Wow...before you know it I will actually have to think about finals or something. And then the summer. But it's hard to think about the summer when it hurts to walk outside. Nice arctic weather we are having, and even I must complain. We've got to get back into the 20's during the day. On the bright side, I did not see any beggers on high street today. If you are out in this weather you deserve money.
Oesterle's class today was great to kick off the week of classes. He described why the double-tax system the US imposes on corporations and their investors is just plain nuts. After taking tax myself, I have to say he is correct. If you want to tax the wealthy it would be much simpler to just do it directly on personal income taxes with obsenely high marginal rates for the top income brackets. He then opened the floor for people to challenge him and defend the US system. The kid who always asks a question said with our budgetary concerns we shouldn't be dropping taxes and Oesterle deflected this easily. Then some "tree-hugging, dolphin-loving, Oesterle-hating" liberal student asks if this all means he is against the progressive income tax system entirely, which is a not-so-nice barbed question trying to make Oesterle out as a crazy conservative. Well I was surprised with the tact of Oesterle's answer, but this was definitely a highlight. He left us as usual with a moral of life...
If you can sum up a political argument on a placard or sign (cutting taxes on the rich is wrong) and the other side (Oesterle in the double tax scenario) has to spend 3 paragraphs explaning why the other side is wrong, the sign always wins. Plain and simple.
Bowling last week went very well, as we were in a three way tie for first in the division at 6-3 and had both of those teams on our schedule for the next 2 weeks. We dispatched the first team (Bart's team, or Avonte's team, or Jen's team depending on your point of view) by 11 the first game and 10 the second. Christie did not show up, and that penalizes you 10 pins a game. Could've made a big difference, so thank you Ms. Bolsen :-)
The other team tied with us went 2-1 last week, so the standings in our eight team division should have us at 9-3, our opponents this week at 8-4, Judas's (Abbie's) team at 7-5, and everyone else at 6-6 or worse. If we manage to 3-0 or 2-1 this week, I think the division lead will be insurmountable and we'll be a lock for the playoffs for the third time out of four. Now of course we'll probably lose in the playoffs, but at least we keep making it somehow. I'm bowling terrible during our win streak also, dropped AVG all the way to 135. Yuck. At least I will carry the team if I turn it around soon. I'm pretty sure I figured out the problem Friday night bowling for fun with Kelley. I was really heaving the strike ball down the lanes and it finally caught up to me as I grew very inconsistent. I figured out that I should be rolling the strike ball slowly in order to be consistent and get my spin to grip a little bit more, but I should keep throwing the spare ball with a lot of force to keep it on-line. We'll see if this works out.
School appears to be firing up this week. We get the topic for Crim Pro Moot Court this week, and then that will be hanging around until the end of March. Writing both of my seminar papers in the next month or so, finishing my note, and classes heating up as well. Fun times. Speaking of school, I think I will know Wednesday or perhaps even tomorrow night what position I have received on the JDR board for next year. If it's notable, I'll blog.
Stay warm Columbus. Or at least stay classy.
Monday, February 05, 2007
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Global Warming
Global Warming is the biggest sham in scientific history. That being said (and nuclear power should also be the power of the future if we care about the environment...creating a solar panel makes far more waste than running a nuclear plant for years), U Weekly ran a nice article on global warming today that made me laugh. So here you go.
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People sure can be an ungrateful, snotty bunch of crybabies. Mother Nature opened her loving arms and offered us a reprieve from the bitterly frigid temperatures that normally drape Ohio in the winter, and the best people could do was complain about global warming. Thanks to whiny, tree-hugging, dolphin-f*ucking liberals, Mother Nature recanted her gift and brought back the nut-freezing climate that us Ohioans were just starting to forget. Piss on Al Gore and his herd of hippy followers. Christ, can’t you people ever be happy?
It was a beautifully mild day in early January. The temperature was 57 degrees. I had just gotten home from a brisk run when I flicked on the television. CNN ran a story about the unseasonably mild weather and had a bunch of nerdy (probably virgin) scientists insisting that global warming was going to be the end of the world. They were talking some crap about glaciers melting, sea levels rising, animals being killed off and ecosystems being ruined. I call bulls**t.
Ever since, news reports can’t shut their mouths about the dangers of global warming. Most of these “scientists” seemed to think that the greenhouse gases that us humans have emitted over the last 50 years has somehow caused the temperature of the world to rise a few measly degrees. What a bunch of dicks.
I’m no genius. I don’t hold a doctorate, master’s, or even a bachelor’s. But I do have a Ph.D is common-f**king-sense. Allow me to explain.
The earth is old. Real old. Around 4.5 billion years to be exact. The earth is also huge – I won’t bother you with the details of just how big it is, but you get the idea. Aside from being really old and really big, the earth is also one of the most complex and ridiculously complicated systems known to man. Leave it to us humans to think that we can destroy something that has survived for 4.5 billion years and sustained meaningful life for the better part of 230 million years in just 50 years. People (especially Americans) have a terrible habit of over stating their importance to, well, everything.
Let’s try an exercise in analogy; it’ll go a long way to discredit the entire scientific community regarding global warming. I may win the Nobel Prize in scientific achievement for this:
If the earth is 4.5 billion years old than that means that 50 years is around .00000001% of the current age of the earth. If the Earth were a 18 year-old adult, that would equate (by my calculations, which are very likely wrong) to just a few seconds - or, about the time it takes to fart.
In my day I have let rip some of the most heinous, insidious, foul and otherwise un-Godly farts that anyone could possibly fathom. I have filled my bowels with countless gallons of beer and Jack Daniels, I have made hundreds of trips to Taco Bell at 3am and I have eaten enough junk food to single handedly keep Hostess in business. But I have never ripped a fart so bad that I simply stop functioning and died. Not yet, anyway.
You see, global warming is like a fart. It isn’t very pleasant, it’s very uncomfortable for the people around you and everyone will be looking to blame someone - but it isn’t that bad. And eventually, with time, you won’t think anything of it...until the next one. And unfortunately there are always people that want to make a bigger deal out of it than it is.
