Busy Busy Bee

Where on earth have I been??

Working! My internship is keeping me really, really busy. I am learning a lot and am looking forward to telling you all about it and the interesting things I've been doing, but right now, I just don't have time!

One great thing about interning for a non-profit organization is that they genuinely can use the help, so I'm getting to do a lot of really great substantive work, and I never have to get anyone coffee or make copies or sit around feeling useless.

The work is hard, but it's great.

More info to come, including a more information on the end of my 1L year and a sneak peek at next year.

Can you wait? You'll have to--I'm busy!!

Skirts

One thing that helps in the heat is wearing a skirt. Skirts are cooler, better circulation, no clingy pant legs, etc.

One thing that's not great about wearing a skirt is that when a subway train approaches a station, it creates a pretty dramatic breeze. I was wearing a skirt today as I went down some stairs toward my train on my way to church. A train got to the station as I was walking down the stairs, and I had a very Marilyn Monroe moment.

My sister sent me this link about another hazard of wearing skirts. I'm in court a lot these days, but fortunately, the courthouse where I'm spending time isn't quite like this one...

Weatherman

Today as I exited the subway after my ride home from work, I saw an umbrella man right at the exit. Umbrella sellers don't normally just stand out on the streets with their carts of umbrellas, but whenever it rains, there are freestanding umbrella carts that appear as if by magic by most subway exits. It's really impressive, and sort of puzzling because I am not sure who those people are when it's not raining. Are they somewhere else with some other cart? Sleeping? Day jobs? Spider-man? Tough to say.

Anyway, the weird thing about today's umbrella man was that it wasn't raining. It was cloudy, but not raining. We've been in the middle of a horrible, unseasonable heat wave (think 100 degrees, 100% humidity), and the weather forecast said it was going to rain tomorrow, so I knew it was going to cool off and rain a bit, but I was still surprised to see the umbrella man out while it was dry. Then, as I walked home, it started to sprinkle a bit. And about 5 minutes after I got into my apartment (maybe 10 minutes after seeing the umbrella man), it was POURING rain, with big, impressive lightning and thunder. How did he know???

Forget The Weather Channel--the umbrella men have the weather down.

Vacation

This is the last weekend of my vacation. Monday, I start my internship. I am incredibly excited, and I'm ready to begin, but that's mostly just because my super-awesome house guest, LL, is gone, and I'm not having nearly as much fun without her.

That's right--I had company! LL arrived last Thursday for a sisters' weekend here in the city. LL now lives in the country, so I went up to the airport to ride the bus home with her because I didn't want her to end up in Astoria or something. Her flight was very, very delayed, but she finally got here.

We went to the temple, we went to a Broadway show, we shopped, we walked and walked and walked and walked (9 miles one day, probably 5 miles another day), we ate gooooooooood food, we laughed, we lounged, we talked and talked and talked, and we just had a grand ol' time. 

This was the first time LL's husband, JC, and her three boys, ages 6 and under, were all home without LL. The boys pulled out a miracle and napped, slept in, went to bed early, and went pretty easy on JC. Of course, now that LL is home, they're back to their usual behaviors, but...

Manhattanhenge - twice a year, the sun sets perfectly aligned with the grid here, and because of the tall buildings and view of the horizon, it's pretty spectacular. LL and I caught this on Monday. This shot is from a minute or two before the perfect alignment.

And perfect sunset. Jealous? Come visit. :)

The day before she left, we were talking on the phone with her boys. I teased Moo, her 4 year old, saying that I was thinking about keeping her forever. He replied that I could keep her for one more week. What a sweetheart! I wish I could keep her forever. It was so fun to show her around my city and to just have someone to laugh and enjoy my break with. It was perfect.

Looking across the reservoir during our walk home after Manhattanhenge.

1L Done

My last final was last Friday morning, and then I had a last project thing that took place during Monday, Tuesday, and today.

Now it's all over. YAY!

