All-nighters are fun and edumacational

I didn’t think I was going to be able to make it. After a week of trying to make good progress on my paper – but failing – I found myself at home last night, with about three pages complete out of a 10-12 page paper. By 6 a.m., those 3 pages were up to 4 pages. The paper was due at 12:55 p.m. There was no way I could make it. I laid down in bed and thought, Screw it. I’ll turn it in late and get my grade docked.

But I knew I couldn’t do that. I had to finish this paper NOW. I had faced harder obstacles in the past. What about all the papers I wrote in college? What about the countless 40-hour production weekends at the Michigan Review? What about the front-page stories set to run the next day in the Sandusky Register, which were only half-done at 8 p.m. the night before?

Now you see that I could not give up. And while evil will always triumph (because good is dumb), I had to keep going. As they may say in one of the latest shitty incarnations of the Matrix movies:

Agent Smith: Mister Schwaaaartz. You will die today.
Me: No. It is you who will die today.
(fighting ensues)
Agent Smith: Your defeat… (kung fu)… is… (flying leaps)… inevitable. Why do you continue to resist?”
Me: Because I choose to.
(Trinity kisses me)

The point is, I won. I chose to keep going, and I finished the damn paper, and it was pretty good, and I drove to school and turned it in at 12:09 p.m. (there’s nothing like the jolting CA-CHUNK of a time-stamp machine to remind you that whatever goes on in the Matrix has consequences in the Desert of the Real).

Okay, my laptop battery was dying so I just went to plug in my laptop and as I was bending down to find the outlet behind the bed I somehow got a paper cut on my eye. I think this a signal that I should go to sleep.

.\.\ @

Match.com — Connecting People — until they die

So I signed up for a match.com account the other day (what the hell), and I was aghast and horrified to read the following in the terms of the agreement:

In the event that you die before the end of your subscription period, your estate shall be entitled to a refund of that portion of any payment you had made for your subscription which is allocable to the period after your death. In the event that you become disabled (such that you are unable to use the services of Match.com) before the end of your subscription period, you shall be entitled to a refund of that portion of any payment you had made for your subscription which is allocable to the period after your disability. (Emphasis supplied)

This was not buried in some fine print in a huge agreement; this was RIGHT OUT FRONT, and you had to read it before clicking “Okay.” Does this strike anyone else as a really bad way to send people off into the merry world of online dating? “Good luck! Have fun! Wear your seatbelt! And even if you don’t, don’t worry… your family will be well taken care of.”

Let’s go through this disclaimer step-by-step and determine exactly how scary it is.

1) “In the event that [I] die before the end of [my] subscription period…” Let’s get something straight: My subscription period is ONE MONTH. I didn’t shell out for the 6 month plan or even for the 3 month plan. No, in my eternal optimism that I would find the love of my life in the next month, I figured one month was all that was needed. So, seeing as that I am only going to be on match.com for a month, I surely don’t intend on dying before that time is out. And even if I do, how much consolation is that unused portion of 12 bucks going to be?

2) “In the event that [I] become disabled (such that [I am] unable to use the services of Match.com)” On the surface, simple. I break my hands in a freak baking accident? I get a refund. But what exactly counts as “becoming disabled” to the extent that I am “unable” to use match.com? Would mental disabilities count? What if I snap under the law school pressure and forget how to type? Does that count? How about if I get a huge assignment, in effect “disabling” me and causing me to be “unable to use the services”? Yeah. You see how it is.

In conclusion, match.com can go to hell.

PS – I got two dates through match this week alone!

Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated

Though my blog has been silent for the past month or so, I am indeed still here, toiling away, one small cog in the vast law school machine. I’ve jotted down many interesting things to muse about here, but sadly, my jot-to-muse ratio is extremely high, and likely to stay that way for some time. My apologies.

That said, keep checking back because you never know what you may find here at the wonderful world of MatthewSchwartz.US!