To be sure, the temperature is rising. But since scientists can, as of yet, only find correlation and not causation, I think its safe to assume that any rise in temperature is likely caused by events that took place long before most of us were even here. Changing the landscape of the most complicated physical system known to man probably takes longer than what amounts to a few seconds.
So maybe if Al Gore and the rest of his parishioners apologize and ask real nice, Mother Nature will bring back those comfortably warm temperatures and forgive us for being snot-nosed, whiny ingrates.
--------------------------------------
People sure can be an ungrateful, snotty bunch of crybabies. Mother Nature opened her loving arms and offered us a reprieve from the bitterly frigid temperatures that normally drape Ohio in the winter, and the best people could do was complain about global warming. Thanks to whiny, tree-hugging, dolphin-f*ucking liberals, Mother Nature recanted her gift and brought back the nut-freezing climate that us Ohioans were just starting to forget. Piss on Al Gore and his herd of hippy followers. Christ, can’t you people ever be happy?
It was a beautifully mild day in early January. The temperature was 57 degrees. I had just gotten home from a brisk run when I flicked on the television. CNN ran a story about the unseasonably mild weather and had a bunch of nerdy (probably virgin) scientists insisting that global warming was going to be the end of the world. They were talking some crap about glaciers melting, sea levels rising, animals being killed off and ecosystems being ruined. I call bulls**t.
Ever since, news reports can’t shut their mouths about the dangers of global warming. Most of these “scientists” seemed to think that the greenhouse gases that us humans have emitted over the last 50 years has somehow caused the temperature of the world to rise a few measly degrees. What a bunch of dicks.
I’m no genius. I don’t hold a doctorate, master’s, or even a bachelor’s. But I do have a Ph.D is common-f**king-sense. Allow me to explain.
The earth is old. Real old. Around 4.5 billion years to be exact. The earth is also huge – I won’t bother you with the details of just how big it is, but you get the idea. Aside from being really old and really big, the earth is also one of the most complex and ridiculously complicated systems known to man. Leave it to us humans to think that we can destroy something that has survived for 4.5 billion years and sustained meaningful life for the better part of 230 million years in just 50 years. People (especially Americans) have a terrible habit of over stating their importance to, well, everything.
Let’s try an exercise in analogy; it’ll go a long way to discredit the entire scientific community regarding global warming. I may win the Nobel Prize in scientific achievement for this:
If the earth is 4.5 billion years old than that means that 50 years is around .00000001% of the current age of the earth. If the Earth were a 18 year-old adult, that would equate (by my calculations, which are very likely wrong) to just a few seconds - or, about the time it takes to fart.
In my day I have let rip some of the most heinous, insidious, foul and otherwise un-Godly farts that anyone could possibly fathom. I have filled my bowels with countless gallons of beer and Jack Daniels, I have made hundreds of trips to Taco Bell at 3am and I have eaten enough junk food to single handedly keep Hostess in business. But I have never ripped a fart so bad that I simply stop functioning and died. Not yet, anyway.
You see, global warming is like a fart. It isn’t very pleasant, it’s very uncomfortable for the people around you and everyone will be looking to blame someone - but it isn’t that bad. And eventually, with time, you won’t think anything of it...until the next one. And unfortunately there are always people that want to make a bigger deal out of it than it is.
To be sure, the temperature is rising. But since scientists can, as of yet, only find correlation and not causation, I think its safe to assume that any rise in temperature is likely caused by events that took place long before most of us were even here. Changing the landscape of the most complicated physical system known to man probably takes longer than what amounts to a few seconds.
So maybe if Al Gore and the rest of his parishioners apologize and ask real nice, Mother Nature will bring back those comfortably warm temperatures and forgive us for being snot-nosed, whiny ingrates.
Saturday, January 27, 2007
Ahh yes, a very relaxing weekend. Just me and the Wii. Good times.
I am writing because of two developments of the late week. First was bowling. We did not have our best week ever, but we went 3-0 and now sit at 6-3 going into a critical battle for first with Bart's team. They dropped 2 of 3 this week and will be 6-3 when we face off. Should be good times. Kelley and I went bowling Friday night too and we did not do great. Very average.
I'm keeping a running tab of Oesterle...we started with the Barrister's Ball and alcohol problems. Thursday he left us with this thought. You cannot blog and be successful at a law firm. If you want to be an academic then who cares about blogging, but a firm will read your blog and they will fire you for breaching attorney-client confidentiality (or the risk of it). If you're blogging now, you better stop immediately.
Hmmm...well on that note I'll leave you until next time.
I am writing because of two developments of the late week. First was bowling. We did not have our best week ever, but we went 3-0 and now sit at 6-3 going into a critical battle for first with Bart's team. They dropped 2 of 3 this week and will be 6-3 when we face off. Should be good times. Kelley and I went bowling Friday night too and we did not do great. Very average.
I'm keeping a running tab of Oesterle...we started with the Barrister's Ball and alcohol problems. Thursday he left us with this thought. You cannot blog and be successful at a law firm. If you want to be an academic then who cares about blogging, but a firm will read your blog and they will fire you for breaching attorney-client confidentiality (or the risk of it). If you're blogging now, you better stop immediately.
Hmmm...well on that note I'll leave you until next time.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
What a week
No updates due to the incredibly busy week around here. But tonight is bowling night and that means relaxation (and essentially the weekend) are here. Last week we had our Evidence Class Presentation worth 5% of the grade and it was such a joke. I spent 5 minues reviewing the rule at issue and then got grilled by other students acting as judges for 5 minutes on my case. It did bring what will be the highlight of my semester as far as talking in class goes.
Judge: Why should we exclude this gruesome picture from evidence?
Me: Because the risk of unfair prejudice substantially outweighs .... and there were three doctors as well as the burn victim on the stand giving expert testimony on the burns at trial.
Judge: Would you disagree with the phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words?" What would you say to that?
Me: I'd say there were probably more than one thousand words of testimony between the four witnesses.
Let me condense it for you: if you bring the smart-ass question shit in a class presentation, I'm not afraid to swing back at you. Gave the class a laugh anyways.
