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May 15, 2005 Exams are finally done, isn't that something? I am officially a 3L, which is kind of exciting. I'd wax rhapsodic about the glorious summer ahead of me, except that the first six weeks or so are going to be insane. I'm working full-time at TinyLawFirm and taking two summer classes which start MONDAY, oh evil scheduling. They should be good classes, though - one is Advanced Legal Research, which I desperately need as I suck eggs at that, and the other is a Persuasive Drafting class taught by Prof. Property. You may recall I had a tiny crush on the man during first year. Well, I still do. He's a QTpie. In news of a trivial nature, my hair has been looking fab lately. May 12, 2005 One of the law professors died yesterday of complications from surgery. I never had him for class; the most interaction I had with him was doing his filing every few weeks. He was very nice, but somewhat intimidating in that he used a wheelchair and was kind of inconsistent about when he wanted doors opened for him and things moved out of his way. S. took his Disability Law class this semester; I don't know if she's heard yet, but I expect she'll be upset. Last exam tomorrow, and witness my apathy. The fact that it's going to be a fairly easy exam only makes it worse, because I still need to study. (And easy law exam is still a law exam, you know?) I have to say, though, that grueling as this exam period has been, I'm overall fairly content with how things have turned out. T says that it's because I liked my classes this semester, and I think she has a point. My second semester grades are terrible compared to the rest of my transcript, and it's all horrible ConLaw and J&J and Sales, and all these classes I loathed. Last semester was better, but I genuinely enjoyed school this semester. Hopefully my grades will reflect that, although honestly, my take on law school is that it's just a really expensive really long training seminar where you learn how things kind of work but don't actually do anything. Oh, and they train your brain to think a new way. Other than that? Training Seminar. May 9, 2005 Today was another installment of "The Statute Doesn't Tell You Everything". Ugh. But. . . I'm over the hump, only two exams to go. May 8, 2005 So, I got this mesh tray-like thing for my laptop. I am addicted to Sims 2 (no surprise there), but if my laptop gets too hot, the game crashes. Keeping it elevated seems to help, and I like having my screen a little higher than it was before. But now it's too high to type on, so I have to take it off the stand to type and put it on the stand to play. I need one of those infrared keyboards and a mouse, the wireless kind so I can keep those on my desk and stop futzing around with freaking CORDS. Next exam in the marathon that is the end of my fourth semester: Decedent's Estates & Trusts, tomorrow morning. I'm not really that worried about this one, to be honest. The class was kind of self-explanatory; I get the feeling that once I learned intestate succession (what happens to your property if you die without a will), I could have skipped the rest of the semester and taught it to myself. I didn't, I was a good girl and went to class, but honestly, it's a pretty basic kind of a class. Our prof. didn't teach state-specific, so I don't have to know what Georgia does for anything. I guess they do that because so many students/graduates practice in Alabama and Florida. Whatever, I'm not worried, it'll be a time-crunch as all of them are, but I'll be fine. I'm more worried about American Legal History on Wednesday. I shall pass it, but how? Skin of my teeth? Solid B? An A is out of the question because it's a history class and I suck eggs at those. But a B would be very very nice. Argh. But then I have Commercial Transactions on Friday 13 (ahahaha. ha. ugh.) and a whopping two days off before summer classes start. Sometimes I wonder what I was thinking when I decided to take all of this on. I had a nice life in Boston. Boring at times as far as my job is concerned, but nice. But, no. This is better. And hopefully it will lead me to my dream of living in Chicago, City of my HEART. April 30, 2005 Um. Hi. Yeah, it's been almost a year since I updated this thing, which is pretty shameful because the second year of law school is filled with things like writing your first brief and being bored to tears by Civil Lawsuits (CivPro part II), and not getting onto Moot Court and really feeling ok about it, and the constant stress about not having a job for the summer even though it's only September and there is so much time! But inter alia fell by the wayside, and that's a shame. I can't really sum up the year, there's been too much and it's been too long, and I wrote about it in other places that I'm not linking to here. I can say that I am no more certain that I want to do law as a career than I was when I was taking the LSAT. I know that I've changed in many ways, some obvious (hello, freshman fifteen, didn't want to see you again), some more subtle. I think I'm more easily irritated these days, and I find it hard to remember sometimes that there is life outside the law. And while I sometimes feel consumed by school, I worry that I haven't learned any actual law. It's just