"Bummer of a birthmark, Hal."

That's pretty much how I felt today in CivPro II today.

I've already been called on in that class. Several times. And yet I was called on again today. Admittedly, I think I may be partially to blame. I did ask a question. But then Professor Barrett switched topics and had me do the hypo. I don't seem to recall the same thing happening to other people who ask questions. Maybe it's because I sit in the center of the second row, just at eye level. So much for hiding in plain sight.

But I'm okay with it, really. I just hope all my classmates appreciate the fact that I'm drawing fire for them. :)

1L Doldrums

I figured it was about time for another serious post on 1L life here at NDLS.

Right now we're in a period frequently referred to as the "1L Doldrums." It's essentially a period of letdown after all of the rigmarole of the first semester. Students often have a hard time getting back into the swing of things for second semester. I'm not really sure what supposedly causes this condition. Maybe it's because there's no longer a sense of fear propelling us, now that we've figured out how things work (mostly). Perhaps grades have given some a sense of futility or comfort (for more on this, see Brendan's post). Or maybe it's just the weather.

I'd heard about this well before starting law school, and vowed not to let it happen to me. But sometimes it is hard to focus. Especially when the reading gets a bit murky. Still, I'm managing to get through it.

It's kind of hard to believe that we're already 1/6th of the way through law school. It must be even weirder for the 3Ls - they're only about 100 days from graduating.

Thursday Bowl-blogging

The NDLS Bowling League officially kicked off tonight (as in, the scores actually counted).
I Can't Believe It's Not Gutter had a lot of fun, but we're going to have to kick things up a few notches to keep up with the other teams. Tonight's scoring (under aliases, to protect the bowling challenged):

Wrong Lane: 99, 105
Take a Knee: 136, 139
9-pin: 123, 114
On Fire: 121
7-pounder: 49
Pinky: 121, 96
7/One-arm bandit: 65
Secret Agent: 59
Bowling Injury: 0 (one frame, double gutter ball)

We're also working on the logo for our team t-shirt. I'll post a picture once the design is finalized, but until then I'll just say "flying manatee."

Oh, and there was a bowler in the lane next to us who did two things of note tonight:
1) threw the ball backwards - as in towards those waiting to bowl, away from the pins
2) threw the highest "lob ball" I've ever seen - I think it was airborne for half the length of the lane
All I can say is Wow.

Bait and Switch

Okay, so according to the syllabus for our ethics class, we were supposed to watch a clip from Arsenic and Old Lace. Instead, we watched a cheesy video entitled "Arsenic and Ethics."

I feel cheated.

Snow

Well, it's been fun being snowed in all weekend. Not that I can really complain, seeing as others have it much worse. A blizzard hit the northeast this weekend, dropping over three feet of snow in some parts of Massachusetts. For full details, I direct you to brendanloy.com, NDLS's resident weather nerd. :)

Rather than trudging through all the white stuff out there, I holed up in my apartment. A little legal research, a little ConLaw reading... fun stuff. But at least we knew that the snowstorm was coming - apparently other locales weren't as fortunate a few days ago, since their weathermen predicted a light dusting instead of the snow and ice they ended up with. Knowing that we would be hit Friday night and Saturday, I stocked up on groceries before the weather hit.

Not much news on the job front. I continue to get the rejection letters from various firms to which I've sent resumes, but the rate has slacked off a bit. I recently got an email from Career Services indicating that a Columbus firm is looking for 1Ls to submit resumes - which is kinda weird seeing as I did send them my resume and they wrote back that they weren't hiring 1Ls this summer. But I guess there's little harm in sending stuff their way again. Maybe last semester's grades, the fact that I've done some work with Depositions and TrialAd, and a writing sample will give me a better shot this time around. Worst case scenario is they send me another letter explaining that they're not interested. C'est la vie.

I can't believe it's not gutter

...is our team's new name. Far better than "The Bowlers."

The second most popular name choice was "The Flying Manatees," but was scrapped because it was something of an obscure inside joke (if anyone's really curious, I can let you in on it). "I can't believe it's not gutter" was simply much funnier and would be understood by all. Many thanks to Chris for coming up with the name.

A long overdue post

My apologies for the long absence. Apparently there are a few of you out there who actually missed reading my entries, especially while sitting in class.

The first week back is now out of the way, and I've finally secured all my books, know what last semester's grades are, and generally adjusted to a new schedule. ConLaw's been less exciting than I originally expected until today, when two of my fellow classmates engaged in an interesting debate over the role of SCOTUS. One debator even cut off our prof a few times, prompting her to chide him that in a courtroom he'd be expected to show greater deference to authority.

Property's been more interesting than I anticipated. In addition to reading cases about foxes, whales, ducks, and lobsters, today we had a rousing discussion on acquiring parking spaces and errant baseballs. Professor Garnett also has a sarcastic streak that I find amusing (which reminds me a little of Honor).

Second helpings of CivPro and Contracts are about what I expected so far. Legal writing is still annoying in that it still meets at 8 in the morning, but the case we will be working on seems pretty interesting so far (though I may soon come to loathe Emma and her idiopathic scoliosis, much as I cannot help but shudder whenever I hear the name Jani Weston). And Depositions is pretty much the same as last semester (it is the exact same class, only with a few new profs and all new students), except I know a lot more about what's going on.

I'll also be assisting the TrialAd course this semester, acting as one of the 1L "jury commissioners." I had a lunch meeting with Professor Seckinger and company today, and it sounds like it'll be an interesting time.