The classes are interesting. State Con Law is a nice weekly discussion, and writing two papers in there should be easy. Business Associations and Evidence are hard to pay attention in because a lot of the class info is straightforward if you did the readings and looked at the class slides before class. Professor Oesterle is a blast in class though, quite the personality. Today the Oesterle words of wisdom: "I'm never going to another Barrister's Ball because all I will see is students getting drunk. The practice of law is stressful and some handle it better than others. If you have an alcohol problem now, it will get worse in practice. If you get drunk in front of your professors, you have an alcohol problem people. Simple as that. So I'm not going to any more Barrister's Balls." Trademark of course I was on call the second week of class, but no hardballs from Professor Lee...I think I've dropped his expectations of getting something intelligent out of me other than in an exam setting.
We recovered in bowling last week, getting 3-0 and back in the division hunt again. We'll see how we do tonight, but the current averages after two weeks are 142 (me, but I sandbagged of course), 128 (Brodie), 123 (Kelley), 76 (Daniel). Kelley's AVG is a bit high for now but Brodie and Daniel are well below usual so we should be OK. Encounters with Abbie the Judas have been interesting this week at the law school. Somehow Daniel always finds a way to make it interesting, and of course I incite them even more. We have a great division, all the best teams except for the professor team.
I think the town is finally getting over the football Buckeyes and are realizing what a great season the basketBucks are having. 16-3 and rolling right now with the only losses on the road to 3 top 5 teams in the country. Should be a great February and March.
Well getting on this week as my blogging time is limited. There were three things occupying my extra time in the early week, those being Ebay sales, the final Acc-Check for Journal, and Mediations Competition. The Ebay sales are mostly in hand tonight as I spent 5 hours catching up the 160 auctions that sold out of 180. Made a nice cool $750 on the cards, so up to $1080 so far with many more cards to sell. This helps pay for the splurges of Xmas, that being the Wii and the new digital camera. Ebay is kind of a pain, but I love the open marketplace and could easily see myself in another dimension opening a business that sells other people's crap on Ebay.
The final Acc-Check was ignored mostly. Symposium last week and the goings on of this week let me spend about 10 hours on it total. I did not do a very great job, but I did a good read through and such...so I shouldn't be in trouble over it. Erik Stock ran unopposed for next year's Editor in Chief, which went directly to my plan if I want a good managing board position. I applied for Executive Editor, Chief Managing Editor, and Articles Editor positions...we'll see what I end up with. The symposium was boring as balls, but we had to go so oh well. One student note and one bib assignment away from done with JDR for this school year. Unfortunately the note will take some serious time in the next month and a half.
Mediations competition had 8 teams of two, and you sat in a mediation in front of judges who judged how well you stick to the negotiation strategy you set and how well you worked together as attorney and client (you switched roles on the second night). The two fact patterns were fun to do, a family probate dispute and a gay guy discriminatory firing. All the all-stars of the negotiations competition from the fall were in there (Erik Stock, Cat Woltering, Andrew Richey, etc), so the field was tough. Richey and I thought we played the game well but our judges were terrible both nights and so alas, we did not make the final four tonight. The top two go to Regionals and get 500 dollars bar/bri money, so hey it was worth a shot (and we did have a lot of fun despite the late evenings).
24 this week set up the season nicely, and wow Jack is back. I love that the squirrely little guy who was behind it all (other than President Nixon, I mean Logan) last season is Jack's brother and is involved again this season. I'm still holding out for a Cuthbert comeback, as there is still more to develop (as in they could kill Jack's daughter too).
Quote of the week from Chloe: "why do people I work with keep dieing?" here's your sign.
On that note, it's bowling time. Woot.
Oh and two more notes. The team I am on for Moot Court is Criminal Procedure. We are meeting tomorrow to discuss travel arrangements. The bad news: it's in Newark NJ on the weekend of Barrister's Ball (also Kelley's birthday). Wonderful. So much for celebrating her Bday there. I instead get to spend that weekend with Brian Smith and some 3L. Oh well. C'est la vie....I wouldn't want to be doing Herman instead.
My grades this semester are ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. I know I got the top grade in App Ad even though I do not know the numerical score yet (damn you Beazley come off them). This week I got my first ever 100 in Tax class, so another top grade. The 97 from Shippy and 92 in Copyright were nice also...so only Patent Law can screw up a beautiful semester. Wonderful how that all worked out.
Judge: Why should we exclude this gruesome picture from evidence?
Me: Because the risk of unfair prejudice substantially outweighs .... and there were three doctors as well as the burn victim on the stand giving expert testimony on the burns at trial.
Judge: Would you disagree with the phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words?" What would you say to that?
Me: I'd say there were probably more than one thousand words of testimony between the four witnesses.
Let me condense it for you: if you bring the smart-ass question shit in a class presentation, I'm not afraid to swing back at you. Gave the class a laugh anyways.
The classes are interesting. State Con Law is a nice weekly discussion, and writing two papers in there should be easy. Business Associations and Evidence are hard to pay attention in because a lot of the class info is straightforward if you did the readings and looked at the class slides before class. Professor Oesterle is a blast in class though, quite the personality. Today the Oesterle words of wisdom: "I'm never going to another Barrister's Ball because all I will see is students getting drunk. The practice of law is stressful and some handle it better than others. If you have an alcohol problem now, it will get worse in practice. If you get drunk in front of your professors, you have an alcohol problem people. Simple as that. So I'm not going to any more Barrister's Balls." Trademark of course I was on call the second week of class, but no hardballs from Professor Lee...I think I've dropped his expectations of getting something intelligent out of me other than in an exam setting.
We recovered in bowling last week, getting 3-0 and back in the division hunt again. We'll see how we do tonight, but the current averages after two weeks are 142 (me, but I sandbagged of course), 128 (Brodie), 123 (Kelley), 76 (Daniel). Kelley's AVG is a bit high for now but Brodie and Daniel are well below usual so we should be OK. Encounters with Abbie the Judas have been interesting this week at the law school. Somehow Daniel always finds a way to make it interesting, and of course I incite them even more. We have a great division, all the best teams except for the professor team.
