The Update...Halfway Home

Halfway home...halfway through law school at large and halfway through this second year. Hard to believe but at the same point I am so ready to start making money instead of taking out loans. I'm sure work will not be great or anything, but it should be better than school. Regardless, let's get caught up from November.

The OSU-UM game was amazing. That's all there is to it. My first game in 2001 was fantastic beating UM up in Ann Arbor unexpectedly, but this was so much better with the national championship game and an outright Big Ten title on the line. Nobody would have guessed the offensive explosion that happened, but the game was really not as close as a field goal. It felt exactly like the Iowa road game being there in person (a little uncomfortable at times, but always felt like we had the upper hand)...the main difference was against Iowa we did not lose the turnover battle 0-3. I pretty much crowned us right then and there, as I am pretty sure had we played playoff games the next 3 weeks or the title game itself we would have easily rolled on to victory. Unfortunately, we had a 51 day wait...

School was so busy the last weeks of November and early December, between finals coming up and one last 2006 JDR assignment and other stuff. We lost in the first round of the bowling playoffs, which were only 8 teams instead of the usual 16. Still making the top 2 in a division of 8 was something. Abbie deserted the team and we've been jokingly calling her Judas ever since. Well at least I'm joking :-) Nevertheless, we added Kelley to the team and will go on as MFR Minus Judas.

Did nothing amazing for Thanksgiving. Onto exams all of a sudden, but Guy and Everson joined me for a tax study group 5-6 times before the exam. We all probably killed that exam as I think I busted the multiple choice only missing 1-2 in all likelihood and we had an answer written for the policy question the night before the exam. So that one went well. As exam season went on, my preparation (and how I felt walking out of the exam) got worse and worse. It's hard to care too much about anything law school with a job in my back pocket, but I still cannot blow it off in case the job doesn't work out. My look on law school is definitely more relaxed than most everyone around me (as Guy reminds me of every time I see him). You cannot take anything too seriously in law school or else it woul drive you crazy. Bad enough as it is.

So Fed Tax went very well as I said. Patent Law was absurdly straightforward, so hopefully Mescher keeps his word about not grading on a curve. If he curves it is hard to tell where I will end up as everyone I know thought that one was easy. Copyright Law took me too much time and I do not think I fully fleshed out the issues in the big essay enough, but the exam was not hard. Accounting For Lawyers was a very hard exam. It wa smore of a Business Associations plus Tax plus Accounting exam, and I rocked the tax and accounting parts but not the BA. Everyone did poorly in there though, so another crapshoot just like Property was (and that was my highest grade last year). Although you have to compete against 3L's this year, they don't care even more than we don't care and it's nice not being in my section anymore which was brutal. We'll see how the grades come out, as they should start popping up soon. I'm actually surprised some aren't up already. Guess they wanted us to have a nice 3 day weekend.

Speaking of grades, I have to bitch about this. This year Moritz switched wholesale from a 7 point scale to a 10 point scale. There will be the same distribution or curve of A's, B's, and C's, but the numerical grades on the whole just get lower. So an 80 was a very low C (essentially bottom of the class) last year and this year it is a B- (above 25 percent of the class). So now we have two completely different grading systems and will have to explain how a 91 first year was a B but a 91 second or third year is an A (minus). What bullshit. Why could we not grandfather this in? I'm all about a 10 point scale to clarify how you did and spread the distribution to separate people in the class better...but not after one year of a 7 point scale which gets averaged against 2L and 3L grades. It's just dumb.

First semester of 1L I did not know what to expect, but second semester I was right on with my grade predictions. Based on how I felt about these exams, I would have to guess Tax will be a mid-high A, Patent will be a low-mid A, Copyright will be a middle B, and Accounting could be anywhere but I'll guess A-/B+. Hopefully I'll keep the no-C streak going. I cannot guess Appellate Advocacy (although I thought I was definitely in the top 1-2 out of my 14 person adjunct section after getting my final draft back and my good oral argument critique) because I already know. That's another topic though.