In some ways, it feels like I've always been in law school. In other ways, I can't believe I'm already done with my 1L year. I'm a 2L now! CRAZY! My sister is a big fan of the 2L year, as she likes to refer to it as the "LL year." It's true that I'm going to be participating in some stuff this coming year that she would definitely approve of, so it probably is pretty accurate to call it my LL year.

Now it's summer. You can tell because over the past few days, it has suddenly gotten really hot here. Wait, what? No spring? Yeah, we had just a couple of nice weeks, and now it's Hotsville here. (That's not really encouraging any of you to visit...hmmm...)

So, what are my big summer plans? Since you all have very appropriately not asked, or waited to ask until very recently, paying due deference to my busy, tumultuous schedule, I'll tell you! I have an internship here in the city, so I'll be starting that on June 6th. I'm very excited to be back in an office environment and doing some work that matters. Beyond working, I plan to read, relax, and see some things in New York that I just haven't gotten around to seeing yet (uh, Staten Island, anyone?).

Today, I went down to the New York Public Library (not the one with the lions...I went to a closer branch, but yes, I do occasionally go by the one with the lions, and yes, it's gorgeous) to present my ID and verification of residency so that I could get my library card! I was like an 8-year-old girl, bouncing with excitement for her first library card. The public library system here is massive, and anything they have can just be requested to show up at your local branch for pick up. So convenient! They literally have every book that I have on my gigantic list of books I want to read. When you're in law school, you don't really read for pleasure much because you spend all day reading for school. So whenever I hear or read about a book I want to read, I add it to my big list of books, hoping that some day I'll have a chance to read. After a semester of reading thousands of pages of dense text, I'm looking forward to making as big a dent in my gigantic list as possible.

My library also has a surprisingly cool option to check out books electronically and read them on your iPhone. You just do it all online, and then when your rental is over, the book just disappears and you don't even have to remember to return it! Not that it's hard to return books here, since there are a bazillion branches of the library and I can return my books to any branch, but...

(Bragging? Me?? Sure. There are some fantastic perks to living in a giant city. One is the library. Another is having anything you want delivered day or night. Jealous? Come visit me.)

I'm also hoping to get out of the city for a weekend or two this summer and maybe do some camping with some friends from church. It is so, so beautiful here, and I'm ready to explore!

At the end of the summer, I have a small break between my internship ending and school beginning, and I'm toying with the idea of flying to Utah for a quick visit. It's an expensive time to fly, but I will have a new nephew by then, and I sure do love my nephews...

All in all, I suspect it will be a fantastic couple of months, even if it is a bit of a sauna in this grand city.

Motivation

My very first job was working at a fast food restaurant. (Side note: there is enough material from that job to write not just a blog, but a memoir, I swear...) One of the assistant managers at the restaurant was a guy named Dan. Occasionally, Dan would yell, "Where is my motivation??" And we'd all reply (with varying levels of enthusiasm, depending on what had happened so far that day), "Go, Dan, go!"

I'm working here on a really, really unpleasant project, and all I want to do is sleep and go to the park and watch TV and sleep some more. That memory from my first job keeps popping into my head, and I sigh to myself, as Dan did periodically, "Where is my motivation??"

I seem to have run out of motivation from this long, long semester. I think I need a vacation to recharge. Or maybe just some Timbits. Or both. Who wants to come visit me?? 

Such A Waste

Ever since I moved to NYC, I've been totally fascinated by the various people that one passes in the subway stations. There are many people, and I have many favorites that I don't have time to talk about today.

The one that's on my mind lately is a pretty big group of people, but there are just a handful of women that I see more than the others. I like to refer to them as the "Holy-God-Will-Bring-Judgment-Day Ladies" since they all have big signs that say "Holy God Will Bring Judgment Day." As long as I've known them, they've been patiently handing out pamphlets in the subway stations letting everyone know that Judgment Day is upon us, arriving on May 21st. They are 100% sure that this Saturday will be the end of the world. Well, not technically. They say all of the very righteous will be sucked up into heaven this Saturday, then there will be a massive earthquake that will shake the whole earth, and then over the next five months, everyone who is left will be destroyed as the world and universe are demolished, ending some time in October in the total annihilation of everything.  Their method of arriving at this date is quite complex, but they're quite certain, and totally not shaken by the verse in the bible that talks about no man knowing the day.

