Indiana joins 20th century

Indiana will soon have daylight savings time. Hat tip to Brendan, who has a more detailed post about this historic development.

Snow?!

Just a quick post to note how utterly ridiculous the weather is here in the 'Bend. Snow? At the end of April? And it's sticking?? This is patently unacceptable, if you ask me.

Scheduling and such

Well, since everyone else seems to be posting their schedules, I figured I'd briefly follow suit and let my faithful readership know what classes I'll be taking this fall.

Business Associations
Evidence
Cyberlaw
Trial Advocacy Intensive
Moot Court Appellate

I'm pretty happy with that lineup, and as of right now I don't plan to change anything. But changes can be made all summer and up until the Add/Drop date next fall.

(Not so) Hot (Golf) Shots, Part Deux

After our round of golf on Saturday, everyone had such a great time that Derek reserved a tee time for Sunday morning. We had a foursome booked for 11 am. So Sunday morning started with me trying to wake Derek up. Anyone who knows Derek and his love of sleep will understand how difficult of a task this can be. Still, I managed and we were soon on our way.

Emily had emailed me to let me know that she wouldn't be accompanying us. Jaime had said something similar the night before, after The Princess Bride, but Derek thought he could persuade her to change her mind. She'd agreed to at least let us call her. But first we needed supplies - gas for Derek's car and chocolate for bribing. As we got back in the car, I called Jaime, who had decided not to go. Derek even tried to plead his case to her over the phone, but to no avail. He wanted to at least drive to the law school to give her the chocolate, but as we were already running late, we headed straight to the golf course.

We were close enough to being on time that we didn't get yelled at (unlike the day before). And since our party was now down to two, they paired us up with another twosome - two ND undergrads who were way out of our league. As for the golf... not so good. No one should be worried about me running off to join the pro tour. (Unless I actually go crazy and do so; in which case everyone should be very, very worried about how I'm going to survive.) It's really quite sad that I can probably chip farther than I can hit a ball with my driver off the tee. Still, we managed to get through the course in record time, and I posted a very good 18-hole score after playing 9 holes. Go ahead and think about that for a minute.

After that dreadful performance, we caught a quick bite at Subway before heading home. Derek chilled out on the couch to sleep/watch television. I did a little studying, then went about making dinner plans. No one was sure where to go or what they wanted to eat, so I made an executive decision to go to the Mishawaka Brewing Co. I made a reservation for 8, but in the end there were only 7 of us. Attending the evening's festivities were: Derek, me, Brooke, Lala, Meghan, Giancarlo, and Emily (we couldn't get a hold of Jaime). As the name implies, this restaurant makes its own beer. I had a raspberry wheat beer which was quite good, though next time I think I'll do what Giancarlo did and order the sampler - something like 8 different beers served in an equal number of small glasses. The food was good, the conversation was good, and an all-around good time was had by all. Derek did cause a little bit of a ruckus by slamming his hand down on the table repeatedly, causing the table to shake, the silverware to rattle, and Brooke and Emily to jump. Fortunately, Emily managed to prevail upon Derek to cut it out.

Next, Derek and I headed home where we watched Harold and Kumar go to White Castle. It was a thoroughly ridiculous movie, which one could probably anticipate based solely on the fact that the same director was responsible for Dude, Where's my Car? Still, it was funny. But I have no desire to eat at White Castle, so ultimately their marketing vehicle failed. Afterwards, we perused the DVD's many bonus features. Then Derek headed off to sleep (that boy does like to sleep), and I did a little studying before hitting the sack myself.

Monday morning saw me again trying to rouse Derek from his deep slumber so that he could make it back to the 'Nati in time for work. Fortunately, I didn't have ConLaw that morning (it was cancelled earlier that morning around 5 am - not everyone was as fortunate as me to read the email before heading to the law school). After a breakfast of pop tarts and OJ, Derek was on his way. All told, it was a fun and successful weekend. For Derek's recap, go here.

The Agony and the Ecstacy

The crowd cheers as Derek* misses a putt.

*not actually Derek.

Golf: a good walk spoiled

Golf can be very frustrating.

Weekend, Part I

My apologies for the recent lack of posts. As exams are fast approaching, I doubt there will be frequent blogging for a while. But I did want to post an update concerning the past weekend.