The next to last week of school we had a meeting explaining the Herman Competition to us, which is basically our school's big Moot Court competition (and we all know if there's one ting employers say they value other than grades, it's law journal and moot court). The top 5 in every app ad section get to participate if they want, but the first week of class there are open arguments for anyone else to try and get in the competition. There's also a selection round the first week for the top student in each app ad section to compete for 4 spots on Moritz's intramural traveling moot court teams. Well I got the top grade in my section and had to reprep my argument from app ad for the second day of school. It was Professor Beazley (who I knew from Legal Writing's oral argument was a tough judge) and Professor Tokaji (who teaches 14th Amendment and whose pet case of 2006 was our Seattle Schools equal protection case), so I knew I was in for some tough questions. Time flies when you answer questions the whole time, and I really never brought the good facts of the case out. In fact I never looked down as I was always engaging the two judges in answering or listening to questions. Maybe technically my oral argument was fine but I felt terrible because substantively I did the worst I have done ever in an oral argument. Nevertheless, I unexpectedly got an email Thursday night saying I got first out of all the arguers Tuesday night. This means I got my choice of traveling team spot and I do not have to compete in Herman. That is SO NICE! I also get second choice for whatever traveling team I want for 3L year (behind the one winner of Herman out of the I'm guessing 60-80 competitors). I've got plenty of time, but I'm torn between doing one of the big national teams next year or IP. For this year, I get to be on the Constitutional Law team. I really cannot believe all of this, but I'm happy I won the appellate advocacy race as it turns out.

Christmas break was very relaxing and I needed that. We did 3 quick days in Marietta area with all the family and no big blow ups happened (although we did get the guilt trip from everyone in some respect when we left). Got back up to Columbus and spent an uneventful Christmas together with Kelley. The big gifts we got (counting the post-loan money purchases) were bowling balls for each other, a Nintendo Wii for me, and a NICE digital camera for her. I'm so happy to have a pretty spare ball to go with my old standby purple Jaguar ball I've had isnce high school, and the few times in December we bowled I did very well. It's a Cincinnati Reds Vis-A-Ball if you want to look it up. After all, I'm going to be living in Cincy and that's the only pro team I like there. Kelley got a black and red ball that smells like cherries (yes it's supposed to smell like that). Her game has been rather inconsistent as she gets used to a slightly heavier ball and a better ball than her old Wal-Mart 10 pounder. I'm sure it will do wonders in the long run for her game as the Jaguar ball did for me in high school. The Nintendo Wii was bought in December because Tom talked me into staying out all night with him when the second big release of them happened. After driving for an hour and a half around Columbus, we found one store on the SW side of town which did not have a shitton of people waiting outside. It was a long cold night, but we had a 24 hour Kroger and a good group of 5 other people to wait with. The Wii itself should have kept the code name Revolution, because that's what it is. EVERY SINGLE PERSON (counting grandparents and people who hate video games) who has tried the Wii loves playing it, and I really think Nintendo may have a chance of not only competing with the Xbox 360 and PS3...but perhaps beat them in sales. It was crazy to think that before the system came out, but the control system is so much more entertaining and intuitive than the button pushers we grew up with. I have Wii Sports, Madden 07, and Zelda Twilight Princess and all are breathtaking. In the next 3 months we have already pre-bought Wario Ware Smooth Moves, Wii Play, and Mario Party 8. It will be a great year to have this system as it is still in short supply and everyone I know loves to play it. The digital camera is absurdly nice, like 10 megapixels and changeable lenses and it's really a dream of Kelley's. I'm so happy that she is excited to bowl with us and her new bowling ball, take awesome pictures, and play the new Nintendo with me. All purchases were well worth it.

The remainder of Xmas break, we finally got out wedding thank yous because I was so sick of them and Kelley obviously was not of a mind to do them ever. I also got my extended card collection ready for Ebay (probably this weekend), prepped for Extended season with the guys, ignored my JDR note, worked with Shipman, and wrote 4 articles for SCS bowl season. Enough to keep me plenty busy. Got the final two assignments done for Shipman and will now be his legal writing TA, which means I will be helping 7 young 1L's learn how to write like a lawyer. Hooray. We also had the first extended PTQ of the season, and since I'm only going to 3 by my plan...I intend to enjoy every one. I played the right deck which was very popular in Cleveland but went 2-2 disappointgly running into 3 mirror matches. 4 people running the deck (including our teammate Dan) made the top 8, so that made it a little more disappointing. Couldn't be too upset as Burton and Tom did terrible with me and I had other things to do in Cleveland actually. We got together with Thomas and Lisa finally and went out to a great dinner and heavenly ice cream and good times with our Wii. The place we got dinner brews its own beer and has a deal where you pay 100-120 dollars and get 70 big bottles of your own creation to drink and keep. We'll have to try that. We hope to go on a nice weekend trip with them this summer.