Anyway, I have to say, Saturday is a REALLY bad day for the world to end for me. I mean, come on. If the world is going to end, couldn't that happen BEFORE I spend two weeks taking finals instead of the day AFTER I finish?

Final number three tomorrow, final number four on Friday. Almost there!

Strangely Disappointed

I saw a headline to a New York Times article today called "A Disputed Surgery Helped Colon's Comeback."

When I clicked on the link, I found out it was about a person named Colon, not someone's colon having a comeback because of a disputed surgery. I was instantly less fascinated by this crazy headline, once I discovered that it was not, in fact, crazy at all.

The Finals Countdown

*cue the music*

Yep, folks, it's that time once again! FINALS!! I always tell people that finals are the victory lap after the big semester of learning. This semester, I'm very excited for my classes to end. I had one class where I didn't care for the subject (but was required to take it), a class where I didn't care for the professor, a class with a ton of assigned reading, and a lot of other things going on.

But now, the end is here! Classes ended last week, and I've been hunkered down in my apartment, doing my best to study. My first final is tomorrow (2:00 pm EDT, for those of you who pray/think nice thoughts/cross fingers). My second final is Friday morning. Then I have the weekend to prepare for my next final, on Tuesday, and then two days to prepare for my last final, Friday morning. Then I will be DONE with my first year of law school. I can't believe it! It feels like I have a lot to do before it's all done, so I'll still be pretty busy over the next few days. Both of my exams this week are closed book, which is rough for law school, and having the two of them right in a row is a bit overwhelming, but it'll be over in a few days!

I was just doing some reading when my textbook for the course with the exam tomorrow dove off my couch, into the trashcan. I think this is a sign. Time to stop studying. :) Or time to take out the trash. One or the other.

Law School Tidbit: Contracts II

We were reading a case in Contracts about the broken levees in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. The plaintiffs in the case were suing their insurance companies, who refused to cover the losses because "flooding" was excluded. The reasoning is kind of long, so I won't bore you with it, but the bottom line is that the levy breaking counted as flooding, so the people lost the case.

Professor: What's your remedy? Well, it's not law; it's Brad Pitt. Life's not all bad.

Law School Tidbit: Criminal Law

Early in the semester, after having a student give the facts of a case, the professor notes what he thought was missing:


 “You left out the most important fact of the case: everyone was really drunk. For most of our cases, you can just take that as a given background fact.”

And that has turned out to be so true.

Law School Tidbit: Contracts

I'll be pretty busy for the next month preparing for and taking my finals for this semester. (Side note: yippee!! Almost done with these classes!)

I don't want to leave you all alone for that time, so I'll occasionally try to write something funny that I discover in my notes as I'm outlining in my exam prep. (In classes, I tend to write occasional funny things that happen or that my professors say down in my notes just along with the rest of the content. It makes for a delightful outlining process as I get to uncover all of these gems!)

Today's gem is from my Contracts professor, right at the beginning of the semester, when we were reviewing the midterm exam he gave us in December. After the professor finished the review, he said:

"Have I upset you? Have I been rude? Not sensitive enough? Of course I have. I’m all of those things and more."

We laughed really hard because he has a dark, dry sense of humor, but he is nowhere near being our rudest, most upsetting professor. (I won't be blogging about that one. You just don't need to experience that!)

More to come over the next few weeks, if I have time...

Well, Sure

I just saw a random commercial while I was eating dinner.

It was about some prescription medication...I don't remember what the purpose of the medication is, but in a discussion about side effects, the commercial mentioned that when taking the medication, you should use caution when "doing unsafe tasks."

