So I haven’t posted in like two weeks. Terribly sorry. I really haven’t even been all that busy, although I’m supposed to have been busy this whole time. My motivation has flown out the window and I’ve been waiting for it to come back.
Okay, okay, I cannot tell a lie. The truth is, I bought Parasailin’s new book, Glowing Rouge, and I just couldn’t put it down. Such wordsmithery! Such esoteric writing! Such depth of knowledge! Such… such…
BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Just kidding, you guys. I’ve just had a severe case of the lethargies.
Today I’m not going to complain about how horrible law school is because really it’s not so bad right now. Over the last couple of weeks we’ve had a lot of canceled classes (Contracts for almost a whole week, Legal Practice for almost two whole weeks because of individual writing conferences, Torts for one day) so my life hasn’t been as hectic as probably most other law students’ lives have been.
Ninja Kid did have a birthday and Ninja Pops (that’s my dad) was in town for that weekend, so that was fun. I can’t believe my little tiny baby ninja will be a teen-ninja next year. Zoinks!
Anyway, I think that late last night I may have found something that resembles my motivation. I did start my CivPro and Contracts outlines. I haven’t started one for Torts and I’m thinking that I may not do one at all. We can’t take anything in the exam so I’m thinking that just doing a bunch of hypos in the E&E and reviewing notes might be sufficient. Also, I bought the Acing Torts and Acing Civil Procedure books. I can tell I’m going to like them because they’re done with more of a list concept, which appeals to me on all sorts of OCD levels.
Aaaaaand, what I’m most excited about is that I may — MAY — have a lead on a paying summer job with a local family law attorney here. But ssshhhhhh — at this point it’s all very, very preliminary.
So, just wanted to touch base with you guys and let you know I’m not dead and I haven’t dropped out of law school yet. I promise to do better with posting. Guess I just needed a little coma time.
Faster than you can say “hideous monstrous rabbit squishing a young girl,” we’re halfway through our fall 1L semester. Can you believe it?
No, that’s not Ninja Kid. I have no idea who this poor little girl is BUT GOOD GOD LOOK AT THE SIZE OF THAT RABBIT!
Anyway.
I forgot previously to write about the Negotiations competition. The competition was actually two weeks ago. So I partnered with another girl in my section and we signed up for the Negotiations competition. Nobody really knew what was going on or what to expect, so we were all on a pretty level playing field. There were 74 teams competing overall and three preliminary rounds to be held before any scores were tallied. Once we got our problems, my partner and I got together and worked out where our firm limits were, areas where we had some wiggle room, and our initial offers.
So maybe we weren’t the best negotiators evah. Okay, maybe we weren’t even in the top 16 best negotiators evah. Or even in the top 16 best negotiators in the 1L class at Ninja School of Law. But still, I’m glad I participated. Obviously it was a great learning experience. Like I said, I certainly had very little understanding of how the process would work, and after going through it three times I think I’d be much more comfortable with it in the future. It was tons of fun to play lawyer for a little while and represent a client’s interests. I was surprised at how un-nervous I was before our first round, and by the time our third round came along I was downright relaxed.
For the preliminary rounds we were judged by 3L students. The judging was pretty inconsistent. One judge would tell us not to do a certain thing, and the next judge would count off for not having done that same certain thing. For example, we were on a 40-minute time limit as far as the actual negotiations at the table. In each of our first two rounds, we finished early and each judge told us it was no big deal. For our third round, however, we finished early and got chastised for it. I happen to know one team got criticized for sitting next to each other rather than across from each other during self-analysis with the judge.
I heard quite a few of my classmates complaining about this and I must admit I did my fair share of griping, too. It’s frustrating not to know what is expected of you and then to get corrected on it.
And then, whilst in the midst of a deep conversation with my good friend Billy, I had a minor epiphany.
I mean, this is how it’s gonna be. In real life. Doing the lawyering thing. There are going to be times — in fact, probably lots of them, especially as newbie lawyers — when we aren’t sure exactly what’s expected of us, or exactly where certain lines are drawn, and yet we will still be expected to perform to the best of our abilities.
