RANDOM NON BARBRI RELATED POST

I need some help in settling a bet with a friend... this has NOTHING to do with BarBri...

Assume it is a very hot, sunny day. The AC in front of the house is broken down, and your father is out there working on it, but to no avail. You are sitting in your room on your computer, when your mother walks in and says: "Come outside, the ice cream man is here and is giving us free ice cream."

Now... what prompted the free ice cream?

This isn't some sort of weird hypo, it just came up with a friend. I thought his answer was insane. So now we have a bet going to see what people would think the cause was. SO - if you can post a comment with your thoughts, I'd appreciate it. Oh, and before you click on the comments, please have your response ready, so as not to taint the results.

THANKS!

I think I'll go home and mull this over

I haven't blogged in awhile because I started playing World of Warcraft. All I can hear in the back of my head is "Good Idea????" Not really, but I'm doing fine on the MBEs in the mixed subjects (75% or so). I'm sure in a week or so I'll freak out for not doing much for prep, but the last 2 days I've had zero motivation. Less than zero. I really shouldn't have been told during the PT workshop that everyone passes... it really did a number on my ability to concentrate.

Drink up with me now and forget all about the pressure of days

Three days ago I cancelled the insurance coverage on my cell phone, as I'd been paying $5 a month for it for the past few years and never used it. Two days ago my cell phone speaker decided to quit on me mid-call. Figures. So yesterday I went to a Cingular store to get a new phone. It was pretty busy when I walked in, but there was a sign up sheet and the reps were using it to call people to help them. So I signed in and started checking out the phones. About 1/2 an hour, I turned around to see that the 10 or so customers had all formed a single file line in front of the counter. Of course, I thought "Wow, those dumb-fucks don't know there's a list" and continued to play with the various cell phones. Another 20 minutes go by, and I realize that they are no longer using the list. (Apparently I missed the sign that said the list became ineffective at 4:27 on Wednesday afternoon.) So I joined the line. There were about 4 people working at the time, so I figured it wouldn't take that long to get to me. Yet, as each rep finished with their customer, they disappeared in a back room and refused to come back. A full 45 minutes later, the one remaining rep had finished with his customer, and I was due up. So instead of renewing my contract as I had planned to do, I simply asked for the phone I wanted and when my contract was up. He told me that it had already expired, and that I could get a big discount for renewing. I politely declined. As he was ringing up my phone, he called up the next person in line and asked them what they needed - and THEN PROCEEDED TO HELP THAT PERSON - while I was waiting. I'm sure the bar stress had something to do with it, but I was livid. After going home, I spent the night researching new cell phone companies and prices, and went to T-Mobile earlier today where they actually were into the concept of customer service. The bitch of it is that I have to go back to Cingular tomorrow to return the phone I bought, but I can deal.

The whole cell phone issue has just added to my sour mood of late... the littlest things have been driving me crazy - lukewarm coffee, minor traffic delays, internet access problems... etc. I think I should start wearing a sign that reads: "Taking the July Bar Exam - Stay Back 10 Feet" It's likely that I'm going to hit someone soon - for no reason what-so-ever.

I've also been having trouble falling asleep. Every night I'm up until at least 4:00 AM, despite switching to decaf after 5:00 PM, taking sleeping pills, having a glass of wine before bed, etc. Nothing seems to work. Considering they won't let me take the bar exam at 9 at night, I need to figure out how to remedy this problem - and quick.

Oh - K MBE's - 60%. I'm not thrilled, but I'm not totally disappointed. At least now I know what the right to reclaim goods from an insolvent buyer means.

On a more positive note -

1) I got brownies from my aunt in the mail for no reason. No note or anything. Too bad I shook the box before I opened it to try to figure out what was in it. Now I have brownie crumbs. But they're good.

2) I decided on my bar trip - Egypt - for 10 days. My sister may come along, otherwise it will be me alone with a bunch of randoms on the tour. So at least now I have something to look forward too.

Sadly, that's about it.

They took your life apart, they called you failure's art

Recent Google searches that sent people to my blog:

fast forward barbri dvd

missing tons of questions on the multistate

Paula Franzese alcohol

And the best one yet:

professor whitebread beastiality


WOW.

