kiddoes, they will be born in the USA baby!)

Weddings!

I'm in my first wedding at the end of May and am super excited for the bride-to-be.  I went to her bachelorette party last weekend and it was suuuuper fun.  I also attended a FAB wedding of a law school friend recently, and in August will go to the first wedding between two classmates, both good friends and a one former house-mate from 1L year, it'll be a great post-bar summer celebration for all of us!

Wow... "Babies!" and "Weddings!" I am such a girl, I need to share some sporty stuff to stop this from becoming a Pinterest board.

C-A-P-S Caps! Caps! Caps!

Me in the Library *RIGHT NOW* Sporting my CAPs gear

The Washington Capitals made it through the first round of the playoffs! In a nail-biting Seventh Game against the Boston Bruins they clinched the victory with an overtime goal by a lesser known player Joel Ward, which just shows you that anyone can make a solid contribution to the team at any moment!

Well that's all the time I have for now, I mean that last picture was kind of awkward to take in the middle of the law library so I'll have to have some actual work on my computer screen before more people walk by and judge me.

Yay for Link-ups and Thirsty Thursdays!

Finals Study Music (LAST SEMESTER EVER EDITION)

First you're ready to go although something is missing and someone behind you is chewing loudly... you know you gotta have some dubstep/techno, to drown out the noise around you and to keep you awake on the late night library sessions

Nero - Promises

(and of course the totalitarian dystopian Orwellian video to match goes well with what we all feel about higher education during finals week)

mix it with some folksy/indie/hipster stuff to remind you how it's never to late to say "scew it" and run off to the west-coast and become a hippie...

The Lumineers - Ho Hey

Or run away to England:

Bombay Bicycle Club - Shuffle

until you remember those six-figure student loans.  So you want to go back to when life was simple and your parents did everything for you:

Lushlife - Teenage Dream

Then like any hopeless romantic you know it's time for something mildly epic love story to let you know you can always find love... once this paper is over.

Gossling - Wild Love

(holler at the red string, LAP classmates, you know where it's at)

Next thing you know you're listening to former Disney Channel star Selena Gomez and dancing at your carrel thinking

Selena Gomez & the Scene - Hit the Lights

And then you start to get a little crazy and find something like this:

Grimes - Oblivion

If you're me you think "I'm less than 6 months older than her, and I also have dyed my hair interesting colors yet she's a Canadian music star performing at SXSW and I'm about to finish law school, she's employed and I'm not."

To cheer yourself up from looming unemployment and studying for the bar you find this little gem:

Cosmo Jarvis - Gay Pirates

Even though if you listen to the lyrics the song is kind-of depressing, there are awesome lyrics like: "It's you my love, you're my land ahoy, yeah you're my boy" and I dare someone to listen to this without calling "Yo Ho Sebastian" out at least once!

And then this:

Luke Million - Arnold

After someone shushes you for laughing out loud in the library, you get to work...

Then pretty soon you decide you need to have a song for a montage to while browsing the internet, oops I mean studying your outline, which leads you to some 80s jams.

The Who - Baba O'Riley

Thinking about John Hughes passing makes you think existential thoughts and become sad so you listen to something that reminds you summer is coming, but also that you won't live forever

David's Lyre - Heartbeat 

For some reason, that does the trick and now you're refreshed and ready to work... only it's two hours later.  At least you have tomorrow to study-- oh wait, tomorrow's the final?
... and you haven't finished outlining cause you've been reading my blog?
...well there's always this classic to fall back on in times of need:

oh your final is on Virginia Procedure... whoops!
At least you've got some fun new music?

If you've enjoyed the small selection here, I'm always wanting to share music I love with people! Comment, e-mail or message me somehow & I'll give you some more recommendations!

ALL NIGHT LONG!

LAST ACADEMIC ALL-NIGHTER EVER (at least I hope I have more of my act together for the rest of finals)

This is all I can manage to post at this time.