Actually, all of law school is kindof like this. For example, Prof. CivPro hates it when someone uses the words “clearly” or “obviously” because, her thinking goes, things are rarely clear or obvious. The first time a student used one or both of those words in CivPro, he or she (I can’t remember who it was) got corrected and treated to a mini-lecture. Now, obviously, I have a disagreement with the professor on this, because clearly there are a lot of things that are both clear and obvious to me:
Brad Pitt is the hottest man in the galaxy EVAH. Trust.
My dog understands every word I say.
Jokes told in the quiet section of the law library inherently carry a funny quotient of x100.
Cats and dogs are irresistibly drawn to sit upon open casebooks.
I could go on; the list is lengthy. But I digress.
The point I’m trying to make is that the law school experience wouldn’t be authentic if there weren’t a high degree of uncertainty involved. Someday you’re going to go up in front of a judge and you’re not going to know beforehand that he hates some specific words and here’s how it’s gonna go down:
YOU: Your Honor, I object! This is clearly speculation and whatnot.
JUDGE: Overruled. Counselor, please refrain from using the word “whatnot” in my courtroom.
YOU: Apologies, Your Honor. Obviously, I was unaware of your disdain for that word, etc.
JUDGE: Counselor, you would do well to never utter the word “etcetera” in my courtroom again.
YOU: Your Honor, would it be possible for me to get my hands on some sort of list of words that are disfavored in this courtroom?
JUDGE: COUNSELOR I’M HOLDING YOU IN CONTEMPT.
YOU: But, sir! Would you please just make a ruling on the law? I’m correct on the law.
JUDGE: [hammering wildly] BAILIFF!!
See? That could so totally happen in real life. This is what law school is preparing you for. Prepare to be unprepared.
Well, week 7 is in the books. We’re nearing the halfway point of 1L fall semester. I know a lot more than I did seven weeks ago, that’s fo sho. But the thought of exams coming up in less than two months now… [please hold for major panic attack]
Seems like the only class with anything exciting going on any more is CivPro. Take this last week, for instance. We only had three days of CivPro because the professor was out of town, but it culminated in a real, live Battle of the Big Talkers. It was like THE CLASH OF THE TITANS!!!
Somehow our discussion about personal jurisdiction devolved into… polluted drinking water? You can’t possibly know just how epic it was unless you were there.
Sidebar: Is it weird that I remember this movie, while most of you probably weren’t even born when it came out in 1981? [cue midlife crisis]
So I’m thinking I’d better start outlining soon, right? I’ve read lots of advice posts all around these tangled intertubez, and I think I’m about ready to get started. Especially since I did absolutely nothing productive this whole weekend. Well, by productive I guess I mean law-school-related. I was, in fact, exceedingly productive at Talbot’s and Dillard’s.
If you’re thinking about outlining, or maybe you’ve already started but you’re not sure if you’re doing it quite right, check out some of these links. Also, if you have any other questions or advice to offer re outlining (or a helpful link that I missed — apologies), please stick them in the comments.
So apparently the blog has been down for a little while. I’m not sure exactly how long, but I know it was longer than 24 hours. Apologies if you were trying to access the site and you got an error message. Hopefully the problem has been fixed and we’re good to go.
In case you didn’t notice, the week 6 edition of Law School Lessons is suspiciously late. Sorry about that. Strangely enough, I’m finding that some weeks are just not as amusing as others. Who would’ve thunk it?
Week 6 was… well… Eastwoodian.
The Good: Prof. Torts and Prof. K were both out of town on Thursday and Friday of last week, and Prof. Legal Practice figured out that if she held class there wouldn’t be very many people who showed up, so I was done last week for the week at noon on Thursday.
The Bad: I chose to spend that extra time staring at the cobwebs on my ceiling rather than getting ahead (or catching up) in my classes.
The Ugly: We had to have two Torts classes on Tuesday (one at 8:00 and one at 10:00) to make up for one of the missed classes later in the week.
The Good: I got my practice exam back in CivPro. Prof. CivPro wrote a lot of things on my paper, but the “good first effort” made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
The Bad: Every person whom I’ve talked to also got the “good first effort” comment.