Don't wake me I plan on sleeping in

Slept through the AM Ks lecture (thanks to a sleeping pill... I should have known better given the lecture we got on Friday.) Made it to the afternoon lecture. Out of guilt, made 100 flashcards for Ks instead of taking the night off, as most of the other BarBri people were going to do. Sad.

During one of our bathroom breaks this afternoon, I had a short convo with someone I didn't know in line. I made the comment that it's like 1L year all over again - seeing legal issues all over the place, and feeling the need to comment on them (at least in my head). (That guy just spit on the car - trespass to chattels? Guy gets hit with a baseball bat on TV - assault? Battery? If he dies within one year... prosecution for murder ok and no double jeopardy if he was already prosecuted for battery.)

Also, if one of my friends is in the middle of telling me a story, I seem to want to jump in with all the random rules I've been refreshed on the last few weeks. (Oh, I'm really sorry your grandfather died. But, keep in mind that if the funeral parlor drops his casket and you're around to see it, you may be able to recover for NIED. That's when....)

Seriously, this has got to stop.

Then we'll drink the night away

Saturday - slept until 3:00 PM. Did nothing in terms of bar study. Went grocery shopping. Watched movies on HBO. Stayed up until 2:00 AM on a phone call with a friend of mine. Clearly, I took Honisburg's advice a little too literally.

Today - finished all the assigned material from Friday, Saturday and today. Basically - I just did 4 essays for corps, and took the simulated PT. I think I did ok on the PT. I tend to quote a lot more than I should instead of summarizing, and spent too much time on on part at the expense of the other, but overall I didn't have a tough time in completing the exam in 3 hours. We'll see when I get my exam back in 7-10 days though.

Tomorrow I start contracts with Prof. Epstein. A full day of it - which means I have him live. (I've been going to the AM lectures on Monday mornings, then sleeping in the rest of the week and watching the lectures on video the rest of the week.) He's the only other name that I recognized besides Chem-Chem that's giving the BarBri lectures to us. I'm still tempted to bring in my camera to take a picture of him... and I still won't do it.

After Ks is done I'll have completed all the MBE subjects. Kind of a scary thought, considering that I feel like I know nothing at this point. I'm also terrified to go back and do MBEs on subject that I covered 3 weeks ago. Like I remember any of that stuff at this point.

Hopefully this "I'm fucked!" feeling continues until the bar exam begins... without it I lack motivation to study (hence sitting at home doing nothing all day Saturday). I do great under pressure - but can't do shit without it. Even with the Paced Program.

Even with the "I'm fucked!" feeling, Entourage still wins out. So now, with all of my Paced Program assignments completed, I'm going home to watch that and ideally get to bed at a half-way decent hour.

Sheep go to heaven, goats go to hell

The fact that today's title is from a legit song really makes me happy right now.

I just got the following e-mail from my Sports Law Prof -

"Dude, you got an A in sports law! (I just got the list back so I could match people to exams.) Of all my courses, how the hell did THAT happen?... I wondered who would use The Cutting Edge as precedent! I also wonder how many points you would lose with any other professor for calling a tort "stupid....""

My sports law prof. kicked some serious ass. I had her for torts, and then proceeded to take everything she offered - hence the Sports Law class. I was also her research assistant, so it's getting this e-mail from her was not as bizarre as it may appear.

Too bad that the bar examiners wouldn't be as keen on the use of humor in exams (she encouraged it for her tests). Although I may have to point out that a few torts are "stupid." Sheep my ass - I'm going to be a goat! Then, after I fail miserably, I'll try the whole sheep approach.

I left class early today - somewhere in the last hour of the PT review. It just got too repetitive to handle. At least it was more substantive than yesterday, and I think I learned a few things. Like what to include in an affidavit, for example. I just got really really tired at the end of it.

Tonight I'm going to take most of the evening off to go see a showing of Dr. Strangelove. I won't get to the Paced Program assignments today, but have sworn that I'll get caught up tomorrow during the day.

They really need to have a supplementary Paced Program that goes through how much one should be drinking each night after studying for the bar. With all the concern of lawyers becoming alcoholics, it'd be nice to have a way to build up tolerance over the next few months before I start work. My current program of a bottle of wine every few days isn't cutting it right now. I may have to draft my own...