I think the town is finally getting over the football Buckeyes and are realizing what a great season the basketBucks are having. 16-3 and rolling right now with the only losses on the road to 3 top 5 teams in the country. Should be a great February and March.
Well getting on this week as my blogging time is limited. There were three things occupying my extra time in the early week, those being Ebay sales, the final Acc-Check for Journal, and Mediations Competition. The Ebay sales are mostly in hand tonight as I spent 5 hours catching up the 160 auctions that sold out of 180. Made a nice cool $750 on the cards, so up to $1080 so far with many more cards to sell. This helps pay for the splurges of Xmas, that being the Wii and the new digital camera. Ebay is kind of a pain, but I love the open marketplace and could easily see myself in another dimension opening a business that sells other people's crap on Ebay.
The final Acc-Check was ignored mostly. Symposium last week and the goings on of this week let me spend about 10 hours on it total. I did not do a very great job, but I did a good read through and such...so I shouldn't be in trouble over it. Erik Stock ran unopposed for next year's Editor in Chief, which went directly to my plan if I want a good managing board position. I applied for Executive Editor, Chief Managing Editor, and Articles Editor positions...we'll see what I end up with. The symposium was boring as balls, but we had to go so oh well. One student note and one bib assignment away from done with JDR for this school year. Unfortunately the note will take some serious time in the next month and a half.
Mediations competition had 8 teams of two, and you sat in a mediation in front of judges who judged how well you stick to the negotiation strategy you set and how well you worked together as attorney and client (you switched roles on the second night). The two fact patterns were fun to do, a family probate dispute and a gay guy discriminatory firing. All the all-stars of the negotiations competition from the fall were in there (Erik Stock, Cat Woltering, Andrew Richey, etc), so the field was tough. Richey and I thought we played the game well but our judges were terrible both nights and so alas, we did not make the final four tonight. The top two go to Regionals and get 500 dollars bar/bri money, so hey it was worth a shot (and we did have a lot of fun despite the late evenings).
24 this week set up the season nicely, and wow Jack is back. I love that the squirrely little guy who was behind it all (other than President Nixon, I mean Logan) last season is Jack's brother and is involved again this season. I'm still holding out for a Cuthbert comeback, as there is still more to develop (as in they could kill Jack's daughter too).
Quote of the week from Chloe: "why do people I work with keep dieing?" here's your sign.
On that note, it's bowling time. Woot.
Oh and two more notes. The team I am on for Moot Court is Criminal Procedure. We are meeting tomorrow to discuss travel arrangements. The bad news: it's in Newark NJ on the weekend of Barrister's Ball (also Kelley's birthday). Wonderful. So much for celebrating her Bday there. I instead get to spend that weekend with Brian Smith and some 3L. Oh well. C'est la vie....I wouldn't want to be doing Herman instead.
My grades this semester are ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. I know I got the top grade in App Ad even though I do not know the numerical score yet (damn you Beazley come off them). This week I got my first ever 100 in Tax class, so another top grade. The 97 from Shippy and 92 in Copyright were nice also...so only Patent Law can screw up a beautiful semester. Wonderful how that all worked out.
Monday, January 15, 2007
The 24 Premiere
Well a good weekend comes to a close. Put up all my extended cards on Ebay yesterday, took about 4 hours and I have 180 auctions running. That's crazy as I though 56 was a lot to keep me busy last summer. I'll probably wait until this summer to finish off the money cards, perhaps around Origins or shortly after. I might take the stuff to Origins and see what I can get, especially for the bulk. I know Villa sold his bulk online on Ebay, but I probably have 4 times as much as he had when he sold. Eh, it's just cardboard. But cardboard that will make some money for poker and other fun endeavors. I was pleasantly surprised by raking in around $300 for my limited collection of standard cards last summer...we'll see how this goes.
Does anyone else find it odd that the President chooses now to send in more forces? 21,000 more troops in Iraq? Are we installing a draft again? OK the last one was kidding, but seriously why was this not done 2-3 years ago? I always thought Kerry was a kook and had the president pulled the troops entirely now we would've been better off with Kerry, but thankfully the President did not do this. I just hope this means he has a real plan with realistic goals and a realistic endpoint. Even if moderately successful, Bush has ruined any legacy he had other than finishing his father's business (getting rid of Saddam). Both Bush presidencies taken down by Iraq, what a cute quagmire. While I think as a conservative that Senator McCain would be the best choice to succeed Bush in 2008 (and John Edwards would be acceptable), it appears the nation is really going to get behind Barack Obama. Could you have a worse name to try and break the white male president trend in this country though? I have trouble truly believing McCain or any other republican candidate has a chance in 2008 after watching a true swing state go so democrat in 2006 (Ohio). Ohio is a perfect model for the country as it has a little bit of everything except maybe a high concentration of the very liberal or far left. Ohio has gone ridiculously blue and I really do not see that changing in 2 years absent some governor or high state official misconduct (thanks Bob Taft, real classy career), and as Ohio basically never votes on the whole for a presidential loser...watch the democratic primary season carefully.
Can you imagine with Iowa going first in the primary season as always...who do they choose? Obama and Clinton are so unpopular there, but they know that Iowa is crucial to setting the rest of primary season. Will Edwards strike gold because Iowa fits his profile? Very very interesting, and almost makes me wish I were a registered democrat in Iowa. But not really. I'd rather my vote count in a general election.
Well 24 has premiered now, and the "shocking turn of events" was indeed pretty shocking. Another long running main character Curtis is killed and by Jack's hand no less. Of course then Jack wants to quit...but nothing motivates Jack like a nuclear weapon going off in LA. I'm happy they are finally letting some big bad stuff happen to the public, as I know America could not be so lucky so many times in a row if 24 were realistic. The stakes have been raised and even though they went back to the old standby of nuclear weapons, 24 doesn't feel right without a good big nuclear threat. Still going to be hard to match Season 5, with a Nixon-like president deceiving everyone and tons of long running main characters getting the axe (Tony, Michelle, Edgar, David Palmer). I do like that the writers are not shying away from a legitimate scary topic, that being the war of terrorism coming to America. Even with 2 more seasons of 24 after this one agreed to, I think we may be seeing the best days of 24 right now.