The Ugly: On closer inspection, I’m beginning to think the comment actually reads “cod list effect.” Except I didn’t list anything about fish anywhere in my answer.
You get the picture, right? A mixed bag. Something tells me this may be a recurring theme.
Week 5? You mean more like week 5… hundred? Seems like I’ve been a law student for FO-EVAH already.
Let me ’splain it to ya.
On the one hand, I am certainly still more confused than not regarding the big picture. I think this is why some people suggest waiting to start outlining until later in the semester. Also, my body and my mind still haven’t accepted the new schedule for the most part. On Saturdays and Sundays, however, my brain seems to get a kick out of waking me up at an unreasonably early hour. It mocks me, my brain.
On the other hand, when you consider where we started just five weeks ago, we have really come quite a long way, baby. For example, remember reading that very first case they gave us for orientation? And it took like more than an hour just to read and understand that one case about the guy who killed his grandpa before he could change his will? Remember how scary that was? That was only five weeks ago, and now look! I can read through cases, pick out the important parts, highlight them (color-coded, of course!), and even discuss them in a somewhat informed manner. This is progress!
Okay, self-congratulation phase over.
Now on to the lessons of the week (last week, that is).
But first, are you guys tired of my breaking down each week by subject? I’m kinda tired of it. I feel like for some classes I don’t really have much to say. Take Torts, for example. I mean, from here on out it’s gonna be negligence, negligence, and more negligence. Surely you don’t want to read about that for eleven more weeks, right? Right. So I think I’m just going to hit the high spots from here on out. Okay, good.
With that out of the way, there’s really only one event last week that I want to talk about.
Last week will go down in history as The Notorious CivPro Blood Bath of 2009. Also known as The Great 1L Gut Check. Also known as The Day When At Least 85% of Section 2 Seriously Contemplated A Different Career Path. It was horrible. Prof. CP felt like some people were un(der)prepared for class and made an example out of them.
Now, the truth is this: At orientation, we were treated to a lengthy lecture on time management, study skills, etc. In that session, we were told of this Magical Device, which, if used properly, would guarantee that we’d never be caught unprepared in class. And everybody knows that if you want to get a 1L’s attention, tell them how to avoid embarrassment at the hand of the Dreaded Socratic Method. The name of said Wondrous Weapon is The 2-Day-Ahead Reading Schedule.
Ooooh. Aaaah.
Did you learn about this at your orientation? Basically, you do Monday’s reading on Saturday, Tuesday’s reading on Sunday, etc. That way, you start out the week two days ahead, and if you get bogged down in something and fall behind, it’s easier to play catch-up later in the week. Or so the theory goes.
I have friends who are using this method still, five weeks into the semester, and they like it. I think I’d like it if I could make it work for me, but the truth is that I don’t get much reading done at home because of the distractions. So, by all means, if you think this sounds like a good idea and you want to give it a try, or you’re already successfully Wielding the Wondrous Weapon, that’s awesome. I’m actually kinda jealous.
For the rest of you, let this be your cautionary tale. You see, Prof. CivPro told us early into the semester that she’s not a fan of the Wondrous Weapon because students have a tendency to forget the details of a case (which Prof. CP absolutely loves to ask about) in two days. She told us very early that we should not follow the advice of the Study Gurus and should only do our reading the day before. (For the record, I’ve upped the ante and started doing the CivPro reading between Contracts and CivPro. Such a daredevil.)
So, the truth of the matter is that the people who were called upon on The Day The CivPro Class Stood Still had actually read the material, but it had been a couple of days since they read it, and they forgot to refresh the ol’ memory bank before class. So, when called upon, these people appeared to be unprepared.
So the moral of the story is this: If you read ahead, make sure you take a look at the cases just before class to refresh your memory.
