"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.

Still here

Yes everyone, I survived finals. Many apologies for the lack of posting. After finishing up the first semester of law school, I spent a relaxing week cruising the Caribbean aboard the ms Oosterdam. I'll post more about that in a later post. For now, I just wanted to reassure my readership that I'm well, back in Ohio, and will be blogging more frequently soon. (Hopefully- this whole "dial-up" business really sucks.)

Hope everyone had a merry Christmas and such. Seems the world is going crazy with winter storms, earthquakes, tsunamis, and asteroid scares, but I've avoided calamity thus far. Of course, I might be singing a different tune when grades come out...

Stay tuned.

The Final Countdown

5 down, 1 to go.

A three and a half hour Torts final is now the only thing standing between me and the end of my first semester of law school. Ok, so there are hours and hours of studying for that exam standing between me and the end of the semester too.

For the sake of Argument

As you've undoubtedly noticed, I've changed the name of the site. I'd like to thank everyone who submitted suggestions for the new name. While I've decided to go with something completely different, I did carefully consider all of your suggestions. Some of my favorites:

• The Irish Buckeye - submitted by Brendan, the Irish Trojan
• The Ho Knows - submitted by Jenni
• A day in the life of A Ho - submitted by Casey

I decided to incorporate arguendo because it's a legal term, in Latin, and rhymes with my name. It means "for the sake of argument," which kind of sums up a lot of what we seem to do in law school. Let me know what you think of the new name. If someone thinks up something more clever or public outcry demands a different name, I might have to change it.

In other news... Crim review today with the Smiling Assassin himself. Good times. Tomorrow's the exam, which will be something completely different from good times.

Also, Professor Seckinger has decided to add an additional section to the spring Depositions course. Since he needs two additional witnesses, he asked some of us seasoned veterans if we'd be interested in reprising our roles. Since all of the prep work is already done, I decided to do it again. This time I'll be several steps ahead of the students taking the course. Those poor hapless deposers-in-training won't know what hit them...

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World

Four finals down, two to go.

Today's final was CivPro, one of the shorter exams 1Ls at ND take fall semester. It's only a tow hour exam because it's only worth two credits. They don't get much shorter than that, except for LegRes which was a mere 60 minutes. (And for an interesting point of comparison, consider that LegWri, also worth two credits, had a final on which I probably spent more time on than all my other exams combined.) So due to the shortness of this one, you might expect things to go fairly smoothly. But you'd be wrong. What is law school without the drama?

While the vast majority of students are taking their finals on their laptops via Secure Exam (tm) -- a new option for law students at ND -- there are a few who still have to hand write their exams. This is mostly because Secure Exam doesn't run on Apple computers. So all the law students with their cool-looking Mac laptops (personally, I think the glowing Apple logo is pretty cool) are basically out of luck. Some of the profs will let these students type up their exams anyway, but others make them write.

So all of the students writing their exam today were put in the same room. Unfortunately, the two CivPro profs didn't give the same time instructions. The prof who teaches my section of CivPro was supposed to give us an additional 15 minutes to complete our exam (so we worked on it for 135 minutes); the other prof did not allot extra time. This became a problem when time was called for the writers -- the end result being that those students writing their exam in my section were not given the additional 15 minutes. This is a pretty big deal considering that the writers may already be at something of a disadvantage since most people type faster than they write. It's not clear yet what will be done about this, though early reports suggest that the administration has so far taken a "What do you want us to do about it?" attitude. It is difficult to envision a viable solution that will remedy the situation. Until then, hopefully Professor Bauer will be understanding and sympathetic when reviewing the written exams.

Ok, on a tangentially related but much lighter topic: the world is going crazy. Again. In addition to the whole exam craziness here in South Bend, here are some other examples:

• As I mentioned in my last post, Derek is considering abandoning civilization for several months this summer.
• Brooke's laundry went missing for a while due to a mix-up by the ND laundry service.
• Brad is hallucinating, envisioning law schools subjects as marauding demons.
• And Niki ran head first into a wall of bureaucracy.