Uh, shouldn't you ALWAYS use caution when doing unsafe tasks? And why are people out doing unsafe tasks? And where are their parents??

Weighty Matters

Since it's spring break next week, and since this break falls very, very close to the end of the semester (only seven days of class once we get back before it's time for finals), I needed to bring all of my textbooks home for the break. I am disinclined to go down to the school when I'm not in classes, and the building will be closed for most of the break, but I really do need to study, so I sadly determined that I would need to have all of my books at home for the break.

Holy cow, there is a reason I don't bring them home more often! Wednesday, I brought home a book for a class that was done for the week. Thursday, another book came home, and then Friday, I had to bring two more home. I was meeting company for lunch after school, and it was like walking to a restaurant carrying an elephant.

Looking forward to the end of this semester so I can try to sell all of these heavy, heavy books!

I'm also thinking that I have shrunk an inch or so carrying around all these books. It's not like I had an inch to spare, so it is a substantial loss.

Auction

My school, like many law schools, holds an auction each year to raise money for students who will be working unpaid in the public sector during the upcoming summer.

At my school, to get one of these stipends, you have to jump through a few hoops. One of the hoops I had to jump through this year was to help with the auction itself. I was assigned to work in the room with the actual goods that had been donated and then purchased during the course of the evening. Some of the items had been displayed on tables during the night, and then were brought down to the room where I was working to be checked off and then processed through to the winning bidder. I ended up working with the chair of the inventory committee (that's right--it's a whole committee--this shindig was HUGE) on keeping things running smoothly, primarily by making sure all items were present and accounted for by checking a large database on my laptop with what was physically present in the large room.

Each lot number was taped along the front of a table (in a series of many tables - hundreds of items here), and when the items were brought to the room, they had to be put in their appropriate lot. Some lots consisted of many items, like dinner gift certificates and Broadway tickets.

There were some items that I couldn't account for, and eventually, someone found a stack of items that hadn't been brought down with the rest of them. I was missing a few items from different lots, and I had people running around searching for them and reuniting them with their lots.

I sent a runner to find me a set of Broadway tickets for one lot where the rest of the items had already been located.

Her: What play?
Me: "Anything Goes"
Her: Okay.

And off she went. I continued to search, direct, and reunite lost goods with their rightful lots in time to be ready for the winning bidders to pick up. Five or ten minutes later, she returned.

Her: What is 508 missing again?
Me: Broadway tickets. "Anything Goes"
Her: Okay. But what play?
Me: "Anything Goes"
Her: (puzzled pause) But, just...anything? What?
Me: "Anything Goes" is the show. I need you to find the tickets to the show "Anything Goes."
Her: OH! I thought you just wanted to find me any Broadway tickets and I couldn't decide which ones you wanted.
Me: (suddenly concerned about what else we had Broadway tickets to that were rolling around still...and suddenly feeling like I had been in some sort of Abbot and Costello thing)

All in all, it was a very successful auction! We had many generous alumni and community members attend our auction to help us work in Public Interest jobs this summer. And I got home by 10, which is all I ask on a school night. (I know--I'm an old woman.)

So many of my friends will be working in a wide variety of public interest jobs this summer. Most of these organizations rely on help from law students, yet cannot afford to pay them at all, due to extremely limited funding. We're so blessed to be at a school that supports our ambitions and helps to fund us in working toward what really matters!

Don't Ask

As a courtesy to people everywhere, I wanted to publish this quick list of things that you shouldn't ask people.

• "So, do you have a job lined up yet?"
• "Are you dating anyone special?"
• (When someone is dating) "When are you two going to get married?"
• (When people are married) "When are you going to finally have a baby?"
• "How much does your job pay?"
• "How much does your apartment cost?"
• "What are your grades like?"

You guys have any other annoying questions to add to the list?

Busy Busy Busy

Things here have been pretty busy. My birthday came and went, lots of applying for internships, lots of planning for next year, lots and lots of reading, lots of studying, lots of organizing notes, lots of feeling tired, lots of needing a vacation...