Four solid weeks of law school and I’m still standing. Must give credit where credit’s due.
nectar of the gods
BREAKING: we’re all gonna die!! Ninja School of Law has announced a special swine flu policy for this semester. Basically, they’ve realized that the current policy of allowing five absences before your grade gets docked will result in people coming to school while ill. And believe me, if one person comes to the law school with the swine flu, we’re all bound to get it, because it’s like we’re all up in each other’s faces all day long. So, the new policy is that if you have a fever and flu/cold symptoms, DO NOT COME TO SCHOOL. Email or call your professors and inform them of your impending porkishness, and your absences during that time will not be counted against you. They don’t even require a doctor’s note for this. Obviously it’s an Honor Code violation to fake the swine flu, plus it’s just not really that good of an idea to start with, but I have no doubt someone will do it. I’m really glad they did this because I was worried about what would happen if Ninja Kid and I both wind up with the swine flu. Now I feel a little bettah, but I’m still gonna start wearing one of these just for good measure.
And now it’s time for Law School Terms of the Week!
2. mensch: shorthand, slang term for something one says in passing; e.g., If I see him, I’ll mensch that you think he’s cute.
3. hereinbefore: where one puts one’s marker in order to win at bingo
TORTS
Gah. Negligence. All we ever talk about any more is negligence. What happened to the good ol’ days when we talked about pushing and hitting and throwing and trespassing and imprisoning and inflicting and placing in apprehension? Still, the reading is the easiest of the three substantive classes and Prof. Torts is still taking volunteers.
Prof. Torts is supposed to be making up a little practice exam question for us. He said we should try to do it within a timeframe of about 45 minutes to an hour and without consulting our book or our notes, in order to best simulate the real exam environment. I’m anxious to have a look-see at this practice exam, although I think I have a pretty good idea what a Torts exam might look like. Anyway, it’s optional whether we turn it in or not, but if we do he’ll grade it and write all over it so we can see just how badly we suck at taking exams.
CONTRACTS
Gah. How boring can one subject be?!?! Seriously. All I have to do is just glance at my Contracts books and it’s like an instant coma. Plus, I’m completely lost in there all of a sudden. I spent all day Saturday on Contracts and it. was. brutal.
Prof. K was really only funny for one day this week. Suffice it to say it involved a talking Dr. Evil doll and something about adventures in urination with kidney stones. Don’t ask.
LEGAL PRACTICE
Gah. So much going on in this class all of a sudden. ICW exercises. Closed memo draft. Video tutorial re secondary sources. Research path #1. Client interview questions (by the way, I have no idea what we’re supposed to be interviewing about). Writing proficiency exam. Library computer session for research tutorial. I’m not making any of this up. Oh, don’t forget the 3783 pages of reading and probably a quiz or two.
But, fantabulous Prof. LP makes it all bettah with a little chocolate birthday cake therapy.
CIVIL PROCEDURE
Okay you guys should probably sit down before you proceed. Ready? I really like CivPro. There, I said it. I’ll say it again: I really, really like CivPro. It just makes sense all of a sudden. Which is weird because for the first two weeks I had no clue what was going on in there. No frakkin clue. I fully expect that this warm, fuzzy feeling will be short-lived, but for now I will wallow in it. Don’t judge.
Prof. CivPro has almost made the rounds, so probably by the end of next week everybody will be fair game to be called upon again. I’m going to step waaaay out on a limb here and make a totally wild prediction: My warm, fuzzy feelings about this class will fade in conjunction with my being called upon again. Ha ha! Didn’t see that one coming, did you? Well, what can I say? I’m all about living on the edge
Sorry, I have no clever picture to go here.
I promise I’m going to try to start posting more frequently than just once a week. Gah.
Apologies in advance to both of my loyal readers. This week’s edition of Law School Lessons will be brief for two reasons: (1) I spent the better part of my weekend working on a draft closed memo, (2) the season finale of True Blood is on HBO in an hour and nothing — NOTHING — will keep me from watching it.
To start, let’s just address a real problem I have with law school. I had hoped that there would be some perks that came along with being in my 30s. For example, I thought by now I might have gotten old enough to stop worrying about ACNE?!?!? WTF?!?!? The law school giveth, and the law school taketh away. And this week, the law school giveth me a giant zit under my nose. Not quite this big, but close.
I like how the guy moved his hair out of the way just in case you couldn't quite see the whole thing.