Hang in there everyone. Christmas break is right around the corner. If we can all just stay sane for another week, I think we can make it.

UPDATE: Another source says that the Bauer writers were probably not deprived of the entire 15 minutes; it may have been closer to 8 minutes. I think that it's probably still significant, as I didn't really finish my exam until 2 minutes before time expired.

Ningat, Ningat, Ningat

South Bend got its first (strike that, second) substantial snowfall today. We got several inches today, though it's hard to tell for sure because high winds kept the snow drifting. Anyway, here are some cool pictures that Brendan took of campus today, covered in white.

And the Hits just keep on comin'...

Ok, I know it's been a little while since I last posted (because of this whole "finals" thing). But since I've done enough studying for CivPro that I think I might recite Rule 12 in my sleep tonight, I figured I should take a little break and post an update.

We're in the middle of finals season. It sucks. A lot.

I took my first "real" law school exam on Friday. Contracts. Who knew three hours could fly by so quickly? The exam was a little different from what I was expecting from looking through Rougeau's old exams and talking to 2Ls. And I honestly have no idea how I did. I didn't feel great about it, but I'm pretty sure I didn't fail it either. Really, that's about all I've got. And I bolted as soon as the exam was over. I had no desire to post-mortem the test to death with a bunch of other 1Ls who have no idea how they did. Just hearing people talking about it in the hallways as I made my exit was annoying enough.

The law school's become ground zero for stress, anxiety, and all-around craziness. I'm not studing there at all this week. I'll go to the other libraries, hole up in my apartment, go to a bookstore... anywhere that isn't the law school. I plan to be there for the exams themselves, and that's it.

To make things even better, I got my first law firm rejection letter today. One down, a whole bunch to go. Hopefully the stream of rejections won't be enough to make me want to desert civilization and become a nomadic wanderer like Derek. If I don't get a job with a firm this summer, I'll probably end up volunteering my time to get some law-related experience, and I might still go study abroad in London. Career services did say that London's something to consider if my grades could use a boost...

Ok, enough doom and gloom. Back to studying for the three remaining finals. This time next week, it'll all be over...

Closings

First to dispose of the most important news of the day:

LEGAL WRITING IS OVER!!!
...until next semester.

After some final polishing and tweaking, I dropped off my legwri final today (the day it was actually due... see yesterday's post for more on that). If you're interested in some ND law school gossip regarding people who are not Alex having trouble turning in their finals, see Brendan's recent entry. At any rate, it's good to close that chapter of my 1L adventure.

Today was also the last day of classes for the semester. Our profs have scheduled some review/Q&A sessions over the coming week and a half, but no more classes. Profs have done what they can in the past few classes to bring the course full circle, where possible. But the winning "closer" was Professor Tidmarsh.

After putting the day's reading into context with the bigger picture, he tied up most of what we've learned in Torts this semester to one concept: Foreseeability. To further illustrate his point, he performed a little magic trick. (He's done this once before, making a cup of water disappear during our discussion of Rylands v. Fletcher, a case about a dam breaking and flooding a mine shaft.) Now some people say that knowing how a trick is performed ruins it. I think it lets you focus more on the style and presentation of the trick.

Tidmarsh came into class today with two items that immediately drew the classes attention. First was the mystery box he had brought in on the first day of class. Flashback: The box was marked "DO NOT OPEN UNTIL 12/7/04." Inside was supposed to be a product that would change the lives of millions of people, but might end up killing many people as well. Tidmarsh used this to launch into the course. The other item he brought to class today was an envelope; as soon as he got to the front of the class, he taped the envelope to the board.

Tidmarsh told us we'd finally get to see what was in the box. He asked for volunteers to open it. He picked two people, and had them cut a deck of cards to see who would get the honor -- high card wins. After we saw the contents of the box and talked about foreseeability some more, Tidmarsh finally told one of the students to open the envelope and read the note to the class, which "foresaw" which cards the students drew. Ah, clever.

