Exams and taxes

I’m only 15 days late. I thought I might owe. I was right. That’s not really why I waited, but it sure didn’t provide any increased motivation to file early. So Civil Procedure took a back seat to taxes tonight. Something about the first of May got me scared. Now for the question of the hour: How the heck does my taxable income increase during my first year of full time school????? And the answer is: with a 20 hour per week cap on hours, I worked really hard between January and August to try to cushion myself. Result? Not worth it. Just in case anyone is thinking of trying it now to cushion for next year, I don’t recommend it. So….moving on.

Civil Procedure final tomorrow morning. I am ready. My outline is in fine shape and I spent several hours studying and reviewing. I will be bringing the text, the rules, and the outline with me. The text is a sign that I am not really comfortable. If I need it, it is there. Let’s pray I don’t. I hope my readers have a lovely day. I’ll be back tomorrow.

spring

It was a beautiful weekend. It was so hard to stay inside and study, but I managed to put in a ten hour day both days. Property is coming along just fine.  I am currently in the process of re-reading the entire text. This is where I am grateful for the ability to read fast. Those minor details are easier to pick up the second time around. I’ll be back tomorrow night with the last property update. The exam is Tuesday. Wish me luck.

Property Exam Prep

Lesson of the day: Remember IRAC. If there is one class this semester where IRAC is going to make or break me, property is it. I took a sample exam and managed to hit most of the issues, but my answer organization was not satisfactory.  The real trick to this is to form the best answer, because everyone knows the material as well or better than I do. It is a closed book exam, and taking my time to construct the answer before I start writing could make a big difference. I’m off to do some memorizing on the property material and then moving on to Civ Pro. But over the next few days, my efforts on property need to involve writing answers so the form comes natural to me. I – R – A – C plus a few case names and I should be in good shape. Good luck studying.

Housework wins

Today was the first day of no class, the first day available to study for these exams, and instead I decided to clean my house. The temptation was overwhelming. I pulled out all the summer clothes, opened all the windows, dusted, cleaned closets, took all the winter bedlinens to the laundrymat and packed them away, and on and on it went. I literally just sat down, shortly after 10 PM. But it’s done and I feel good about it. That leaves me free to work on law school for the rest of the weekend. I hope everyone had an enjoyable day and found some time for sunshine. OH YES – I also cleaned my car inside and out, which made me a very happy woman. The sun was good for me. See you tomorrow.

The final 2 weeks of 1L!

Two weeks from today, I will be officially done with my first year of law school! How cool is that? I keep a real journal and for the past two days I have refrained from any self-criticism. It is nothing short of a miracle that I have come this far. I am grateful for the opportunity, satisfied that I will retain my scholarship, and proud of myself for pulling this off. Classes are over and I am free to move on, although there are review sessions scheduled for the rest of this week.

Tonight – the memo, which I believe should get me a much better grade than the first draft. It is edited and there are no errors in punctuation, citations, etc. And I do mean zero. There are no point headings hanging at the bottom of the page, and all the formatting is perfect. I am pleased with it, although I am confident the final grade for the semester will reflect my earlier errors. I am at peace with everything for today. The paper will be turned in tomorrow and it really will be a relief. I hope all my readers have  a lovely day.

1L Summer work

I am so happy with my job. I spent about an hour there and I am convinced it is a perfect fit. I will start work the day after Memorial Day. I also learned all about confidentiality and other practice rules today, and that will place serious constraints on how much blogging I am able to do. But I am allowed to give general information that would be available to any member of the public, so I can tell you about the job itself. I am going to work in Community Court where individuals who have been accused of minor criminal offenses and quality of life crimes can enter a conditional guilty plea, serve a sentence based on a concept of restorative justice, and have a clean record after they complete the requirements imposed by the court. Special programs include a supervised community service work crew, a program designed to move women out of prostitution and into paying employment and new neighborhoods, a program designed for truants where they are “scared straight” back into school,  and arrangements with social service organizations providing drug treatment, anger management, and other rehabilitative type services. My job duties will be varied as I work with the administrator of this court. I will be in court two days per week. The other days will be assorted paperwork and — get this! I will be allowed to observe portions of a murder trial or other high profile trial. I was surprised to hear that and very much looking forward to the opportunity. Basically, as summer jobs go, I feel quite lucky. I hope all my readers have a great day. I will be back tomorrow with an update on the memo and exam prep.