TORTS
We’re mostly finished with consent and privileges/defenses, so next week it’s on to negligence. I’ve been told that this is where it starts to get more difficult. Torts is still my favorite reading.
I believe we’re also supposed to get a practice exam pretty soon. Can’t wait to see what that looks like. None of my professors have practice exams available in the school’s database. FAIL.
This week we were discussing a case in which a football player hit another player during a game, and whether the one was liable for battery. Professor Torts said, “I didn’t get to play football; I was on the debate team. We called it ‘Jewish football’ because none of our mothers would let us play the real sport.”
LEGAL PRACTICE
Well, I knew this day had to come. Legal Practice is starting to be a pain in the posterior, and it’s only gonna get worse. This week we had to take a writing proficiency exam, which wasn’t hard, but it required that I come back to school on a Friday afternoon, and that ain’t cool. Should have the results of that test in a week or so. We’ve been informed that if we don’t like our grade, we can take the test again and they’ll take the higher grade. WIN.
And about that closed memo: not really very pleasant. I hate to bitch about it too much, though, because I know in a few weeks I’ll be longing for the days when my research was done for me. It’s due tomorrow at 9:00, and frankly I’m bursting with pride because I finished it this afternoon instead of starting it after True Blood. How very adult-y!
CONTRACTS
Contracts this week was quite eventful. First of all, you already know that I’m highly entertained by Professor Contracts. The thing is, when he says funny stuff, you don’t always know it’s gonna be funny until after he’s already said it, and then it’s too late to start writing it down. This happened one day last week, when Professor Contracts had the most elegant moment of poetry, and I realized it just a little too late. Luckily for me, the Contracts tutors dutifully recorded it word for word, and I reproduce it for you here in all its profundity:
We are engaging in an astonishingly boring activity. You are going to find in law school you are going to spend a lot of time looking at the most boring concepts in the world. But part of the motivation is fear, and that works for me. You are going to be afraid of not knowing these things in December. Once you get out in practice, you are going to be doing the same horribly, horribly boring things.
I got called on in Contracts this week while we doing promissory estoppel. Go ahead. Ask me any question. I’m an expert now. I was on for this one case and I did okay, and then he moved on to the next case and called on someone else. At that point, I completely checked out. I mean totally. The people on G-chat in front of me were providing me with plenty of entertainment and I had no idea what was going on until I noticed people in front of me turning their faces upward to look at me. Wut? Sure enough, Professor K is saying, “Are we still on up there?” So I stumbled around and looked like an incompetent boob for a few seconds, and then I managed to figure out what he was looking for. Good god, man, don’t you know it’s not nice to double dip??? FAIL.
One last thing about Contracts this week. This was by far the funniest thing EVAH to happen in class, but when I retell it you won’t think it’s so funny. Anyway, I’m gonna tell it anyway. So we were in class on Friday morning, everybody was half asleep because, well, it was Friday morning, and Professor Contracts is talking about the Lucy v. Zehmer case. You know, the one where the dude got drunk and sold his farm? Prof. K asks a question and a girl toward the front raises her hand to answer. Right when she started talking, the fire alarm went off. LOUDLY. Everybody in the room jumped a mile, some people started acting like they were headed for the door, and there was a general sense of confusion. Without missing a beat, Professor Contracts gets this kinda crazy look on his face and yells out, “You won! You won!” The whole class dissolved into hysterical laughter, and it took forever to get back on track. WIN.
CIVPRO
Okay this may sound weird, but I don’t hate CivPro anymore. At some point early in the week last week, a little tiny light bulb went off in my head and I saw the light. Yay! We’ve been discussing Rule 12 and all these motions you have to file, some all at the same time, some not, some favored, some not so favored… It all appeals so much to my OCD self. I confess. Don’t judge.