After "officially" ending class, Tidmarsh strode out of the classroom to a well-earned round of applause. It reminded me of a scene in The Paper Chase, when the professor concludes class and receives a standing ovation on his way out.

Thanks for a great semester, Professor Tidmarsh.

Ahead of schedule? That's unprecedented.

It's true. My legal writing final is actually done* early. Not early by a few hours, but a whole day. Unfortunately this isn't so much the result of me being studious and industrious, but rather because I thought it was due today. How did this happen, and how did I realize my mistake?

*"Done" is, of course a relative term. More on this below.

I'm not sure when I first got it in my head that the final was due today. My guess is that the last assignment we turned in was on a Monday and I had calculated that there was about two weeks between that assignment and the final. Because the final is something of a large assignment -- 3 different papers totaling close to 30 pages -- I actually got an early start on it. Heck, I even worked on it during Thanksgiving "break." I read through the fact pattern, the statutes, the cases... I took copious notes in yellow legal pads (anyone who knows me from my undergrad mock trial days knows what this means)... I outlined each paper. Then things got really busy this week. Bar/Bri held review sessions for each of our core classes (CivPro, Torts, Crim, and Contracts). This consisted of watching hours of videotaped lectures and taking notes as they essentially attempted to outline the semester's material. This took a good 3-4 hour chunk out of four days. While I found the sessions helpful (for the most part), every hour spent there was one fewer hour I could devote to legal writing.

Ok, so the weekend comes around. I get some serious work done. Then as I'm reading my papers, I spot some gaps that need to be filled. Only now the structure doesn't work. So I scrap it all and start from scratch. (Well not entirely from scratch. I completely overhauled the organization of my papers, though.)

At long last, I get my final to a state such that it's fit to be turned in. Not perfect. Like most works of art, legal writing papers are never truly finished; they're merely abandoned. After a final proofreading, it's time to print it out. I planned to print it a few hours earlier before it's actually due, since I'm expecting a run on the printers in the last hour or so. I submit the print order, then around lunchtime make my way up to the law library... only to find that the printers are down.

I still think that my final is due in 3 hours, and I have no way to get a copy into my hands. My mind rushes through possible alternatives. Print from another computer lab on campus. No good, the system is down throughout most of the university. Hook my laptop up directly to the printer. No, my laptop doesn't have a serial port or an infrared port, and the printer doesn't support USB cables. Email my professor. Nope, their computers are down too. Run home and print off my printer... might work, but I have class in half an hour. Maybe my prof's in her office... probably not, since she's rarely there. Well, maybe there'll be someone else to talk to.

So I rush downstairs to the legwri profs' offices. After confirming that my prof isn't there (typical), I talk to one of the profs from another section. It's then that I learn that the final isn't due until tomorrow. I'm sure a wave of different expressions washed over my face: surprise, confusion, skepticism... She pulled out the syllabus and shows me. Sure enough, "DUE: Tuesday, Dec. 7" right there on the page. Clear as day.

I felt a bit like Phinneas Fogg at the end of Around the World in Eighty Days. If you've read the book, you'll probably get that. If not, go read it and come back. Unless you're currently in law school, in which case wait until after finals. (Or if you're lazy and don't mind me spoiling the ending, email me and I'll explain. If you really care.)

So now I have time to polish my legwri final a bit more before abandon- er, I mean turning it in tomorrow. Then it'll be 1L finalmania. Let the good times roll.

Ice Master Ho Loco

That's my pimp name courtesy of playerappreciate.com.
Hate the game, not the playa. Yo.

Thanks go out to Brooke who's post originally directed me to the site.

P.S. The site generates a new name every time, so typing my name into the generator may not yield the same result (my second name was Sheik Alex Glide, also cool). So if you don't like the first one you get, you can keep trying until you find a keeper. Feel free to post your playa name below.