My good friend Derek came to visit this weekend (he'll be posting his own update soon). It's been a while since we've hung out, so I was glad to have the chance to reconnect. He arrived Friday night after work (he's currently working at Fidelity, soon to become a stock broker). Since it was still really nice out, we took an evening walk through campus. At this point I should mention that I am the last person who should ever give campus tours. As a law student, I'm really only familiar with a handful of buildings on campus. In addition to the law school (where I spend the better part of my life, it seems) and the obvious buildings (the main building (aka the one with the dome), the basillica, and the main library), I can point out the South Dining Hall and LaFortune (note that both of these buildings contain food) and Coleman-Morse (because they have free popcorn and soda), DeBartolo (where the undergraduate mock trial regionals is held), and the engineering building (which is next door to the law school). Anyway, after this essentially ineffective tour, we met up with Brooke who was studying at the law school. We got some dessert at Reckers, then headed back to my apartment. We chatted a bit, played a game of chess, then decided to call it a night.

The next day started with a rousing round of golf. Joining Derek and me were fellow 1Ls Jaime and Emily. As usual when dealing with either Derek or Jaime, we were running a little late. I caught some flak for this from the guy at the clubhouse when we showed up to play. At least I had reserved a tee time in advance; apparently the weekends get pretty busy at the ND golf course. We got off to a rocky start, and after finishing the first hole, the course attendant told us that we were holding things up and should simply play best ball (read: we were a disgrace to the game of golf). Instead, we just split into teams and played scramble. Derek and Emily were at a decided advantage, since Derek actually has a long game. Jaime did most of the heavy hitting for our team, though I conributed to the effort with some good putting. A few highlights: we made par on one hole, and I sank a 25 foot putt on another hole. Derek and Emily won the day, but a good time was had by all.

After finishing the front (and only) nine, it was time for some lunch. Derek had never been to Michigan, so we drove north in search of sustenance. We ended up in Niles, Michigan at the Golden Nugget Saloon. We had burgers all around and an interesting discussion on the nature of religion and Catholicism. Since it was mostly Derek talking with Jaime and Emily, I'll leave it to him to detail the salient points of the conversation. Lunch was capped off with dessert at Dairy Queen.

Next came a touch of studying and/or siesta. After a few hours, Derek and I ventured out again, this time to pick out some movies and dinner. Brooke and Jaime came over, and we watched The Princess Bride. Then it was off to bed, for Sunday would be another adventurous, action packed day. More on that in my next post.

Springtime for South Bend, and Notre Dame

We're finally getting some good weather here in the 'Bend (I'm even posting this while sitting outside - yes, they do let us out of the law school dungeon from time to time). It's sunny and bright, there's a nice breeze, and best of all, no snow. This isn't to say that I'd be surprised if winter raised its nasty head again. It is South Bend after all, which means the weather here's about as predictable as it is in Ohio. (Don't like the weather? Wait a minute.) In general, I'm usually not a big fan of spring, but it for now it comes as a welcome relief to the bitter winter weather.

Of course the nice weather outside only underscores how bad things are in the classrooms at the law school. It's been insufferably stuffy. Unbearably warm. Oppressively hot. It's hard to absorb the finer nuances of implied easements and FRCP 23 when you're melting into your chair. I'm not alone in this complaint - everyone I've talked to has lamented the inferno.

Part of the problem is that the heating system in the law school is out of control. Personally, I think that the heat build up in the library stacks has finally built up to the point that the heat is escaping to the rest of the law school. Thermodynamics at work. The problem could be remedied by giant blocks of ice that would serve as heat sinks, but the ensuing flooding would be... problematic.

A Farewell to (Bowling) Arms

Last night was the final night of the NDLS bowling league. ICBING wrapped up the season with a good performance. Here are the scores:

One Arm: 140, 110
8 lb: 62, 88
Nugatory en Fuego: 115, 125
Wrong Lane: 160, 121
Bowling InJury: 104, 81
Breaks 50, et al.: 93, 110

Nugatory also has a report here, and InJury posted some pics here.

Some additional highlights:

InJury successfully bowled backwards for the second half of the second game, picking up several spares. Wrong Lane also scored a personal best of 160 in the first game, which included four consecutive strikes. (Apparently this is known as a four-bagger, though I personally prefer Nugatory's term for it - 'buffalo.') We're pretty sure last night's scores didn't count towards the league standings (I use that term very loosely, since I don't think anyone knew what the standings were, or even if there were any, for most of the season), and I haven't seen the final result. But rumor has it that ICBING may have placed second...

It's been a lot of fun bowling with ICBING, and all of us are a bit sad that it's over. But there's always next year. InJury has suggested that we create a team named "Gutter Hos."