We did have one pretty hilarious moment in CivPro this week, also. We were talking about anonymous plaintiffs and when that’s appropriate and when it’s not, blah blah. So we had a little squib on this case where this girl was suing her (former) boyfriend for distributing a sex tape they made, and she wanted to remain anonymous but the court wouldn’t let her. Anyway, we were discussing this and out of the blue Professor CivPro hits the button and the giant movie screen starts dropping. The whole class started quietly giggling, then laughing louder, and louder, and Professor CivPro kinda looked at us like we were crazy. Then she realized what we were giggling about and she said, “Oh! No! No, I’m not gonna show you the sex tape!”
Yeah, so much for brevity. Perhaps I should start doing this more frequently so these aren’t so freakin long. FAIL.
But the True Blood finale was freakin awesome. WIN!
Thank heavens for three-day weekends! By the end of last week, I was completely out of motivation to do any reading. So, I just didn’t. And now I’m a tad behind. This is why Barack Obama invented Labor Day, right? I hope he invents another Monday holiday in October because I’m pretty sure I’m gonna need it.
But first, a new feature! Law School Terms of the Week! (applause)
1. administratrix: like a dominatrix, but with a rule book in one hand
2. chattel: a genetically unlikely cross between a French cat and a herd of cows
3. perdurable impetus: an infuriatingly large and long-lasting skin lesion on one’s mouth
This week’s Law School Lessons won’t be broken down by class because I’m feeling a little lazy. Sue me.
I still like Torts the best. The reading is interesting and the lectures are informative and entertaining. That spells W-I-N in my casebook. Professor Torts is still taking volunteers to discuss cases, so I’m probably going to try to get a turn next week. Pretty soon he’ll start cold-calling people who haven’t volunteered, so I’d just like to get my turn over with. Since I like reading Torts so much, I’m way ahead in there. I may not have to read Torts again until next weekend, if I’m lucky. We finished up all the intentional torts and have moved on to privileges and defenses (e.g., consent).
Contracts is quickly becoming my least favorite. It’s a close competition between Contracts and CivPro for that bottom slot, but for now I think Contracts has the edge. Blah, blah, blah, illusory promise, blah, blah, specific performance, blah, blah, blah. I’m pretty sure the abbreviation for Contracts is K for Killmenowpleez. I hope this gets better. I am still highly entertained by Professor Contracts, though. This past week he recommended a book on Contracts by a guy named Chirelstein for help in understanding some of the more complicated cases we’re reading. I ordered it, and I’ll be sure to let you know if it’s really helpful or not.
My number was up in Civil Procedure this week. I got called on, but I got off pretty easy. We were doing a class exercise on the federal legal process as a whole, and she was wanting the entire class to participate but sometimes she’d ask a question and get a classroom full of blank stares. So she got frustrated and decided to call on people, and of course she called on me. She asked me a hypothetical that I had no idea about, so of course I answered incorrectly. Then a classmate tried to chime in and offer help, and he got it wrong, too. She asked me a few more questions, I ended up feeling wholly inadequate and foolish (just like I predicted last week), and then she moved on. After class, several people told me I was so lucky to have gotten called on that day because it was pretty easy. And by easy I mean that I didn’t cry or wet my pants. Also, I have no idea what the hell is going on in this class. I’m as thoroughly confused as I’ve ever been in my whole life. I’m just gonna have to pull a Dory.
Legal Practice is still going swimmingly well (hee hee). We got our first major assignment this week – a closed memo assignment that has to do with a real Texas case involving a monkey stealing plants from a nursery at the behest of his owner. Ka-razy! I just couldn’t love my LP professor any more than I already do, so I’ll refrain from gushing.
We had a mandatory meeting last week about filing our intent to practice law with the bar. Apparently this form is made of gold and encrusted with jewels, because it costs us each $190 just to file the damn thing. Actually, at this point I’m already so numb to spending god-awful amounts of money on law school that I didn’t pay that much attention to the cost, but quite a few of my classmates were seething mad about it. Anyway, what are you gonna do? Not file it? I didn’t think so. Also, they went on and on and on and on about being 100% positive that we disclose everything that might come up on a background check, so that it doesn’t seem like we’re trying to hide anything. I’m talking this lady spent at least half her entire speech on this one point. I get it, I understand that they’re just trying to help, but jeez. I’m now so frightened of forgetting some little detail of my life that I may or may not be hearing voices. And the voices tell me to run away! run away! run away!