case after case, hypo after hypo. I'm working at a firm this summer, which is an incredible relief. I'm also scared to death because I am keenly aware tht I know absolutely nothing. The firm has three huge cases going to trial this summer - a six-count felony-murder, a big class action thing, and a standard "thug homicide". My friend T and I are clerking together, which is nice because she's super-smart and also feels like she knows nothing. We shall fret together. The firm - man, this firm. Totally casual in dress, like they were wearing jeans and polo shirts (I'm singing alleluias to them for that because I loathe suits). It's small, just four attorneys, two men two women. They seem to get along well, although most of the ribbing and joking were between the younger male attorney (hereinafter referred to as misterLOVE) and the administrative staff. Interesting. We start on May 26. Woo! May 17, 2004 Instead of talking about how horrible the ConLaw exam was, and how it ATE my SOUL and made me cry, I shall give you my meager list of professor quotes. They weren't quite as funny this semester... Class quotes, spring semester 2004 "Your first infatuation is like a musk deer, all you nerve endings running around." Prof. ConLaw "Again with the pronouns! I'm going to have to spray the whole class before Thursday, nip this in the bud before it spreads like a virus and we have to quarantine the whole class. Which would be okay, except that I may have to be quarantined with you. I don't mind quarantines if its for everyone else but me." Prof. Sales "Who goes to law school? Smart kids who can't do math." Prof. LegPro "It's not a profession unless the professionals take control." Prof. LegPro ProfSales: If a man drank a sixpack of beer, and fell down, is there a breach of the implied warranty of merchantability? Student: He drank the whole sixpack and then fell down? Then that's good beer. "Well, the cream does rise to the top in a laissez-faire system. The the cream starts screwing over the milk." Prof. ConLaw "Your life is worth more than any piece of property. If someone wants your property, let him have it. People say, "oh, how brave, he stood up to the guy." Yeah, and then he got knifed! And if it's someone else's property, open the door." Prof. Sales "Why would law schools not [require training in counselling] other than the snootiness of over-educated geeks?" Prof. LegPro May 13, 2004 It's funny how I post more in the blog when I'm supposed to be studying for exams. I'm sure there's a reason. I have achieved zen. ConLaw tomorrow, and I know that I don't know everything that I'm supposed to know, but I also realize that I'm not going to learn it all tonight. I'm not going into the exam completely unprepared, mind you. I know my scrutiny levels, I can talk fairly intelligently about Dormant Commerce Clause, Art. 4 Sect. 2 P&I, and Equal Protection. I only have a few case names to hang on these, but I don't think he wants us to use them, so that's a relief. Basically, I'm going for clarity and eschewing sophistication, and hoping merely to make it out alive.
The plan for the next couple of days is as follows:
Sunday looks a lot like Saturday, with a little telephone call from overseas thrown in (yay!), and Monday I start my little 20-hour a week job at the law library. Nice mindless work. You will never believe how much I am looking forward to it. May 12, 2004 I am almost done with my first year of law school. I'd be more excited, but the craptastic Sales exam that I took this morning, added to my absolute fear of my ConLaw exam Friday, is sucking every emotion out of me. Well, except apathy. Is apathy an emotion? See? I've gone stupid. This semester has been a little bit brutal, and I'm speaking for the whole class now. Last semester this time, with one exam to go, all anyone could talk about was the big party at the end of the week, and how much fun it was going to be, blah blah blah. This semester, our designated Party Guy is barely keeping his head above water, like the rest of us, and didn't officially announce the party until yesterday. This is big, because we are The Class That Has Fun. I cannot get that sales exam out of my head! Argh! So, let's talk about the summer. I have decided to take this summer off as far as the law goes. I'm going to be working for 20 hours a week at the law library at school (which will likely translate into a job during the semester, thank goodness), and playing housefrau. All these little projects are piling up that I want to do, like painting the rooms bright cheerful colors, and finishing my sock that I'm knitting, and knitting Ro her funky hat and whatnot that I promised oh so long ago, and reading BOOKS that have NO CASES in them! Is there such a thing? Plus, I've got visitors off and on. TR is coming to play at the end of the month, and then I have Kiwis coming to visit mid-July. Whee! The Kiwis, Chara, assorted other friends and I will be meeting up again in Miami for a fun weekend in the sun where hot guys and girls will be ogled and alcoholic beverages will be consumed. Bliss. And well-earned, let me tell you! Is the my crankiness showing? I don't mean for it to. It's just been a long week. April 22, 2004 Yes, I am still a law student. I actually got some perspective over Spring Break (and picked up a dog for the next few months, thanks Mom and Dad!) and remembered that I do actually want to do this, and that I'm not going to flunk out no matter what. March 31, 2004 Today is Chili Day! The Great Law Professor Chili cook-off starts today at 11am. It seems that this is a highly competitive event; there have been signs posted all over school promoting "Chili Ipsa Loquitor" and "Party Admission Chili" and "Joinder of Parties Chili: the chili everyone can agree upon!" They're sneaking in now, tossing a few snide remarks back and forth. My favorite sign: "Professor Property [known for his baby face] is really fifty! He keeps his youthful figure with a daily dose of Prof. Blank's CHILI IPSA LOQUITOR!" Law professors can be kind of nerdy. *g* Spring break is next week, and it cannot come soon enough. If I can make it until Friday afternoon, and turn in the memo (and have it be a memo worth turning in), then I may survive. March 15, 2004 Haven't written in a while, and I can't help but think that it's symptomatic of my general disconnectedness from this whole semester. Or maybe disconnected is the wrong word, because I vacillate between incredibly stressed out to complete apathy. I had a little breakdown on the phone with my mother the other day, which never helps because this is an area where she has no experience (because there is nothing quite like law school, nothing at all, and for sheer stress, it comes a close second to medical school. Very close) and can offer little more than sympathy. Which, really, at my age, I should be able to figure this out myself, get myself back into gear, kick my own ass and do what I know I need to do. Beating the curve is lovely, but there's greater beauty ahead. The school needs a new American Flag. Ours is somewhat tattered, which is a little shameful. OK, a lot shameful. I don't know what it is with me, lately. I cannot express just how much I do not want a legal job this summer, which is working out nicely since no one wants me anyway. I can do any number of practicums around town, the legal aid clinic is begging for people, but the will, the inner impetus is not there. I want the summer off, and to play with TR when she visits, and although I know that this is dangerously close to the "I deserve it" mentality (which according to Prof. LegPro, is the beginning of the slippery slope to the Maserati and the debt and the working 2500 billables a year and no life and misery), I can't help but want it anyway. Plus, my girl is coming to visit in July and dammit if I don't want to climb into her car and tour the country with her. It's beautiful outside, and I'm being self-indulgent and uncaring and spring feverish. Hello, Legal Writing, most dreaded of all classes, I'll see you in about forty minutes. March 2, 2004 M. University's section of the Association for Women Law Students (AWLS) holds an auction every year to benefit women's shelters and victim advocacy programs around the area. The auction is in three weeks. Two representatives came to talk to the AWLS group today to tell us how the money we raise (over $10,000 last year) is used. It was amazing and inspiring, and I hope - I dearly hope - that we can beat that total this year.
February 22, 2004 Well. The legal memorandum. I have the most sporadic case of writer's block. I get a sentence down, and then I sit and stare at the computer monitor for what seems to be an interminable length of time. Then I write another sentence. Stare. Sentence. Stare. Delete everything I've already written. Stare some more. Check e-mail. Stare, delete, stare, write a paragraph, stare. I have 461 words out of 3500 allowed. Four pages out of ten. This sucks. I'd actually meant to do this yesterday, but my body rebelled against me. I had a visitor Friday night who didn't leave until 1am (and really, she could have stayed later, we were having a great time). I toddled off to bed around 2am, slept until noon, went out for lunch, came back to change clothes and work on The Memo From Hell, and slept another three hours. The rest of the day was a complete wash - I'd hit the wall and couldn't think to save my life. So, I'm writing today, the paper is due tomorrow at 4:30, and I'm not allowed to cut any classes to work on it. Not that I would anyway. Besides, I've scheduled a cut for Legal Profession on Tuesday so that Chara and I can go CD shopping. Yes, it's important. So. Back to the memo, and untangling the theory of a special relationship between a manufacturer and a retailer from the theory of negligent entrustment. :P Also, look! Comments! February 17, 2004