The other big thing over break was our new year's party, which did not really happen as planned. Tom and Heather cancelled at the last minute after being too tired flying back from Germany (whatever, I expected this one), Shep and Marissa cancelled because Marissa got throw-up sick the day of, and Lisa and Thomas cancelled because Thomas spent that whole weekend in the hospital. Very frustrating, but we still had Zach and Sarah as well as Brodie and Sarah Miller over. Made too much food for all of us, but I just had to have no-bake cookies, chex mix, and cucumber sandwiches. Played poker (which since I suck in real life now apparently, I lost again), blackjack, roulette, Wii, and Rage. Not as good as if we had 10-12, but still a fun time.

The first week back was HECTIC. Not only did class start up again, but Monday night was the championship game party at Villa's, Tuesday night was Herman selection argument and watching House with Tom and Heather and Burton and Leah's place, Wednesday was bowling, and my first draft of my JDR note had to be completely written in 2 days (15 pages minimum). Yuck. The championship party was fun, but watching the game was not. It really has been a bad week in Columbus as the Blue Jackets have lost 4 in a row, the basketball Buckeyes barely went 1-1, and the football team got thoroughly embarrassed by Florida just like they did in basketball a month ago. I've only seen a Jim Tressel team get embarrassed once in my life and I had the displeasure of attending that game live (30 point loss at Iowa in 2004), so I was very happy we did not pay big money to get tickets to Glendale. Not only did Florida hold the best offense in the country to 85 yards total, Jim Tressel got out-coached and looked silly out there. It has been a long week and will be a long offseason because the Buckeyes are not bringing back conference title talent, let alone national title talent. I'm not nearly as depressed and upset as everyone else in town seems to be, but it's not like I'm going to forget this one anytime soon (going to Iowa was so satisfying this year because it sort of erased the 2004 memories). Bye bye Troy Smith, Ted Ginn Jr, Anthony Gonzalez, Antonio Pittman, and my personal favorite senior Quinn Pitcock. On the bright side, Michigan and Notre Dame got their butts whipped too in BCS bowl games and Iowa almost beat heavily favored Texas...so that makes me happy. And we did win a 7th Heisman Trophy and our 5th Michigan game in 6 seasons and a 2nd straight Big Ten title.

I swear I'm going to make a T-shirt that on the front says "MICHIGAN, Rose Bowl Greatness 2004, 2005, 2007..." and on the back shows the scores of those three games and says "...Three-Straight Ass Whoopins!" Honestly Michigan, can you please stop embarrasing the conference in the Rose Bowl?

House is seriously one of the best shows on television right now. And come to think of it, TV seems better than it has been in recent years, especially on Fox. Standoff, the Office, American Idol, Survivor, etc. is all watchable. My three shows are Lost, 24, and House. House has had an amazing story in this season and it will be interesting to see where they go with the second half of the season with a new major storyline. Lost is having a great third season as well, and the wait until mid-February for new episodes is excruciating. 24 finally comes back tomorrow night for Season 6, and if you have not watched 24 before please please please tune in this weekend (8-10 Sunday and Monday). Kelley and I watched the beginning of season 5 last MLK day weekend and never looked back as we bought all the previous seasons on DVD and watched them to catch up over the summer. The writing and suspense is very good, definitely one of the best shows on television.