One final note from the premiere: I am always amazed the actors they bring in season to season (last year they had Sean Astin better known as Samwise Gamgee playing Lynn McGill, Jean Smart playing Martha Logan, and the guy who plays Desmond on Lost as a critical British MI6 agent), and this season I was happy to see Alexander Siddig playing Asad. Siddig used to be known as Siddig El Fadil when he played Dr. Bashir on Deep Sapce Nine, and I am always thrilled to see the good actors from Star Trek series get good roles elsewhere. Siddig also was good in the movie Syriana last year. We'll see if there are any more big actors coming in this season.
Well if you did not tune in to the 24 premiere the last 2 nights...Fox in their money making mind will give you a reprieve if you wish to catch up. The first 4 episodes are on sale in DVD tomorrow, to which I say HA! Fox might as well give up and webcast the episodes for a limited time after they run the first time...ABC is already doing this and they are the only other network with shows close to as good as Fox's lineup. It was so nice not having to tape Lost but just loading it up later on ABC.com. I hope Fox follows suit, as it would be wonderful to catch House or 24 if we ever missed it.
In the end, if you are not watching 24...you should be. There's nothing else even close to as good on TV Monday nights. Should I watch American Idol this season? I mean every other Fox show I've watched turns out to be good (Prison Break, House, 24, and Standoff as well as Trading Spouses), so maybe I'll finally give the old Idol a chance. I did like Survivor after all, and it has to be better than that.
Back to school tomorrow. Suck. Talk to you all later.
Does anyone else find it odd that the President chooses now to send in more forces? 21,000 more troops in Iraq? Are we installing a draft again? OK the last one was kidding, but seriously why was this not done 2-3 years ago? I always thought Kerry was a kook and had the president pulled the troops entirely now we would've been better off with Kerry, but thankfully the President did not do this. I just hope this means he has a real plan with realistic goals and a realistic endpoint. Even if moderately successful, Bush has ruined any legacy he had other than finishing his father's business (getting rid of Saddam). Both Bush presidencies taken down by Iraq, what a cute quagmire. While I think as a conservative that Senator McCain would be the best choice to succeed Bush in 2008 (and John Edwards would be acceptable), it appears the nation is really going to get behind Barack Obama. Could you have a worse name to try and break the white male president trend in this country though? I have trouble truly believing McCain or any other republican candidate has a chance in 2008 after watching a true swing state go so democrat in 2006 (Ohio). Ohio is a perfect model for the country as it has a little bit of everything except maybe a high concentration of the very liberal or far left. Ohio has gone ridiculously blue and I really do not see that changing in 2 years absent some governor or high state official misconduct (thanks Bob Taft, real classy career), and as Ohio basically never votes on the whole for a presidential loser...watch the democratic primary season carefully.
Can you imagine with Iowa going first in the primary season as always...who do they choose? Obama and Clinton are so unpopular there, but they know that Iowa is crucial to setting the rest of primary season. Will Edwards strike gold because Iowa fits his profile? Very very interesting, and almost makes me wish I were a registered democrat in Iowa. But not really. I'd rather my vote count in a general election.
Well 24 has premiered now, and the "shocking turn of events" was indeed pretty shocking. Another long running main character Curtis is killed and by Jack's hand no less. Of course then Jack wants to quit...but nothing motivates Jack like a nuclear weapon going off in LA. I'm happy they are finally letting some big bad stuff happen to the public, as I know America could not be so lucky so many times in a row if 24 were realistic. The stakes have been raised and even though they went back to the old standby of nuclear weapons, 24 doesn't feel right without a good big nuclear threat. Still going to be hard to match Season 5, with a Nixon-like president deceiving everyone and tons of long running main characters getting the axe (Tony, Michelle, Edgar, David Palmer). I do like that the writers are not shying away from a legitimate scary topic, that being the war of terrorism coming to America. Even with 2 more seasons of 24 after this one agreed to, I think we may be seeing the best days of 24 right now.
One final note from the premiere: I am always amazed the actors they bring in season to season (last year they had Sean Astin better known as Samwise Gamgee playing Lynn McGill, Jean Smart playing Martha Logan, and the guy who plays Desmond on Lost as a critical British MI6 agent), and this season I was happy to see Alexander Siddig playing Asad. Siddig used to be known as Siddig El Fadil when he played Dr. Bashir on Deep Sapce Nine, and I am always thrilled to see the good actors from Star Trek series get good roles elsewhere. Siddig also was good in the movie Syriana last year. We'll see if there are any more big actors coming in this season.
Well if you did not tune in to the 24 premiere the last 2 nights...Fox in their money making mind will give you a reprieve if you wish to catch up. The first 4 episodes are on sale in DVD tomorrow, to which I say HA! Fox might as well give up and webcast the episodes for a limited time after they run the first time...ABC is already doing this and they are the only other network with shows close to as good as Fox's lineup. It was so nice not having to tape Lost but just loading it up later on ABC.com. I hope Fox follows suit, as it would be wonderful to catch House or 24 if we ever missed it.
In the end, if you are not watching 24...you should be. There's nothing else even close to as good on TV Monday nights. Should I watch American Idol this season? I mean every other Fox show I've watched turns out to be good (Prison Break, House, 24, and Standoff as well as Trading Spouses), so maybe I'll finally give the old Idol a chance. I did like Survivor after all, and it has to be better than that.
Back to school tomorrow. Suck. Talk to you all later.
Saturday, January 13, 2007
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.
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.
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Welcome 2007
I will update on all the Christmas and finals stuff that kept me from blogging for weeks sometime later, but anyways just had to start 2007 by posting the nastiest story I have ever heard from a college football fan. After all, it is bowl season!