The School To-do List I can do all that in one evening, right? I've been trying out a program, Storelaw Outliner, that was highly recommended by some of my fellow students. It's supposed to help organize your notes, so that you've got your briefs together, your class notes together, and your own notes from the reading together. What I've found happening, however, is that I can't find anything, especially in J&J. My notes are chopped up into these little pieces, and I don't see how they flow from one topic to the other. It doesn't help that Prof. J&J will spend two days on the diversity requirement (did you know that New Hampshire and Maine are different states? They are! Let's talk about that for forty minutes!), so that by the time we've moved on to something else, my brain has shut off. Plus, he has this really annoying habit of referring to "the dead framers", as in "the dead framers did not leave us detailed instructions on how to determine jurisdiction". So very creepy and irritating. This is going to be a challenging semester, but for different reasons than last semester. The motivation is not as strong as it was. The classes aren't as interesting, except ConLaw. It's difficult to really get into the swing of it, which is bad one month into a four-month semester. February 9, 2004 Shame on me, I'm writing this during Sales while a student struggles mightily with the elements of a contract. Poor thing. Prof. Sales is not a happy man. There was an ethics trial last week. One of the 3Ls asked her roommate to sign the attendance sheet in class for her, which is against school policy and is a violation of the ethics code. While the trial itself was interesting in that Springer sense where there were allegations of this and that, and two students invoked the Fifth Amendment (all very exciting), what's happened is that there's a little conversation going around the school about attendance policies in general. Some professors take attendance by calling a roll, like in high school. Some professors pass around a roll sheet to be initialed, or a seating chart. Some, like Prof. Sales, don't even bother, but tell the students that they are responsible for their own attendance, that they are not to go over a certain amount of absences, and to let him know when they do. In the case that was tried last week, the professor, while stating that he did not agree with having attendance policies in graduate courses, passed around a roll sheet. It seems to me that attendance is something that is assumed. Law schools have to require attendance to retain certification (although the ABA doesn't track whether schools actually enforce their attendance policies), class attendance is the best way to learn the law because all the good discussion happens in class, professors all lay out their individual policies at the beginning of the semester, and students are expected to abide by them. Badda boom, badda bing. Yet, there are those who say that it is insulting to "call roll" at the graduate level. I disagree with this. Attendance is required in the workplace. It is tracked, and employees who have too many absences suffer the consequences. It is unprofessional to not come to work on a regular basis. If part of the goal of law school is to train students to be professional, which I think it is, then instilling a respect for punctuality and attendance is important. Yikes. This is a really painful class today. How ridiculous is it that a question of attendance came to the point of an ethics trial? On one level, attendance is such a trivial thing that it seems like a waste of time for the Chief Justice and Prosecutor (both students, both working outside of school, both with incredible time pressures) and everyone else to have to schedule around. On the other hand, there is a rule in the classroom, the rule states that students are not to sign the roll for each other, and how difficult is it to abide by this rule? Is it professional to cut class? No. Is it ethical to sign in when you weren't actually there, or to sign in for a friend? No. I don't understand what the debate is here. And yes, this was a very disjointed entry. I'll try to organize it better when I get home, prior to uploading. Of course, if you're reading these sentences, then you know that I didn't have time. February 5, 2004 Briefed in Sales today. Lucky me, I got to go over 2-207. I love my Sales professor! He's just a big bottle of quirks. He hates pronouns, hates when students say "Well, you know," - M. did that today, and Prof Sales bellowed, "This is not an interview with a sports athlete, Mr. H! This is not ESPN, this is Sales, this is law school, Mr. H!" He bagged me on pronouns ("If I can get through the maze of 'they's, Miss H., I can help you out,") and of course, for that pesky legal thing. But I did fine, I got a "very good" at the end. Despite JS's assurances that "Prof. Sales is out for BLOOD, ames! Prof Sales is going to EAT your HEART!" I love JS, he's like a brother to me. It's amazing how busy I am! So. Much. Schoolwork. And J&J (CivPro) is going to be the death of me. Subject matter - actually pretty interesting. Professor - creepy, stalkerish, and deadly dull. February 3, 2004 We will not discuss how I missed two classes today. Nor will we discuss how I'd spent hours and hours last night preparing for those very two classes. Nope. Not gonna talk about it. I'm doing a Legal Research assignment, looking for cases in Florida that show where tacking can be used to complete the statutory period for adverse possession. I type in my little search command and come up with a case for trover of a slave being held in adverse possession, back in 1856. Not what I was expecting, but interesting nonetheless. Legal Research is, frankly, a pain in the ass. Clearly, this is an important skill, and it's great that we have a class on it designed for the first-years. But it's SUCH the poorly designed class. And the exam is horrific - a paper exam instead of a research task. Ugh.