But a vacation I will get! Next week is spring break, so I just have to survive one more week of classes and then I'll have a much-needed rest. After spring break, I only have a few days of classes left, and then it will be time for finals.

I can't believe my first year of law school is coming to an end. In some ways, if feels like I've been a law student forever. In other ways, it feels like I just started. But here I am--almost 1/3 done with law school! It has certainly been an adventure.

I've definitely turned into a nerd in new ways that I never thought possible. When I watch TV now, I see torts, I analyze defenses to crimes I watch people commit (both at common law and under the Model Penal Code, which makes me even nerdier), I consider constitutional questions, and all kinds of new nerdy things. I am more analytical in my arguing, more precise in my language, and more thorough in considering all positions in a conflict.

But fortunately, even though I'm nerdier, I haven't lost the fight that brought me to law school. Each new case isn't just a story--they're real people, and I still feel for each of them. This does make my case reading exhausting at times, but it's all part of the journey.

All in all, it has been a good year. It has been difficult, but good. I'm looking forward to this summer and then next year. I get to select my own courses in my 2L year, and I'm already considering what all I want to take. This is another area where I get to demonstrate my incredible nerdiness--the classes that I'm excited about taking are so, so nerdy. But I'm excited. It's going to be another great year.

Now to survive the next month...

Scary

I am in the process of outlining, which is where you sit for a long time, re-reading all of your notes and thoughts and distilling them into a shorter format for exam-taking purposes. In the case of the outline I'm working on right now, the exam is actually closed book, so I'm really creating it for memorization purposes in preparation for exam taking, but the process in the same.

I found a questionable line in my notes from early February: "Original jurisdiction is blah blah blah, appellate jurisdiction extends to all other cases."

Even scarier? I know exactly what that "blah blah blah" means. Apparently, I just take notes in code now.

Cool

One weird thing about being a law student is that you start to become really uncool. In conversations with my mom, for example, I've been known to say things like, "So I'm reading along, and then Justice Scalia quotes Justice Brennan and talks about how much he likes Brennan's decision, and my head exploded."

Not cool or interesting to anyone but law students...but that doesn't stop us. Here are some funny things that my professors have said this semester that probably aren't funny to you, just for more examples:

• The Framers, famous for their foresight, failed to plan for the invention of the airplane. Huge hole in the document…
• Wait, Mr. Justice, you’re a strict textualist!
• Mistake? A HUGE mistake! But not a legal mistake.
• You never have to guess. You can always read the statute! In this class, and in life.
• Unfortunately, you have to learn something every day you come to criminal law class, whether you like it or not.
• Of course, it was supposed to be a government of enumerated powers, but maybe that just didn't work out.
• Your client is going to be a man named Edward Scissorhands. And as you might guess from his name, he has scissor hands.

See? Not that funny to you. But we laugh and laugh and laugh.

We're all pretty lame.

I'm not sure I'll ever be cool again.

Then again, I wasn't really cool before, so it's not a huge loss.

Ides

I know, I know: it's been a while. I've been busy. I may or may not catch you up on what I've been doing. We'll see. One of the things I've been busy doing is writing an appellate brief for my legal writing course. I would post the paper here in all its glory for you to read, but really, you probably wouldn't appreciate it. And it's long. So go ahead and just assume it was awesome. I'm sure that's what the professor decided to do with it as well.

I just wanted to take a moment to say a quick hello to my Grandma Seaver, who celebrates her birthday today. Not a day over 50, I'm sure.

Anyway, I am a poor student, so I didn't get my Grandma anything, but recently, she got me something, and I haven't had a chance to tell you all about it yet.

It's....

a......

CART! That's right, folks. A wonderful, wheeled cart that I can use to go to the grocery store, laundromat, or just take out for a walk because it's awesome. She even got me a little liner bag to go in it. It's pretty fantastic, and now I fit in with all of the other New Yorkers who are carting their goods from place to place.

A big thanks to my sweet grandma, and happy birthday!