HANDSOME DEVIL

I owe an apology to you, my dear friends and loyal readers, for my increasingly infrequent posts to this sporadically updated blog.

As a sign of retribution, I offer you an update in the world of Darren, and I must say life has been good lately.

I am happy to say that I feel very connected with my co-workers at YRL. The stacks crew gets along rather well within the library walls, and it was great to see that everyone enjoyed each other's company just as much at the YRL party last week. A number of my friends at the library speak Spanish and are willing to teach me, so my Spanish has been progressing (slowly, but surely!).

This summer I've also read quite a lot, which is pleasing. I've read Huxley's The Doors of Perception, Vonnegut's Breakfast of Champions, Kerouac's On the Road, Vonnegut's The Sirens of Titan and am now concluding Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. I think the book I enjoyed most was the The Sirens of Titan but I'm hoping to read at least a few more books by the end of summer with the potential to change that.

My only concern at the moment lies with my love interest, whose untimely travels have left me discouraged. I would like to have been able to update you further, but as it stands, that's all I can really say. I hope to get in touch with her sometime soon, and hopefully this will shed some light on the situation.

That's really it for the present.

As for the future, I have given my ten year plan (and beyond) extended thought and am more excited than ever for graduation. After graduation, I plan to vacation in Argentina before settling into some office job in San Francisco (ideally at the Justice Department or the District Attorney's office). Then I'd begin to apply to law schools. I think Hastings is a realistic goal and I really hope to attend-though it's not an upper-echelon school, it's still in the top tier, and is, of course, located in the greatest city in the world. As a dreamer, I'll also apply to Berkeley, Penn, Georgetown and USC. If worse comes to worst, I'll end up at USF, and I don't think that's too shabby. In any case, I will study abroad in either Spain or Argentina-I'm glad to see that many of the programs in which I'm interested have programs in one country or the other (or both!).

I can't predict with any accuracy what will happen after that, but my aspiration to be a judge is now nearly matched by my desire to be on the Senate Ethics Committee. Ethics, in my mind, is of the utmost importance, especially in politics. Popular consensus is that the Ethics Committee is laughable-I cannot comment, as I don't know much about it. But in my opinion, the Ethics Committee ought to be revered rather than mocked. I think they have the most important duty in the Senate. If the policymakers in this or any country do not use ethics to shape their propositions, then the laws they create are in vain. I'd love to have a legacy as being the man who brought United States laws closer to the laws of ethics. As you can see, I have not fully thought this through, but I do have ample time.

That's it for now.

Darren.