Memo-ing

Yes, it’s a verb. I am now on page 19 of the revised memo, with one more to go. Within the hour, I will have it written. But that will not be the end of it . . . oh no! Look at those elipses <– ! They are perfect. The ALWD Citation Manual says so. 540 pages of legal writing rules including appendices 1-8. Who knew? I pray the adjustment to Bluebook isn’t that difficult because that is what is needed for law review, or so I understand. My draft was littered with ALWD rules when it came back from the prof. Who knew there was a special rule that says when the same page of the same case is being discussed in the same paragraph it is not necessary to use Id. Who knew? Not me. Do I care? Yes. Do I want to care? No. I want to cry. I am not a detail person. I don’t care if the underlining carries through the comma or ends before it. Except I do care and I need to get it right. If only I was a detail oriented person this would all be fine. But I’m not. So I need to print out this 20 page paper when I’m done with it and spend a solid day checking every cite and every punctuation mark and every idea for validity.  I need to mark it all up. And then I need to very carefully get back on my computer and fix all the errors. Oh yes, I know they are there. But my client is free, because my ideas are good and my argument is solid. Prof. says . . . if the judge sees errors, he will not be persuaded by my fine arguments. He will assume I am a careless clod. Actually, he wrote “You have some good ideas. Be more careful of formatting, citations, + wordings  – all can work against you even though none directly relate to your argument.” So, I am memo-ing. And because this is my blog, I can make up that word and punctuate it any way I like. So there. Seriously, I want the high grade on this memo, and that is going to take some serious doing. Wish me luck.

Contracts . . .

Yes, I’m still on contracts. Worked on it all day from 9 to almost 7, and now I am on my way out for the evening! I won tickets to a local production on my way to school the other day, so my honey and I are taking the night to ourselves. Sort of. I said no to dinner so I could spend more time on contracts. One might think I was having a love affair, but NO. So…I need to go. Have  a lovely Sunday.

Uber Productive Holiday

Sweet. I got so much done I could sing! NO – You would not want to hear me do that. I have completed every last page of reading for Property. Yes, for the remainder of the semester. Plus I completely finished my outline for the class. All I need to add is whatever I get out of the next few lectures. It is a closed book exam, but it seems like a simple matter of IRAC approach here, a pure issue spotter where knowledge of the black letter law is going to get me somewhere. This is, of course, in direct contrast to Contracts where the black letter law is not black and the Prof. has no interest in seeing conclusions. Anyway…Property is in good shape. I got my grade back on my memo (draft 1). It is not the high grade, but it is high enough for me. I need to ace the rewrite while changing it into an appellate format from a memo in support of a motion. I started this project over the weekend but felt I was lacking direction so I will wait to speak with the Prof. tomorrow before I do anything else with it.  On tonights agenda is Civ Pro. The week overall will need to be divided between Civ Pro, Contracts, and the memo. Not exactly how I had planned things, but it is what it is. (I have a friend who hates when I say that, but it is true.) So…this is the last full week of classes. Next week we have a few makeup classes for those that were cancelled due to snow. I have an interview Wednesday, and hope that I don’t need the job. But seeing as I don’t have an actual assignment yet, I need to plan. This would be for a volunteer position working with crime victims. I really do believe that everything works out exactly as God intends it to be, so I have let go some of my angst over this summer job thing. The most important thing right now is to ace these exams, because my scholarship really is riding on my performance. Top half or call it over.  While I want to say I am 100% confident that is easy to achieve, it is not.  Nothing in life is free. So….I need to go get busy. Have a lovely evening. I hope you accomplish whatever it is you need to do. See you tomorrow.

Law school mom all at once

Murphy’s Law has entered my world at the most inconvenient of times, as is usually the case. Next week is going to be the week from hell.  I think public schools should have many fewer vacations and days off and get longer summer vacations instead. So…the children are home for a week. On its own, that was not a problem. But – the normal childcare provider is going to Florida????? Now?????? This is not good. This is my last week of school. I have exams to prepare for. I have hours of studying to do. I need to be in school every day and I can not take a vacation. I can’t even take one mommy day to be honest with you. No. I am not happy, and no, this is not ok. So I have spent half my afternoon and evening on the phone with family members trying hard to work out child care for the entire week. Sleepovers out of town, etc. It is a nightmare. Yup. A nightmare. And you know what? It is going to be fine. One way or another it will all work out and this worst case scenario will not entirely derail me from the business of finishing the 1L year. I could be in much worse situations. But I still feel entitled to be mad about it for a day or two.

Lest the children start to think I just hate the idea of having them home, I made it a point to spend some time with them tonight and also to invite each of them to plan their own day out with mom for the first week after school gets out. I always love those day’s out and can’t wait to hear their selections. Well, that sums up my day. Tomorrow is the last day of a short week. I can’t wait. The boys will be spending Easter with their dad and my daughter is not coming home for the holiday, so I will be devoting my weekend to exam prep. I will be spending more time with property tonight. But come Friday, I need to move on to contracts for real. I also need to revise my memo. So that’s it for tonight. I’ll be back tomorrow with an update.