Link is here with discussion: http://mb25.scout.com/fthehivefrm1.showMessage?topicID=65970.topic
Since 1974 (thanks Dad!) I have attended Georgia Tech football games as a fan, student, and then alumni. Over the years, I have witnessed odd behavior at college football events. Until New Year's Day 2007, the event that stood out most was when the Georgia Tech student section covered the Notre Dame Team with raw fish in the late 70's.After the Gator Bowl? Wow. Just wow.I always carry my camera to Georgia Tech football games. We were fortunate and had seats on the lower level, two seats away from the Georgia Tech Band section. At the end of the second quarter, the band was in position on the field, leaving their section empty. I walked to the bottom of the band section to get some panorama shots of the stadium and then returned to my seat. I noticed a West Virginia fan standing in the middle of the Georgia Tech Band seating area, with his pants around his knees. As this is unusual, I pointed the walking stereotype to my fiance', a Virginia Tech alumni. She had been preparing me for the encounters with West Virginia fans and this individual only supported her prior observations.Then things got ugly.The WVU fan then dropped his drawers and defecated on one of the Georgia Tech band section seats.I turned the camera on and snapped the below series of pictures...picasaweb.google.com/THWU...andSection The Georgia Tech fans around us saw the incident and were also speechless.My first stop was to one of the Georgia Tech Band members remaining in the section. I introduced myself as a Georgia Tech alumni and apologized to him for what I had to say next. The story was repeated with accompanying pictures. The band member was in shock and then thanked me for looking out for the band. He went to find a member of the stadium facilities managment staff. I went to find a law enforcement officer.The Police Officer was in disbelief that behavior such as this would actually occur. The officer requested that the WVU fan walk up to the portal to discuss the incident. Walking up the stairs was a little too much for the WVU fan as he apparently had imbibed quite a large quantity of alcohol. Falling UP the stairs twice did not help his cause with the officer...We could hear the WVU fan screaming, 'y'all ain't got no proof I did nothin!' repeatedly as the officer questioned him on the 'leavings' in the seat. The officer motioned for me to bring my camera over and show the pictures to the WVU fan. Well, two things happened as he saw the images. One, he stopped protesting. Two, he vomited down the front of his shirt (always a classy move).The officer took the individual into custody and requested that I provide the images to the police command station. None of the officers in the command station could belive my story until I displayed the images. The WVU fan was arrested and removed from the stadium."I went to the Gator Bowl and all I got was arrested!"picasaweb.google.com/THWU...andSectionFor what it's worth, the rest of the WVU fans treated us with respect. It was a great game.
Well I'll be damned. A Mountaineer fan drunk off his kilter and so drunk he does something disgusting and stupid in the name of competition. Who'd a thunk it?
Link is here with discussion: http://mb25.scout.com/fthehivefrm1.showMessage?topicID=65970.topic
Since 1974 (thanks Dad!) I have attended Georgia Tech football games as a fan, student, and then alumni. Over the years, I have witnessed odd behavior at college football events. Until New Year's Day 2007, the event that stood out most was when the Georgia Tech student section covered the Notre Dame Team with raw fish in the late 70's.After the Gator Bowl? Wow. Just wow.I always carry my camera to Georgia Tech football games. We were fortunate and had seats on the lower level, two seats away from the Georgia Tech Band section. At the end of the second quarter, the band was in position on the field, leaving their section empty. I walked to the bottom of the band section to get some panorama shots of the stadium and then returned to my seat. I noticed a West Virginia fan standing in the middle of the Georgia Tech Band seating area, with his pants around his knees. As this is unusual, I pointed the walking stereotype to my fiance', a Virginia Tech alumni. She had been preparing me for the encounters with West Virginia fans and this individual only supported her prior observations.Then things got ugly.The WVU fan then dropped his drawers and defecated on one of the Georgia Tech band section seats.I turned the camera on and snapped the below series of pictures...picasaweb.google.com/THWU...andSection The Georgia Tech fans around us saw the incident and were also speechless.My first stop was to one of the Georgia Tech Band members remaining in the section. I introduced myself as a Georgia Tech alumni and apologized to him for what I had to say next. The story was repeated with accompanying pictures. The band member was in shock and then thanked me for looking out for the band. He went to find a member of the stadium facilities managment staff. I went to find a law enforcement officer.The Police Officer was in disbelief that behavior such as this would actually occur. The officer requested that the WVU fan walk up to the portal to discuss the incident. Walking up the stairs was a little too much for the WVU fan as he apparently had imbibed quite a large quantity of alcohol. Falling UP the stairs twice did not help his cause with the officer...We could hear the WVU fan screaming, 'y'all ain't got no proof I did nothin!' repeatedly as the officer questioned him on the 'leavings' in the seat. The officer motioned for me to bring my camera over and show the pictures to the WVU fan. Well, two things happened as he saw the images. One, he stopped protesting. Two, he vomited down the front of his shirt (always a classy move).The officer took the individual into custody and requested that I provide the images to the police command station. None of the officers in the command station could belive my story until I displayed the images. The WVU fan was arrested and removed from the stadium."I went to the Gator Bowl and all I got was arrested!"picasaweb.google.com/THWU...andSectionFor what it's worth, the rest of the WVU fans treated us with respect. It was a great game.
Well I'll be damned. A Mountaineer fan drunk off his kilter and so drunk he does something disgusting and stupid in the name of competition. Who'd a thunk it?
Friday, November 17, 2006
The best week ever
Let me start by linking you to www.southerncollegesports.com where my article "Go Blue! Go Bucks! The Game Finally Arrives" is up and running on the big game.
This is one of the best weeks. Got my candidate to be a lawyer application into the Ohio Supreme Court on Monday, appellate advocacy ended for me Monday as well when Oral Argument happened. I think I had a worse oral argument than our practice argument, but I only got one minor criticism (saying "you know" when answering a question from the court). The group of 14 people in my App Ad section are very good, but I think from the comments I have gotten on my brief and my oral argument that I have a legitimate shot at the top grad ein the section. This would qualify me to try to get on a traveling Moot Court team this year, and I'd like to give it a shot. Nevertheless, I will be doing the Herman competition for moot court next semester (to get on a traveling team for my 3L year)...this sounds much more exciting than Journal crap.
