For some strange reason, I feel more compelled to post to this blog during this week before finals than I did during the course of the semester. Maybe it’s the guilt of not writing that’s catching up to me, or just general avoidance of my casebooks, class notes/outlines and commercial outlines, but here I am.
It could also be the fact that my Undergrad Neighbor, a student at a local university, decided to invite his noisy friends over to his place, which I share a wall with. Dudes, I haven’t met any of you, but you all sound like complete turds.
Yup, I heard one of you trying to sound smart and worldly by talking about Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica” while puffing on your cigarette. But, seriously, fool, anyone who’s taken a community college art history course can regurgitate art speak that sounds vaguely brainy and deep. Next thing you know, you’ll be talking about chiaroscuro, melting clocks and how Gauguin made you confront your own mortality. Turd.
Yeah. Finals make me feisty and grumpy. Folks who wear sunglasses indoors, you’re next on my list.
I know I could study at the library, especially now that it has extended hours for finals. But I study best when I’m at home where I have a hot pot of free coffee nearby.
Thankfully, I can drown out the noise with music from imeem and white noise from simplynoise.com. Just in case the partying undergrads get unbearable, however, I looked up my city’s noise ordinance:
“It shall be unlawful to conduct or allow to be conducted any party where there is loud and unreasonable noise between the hours of 10:00 P.M. and 6:00 A.M., if such noise is sufficiently loud and unreasonable in volume level, duration and character to maliciously and willfully disturb the comfort, health, peace, safety or repose of reasonable persons of ordinary sensibilities. Continuation of an activity prohibited by this section after notification by a peace officer that the activity is disturbing the peace, shall be prima facie evidence of malicious and willful intent.”
I’m not sure if the group next door is large enough to be considered a party, but looking up the ordinance made me feel better. It also led me to this little gem about hypnosis buried in the municipal code:
“No person shall carry on, or practice, exhibit or teach the business or the art or practice of hypnosis, nor teach self-hypnosis to any person undergoing a course of treatment or program of self-improvement except … Nothing in this section shall prohibit a peace officer, as defined in Chapter 4.5 (commencing with Section 830) of Title 3 of Part 2 of the California Penal Code, from utilizing hypnosis in the fulfillment of his or her duties as a peace officer.”
Maybe the police can come over and hypnotize Undergrad Neighbor’s friends into not being turds anymore. Oooh, and maybe they can use this video:
If you have noisy neighbors, here’s what someone suggests you do.
Photo: launceston_lad / Flickr
Hi, all! Trying out a new website I stumbled across called ToonDoo, which lets you create your own comic strips and customize your own characters! Yeah, I should be studying. Back to it then.
It is now less than a month before my first set of law school finals, and a mild panic has set in. If you’ve ever been at the top of a roller coaster drop or have waited on the side of a stage for your cue, you probably know the feeling: that in between-ness, a rubber-band ball that fills your gut and your ribcage, that tugs and pulls you between calm and thoughts of impending doom.
This is also a close approximation of what it may feel like:
Now take that feeling, and stretch it out over one month, and you’ll get a better idea of what the weeks before finals are like for first-year law students. Well, this one at least.
Photo: I Can Has Cheezburger
Ha! This could be any of my first year classes! Looking at this photo, I wonder if this is what my professors see.
Photo: I Can Has Cheezburger
It’s hard to believe it, but I am at the halfway point of my first law school semester. Theoretically, I should be half as stressed as I would be during the final in December, but that is, sadly, not the case.
Why? One word: Midterms.
I really shouldn’t be. Of my five classes, the LRW memo “midterm” is 25 percent of the final grade and the Torts multiple choice midterm amounts to just 5 percent of the final grade. However, the fact that finals is just under two months away is not helping me sleep any better.
Despite the stress, we 1Ls still find things to laugh about, like this morning before the Torts midterm.
After going over the written instructions, the test proctor asked if anyone else had any other questions.
Student No. 1: Um. I’m not sure if this is a problem, but I’m not ‘Frank’ and Frank’s name is listed under the name on the Scantron.
Proctor: Oh. Yeah. That might be a problem.
Student No. 2 (a female): My name is also not Frank, and it’s on the Scantron.
Proctor: Anyone else named Frank?
(One more student raised his hand.)
The whole incident was really not a big deal, but it gave the class a teensy chuckle. Also, in retrospect, and after seeing the content of the entire episode written down, it’s really not that funny and probably would not be funny to an outside audience.
Just another testament to how law school is slowly chipping away at my sense of humor, I guess.
New post at The Shark about balancing law school and life with my handy, dandy hot pink planner!
One day searching the web on a whim
I found the presence of law limericks quite slim
So here’s one I penned
Read it in depth, or instead
Read it like your case books and skim
A NEGLIGENCE FORMULA
Some would say negligence is bland
For others it’s hard to understand
But it’s not so opa-ic
And almost algebraic
When guided by one learned hand
Photo: Brisbane Falling / Flickr (It’s an apple tort)
In The Shark Attack, the Blawgirl brings you a list of links to blog posts published at The Shark, a blawg written by and for law students.