Ninja Dog apparently is having issues with my being gone from home all day, because every time I turn around she tries to eat some of my precious highlighters. This week I had to say a sad farewell to my red, dark blue, and purple highlighters. Those colors have been replaced with thin Crayola markers in comparable shades. I’m such a school-supply nerd.
I realized yesterday that after five days of Civil Procedure, the above four words plus the two symbols represented the sum total of notes I’ve taken during class. In case you’re curious, that’s 28 letters, or 30 characters total if you count the equal signs.
Apparently most CivPro classes start with jurisdiction issues. I know this because the other sections at Ninja School of Law are working on jurisdiction issues. Also, my blawger friends are working on jurisdiction issues. Everybody in the whole entire world knows about Pennoyer v. Neff and International Shoe, and all I know is… well, see above.
Oh, wait! There is one more thing I learned, I just forgot to write it down.
Well. The first week of law school is over. Do I love it? Absolutely. Is it going to be a huge challenge? OMG. Yes.
So rather than bore you with a lengthy account of my first week, which was probably very similar to your first week as a 1L, I thought I’d just do a brief recap of my week by class. Hopefully I can do this as a weekly series.
But first, I do have some general thoughts:
I just love my law school. Love. I realize I’ve only been there a week, and all you seasoned law students are at once rolling your eyes and thinking to yourself, “Let’s ask her how she feels in three months at exam time.” I know I may be a little doe-eyed at this point, but seriously, it’s been great so far. The building is nice (especially the new add-on), there are lots of comfy chairs and couches and nooks and crannies in which to study, and it just has a good vibe. Most of the professors are pretty un-scary and everybody seems to be very willing to help when you run into a snag. I’ve met some nice people and some fellow snarksters and some who annoy the crap out of me, all of whom make for a very entertaining day.
I didn’t spend enough time doing the assigned reading before classes started, and as a result I was barely able to keep my nose above water as far as reading for class. Luckily, the gambles I made paid off and I didn’t get caught unprepared, but I have to get a little farther ahead in my reading. This week I had a mandatory parent’s meeting at Ninja Kid’s school and that two hours cost me.
On a related note, it took me about four days to realize that this formal case briefing business is for the birds. It simply takes way too long. If you have some extra time or you just want to make the time, more power to ya. Instead of formal briefing, I’m just highlighting (color coded!!) and making notes in pencil in the margins of my book.
Waking up at 5:45 every morning SUCKS. Is there some sort of button I can push to make myself go to sleep at 11:00 instead of midnight or later? For some reason, no matter how tired I’ve been all throughout the day, shortly after supper I get a second wind and I can’t make myself go to bed at a reasonable hour. This resulted in my falling asleep with my head in my torts casebook by the time Thursday came around. I really, really need to get this under control.
I love OneNote for organizing all my class materials. Can’t say enough about this program. However, I’m kindof at a loss when it comes to taking notes in class, especially in those classes where we spend inordinate amounts of time on details of cases rather than the big picture. I can hear some of my classmates typing furiously throughout the entire class period, yet for some of my classes I barely have half a page of notes for the whole week! Just when I was starting to think I was missing something, I came across this post on Fearfully Optimistic. [Sidebar: If you're not reading Fearfully Optimistic on a regular basis, shame on you. It's brimming over with helpful, practical advice and you owe it to yourself to check it out if you're a current or future law student.] Anyway, I feel better about my lack of notes now. Thanks, John!
And now, for this week’s installment of Law School Lessons!
TORTS
I like Professor Torts. He’s got a good sense of humor and he makes funny jokes. He uses PowerPoint and he posts it so we don’t have to copy down a bunch of stuff if we don’t want to. Better yet, at the end of each major concept he hands out an outline of the pertinent points. So helpful! He generally takes volunteers, and so far he hasn’t called on anyone out of the blue. There are a lot of people in my section who like to talk.
This week we studied Intent and Battery; next week we start with Assault. What’s cool about Torts is that the cases are interesting and sometimes even kinda funny, so reading is not a chore.