February 2, 2004 It's 8am, and I don't have class until 1:10, but I am up and briefing cases because I was a slack-ass and didn't do all that I should have over the weekend. Also, I am drowning in meetings and study sessions and social thingies. And my roommate told me last night that she didn't think I was stressed enough last semester, and she has a point. My weekend needed another day. January 29, 2004 Yes, new name. Inter alia. Live it, learn it, love it, squeal when you read it in a Judge's decision. (For the non-legally-minded, it means "among other things". Which just fits.) And in other non-law-school news, I just bought two tickets to see Britney Spears. Eeeee! Unless she has a meltdown before then. Yes, I like pop music, no I do not apologize for it. BRITNEY!
January 28, 2004
"Plaintiff's counsel, apparently laboring under the impression that I am not dealing with a full deck and that my knowledge of diversity requirements is about equal to that of a low-grade moron, chose to disregard the directional signals posted in my memorandum. Counsel brazenly, discourteously, defiantly, arrogantly, insultingly and under the circumstances rather obtusely threw back into my face the very allegations I had held insufficient by reiterating and incorporating those same crippled paragraphs . . . I suppose I can hardly expect any more from counsel whose familiarity with Title 28 U.S.C. §1332 could be no more than a friendly wave from a distance visible only through a powerful telescope." ::applauds:: Dude, that's one pissed-off judge. And now, possibly my favorite. I love a good smack-down. January 26, 2004 Shiny new desid! Now, with extra monkey. Thank you, Ro. I love it. We have a class here at M. called "The Legal Profession". It's brand new this year, and according to the dean, it's the only class of its kind in the nation. We are the vanguard, he says. We are the guinea pigs, we say. But happily. The goal of the class is to give us a glimpse of what we'll be facing three years from now, when we are active practicing lawyers. We're going to be studying the history of the profession, as opposed to the history of law, looking at external and internal criticisms of the profession, and examine the moralilty of the lawyer. We also had to write a 3-5 page paper on why we want to be a lawyer. At first glance, this is such the kindergarden assignment, not to mention something we all did in our applications anyway. But as I thought about it, I realized that writing this now was different than writing the application essay. A year ago, I wanted nothing more than to get in, get accepted. But, I'm here now. Plus, the essay is anonymous - blind grading numbers, he doesn't know whose paper he's reading. So, I gave him what he asked for. The result is here, if you are interested. Text format. It's going to be a good class, I think. If, and I say if, I can get through the first two books we have to read. Good grief. Profit and the Practice of Law - most boring book on the planet. Statistics, statistics, and more statistics. Allow me to sum it up for you: Law firms in the 1960's were smaller, more client-focused, had higher community involvement, were more interested in the law than in making money, and were inefficient, but mostly due to the technology of the day. There were few Jewish lawyers, and fewer women lawyers. Lw firs in the 1990's were larger, more profit-oriented, efficient but impersonal, and have many more Jewish and women lawyers. Thank you. Goodbye. In other news, I am currently risking life and limb by printing out twenty copies of my resume January 23, 2004 New semester, cleaned out blog. Because, really, who cares about what happened last semester? Well, other than me. I saved it all, and once my sparkly new design is up (I love you, Ro), I'll link to it. Grades. Well, it's like this. I did much better in Torts than I expected. Like, much better. I did not do as well in the Class of Happiness as I thought I did, which was really disappointing. I asked for my test back, and if I'm confused about the grade after, I'll ask him. I'm hoping that it's because I punted on the Estates in Land, and not the essay. Contracts, passed, as reported earlier. Criminal... I have no idea how I feel about my grade. I did fine. Whatever. New semester! American Constitutional Systems (which every other school in the nation calls Constitutional Law), Judgments and Jurisdictions (which every other school in the nation calls Civil Procedure, why my school has to be different, I have no idea), Legal Research and Legal Writing, Sales with scary Prof. K (who I think I'm going to love), and Legal Profession, about which I will talk later. The most complicated part of the semester so far is the seating charts. I swear, my class has no spatial sense. Of course, it doesn't help that we're in the same classroom for all of our classes except the Tuesday J&J and both Legal Writing classes. I have a different seat in each class, but they're all in the same four-seat circle. And none of us know where we sit. Sales - I sit next to CP, but where does she sit? And does NolensVolens sit next to me, or is that TSBW? What row are we in, anyway? The whole class stands around helplessly, until The Toad takes his seat, and we all remember how far away from him we were. Bless The Toad, for he is the negative charge that repels our happy positiveness. ::points to the guestbook:: One day, I will figure out how to do a comments thing on here. Until then, please feel free to drop me a line!
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