Holy crap! Just realized I haven’t posted one of these in several weeks. Here’s a rundown of stories written by the Blawgirl published at The Shark. Chompy, chomp.
- Don’t count on those loan forgiveness programs. You know that plan you have? You know. The one to go to law school in order to help people, and to not worry about student loan debt because, hey, those public service loan forgiveness programs will help you. Yeah. Turns out those might not be as reliable as you think.
- ABA’s accreditation review process may signal that it’s finally heeding criticism. Earlier this month, the American Bar Association announced that it was planning to overhaul its law school accreditation process. But what exactly are some of the ills that its critics hope it fixes? Clickety, click to find out.
- UC Irvine, continuing a possibly overly-rosy view of the itself, thinks its timing is good! Is the California budget crisis going to affect the fledgling UC Irvine School of Law? Not really, according to school officials.
- Law school: busy hating on your pretty little mac. I am in love with my Mac. Apparently, law schools are still in the courtship, will-they-won’t-they phase.
- Perspective: the secret to law school success? I’ve read tons of blogs and wee bits of advice from current and former law students. My favorite bit of advice so far comes from a brain doctor and a lawyer lady who take a step back from picking at the small things and take a look at the bigger picture.
- Craigslist “attorney” trying to recruit young things. The latest Craigslist cautionary tale comes to you from The OC, where a dude posing as an attorney tried to recruit law students for his law firm. In a perfect world, this dude would probably never work in this town again. In reality, he’ll probably get a movie made about him. Starring Leo. Directed by Spielberg. Which I’ll probably watch.
- Law schools slow to hop on Web 2.0 train. While media scramble to out-Twitter other Twits, law schools have been slow to incorporate social media into their websites.
- Save an annoyed boyfriend, hug a lawyer. Sometimes that angry person just needs a hug. Law students and lawyers are no exception.
- Great news for those indebted: new federal loan programs. If you currently have or are planning on taking on huge student loans, a new federal program effective July 1 can help you deal with the debt. Some borrowers can even have their student debt forgiven after 10 years if they work in public service jobs. Not bad.
- Much ado about Yoo: Padilla’s civil suit rages on. Tenured UC Berkeley law professor and torture memo writer John Yoo is in trouble again. This time, a convicted terrorist is bringing a civil suit against Yoo for Yoo’s role in memos that he say authorized his torture while in custody. A judge, who was appointed by Dubya, gave the green light for the case to continue.
Photo: Richard Ling / Flickr
Surprise! Law school students on Twitter have a lot to say about the law and law school. The Blawgirl compiles some of her favorites from the past 24 hours or so.
We’ve all heard how competitive law school can be, but I wonder what madness Tweeter @shiratic encountered that prompted her to ponder this:
I was a vegetarian for about five years, then I discovered that sausages and the animal(s) that go into them are delicious. But I do have to agree with Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen, Duke of Lauenburg, Prince of Bismarck (yes, that is just one person) that learning what exactly goes into those sausages might not be the best thing if I want to retain my regard for them. The same goes for the law. [@ericdkuzma]
After months of working on and bitching about law school applications, this next tweet just annoyed me. [@dunord]
Despite the reputation that lawyers have, at least one law student states that he will have no problem announcing his lawyer-ness to the world. Good luck with that. Might as well write “slash my tires, break my windows and steal my GPS, please!” on the side of your car with neon spray paint. [@noelbagwell]
[@shiratic, @ericdkuzma, @dunord, @noelbagwell]
In The Shark Attack, the Blawgirl brings you a list of links to blog posts published at The Shark, a blawg written by and for law students.
A grout way to cheat. Bathroom breaks aren’t just for gathering pithy bits of wisdom anymore. Some law students see it as an opportunity to get ahead in their law school exams.
Anti-John Yoo protests at Berkeley’s commencement ceremonies: round two! Surprise! Students and alumni were expected to protest Capt. Waterboard John Yoo during U.C. Berkeley’s commencement ceremonies.
Shame on you, law school cheaters. Shame on you. Everyone has an opinion on cheaters. The Blawgirl is no exception. They are idiots.
Supreme Court nominee round-up. Before Sonia Sotomayor was announced as President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee earlier this week, the blawgs, blogs and pundits were doing what they do best: speculating! At The Shark, we scoured the Interwebz to find some little-known factoids about the possible nominees. Check them out: Possible SCOTUS nominees way back when: Kagan and Sotomayor in law school, SCOTUS shortlist: one scholar and two politicians, SCOTUS shortlist: The man, man
0L dates 1: Turns out law school puts some pressure on romance. As you know the Blawgirl is dating the Boyfriend, who just finished up his first year in law school. At The Shark, the Blawgirl reflects on the Boyfriend’s past 1L year.
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