Also this week: the debut of a new James Bond movie and a new James! I like Sean Connery and all, but I grew up with Pierce Brosnan as Bond and I will have trouble adjusting to the new guy. The critics reviews are 95% positive though, and that's amazing...this movie should be great.
The latest battle of the Console Wars is officially on this weekend, as Playstation III is out today and Nintendo Wii is out Sunday to combat last year's Xbox 360. I'm a longtime Ninetndo fan, having the original NES and getting the SNES and N64 on their release dates. I waited to buy a Gamecube (why pay so much when prices go down) and finally branched out and bought an Xbox in the last wave of consoles. I like having it as a DVD player but not the $30 you have to pay for the remote for the Xbox to enable that feature. Money grubbing Microsoft. I cannot wait to buy a Wii, as I think the new remote and motion sensitive controls are the best innovation in video games in a long time (all due respects to 3D life-like graphics and wireless controllers). I might get one before next summer because they are so affordable.
I have been thinking of which second console I would buy, and I think without a doubt the PS3. I kind of hated Sony for combatting and winning market share from Nintendo back in the day, but I have to give them credit for bringing out good systems and the best set of games. I really have no interest in Xbox 360 other than Halo 3, and I can find friends to play with. I am switching second allegiance to Sony and Microsoft be damned. If the PS3 goes down in price (not likely thanks to Blue Ray players installed) before summertime, I may consider getting one next summer when I have a little fun money and a lot of time alone in a Cincinnati apartment. You can only play so much Magic Online and online poker lol.
And the best part of the week: OSU Michigan. The Game. Campus is crazy and has been since Thursday evening...and I am so happy this is a home game so I can see it on the cheap. This is the first time both teams have come in #1 and #2, first time in 30 years both team undefeated...and the national championship and a Big Ten outright title on the line. With the passing of Bo Schembechler today (here's hoping he and Woody are kicking back and watching the game tomorrow from heaven, they both deserve it after their great lives), Michigan has so much more to play for. I think the line is ridiculous at OSU -7, as the Wolverines are definitely the same team or slightly better overall than the Buckeyes. The only thing sweeter than this game is seeing this game when everything is on the line. I cannot wait for 22 hours to pass by and see this battle of titans.
Please please please let the Buckeyes win...please please please let there not be riots :-)
This is one of the best weeks. Got my candidate to be a lawyer application into the Ohio Supreme Court on Monday, appellate advocacy ended for me Monday as well when Oral Argument happened. I think I had a worse oral argument than our practice argument, but I only got one minor criticism (saying "you know" when answering a question from the court). The group of 14 people in my App Ad section are very good, but I think from the comments I have gotten on my brief and my oral argument that I have a legitimate shot at the top grad ein the section. This would qualify me to try to get on a traveling Moot Court team this year, and I'd like to give it a shot. Nevertheless, I will be doing the Herman competition for moot court next semester (to get on a traveling team for my 3L year)...this sounds much more exciting than Journal crap.
Also this week: the debut of a new James Bond movie and a new James! I like Sean Connery and all, but I grew up with Pierce Brosnan as Bond and I will have trouble adjusting to the new guy. The critics reviews are 95% positive though, and that's amazing...this movie should be great.
The latest battle of the Console Wars is officially on this weekend, as Playstation III is out today and Nintendo Wii is out Sunday to combat last year's Xbox 360. I'm a longtime Ninetndo fan, having the original NES and getting the SNES and N64 on their release dates. I waited to buy a Gamecube (why pay so much when prices go down) and finally branched out and bought an Xbox in the last wave of consoles. I like having it as a DVD player but not the $30 you have to pay for the remote for the Xbox to enable that feature. Money grubbing Microsoft. I cannot wait to buy a Wii, as I think the new remote and motion sensitive controls are the best innovation in video games in a long time (all due respects to 3D life-like graphics and wireless controllers). I might get one before next summer because they are so affordable.
I have been thinking of which second console I would buy, and I think without a doubt the PS3. I kind of hated Sony for combatting and winning market share from Nintendo back in the day, but I have to give them credit for bringing out good systems and the best set of games. I really have no interest in Xbox 360 other than Halo 3, and I can find friends to play with. I am switching second allegiance to Sony and Microsoft be damned. If the PS3 goes down in price (not likely thanks to Blue Ray players installed) before summertime, I may consider getting one next summer when I have a little fun money and a lot of time alone in a Cincinnati apartment. You can only play so much Magic Online and online poker lol.
And the best part of the week: OSU Michigan. The Game. Campus is crazy and has been since Thursday evening...and I am so happy this is a home game so I can see it on the cheap. This is the first time both teams have come in #1 and #2, first time in 30 years both team undefeated...and the national championship and a Big Ten outright title on the line. With the passing of Bo Schembechler today (here's hoping he and Woody are kicking back and watching the game tomorrow from heaven, they both deserve it after their great lives), Michigan has so much more to play for. I think the line is ridiculous at OSU -7, as the Wolverines are definitely the same team or slightly better overall than the Buckeyes. The only thing sweeter than this game is seeing this game when everything is on the line. I cannot wait for 22 hours to pass by and see this battle of titans.
Please please please let the Buckeyes win...please please please let there not be riots :-)
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
November
Ahh, the fall foliage has mostly blown away and now it will finally get cold. November also brings the best college football games, and at long last perhaps an Ohio State game worth watching (and considering I've seen every minute of the past 5 games in person...I'm expert enough to say that the last 5 weeks has been a bore-fest). It's been fun actually blowing out Big Ten rivals, but let's see how the buckeyes perform with a berth in the national title game and an outirght Big Ten title on the line against hated rival UM. Speaking of football, Ohio U is winning their division in the MAC now and I'm happy the Bobcats are finally worth cheering for.
I was all ready to write a blog article yesterday about how Halloween and October passes me by and I still have no job offers after 3 months (the Loyola Patent interview program was August 3-4). But then, a Halloween treat in my inbox. Wood Herron and Evans from Cincinnati gave me a job offer for next summer.