Day 1: 1 glass of wine.

Day 2: 2 glasses of wine.

Day 3: 1 bottle of wine.

Day 4: 6 shots of grey goose.

Day 5: 1 liter of grey goose.

Days 6 though 34: Enter rehab, use extra "reflection" time to study for bar exam.

Day 33: Start the program again.

Yeah - I better start working on that... right now.

I'll be waiting with a gun and a pack of sandwiches

I had the first of my performance test workshops today... and about 96% of it was a complete waste of time. They really should just have held that class the first day of BarBri, over drinks at a local bar, as the vast majority of it consisted of a motivational speech about how "Everyone passes the bar!!!" To emphasize this point, the Prof. told of stories of people who overcame the odds to pass (a vet with brain damage and a girl who slipped in her shower and suffered a concussion right the morning of the exam stick out in my mind). "They passed!" His mantra was - if you don't know it, no one knows it, so don't freak out. The reason that no one knows it, btw, is because "Everyone takes BarBri! There's no competition!" Hmmm... no wonder there's class action litigation going on right now. Aside from convincing us we were all going to pass, he made a few important comments like: 1) read the question, and 2) follow instructions. I'm glad my firm is paying $3,000+ for me to hear that point repeated over and over again.

On a somewhat more positive spin - I did appreciate him going through the math relating to the grading of the exam. Rather interesting that you can fail all of the essays and still get a passing score. Also - the story about the chick writing down on her property essay that she was depressed was damn funny. And she managed a 45. (5 points above the minimum.) But other than that, it was a waste of time. I'm debating if I want to go back tomorrow or just take some extra time to outline essays and the other PTs, so if anyone has had that part yet, please post and let me know if it's worth it or not.

Also somewhat related was a comment I overhead one chick say during our break - "I'm so sick of getting YELLED at every day in here." I agree. There's nothing wrong with a professor being enthusiastic, but why must most of the BarBri people yell at the top of their lungs when they want to emphasize a point? Today, for example, "FABULOUS!" "It's a BITCH!" and "THEY PASSED!" were constantly shouted. It's getting more than annoying. Then again, when he calmly asked: "Good idea??? Good idea???" after every clearly bad idea, I wasn't happy either.

Also overheard today on a break - apparently there is a Loyola law student who wrote/writes a blog about how law school is horrible... or something like that... which the Wall Street Journal is interested in writing an article about. Anyone have the link for this?

Finally - I wanted to tell everyone taking the bar to check out this blog - Law with Grace. That chick is a fucking riot. Special encouragement goes out to the girls in West LA morning session to read her post about using the restroom. I'm capable of using the restroom in 30 seconds - so I'm as confused as Grace is as to why everyone takes so damn long.

Thanks to Cirkuspeanut...



This is what I dealt with today.

She laid out in front of a truck so it would look much more like an accident

Finished typing up/reformatting my Civ Pro outline... claim and issue preclusion is a complete mess. Most of the other stuff is okay - except where my class notes (and the given outline) - specified certain rules for Cali but not for Fed (like timing issues). I also think that we were given way too much information on non-testable areas. Ick.

Time for a practice exam to see how little I've manage to retain.

He's not half right

I just got done with Agency/Partnerships with Michael Kaufman, who was by far the oddest prof. that's done BarBri so far. His manner of speaking was unique, to say the least, and included noises that I've only heard made by either 1) consenting adults behind closed doors or 2) Yoda. I was in the afternoon session today... so I have no idea how the morning section who had him live kept a straight face. The lecture was pretty good in terms of boiling things down to the basics. I was also happy that he seemed to have reviewed bar exams from all over the country for similar fact patterns... a vibe I haven't gotten from anyone else (most of them just refer to the last time a given subject was tested on the Cali bar, not to specific fact patterns, and not nationwide.) I think this will end up being very helpful for agency/partnerships, as that's it's a brand new subject on the CBX. My only problem was that in going through the exam, all I could see were the potential cross overs with torts, contracts, corps, etc. It started to freak me out a bit. Things were made worse when I got my Property essay back, with a whole series of Fs on it like I had expected. (Once again, fuck you adverse possession.) At least I knew what was coming. However, the grader didn't like my writing style at all, which bothers me considering the last grader was all over it. I'm sure the same will be true for the bar exam grading process... but still, it's annoying. I'm still wondering what I should be doing in terms of reaching conclusions. I went with the whole "Rule, Here, Therefore" method - and reached a reasonable conclusion after applying law to facts. In the first essay, this was praised, but now all of my "Therefore's" are met with the statement "Conclusory (you stupid bitch, stop doing it.)" Well, at least the first part of that. Maybe I'm supposed to qualify these statements with "Therefore, it is LIKELY that John and Jane had a valid contract" instead of "Therefore, John and Jane entered into a contract."

