The End Cometh...

A surefire way to tell that the end of the semester (and thus, the impending Doom that is finals) is near is when you get to the end of the assigned readings for your classes.

Yesterday, I finshed the readings for Contracts and CivPro, and the last readings for Crim are around the corner. I have to admit, it's a little weird. It's kinda like saying "goodbye" to a good friend. A good friend that weighs 10 pounds. And sits on your back. Every day.

Normally, this isn't really a big deal since I had as much, if not more reading as an undergrad. However, I feel a certain... affinity for my law readings because, unlike undergrad, I did all the reading. Every. Freeking. Single. Page. Now that's devotion.

Hell, after reading 1,000+ pages over a span of 14 weeks, you'd become attached to your textbooks too.

I think that some of the weirdness also stems from the fact that the end of reading means there's nothing left to do but study for finals. O_O

Pop Quiz

My buddy Thomas, who sits next to me in Crim, was like “Soooo good....”

To what was he referring to?

A. Today’s lecture about complicity/aiding and abetting
B. The cute girl in the third row
C. The cute guy on the other side of the room
D. Prof. Westen’s handwriting
E. The Bailey’s Irish Crème Kahlua “special additive” in his coffee

Turkey Day!

Goin' home for Thanksgiving today. When I get back, it'll be T-minus 2 weeks until finals.

I've been flying up and down California a lot these days, and one of the things I'll definitely be looking forward to is the airport security people making me take my laptop out of my bag to be screened separately.

Have a good Thanksgiving!

This Is the Sound of Studying

Two and half weeks until finals!

I was told by many people that the atmosphere around the law school would get really stressful as finals approached. I can't say that I sense that yet, though for a couple weeks now, there's been an undercurrent of unease as I suspect that many 1L's are beginning to freak out in private.

I think a lot of the stress has to do with the fact that 100% of our grade is based on the final. No midterms, no papers, no quizzes. If your first year in law school really is like drinking out of a fire hose, how is one supposed to study for such a beast?

It turns out there are a lot of different ways to tackle the massive amounts of material that they throw at us. The most popular way to do it is with outlines: 10- to 30-page pieces of academic flotsam filled with nuggets of knowledge. Essentially, we take everything we've learned the entire semester, boil it down to the important stuff, then put it down in bullet-point form.

At the beginning of the semester, lots of 2Ls and 3Ls were telling us to start early- as much as a month and a half before finals. I, in my infinite wisdom, decided to wait a little bit and start... this weekend. It turns out that the combined experience of 2Ls and 3Ls contains more wisdom than I initially thought. Outlines take a really really long time to work on. I spent this entire past weekend working on my Contracts outline, and I only got through a third of the course.

Of course, I could just do the easy thing and buy commercial outlines, but much of the learning actually comes from writing the outline yourself. Alternatively, I could opt not to outline at all and use my undergrad studying strategy (wait until a few days before the final then cram- really bad idea), but where's the fun in that? If you're the type that learns by doing stuff (whether it be taking notes or talking it out with a friend), then outlining is definitely one of the better ways to help you get as much out of the proverbial fire hose as you can.

Looks Like I Owe Someone $5...

I got my elective assignments for next semester. As some of you may recall, the process for choosing the electives was somewhat complicated, involving evil robot hamsters.

I bid on 5 electives, and expected to get my #2 and #3 choices. This is because my #1 choice, CivPro II, had 1L enrollment capped at somewhere around 10. And given that it was being taught by one of the best professors at Boalt (he brings his guitar to class and sings songs about discovery... that's pretty badass), it's easy to see why the odds weren't exactly in my favor (somewhere around 1.5 students per mod or something).

I was so sure that I'd end up with Legislation and Constitutional Law that I made a bet on it (not sure with who though). I entered my choices, prayed a little, then waited anxiously as the hamsters did their thing.

Well this past Thursday, the registrar announced our class assignments, and lo and behold, I got my first and second elective choices. Woohoo!