Somehow this week, while talking about intent to harm, we got off onto a discussion of duty versus obligation to help someone in need. He mentioned that in some instances, if you stop to help someone and you end up harming them in the process, you may be held liable. One student was incredulous and asked, “You mean if you just try to help somebody they can sue you later?” Professor Torts replied, “Well, the basic principle of life is that it sucks and then you die, so… yeah.”
Regarding the obligation to help someone in need, Professor Torts explained that if we see a fellow classmate whom we don’t particularly like drowning in the local lake, it’s legally okay to “pull up a lawn chair, light a cigar, and watch the show.” Totes.
CONTRACTS
Professor Contracts is great. He sports a bow tie on most days, and Fridays are Hawaiian shirt days. Snazzy! He’s pretty laid back and a slow talker, and he also has a great sense of humor.
On Friday, Professor Contracts announced that it had come to his attention that some in our class were concerned that we weren’t moving quickly enough through the material and that we needed to pick up the pace. He assured us that he knows what he’s doing. WTF? Somebody actually complained about that?! In the first week of class?! WTF is going on here? I guarantee you, if I find out who it is, I’m gonna have my posse boil their bunny on the stovestick a horse’s head in their bedattack them in the shower give them a stern talking-to.
This week we studied contracts in general and we started talking about consideration. We were reading a case that referenced a “noted thinker” named Chitty. Professor Contracts said, “Okay, Chitty on Contracts. Why do we give a chit?”
CIVIL PROCEDURE
Professor CivPro is the most intimidating of the lot. We can’t use laptops in her class. When you get called on in her class, you have to stand. And you don’t just answer a couple of questions; you have to stand there for about half the class period (20-30 minutes) and respond to hypotheticals.
This week we studied due process. Professor CivPro’s class tends to devolve (or maybe it’s intentional) into discussions of public policy, such as the fairness of the welfare system or the disability benefits system, instead of focusing on the law. This aggravates me for two reasons: (1) isn’t this what we did in undergrad? (2) is it even relevant if my classmates think it’s unfair to rely on the testimony of doctors in determining disability benefits because a friend of a friend once had an on-the-job injury and the one doctor said she had this percentage of disability and the insurance’s doctor said she had less disability, so therefore doctors could be biased and we should just give Mr. Eldridge the benefit of the doubt when he says he’s in pain…? Now I’m not saying I have no empathy, but I just don’t think it has anything to do with the case we’re talking about, now, does it? Grr.
A lot of people in my section are spending an inordinate amount of time preparing for CivPro because of their fear of getting called on and not knowing every single little tiny miniscule detail of the case. As a result, one student already got caught unprepared when she got called on in Contracts. I think this is a losing strategy, and I ain’t fallin’ for it. Here’s my rationale: If I get called on in CivPro, regardless of how well I know the case, I’m going to end up looking like a fool because Professor CivPro is eventually going to get the best of me. Additionally, this will eventually happen to every single person in my class. So I’m going to read the cases and do my highlighting tricks, and I may jot down a couple of notes on a piece of paper to keep handy just in case. But I will not neglect my other classes just to join in the freak-out-over-CivPro party. Hopefully this strategy will pay off.
LEGAL PRACTICE
This is the research and writing class and it lasts for two semesters. I have nothing but nice things to say about Professor LP. She’s pretty, she’s a fashionista, and she seems really, genuinely nice and very smart. She tells us stories about when she was practicing. Also, she bakes birthday cakes.
For this week, this was my favorite class. That’s because it was so easy. We talked about court structure and that’s about it. It was like taking a freshman government class. But please don’t misunderstand: it was glorious, restorative therapy for my overloaded brain to get to sit there and relax for an hour. I realize that later in the semester I won’t be such a fan, but for this week it was just right. Also, my classmates who have different LP professors have already had one quiz and one group exercise where they had to prosecute/defend a fictional character. None of that from my Professor LP. No stress here (yet).
Okay, so this didn’t turn out to be as brief as I intended. In my defense, though, there was a lot to cover. I suspect when things settle down a bit this weekly post will, too.