Tonight will be spent back at coffee, trying desperately to finish my Civ Pro notes... which is taking MUCH longer than expected. I should also outline the Civ Pro essays from yesterday and today, but I'm not sure that's going to happen. Especially given that Rescue Me starts up again tonight and I still have 2 episodes on DVD to watch before I can get to it. Life's full of hard choices.

And finally, in the spirit of boiling things down - my list of pros and cons of bar review thus far:

Pros:
* Minimal traffic, even for mid-day, going to BarBri. Today only.
* TiVo, so bar review doesn't cut into my viewing of new episodes of the Deadliest Catch or Y&R.

Cons:
* Generally shitty traffic, for mid-day, going to BarBri.
* Getting asked by some randoms in the elevator in my building if I'm studying for the bar exam. This has happened a few times now. At first, I thought it was nice. Now I'm just annoyed. I'm apt to respond: "No, the 3 big fucking books in my hands that are labeled "BarBri Bar Review" are my paperweights." Or "What's the bar exam?" Or "No, these books are for my boyfriend. If I don't get these too him before his class starts he'll start beating me again, like he did last night."
* Getting to coffee to find out there are no tables open. (While lugging the 3+ books, my laptop, my purse, etc.) Having to stare down a few people until one of them left.
* Eating PB&J sandwiches every night because I'm too tired to make anything else.
* The complete and total lack of motivation, running from Tuesday to Sunday each week.
* Having a social life that revolves around my cat and long distance telephone calls.
* Hearing my mother say "Atta-girl" every time I talk to her and she asks if I've been studying at all.

Hmmm... kinda puts things in perspective. Final con: depression.

It's no problem, I'll just keep quiet if its easier for you... To make believe in that I don't love you as much as I do

As requested - pictures of the cat. Here he is threatening to knock over my expensive bottles of wine.











This is where he got stuck - actually - behind the washing machine - when I thought I had killed him.








And this is just his generally pissy look.






I bought a bottle of Caymus this past weekend (which I paid double for somehow, as I got it at Ralphs... still not sure how that happened, but I'm not too happy). George has been threatening to knock it over unless I spend more time with him. Looks like we'll both probably lose out on that one.

Today was Corps... and I realized that in 3 hours I probably learned more than I ever did in BA/Corps in school - at least on the Corps end of things. I'm surprised at the level of detail they ask in the exams according to the prof... put and call options, for example. Thankfully I dated a CPA for a bit my 2L year, so I'd be okay on that question (provided I kept the two straight, which I'm going to do by remembering that they match up with the thing that ISN'T the same amount of letters - put - option to SELL, call - option to BUY. Enthralling material, seriously.

Tonight on the schedule is outlining a few essays for Civ Pro. Since I didn't get to the second half of typing up my outline yesterday, I'll be doing that first and then giving the essays a shot. I'd really rather do MBEs... I think they give me more practice... but "sadly" there are no Civ Pro questions on the MBE. Time to suck it up and just go with it.

I'm cranky.

So a jury was formed as more liquor was poured

Today was BarBri day from hell. Not only did I have to spend a full 7 hours of classtime going over civil procedure, but as the second half of the day started up the guy in front of me knocked over my coffee, which completely covered all of my workbook pages. The notes I had taken from the morning session now have bleeding ink all over them, and the whole mess smells like vanilla cream. So that was pretty awesome. Things were made all the better when, with about 1/2 hour remaining of civil procedure torture, the fire alarm went off. Now had this happened during the "shouting fire in a crowded theater" portion of con law, I would have found it mildly entertaining. But it loses it's entertainment value when it goes off during the jury selection portion of the notes. I'd been dying to get out of there since I arrived, as I got only about 3 hours of sleep last night. Argh. Next Monday isn't looking too good either, with a full day of Contracts, which will only serve to bring up painful memories of my horrific contracts prof. from law school. I'm shuddering already.