Here are the classes I'm taking next semester:

Property
Torts
Written & Oral Advocacy
Civil Procedure II
Legislation

I'm pretty jazzed that I'm getting such a solid schedule. Apparently, nobody made any effort to fix the machine that randomly picked our classes, so some people I know actually got conflicting classes. I think the best part about next semester is that I get out every day no later than 3:30 PM, which, while compared to my undergrad schedule, is actually pretty pathetic, it still beats leaving school at 5:00.

What I Learned in Law School

Dear Mom and Dad...

Boalt = Crusty Old High School, Part 3

A little known fact: while the nasty mildew and other crap on the outside of Boalt Hall would lead one to believe that the school is "poorly maintained," it turns out it's just natural weathering, owing to the fact that it was built in the early 11th century by French Visigoths, who carved the school out of a limestone rock formation.

Deep Thoughts From Today's Classes

A summary of what I learned today, in convenient, easy-to-digest haiku form:

Crim:
Attempted murder
Nobody got hurt from it
Why is it a crime?

Contracts:
I say "potato"
You think I say "tomato"
Is there a contract?

CivPro:
The jury was drunk
SCOTUS says that it's okay
But it still seems wrong

haha... I really enjoy haiku, and I don't know why.

Network like a Polaroid Picture

Yikes! I haven't updated this for a while. But I have a good excuse! I've been working. Net-working.

This past week I went to not one, but two lawyer networking events. American Bar Association rules forbid 1L's from contacting potential employers about summer or future employment until December 1, but I've been told by 2L's and 3L's that these events are still a good chance to meet recruiters, talk to them in general terms about their firm, get some interpersonal conversational practice, and maybe even impress yourself on the minds of potential employers so that they remember you when they come back later for interviews.

[---]

On Wednesday, I went with some other members of the Berkekely Technology Law Journal to San Francisco for a "Women and Minority Law Student IP Summit," hosted by Microsoft.















There were several firms at the event handing out brochures and tons of sweet tchtotchkies. The main event of the night, however, was a talk given by 15 panelists representing the in-house counsel for huge tech companies:















I totally expected the Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft people to get into a Jerry Springer-like 3-way brawl on-stage, but it never happened. Bummer.

Afterward, there was a reception where we could talk to the panelists about their jobs, ask them questions about what it's like to work such huge companies, and maybe even get an email or two. I talked to the lawyers from Google, Sun Microsystems, Yahoo, and Microsoft. The Google and Yahoo people were really cool, and really seemed to like their jobs. The Microsoft people were kinda weird, though they also seemed to like their jobs too.

[---]

On Thurday night, the Berkeley Center for Law and Tech hosted a huge event where over 30 of the biggest law firms in IP came and set up tables with even more toys and junk.

I used the evening as an opportunity to learn the firms' names and get a feel for their corporate culture. I only got to talk to about 7 of the firms, but I was able to collect business cards and I think I already have a partial list of firms that I might like to work for.

Probably the most interesting thing I took away from the night was the realization that lawyers, even in their stodgy pinstripe suits and garish ties, are just like anyone else. All the lawyers I talked to were funny, weird, and even kinda goofy. Most of them seemed to like their jobs, though talking to them about firm life confirmed my suspicion that law school is a reflection of life in a law firm in the same way the SAT is a reflection of life in college: they're nothing alike.

[---]

My week of talking to the lawyers was immensely eye-opening, but I have to be honest. While making connections with people from companies like Google and Yahoo, and big firms like McDermott, Farella, and MoFo is incalcuably valuable, the sweet junk they hand out definitely comes in a close second on the hierarchy of awesomeness. Look at all this schwag!















Unfortunately, this only represents a fraction of the stuff available during the two nights. My Sidley Austin tote bag (not shown) just wasn't big enough to hold the other assorted pens, water bottles, highlighters, business card holders, photon lights, calculators, leather mouse pads, note cubes, and fishing lures that some of the other firms were offering. I think I'll be just as happy though, with my Weil foldy-useless-map-circuit-court-paperweight thingy.

