Vacation, or I SURVIVED!

Well after telling everyone I was going to the boondocks of North Carolina and being out of touch with society and the internet for over a week, here I sit in our rented house which has internet. Nice. Anyways, the trip down was quite long because of a short night beforehand, but we made it by around 5 PM and unloaded the four vehicles. There are 11 of us total: Angela, Stephanie and her twin boys, Aunt Hope, Kathy and Bruce, Zach and A.J. his friend, and Kelley and I. Yes, all but A.J. are in-laws. It's funny because Angela was asking Kelley if I could go take a surfing lesson with her and Kelley, knowing this vacation was right after the bar, said "sure if you can get him sober enough to go." Well Angela told her mom Hope and Hope asked Kathy (mother-in-law) about being worried that I have an alcohol problem. Heh. Thankfully not yet, and hopefully never. These vicious rumors...

Speaking of vicious rumors, apparently everybody at Moritz thought I was working all up through the bar exam and just studying in the evenings. Apparently that was the rumor because most of my friends I had not seen all summer asked me about it. Ummm, no. I've been off since June, and it SUCKED for the 3 weeks of overlap. But we are insured now and they are covering the birth in case something happens while we are away from Cincinnati. So that's awesome.

So the doomsday...the bar exam. As it turns out, not so much.

Tuesday morning I roll out of bed and go grab a very light breakfast at the hotel and show up at the Vet around 8:30. I knew being number 1224 would likely be towards the back of the room, but I did not anticipate being the next to last table in the back corner of the entire building. 1207 people took the exam total (numbers went to 1307), and I could see them all because I was on the side of the table facing them. Also right next to proctors so my papers were picked up basically out of my hands every time. Still feeling a bit nervous, we go through tons of instructions and finally it's time to go.

The Ohio essays were first, and the first one was on Criminal Law, specifically defenses and the burden of proof. I sat there kind of stunned for a bit because I could not come up with a defense to 2 of the 3 crims committed. But I remembered necessity in torts and since those subject overlap I just made it up, and turns out that was correct. Beyond that oh crap moment, the morning went very well. The second question was all about privileges in Evidence which are very broad in Ohio and easy to talk about. The next set of two were what I had nightmares about, a Constitutional Law question all on First Amendment and mostly speech and the hardest question of the bar exam coming from Civil Procedure. Still, the speech regulation was all content-based and so that was easy. Nobody knew what the heck to talk about in Civil Procedure, but I feel like I had a better handle than most on the question. The highlight of infamy was whether a Motion to Dismiss for failure to state a claim could be treated as a Rule 56 motion for summary judgment. Eh, didn't study that this past semester. The final two questions were home runs though, a Corporations question limited to duty of care and loyalty and a Real Property question on estates. The last hypo of the session in the Real Property question brought up the Doctrine of Worthier Title, and I came up with the name of the rule out of the darkest reaches of my brain. Thanks Morgan! Anyways, I felt like there were no questions I would score worse than a 3 on, and most likely all were 4's or higher. I took my hand off the pen to rest during the sixth question and my fingers started throbbing so bad and probably swelling, so I immediately put the pressure back on the pen and kept going. Silly bar exam.

After lunch I found out OSU was offering free food at a tent for breakfast and lunch each day and free massages, so I guess I can stop complaining about how lazy they are to not mail diplomas in June. On the power of lunchables for the first time in over a decade (yeah those Lunchables), I go back in there for the Tuesday afternoon session. This session was the MPT, which is a "practical skills" test. Basically you have a 15 page case file and library where all the law you need to know is located and facts from your client, then you have to write a memorandum or a will or jury instructions, etc. What's funny is that this is not practical at all...you are never going to have to pick up a case file and write a damn memo by hand in 90 minutes. But anyways...the first MPT was all about a child custody case and civil procedure jurisdiction laws determining which state can host the case when the parents are in neighboring states. The problem with that one was the second half of the objective memo to write was a SIX PART BALANCING TEST! Let's just say the last two factors got about one sentence and there was no real conclusion, just half a sentence. That's kind of diappointing, but oh well. The second MPT was a fraud case where you had to evaluate a few statements made in the course of an auto repair shop bending a guy over and screwing him for about $2000. That one I got through although it was close. I don't think I did perfectly and I know this was thre part of the test where I was at a big disadvantage compared to faster writers and all the laptop users. It's only worth 13% though.

Tuesday night I grabbed AK and Daniel and we escaped to Quaker Steak and Lube for cheap wing night. I tried the Buckeye BBQ and they are not all that hot. The Cajun wings were good and we talked the bar exam to death before relaxing and talking about lots of other stuff for two hours. It was a blast and we got back to our hotels/houses and hit the sack.

Wednesday morning I was up earlier and went to the OSU tent for breakfast. It was nice to chat with the friends before tackling Day 2. The MBE is all day Wednesday and every state and territory (except Louisiana and Washington) take this 200 multiple choice test on Contracts, Constitutional Law, Criminal Law and Procedure, Torts, Real Property, and Evidence. 100 questions per 3 hours, so you have about 1.8 minutes a question. Unfortunately the first 3-4 questions of my test form in the morning were killer, probably some of the toughest all day. Bad way to start and I had trouble staying on pace for thre first half. The back 50 went better and so the morning was probably average or a little below. The afternoon questions were much easier and I finished with over a half hour left to sit there and nap or do whatever. I certainly was not going back and changing answers, a sure way to failure. The guy who finished with 30 minutes left in the morning finished a little after me in the afternoon and glared at me for the remaining 30 minutes. Dude, sorry I finished before you, don't let it get to your manhood. Anyway, I think I did not improve on my BarBri practice test but I should be good to go. It's hard to really say, and if I were to fail it would probably be the MBE that would be the culprit.

Wednesday afternoon I met Tom on the Park of Roses tennis courts and sweat through my first two sets of the summer. He's usually a little better than me, but he's been in practice and beat me 6-2, 6-1. I was doing respectable but could not win a service game to save my behind. Eventually Kathy and Kelley showed up and we all drove to meet Heather at Applebee's for dinner. That was nice, and it was again time to get another restless night of sleep. This time with Kelley.

Thursday morning I was confident after rocking the first six essays and having my two strongest subjects lefts in Ethics and Wills. Questions 7-8 were an Ethics question where there were 8-9 issues and you could really excel, and then Commercial Transactions which was a mostly Commercial Paper question with some Secured Transactions details thrown in. I'm sure I did OK despite only having about 27 minutes after really espousing on Ethics. The second set included a pretty tough narrow Torts question on wrongful death standards and NIED, and an Agency question that I think I punted a little bit. The final two questions were Wills which I absolutely rocked and Contracts which was only about consideration and exceptions (not even promissory estoppel). So another pretty successful session and I think I've done more than well enough on the 53% alloted to the essays to carry any deficiencies on the MBE and MPT.

So that's it. I survived the bar exam, and I expect good news on October 31 at 7 AM (Trick or Treat bar examinees). We all went out for drinks at Eddie George's after picking up diplomas and that was good fun. Got sloshed there and some more at the in-laws Thursday night. Had a minor headache for not drinking enough water before bed, but not much else. Back to vacation now, but wanted to get that off my chest.