Anyways... civ pro. I think the lecture could have been organized a lot better. We spent the morning doing federal civ pro, and the afternoon with a mix of federal and Cali rules. A side-by-side comparison throughout the whole thing would have made more sense, at least to me. The prof. giving the lecture, Freer (I think), wasn't too bad, but sounds like either 1) a game show announcer, or 2) the guy that does Moviephone. I got used to it, but first thing this morning I was close to shooting myself. (Not like that feelings gone away.)

Tonight the only thing on the BarBri schedule is to review civ pro. I think I'll be doing this by taking my coffee soaked notes and putting them into chart form. If I manage to finish with that before 10, I'll try a few PMBR problems in Con Law. Or perhaps I'll just pass out in the bathroom at coffee - I tip well enough that they should be cool with that.

Final random point to bitch about - why aren't we doing contracts now? It would make a lot more sense to do all the multistate subjects first, as they are guaranteed to be on the exam. Instead, tomorrow we have corps, followed by agency & partnership on Wednesday, and two performance test workshops to finish out the week.

This coffee better kick in quick... I'm cranky.

I don't know you, but I want you

The title is, of course, referring to the Bar Examiners, who today let me know that I apparently am of good character. My parents will be proud. (And confused.)

Barely got over 50% on the Advanced Crimes MBEs I've done so far. I'm now starting to get pissy with the discrepancies between BarBri and the PMBR tapes. For example - If a police officer goes to your house, and a person answers the door, can that person consent to a search? PMBR says that the police have to reasonably believe that the person has ownership or control, and can't just assume it by the fact that they open up the door - basically, that they need to ask: do you live here? BarBri says they just need a reasonable belief - so in the above case, the fact that the person opened the door, said that the person they were looking for was away for a bit, and consented to the search, was enough to give the officer the reasonable belief.

Granted - in both cases the issue is reasonable belief. I get that. But PMBR makes a point of saying reasonable belief requires something more than BarBri seems to imply with their question. (Advanced #30 by-the-way.)

SO.... this leads me to a two questions - 1) Who do I go with? 2) Is this sort of fine distinction going to be on the bar in the first place?

Given my shitty performance I'm going to give up for the day. At least for a few hours, at which point I may bust open the PMBR books I got in the mail today. Sounds like the makings of an awesome Saturday night... try not to be jealous.

Words fall through me, and always fool me

I skipped BarBri today, and only feel mildly guilty about it. Today was another Essay workshop, and I didn't feel like I got anything out of the first one that I wouldn't get by going through the process of outlining answers and checking them with the sample answers myself. Not like I'm actually doing that either - instead I've spent most of today finishing up my flashcards from Crimes. The results on the drills wasn't good - 11/17 - but I'm assuming that will improve once I commit all of the elements to all of these f'd up common law crimes to memory. Crim Pro is definitely my strong suit, thanks to working my ass off during that class first semester of my 3L year.

I've been listening to the Crim Law and Crim Pro PMBR CDs... and last night on my way home from coffee heard the most entertaining thing thus far on the otherwise drab CDs - "Don't worry about the essays. If after 4 years of college and 3 years of law school you still haven't figured out how to bullshit your way through an essay, you don't deserve to be a lawyer." Granted, this statement by PMBR was self-serving, as they only focus on the MBE, but the force with which the prof. said 'bullshit' was hilarious. And I actually think that will be true in my case - I'll be fine on the essays provided I learn the black letter law, and I'll be able to learn the black letter law by doing a fuck-ton of MBE questions.

It's odd - I actually feel okay about the bar right now. With only a month and a half to go, I think I may be able to get all of this stuff down to pass, provided I put in the work. Speaking of work - I need to knock out some Crimes IQs before heading home later tonight, drinking a few glasses of wine, and getting some much-needed sleep.

There is no you, there is only me

Evidence MBE - Advanced - 77%. I'm thrilled. Looks like I may not suck on the multiple choice questions as much as I thought I was going to.

I've ordered the two PMBR books off of ebay, which I should have in a few days... for those who had the course - what's the difference between the two books? I'm assuming one is the "hard" questions...