Also: check out David's Lyre, his music got my through last night

His cover of "We Found Love" is better than the original I think:

My Best Somethings Drawn

So I'm sure by now you've heard of Draw Something, the pictionary-like game with no rules where you basically play with (as opposed to against) other iPhone, iTouch, or iPad users and guess what the other has drawn, earning coins based on the difficulty of the drawing.  The coins allow you to buy more colors, and then be able to make cooler drawings.  Here are some of my best so far (I know they can't touch the "all-time best of Draw Something tumblrs but I have fun and this blog is my oyster so by golly I'm gonna post them)

your choice of "Taylor"s

camo is fun to draw and I've never seen a rule that you can't write slogans

i love how simple this one is, (done when I only had one shade of brown)

I've drawn this one maybe 5 times, it's become a favorite

She guessed at the hat + braid

this one was fun

She got this pretty quick

I find the squid's expression HI-larious!

smushed fossil + field... got it! Also, i will now refer to driving long distances as burning a lot of smushed dinosaurs

(she guessed it when I had only drawn the igloo)

Spring Break Recap Video *Insert Excited Face*

"But Bitz... Spring Break ended a month ago..."
Yeah, well some of us had stuff like law school to do and kept forgetting to upload the footage to the computer...
Anyway, I recorded a little recap video of the whole trip as soon as I got back, it just took awhile before I had the time to get it up on the interwebs.  There is actually a 1/2 hour of footage from the trip and I made a lil movie for each of the ladies but since I have yet to ask their permission for eternal glory on the interweb (and I haven't had THAT much time to make a highlight-reel or edit out faces) , I haven't included all my footage. That might occur later. So stay tuned:

check out my horribly awesome Aussie accent at 3:28-408, and then at the very end

Also, let's take a moment to think how this is only my fifth numbered vlog entry and I had already forgotten which number I was on when I uploaded it...

As I face the last two weeks of law school and finals, we can be sure I will either ignore this blog completely... or devote all the time and energy I should be spending on my studies here instead.  

Banana Bread w/ Wheat and Honey!

So the following is my attempt at a recipe-sharing blog post (a'la Susie Horn) based on what I've seen on a lot of other blogs.  I chose to document my first attempt to make a "healthy" banana bread.  Basically it was the start of Spring Break and I was itchin' to bake something and one roommate had left like 6 bananas and the other roommate had given up processed sugar for lent... hmm the perfect solution: Banana Bread w/ honey! I found a recipe using wheat flour here and I decided since I love the taste of honey-wheat bread and I love banana bread I'd get the remaining necessities and make the recipe.  Here's how you can do it too!

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup vegetable oil

• 1/2 cup honey

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 2 eggs

• 1 cup mashed bananas

• 1 3/4 cups whole wheat flour

• 1/2 teaspoon salt

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• 1/4 cup hot water

• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts (I used pecans)

My Ingredients. I doubled everything to make two loaves to use as many bananas as possible

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C).

In a large bowl, beat oil and honey together. 

Add eggs, and mix well.  

Stir in bananas and vanilla:

Stir in flour and salt: 

Add baking soda to hot water, stir to mix, and then add to batter. 

Blend in chopped nuts. 

Spread batter into a greased 9x5 inch loaf pan. Bake for 55 to 60 minutes:

While baking, clean up the mess/damage:

Also, watch the end of a chick flick on TBS (View from the Top was on, love me some Mark Ruffalo)

Lastly, make nachos and a salad for dinner (These last three are obvi my own suggestions and will not affect the taste of the bread)

Check it:

Cool on wire rack for 1/2 hour before slicing:

Basically it's SUPER SIMPLE! The only new thing for me was this was the first time I used whole wheat flour and also the first time I tried the baking soda + hot water trick.  It seemed to work pretty well.

I made one leaf with nuts and one without and both were DELICIOUS!

Let me know if you decide to try the recipe, and how yours comes out!