Doo doo doo doo...

That's the Windows start-up sound I hear every once in a while in the library or in class as someone forgets to turn off their speaker. It's a minor anoyance, but it serves as a reminder of just how prevalent laptops are in law school.

One of the most interesting things about law school is the fact that we take notes on laptops. I had always taken for granted the fact that I needed to buy one before school started, and like a good student, I got a nice Sony VAIO about a month before classes started. I guess I owe it to all the movies I'd seen about law school that showed people in class happily typing along on their sleek pieces of technological machinery.

Even after I got here, I never really gave it much thought until I talked to one of my mod-mates, Iris. "Don't you think it's odd that law school is the only graduate school where students take notes on compuers?" she asked me. "Uh... not really... well... maybe? Yeah sort of." I said. Iris (who, by the way, is a complete sweetheart- don't get me wrong) proceeded to explain to me that she planned to take all her notes with pen and paper, and that thirty years from now we laptop-istas would all regret using computers as we suffered from accelerated carpal-tunnel syndrome.

Then I got to thinking. Why is it that law students take notes on computers? I remember as an undergrad that to see someone taking notes on a computer was to automatically brand them an "overachiever" (or alternatively, "freak"). My friends in other grad schools all tell me that it's still rare to see students with laptops. But here in law school, latops are as common as... well, lawyers.

For me at least, I can definitely say that I'm glad I'm typing my notes instead of writing them. Given that my professors put handouts and slides on the web to download, it makes things that much easier. In many cases (like Talley's blazing-fast Contracts lectures), I think it would be physically impossible for students to keep up with the lecture if we were writing them by hand (I don't even want to imagine the massive hand cramps that would result... ever think about that, Iris?).

Perhaps most important of all, if I didn't have a computer at school, I wouldn't be able to write in my blog as often as I do. And I know that for many of you, that would be unbearable. :-)

Note to Self

Start writing your memos a lot earlier than the day before they're due. Especially when you know they're going to be more than 15 pages long. And especially when you know you're going to procratinate like a muther.

Ugh... 14 hours, 3 cups of OJ, 2 cups of tea, 6 trips to the bathroom, and 17 pages later, I'm finally done with Memo 3. Yes yes, I know that LRW is only pass/no pass, but I'm going to use this memo for my writing sample when I apply for jobs at firms, and given that the memo is about copyright and fair use, I figure it might pique the interest of the big IP firms out there.

Haha the funny thing is, I'm not really done. I still need to proofread and print it before I turn it in tomorrow (today). Experience tells me that writing papers at 2 AM makes for seriously incoherent sentences.

Picking My Knows

What week is this? 10th week? Seriously? Already? Shit. At UCLA this means that finals would be next week. Haha luckily, I'm not at UCLA. But what it does mean is that it's time to choose classes for next semester.

As you may remember from my earlier post, every 1L has to take the same set of courses no matter what school they're at. Currently, I'm taking Contracts, Criminal Law, Civil Procedure, and the first part of my lawyering skills class, which leaves Torts, Property, and the second part of my lawyering skills class for next semester. In addition to this already imposing schedule, Boalt requires us to choose two additional electives- no more, no less.

In order to take a bit of the stress out of process of competing for classes, the registrar set up this system where we submit our top 5 classes in order of preference, and some evil robot or oligarchical panel of hamsters choose two of them for us. Ideally, we're supposed to get our top 2 choices, but it's not guaranteed. You know how hamsters are.

Thus began the two-week-long stressfest that is elective-picking. The ordering element adds an extra level of complexity, since we not only have to choose five classes, but also our preference for them. To make things worse, Shawn (my ASP tutor) told us that while the robot that picks our classes is evil, it apparently isn't very smart because it might actually give you classes with conflicting class times.