Today was Crimes with Prof. Whitebread. His style is interesting to say the least - as opposed to going through everything, he basically makes one small point, repeats it 5 times, and moves on. I also found him rather entertaining, despite the repetition, thanks to a few comments he made about animals. (You aren't guilty of murder for killing a crime solving talking dolphin, and the MBE examiners aren't going to ask you a question on beastiality. If you've seen the lecture you'll know what I'm getting at with these.)

Speaking of animals, George may be dead. I'll update later.

When your mind's made up

67% on the second half of my Evidence MBEs. Not great, but at least I didn't completely fuck up. I'm starting to think I'll actually get better at these with practice, which helps.

I also got a "Pass" on the Torts essay that I turned in a week ago. So I don't think I'll feel as bad when I get the big fat "Fail" on my property essay. Yes, still bitter about missing adverse possession.

I overslept this morning, which means I got the evidence prof on TV this afternoon... it was a long, boring, experience, of which I felt that I got little out of. Most of this stuff is just going to take a lot of practice, so I should try to rely less on how great I think the lectures are going to be.

Tomorrow is Crim Law day, and there's no handout. Why? I have no idea, but it pisses me off. I'm not looking forward to Crim Law in general, as I completely zoned out in that class first year and have virtually no recollection of anything aside from my Prof.'s stories about clerking for Justice Thomas. Too bad they don't test on that.

Back to reviewing the MBEs I missed.

Two tickets torn in half

Update... Motivation Monday has taken a turn for the worst, thanks to a $40.00 parking ticket for an expired meter in front of my coffee shop. Argh. And I was 10 minutes late in sticking in another quarter.

No it doesn't mean a thing, big nothing

Evidence Drills - 76%

Evidence IQ MBEs, 1-34 - 53%

I'm ok with the percentages so far, as most of the questions I missed related to material that wasn't covered in today's lecture. Speaking of today's lecture, I'm not overly impressed with the prof so far. His style is a little odd, and not as well outlined as the other profs so far. I'm probable just spoiled because I had an excellent evidence prof in law school, who would make a far better BarBri lecturer. If only my law school prof had taught us Cali law (especially that damn Prop 8, which seems to fuck up everything).

Anyways... Motivation Monday is going swell. I'm done with the assignment for today, and now will go back and start checking my answers and making flashcards from the CMR. George has also seemed to have gotten into the Motivation Monday spirit, as I found him on top of the refrigerator this morning, and still don't have a clue how he got up there or avoided knocking over the bottles of my "good" wine that I keep up there. Reach for the stars, George, reach for the stars.

And the truth is, I missed you

Completed the turn in exam for property, and missed adverse possession. In the commentary, the notes state: "... if you missed adverse possession... you would also fail." Great. Failure. What a good way to end the evening of studying.

I don't get many things right the first time

I sucked ass on the Property drills, and got 59% on the Property IQs. Property was my best subject first year, so I found this rather frustrating. My timing was fine on the questions though, which makes me feel slightly better about my sub-par performance. I'm now beginning to wonder how many of the 33 questions will be of the IQ level, or worse yet - the advanced level... they don't really tell you this in BarBri. I'm going to spend the next 2 and a half hours going over the answers, then write the essay that's due tomorrow. I haven't done any of the other assigned essays on this, partly because I've been lazy, though mostly because I don't feel prepared. Should be fun.

George likes to open up the doors to the cabinets below my sinks in the bathroom and in the kitchen and chill with my cleaning supplies. I think he misses his tiny cage from the shelter. I miss my tiny cage of my coffee shop in St. Paul, so I can relate.

I'm dubbing tomorrow "Motivation Monday" where I'll get to all of the assigned questions on Evidence and not slack off. We'll see how that goes.

She shows no emotion at all, stares into space like a dead china doll

I don't want to study for the bar. At all. And to make sure that didn't happen, today I adopted a cat named George, who, despite being in my apartment for the last 8 hours, has yet to use his litterbox. Perhaps he's just angry with me for lining it with the property pages of my CMR. I've given up for today, and will now turn to the bottle of wine I've been eyeing up for the last 4 hours or so.

51 days until the bar... you'd think I'd be more motivated.