First week of bowling was not great, but not a complete loss. Our division is all I could ask for, as we have a good 3L team that always does well (Bring Back Clovis), Brian Smith's team, Abbie's new team, and Bart/Christie's team. We bowled against Clovis for the first week and thank God we got that out of the way as they beat the everloving shit out of us. We went 0-3 also because they beat us consistently (by 27 the first game after handicap and by 26 the second game, by 150 pins scratch both games). The 2 out of 3 seasons we made the playoffs, we started 2-7 both times though so it's OK. And our handicaps are set nice and low compared to where I expect the team will be. I amazingly did not mark the first eight frames (possibly the longest streak of futility I have had in years) and had a 68 through 8...but then I got a spare in the ninth and 29 in the tenth to finish strong at 117. I had it going in the second game getting a 175 fairly easily. I like that I recovered the bad start, but I hope this week is not a sign of going back to inconcsistency. I am so much better when my scores are consistent. Nevertheless, the averages we carry will help as they are a little lower than last season.

ME: 146 average, 154 last season
BRODIE: 129 average, 133 last season (and 140 last year)
KELLEY: 100 average, 110 last season when she subbed for us
DANIEL: 77 average, 94 last season.

With a 16 team playoff again, I think we can get in since we have our tough week out of the way. Thank God bowling is back :-)

The JDR note (note is such an inappropriate word for a 25-30 page scholarly paper, but when compared to the 100 page behemoths professors and experts write for JDR and we edit...I guess note is OK) should not have been ignored as longas I did, but all my friends were in the same boat. I don't care for my journal...I mean I'm happy to be a part of such a great journal but I really don't care about ADR itself. Having to write a lengthy paper about ADR is murder...I don't want to research and I don't want to write. But I somehow came up with a nice 11 pages fully footnoted and 4 pages of BS I'll have to rewrite and redevelop for the next draft. At least I got it in on time. It would be nice to get published after all this work, but I don't care if it doesn't happen. I wonder if I will be as cynical about moot court next year as I am about journal, but writing briefs and doing oral arguments is a whole hell of a lot more fun than acc-checking, preparing bibliographies, and writing scholarly articles. So I'm guessing no.

The new classes seem better than last semester. In retrospect last semester turned out poorly as Accounting was a waste (Shipman can only teach BA in my opinion), Patent was terrible to sit through (professor was awful), Copyright's rules were irritating, and Tax was awful. Other than Lee the professors were not good last semester. All my professors this semester seem much better. Oesterle is the only full-time conservative professor in the law school, and BA should be good with him. Evidence has very entertaining cases and Simmons is engaging. Trademark with Lee should be as good or better than Copyright was. State Consitutional Law seminar seems awesome too and I'll be done with the writing and presentation for that class by beginning of March (Judge Sutton is a nice change from normal professors too). My three bigger classes all have what I call powerpoint professors, which makes taking notes so much easier. I have enjoyed Civ Pro with Fairman, Legislation with Colker, and Copyright with Lee so much more than I would have had they not been powerpoint professors. Should be a good semester, even if the classes are not tailored for me [Accounting and Tax are full of math, Copyright and Patent are my beloved IP].

So between four classes, moot court traveling team, JDR, and extracurriculars I will be very busy this semester. March will be a good month as the 9-10 weekend I'll be in DC doing national moot court competition, the March 3 weekend is Tom's bachelor party, March 17 weekend is Tom and Heather's wedding (which Kelley is playing piano for and I am best man), and March 31 is Kelley's birthday and law school prom, the Barrister's Ball. AND March Madness! What a fantastic month!

Well I've updated my blog now. I know some of you thought Moritz Trek was dead, but hopefully it is not. And hopefully I at least get on here weekly to update the musings of law school. One final note of interest from the first week of school...

So there was this douchy guy who wasn't in my 1L section but was in my App Ad...let's just say he was an interesting character. His name was Adam. We come back to school in January, and now this person's name is Alice. Yeah...so now all of us in law school get to experience a co-worker getting a sex change first hand. Knowing the gossip of law school, it only took about half a day for word to get around. I hear from my good buddy Joe Siefert who asked Alice about this situation that the state of Ohio does not recognize sex changes. So she will always be Adam according to them. Just another "backwards" thing in this state that republican people like me think is OK despite being a little 1900. I figure what the hell though, you want to cut the junk off and bring out the feminine side of yourself, it's your life. By far, the most entertaining thing from the first week back. 1 down, 14 to go.