Today is the deadline for bidding on classes, so after some thought and a great deal of procrastinating, I decided on my top 5 electives:

1. Civil Procedure II
2. Legislation
3. Constitutional Law: Liberty & Equality
4. Introduction to Intellectual Property
5. Constitutional Law: Basic

Seriously, this thing is a freaking work of art. I have some interest in all the classes, it's ordered so that it's unlikely that the registrar will give me both CivPro II and Con Law (both are huge 4-unit classes), and it's set so that the classes fit together well in my schedule among the mandatory classes. I definitely would've put Intro to IP higher up on the list if it weren't for the fact that there are no reviews about the professor.

CivPro II is supposed to be really hard to get into (only 10 IL's allowed), so $5 says I'm going to end up with Legislation and ConLaw L&E.

It's All About the Benjamins

Today was an interesting day, namely because there was a lot of talk about finding jobs for this coming summer. You know, the one that's only eight months away.

Since law school is three years, we only have two summers in which to do something. The summer after the 2L year is the one in which most students apply to a firm and hopefully get an offer of permanent employment by the end of the summer. The first summer therefore, is the last summer ever in which we get to do whatever we want (as long as it's somewhat legally-related... law firms like to look at what you've done).

There are lots of options for the 1L student to do something cool in his/her first summer, including externing (still not sure how it's different from "interning") for a federal or state court judge, working for a government agency, working for a non-profit or public interest organization, and of course, working at a firm.

In applying to these jobs, time is of the essence. The ABA prevents 1L's from talking to either employers or the career office until December 1st, under the theory that 1L's have enough stress to worry about in their first couple of months at law school. Of course, what this also means is that EVERY 1L (at least the neurotic ones- me included) are going to send out tons of letters and resumes once that magic [*checks calendar*] Thursday rolls around.

Therefor, we don't have very much time in which to prep our materials to send out to all employers out there. In order to prepare us (both mentally as well as practically), lots of student groups, as well as the Career Development Office (CDO) are having programs this week in which they talk to us about how to choose a job, how to write legal resumes, and how to "get that summer law experience of your dreams."

Today, Shawn, my mod's ASP tutor, brought in a bunch of his mod-mates from his 1L year to talk about what they did. Some worked for federal magistrate judges, some worked for the county DA's offce, some worked for the public defender's office, and some went to firms. One guy actually spent his summer doing legal work in Thailand. Apparently what they did their first summer didn't have too much of a bearing on their ability to get a high-paying firm job their second year.

Key piece of advice from Shawn: "As long as you have a good story about your summer to tell in interviews, it doesn't matter what you do. So do something you're interested in."

Of course, working for a firm during the summer has a huge perk going for it- namely, the huge wad of cash you make. Judicial externships are completely unpaid, and while public-interest jobs aren't paid either, Boalt has a fund which gives stipends to students who pursue public interest work during the summer. Pretty cool.

The CDO had an information session about externships this evening after class, and while it was only marginally helpful in terms of new information, it did get me thinking about all the possibilities available to me this summer.

I had been planning on working at a firm this summer, but I just might end up going for the unpaid judicial externship. Sure there's no money in it, but I think it would be kinda fun to see how the legal system works from the inside. It also wouldn't hurt to be able to say you're buddy-buddy with a federal district or circuit court judge.

*sigh* ...time to dust off the ol' resume, I guess.

General CivPro Awesomeness

Okay so today in CivPro, we were discussing Markman v. Westview, a case dealing with the issue of whether a judge or a jury should decide the meaning of certain words in a patent.

Vetter: Does anyone know how this case is different [from the other cases we're talked about this week]?
Danny: *raises hand* It’s about patents?
Vetter: Yes, that’s right. It’s also about two parties, named Markman and Westview.

Hahaha oh SNAP! After that, Vetter proceeded to call Danny "Captain Obvious." Haha no just kidding. But if he had, I seriously would have fallen out of my chair right there. You really don't expect a guy like Vetter to be such a smartass like that...