But the big news around the law school is the start of the Law School Bowling League. This is a pretty big thing here at NDLS, and I'd say the vast majority of people I know are participating. We'll go bowling almost every Thursday this semester, and they'll keep track of how the various teams do. Some teams have picked out clever names like "Splitigation," "Motion to Strike," "Holy Rollers," and "Six Drunks and a Ringer." So far my team's name is the rather uninspired "The Bowlers." Really? Is that the best we can do? I say we can come up with something more amusing. Sure, many of the good law/bowling puns may be taken, but no one said it had to fit that mold. We don't have to go super-law-geek and name ourselves "12b6" or "Proximate Cause." We could go only somewhat geeky with something like "Palsgraf's Pins." Or just something else entirely - based at least on my bowling prowess, I suggest "Mostly Harmless."

1 to go

I almost have all of my books now. The shipment of ConLaw books arrived yesterday afternoon, so I picked it up last night so that I could do the reading assignment due today on Marbury v. Madison. Of course, I could always have read it online if it came to that, but it's nice to have the book. Less eye strain, you know. It's a huge book though, and had a price tag to reflect that fact. I still don't have my Property books. Apparently our Property professor didn't tell the bookstore in time what book to order, and thus, no books. A shipment has been ordered, but the last time I checked with bookstore personnel, there was no ETA for it. But rumors circulating in the law school have earmarked Friday as the most likely arrival date. Until then, we're reading Xeroxed handouts of the relevant material. Fun, fun.

I also almost have all my grades back. Only Contracts has yet to be posted, which is interesting because that was the first exam all 1Ls took. We reviewed the exam, generically at least, yesterday in Contracts II (same prof). As Brendan pointed out on his blog the other day (at that time his section hadn't gotten their Contracts grade back either), such a review is probably of little practical value because students probably spent most of the time trying to figure out how they did rather than absorbing any analysis.

And the last entry on the "1 to go theme" is classes themselves. I've had all but one of all my classes at least once (Ethics being the exception here).

So far things are well, and getting back into the swing of things hasn't been too bad. I'll try to post a better reflection of the week's experience in a few days (when the week is over - neat how that works, eh?).

Deep Impact II?

Remember a little film called Deep Impact that came out in 1998? It was the other space-object-threatens-to-hit-the-earth-and- wipe-out-all-life-as-we-know-it movie released that year (and far better than Armageddon, in my opinion). Well consider the following plot for a sequel:

A NASA mission to study comets has a probe slam into a passing comet. The probe makes contact, creating a huge crater (150 yards in diameter, about the size of the Pasadena Rose Bowl), and causes the comet to veer off course and towards earth. Sounds pretty Hollywood, eh?

Well it's all going to happen for real (except for the last part of changing the comet's trajectory), as NASA is launching a mission today called "Deep Impact." The two spacecraft will rendezvous with Comet Tempel 1 on July 4 of this year, when one of the spacecraft (Impactor) will slam into the comet taking and transmitting pictures all along the way. Impactor's companion, Flyby, will witness the event without going kamaikaze on the comet. Interesting stuff. Read more here.

Back to the Salt Mines

Yes, I'm now back in South Bend and I've started my second semester as a NDLS 1L. My Property class was cancelled for today, so it's been pretty light so far. Constitutional Law at 9 this morning went well. We talked about the 4th Amendment and what constitutes unreasonable search and seizure. Professor Bellia hit the gates running, and cold called someone right off the bat. Fortunately it wasn't me (though I had read the Constitution, our only reading assignment for the class). Still up is CivPro II with a new prof. But that reading assignment was rather light as well (including Rule 3 from the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure - a whole sentence). And after that Professor Tidmarsh has scheduled a review of the Torts exam we took last semester.

Tomorrow I'll be in Contracts II and LegRes/Wri II; my first taste of Property will come on Wednesday, and Ethics on Thursday. While I'm not crazy about having class at 8 or 9 each morning, at least on Tuesdays and Thursdays I'm pretty much done by noon.

And now for the rant of the day... I tried to buy my books last night only to discover that there weren't any in stock. You'd think that the bookstore would know how many books to buy, since NDLS has a 1L class of around 180 students every year, and classes have been more or less scheduled for over a month. Some of my classmates who returned to the Bend early were able to get their books, but a lot of us will be awaiting the next shipment due in later this week.

Happy New Year

Well, we've made it through another year. Best wishes to all for a happy, healthy, safe, and productive 2005.

I spent New Year's eve with Honor at her apartment, where we chowed down on some Chinese food and played a few games of Trivial Pursuit. There was a little champagne at midnight, but nothing fancy and no ball dropping in Times Square.

I'm not into the whole new year's resolutions thing. The December 31/January 1 year border always seemed kind of artificial to me, and I feel you should resolve to do things as you find necessary rather than wait until a specific time of year. But best of luck to all of you out there who've resolved to do something different in the upcoming year.

It's now one week until the gears of law school start grinding away again. More Contracts, more CivPro, more LegRes and LegWri. Plus some newcomers: Property, ConLaw, and Ethics. I'll be playing witness for Depositions again, and might be one of the jury commissioners for the TrialAd class. Oh, and undergrad mock trial regionals will be held at ND in February, and I'll be judging. Fun stuff. Now the circle is complete. When I left, I was the attorney... now I am the Judge. Unfortunately, OSU won't be competing at ND this year.

Before I head back, I'm still planning to post a little about the cruise as promised. Until then, you can see some pictures that my sister took by clicking here.