HALLELUJAH! (Happy dance and much rejoicing in the background)
If you had asked me before I went to the 8 firms which one I would cut first this would have been the one based solely on location...but a job is a job and this firm is the biggest IP boutique in Ohio so that makes me happy. Summer salary is higher than all non-Chicago and non-Dallas places too, so I'm more than likey accepting the job offer (plus being only 2 hours away this summer is convenient for its own reasons). I did notify the remaining three firms that they have one week to offer me a job, so Harness Dickey (Detroit), Leydig Voit and Mayer (Chicago), and Greenebaum Doll (Louisville)...you are on the clock. It is so satisfying knowing that I have a job next summer and I will be doing IP work and I will be officially done worrying about jobs in 6 days. Now I'll have even more time to focus on school, whatever that means.
Let's review quickly what I think of the firms left in the pool today:
1. Wood Herron and Evans in Cincinnati: The plus is I have a job offer (just kidding), but seriously they do pay better than the others and it's close enough for next summer and I get to see Reds games...the downside is still long-term location but that's not such a big deal anymore.
2. Harness Dickey in Detroit: I think these guys have the best overall summer experience to offer and really have a good IP firm going, but living a half hour north of Detroit sucks. The people were really nice though, and it seemed like I could fit. I do not know the pay for these guys.
3. Greenebaum in Lousiville: This was probably my best job interview after Fish in Dallas, but the one thing that scares me from this firm is that it is GP. I really favor IP boutiques now, and so this factor is crucial even though Louisville is one of the nicest cities I've been to.
4. Leydig Voit in Chicago: well let's see, they are in Chicago. That's about it (they are IP as well). The firm was not the greatest, their recruiting seems out of order, they did not confirm my interview until the day before, they did not get a hotel reservation until I was driving to Chicago the day of, and they were condescending on the phone when I told them they have a week to make a choice as of yesterday...hmmm, much as I love Chicago this has not gone well for this firm so far.
Bowling is going fantastic, and it has been a great season. Daniel and Brodie are crazy, and we do a nice job as a team of freaking out the competition or getting in their head with our antics. Everything from the Dr. Mario Virus dance for three strikes in a row to our mascot the creepy garden gnome to the weekly theme and outfits Brodie and Daniel (and sometimes I) wear...we wreck the competition. Everyone except for Brodie has a much higher average than last year, and we just keep on rolling. I finally made the bowling sheet for the first time last week for 2nd high average in the league at 153, so now we are taking over the sheet as well (Abbie's 187 is holding up nicely as a top game...187 = killed the other team = murder cop code = mens fucking rea). We started the season 1-6 but have ripped off 11 straight and stand at 12-6. I think we will be in first place tonight when the sheet is passed around the bowling alley, so all we have to do is hold serve this evening and we will be division champs. To hell with the playoffs...division champs would be sweet. Can you tell it's bowling night...?
I've successfully put off Appellate Advocacy now and I have 5 days to comeplete my brief. Thankfully all I have to do is minor repairs and mostly grammar, spell checks, and cite checks. One quick oral argument in 2-3 weeks and then that hassle is over. Just in time to start worrying about my 4 exams.
The Schottenstein Center here on campus has been jumping this week. Saturday night was a Daily Show cast and Jon Stewart event for the students at OSU, Sunday Barenaked Ladies played, and Monday Red Hot Chili Peppers played. That's the best three straight days ever at that crappy arena probably. Kelley and I went to see Jon Stewart, and it was a nice funny evening. They showed clips from previous shows, the highlight of which had to be when they followed around a Cleveland area reporter who is known for investigative reporting in a clip called "You Jackin It?" This reporter caught a college kid jacking off in a public library, and then proceeded to hound him and his family for weeks about it on the local news. Not to be trumped, the Daily Show hounded this real life reporter and libraries in the area seeing if they could find more people "Jackin It." Stewart and the gang are taping this week's shows on campus so they can be in the middle of the most important swing state during these midterm elections. Should be good times.
I'm playing a little online poker (down a little again since I talked to you last, but I'm sure the luck will turn around) and some Magic online now...it's nice to have time to play those games and not feel like I'm putting off something (other than App Ad). Also, if anybody has a copy of Mario Party 6 and a gamecue microphone they wish to sell...message me. I don't want to buy the game new and MP7 is good but would be better with a mic (and I think MP 6 which my old roommates have has better mini-games).
Shipman cancelled class today, hope he's doing alright. Especially since that's my primary job for next semester and my best reference until after this summer's employment. This is a good week, as last night we went out to celebrate my job offer, tonight is bowling, Thursday Dell is coming to fix my computer in my house (new motherboard and touchpad among other small things), Thursday night I'm watching Saw III with Tom and Heather and then the WVU-UL football game, and Friday night we are hosting poker and Thomas and Lisa will be down to stay the evening as well. Time for a little payback for Mr. Applebaum :-)
Anyways, class is about to start and I'm sure I've caught everyone up and all they want to know (and more than they ever wanted to know) and my life. To sum it all up...I GOT A JOB. WOO-HOO!
I was all ready to write a blog article yesterday about how Halloween and October passes me by and I still have no job offers after 3 months (the Loyola Patent interview program was August 3-4). But then, a Halloween treat in my inbox. Wood Herron and Evans from Cincinnati gave me a job offer for next summer.
HALLELUJAH! (Happy dance and much rejoicing in the background)
If you had asked me before I went to the 8 firms which one I would cut first this would have been the one based solely on location...but a job is a job and this firm is the biggest IP boutique in Ohio so that makes me happy. Summer salary is higher than all non-Chicago and non-Dallas places too, so I'm more than likey accepting the job offer (plus being only 2 hours away this summer is convenient for its own reasons). I did notify the remaining three firms that they have one week to offer me a job, so Harness Dickey (Detroit), Leydig Voit and Mayer (Chicago), and Greenebaum Doll (Louisville)...you are on the clock. It is so satisfying knowing that I have a job next summer and I will be doing IP work and I will be officially done worrying about jobs in 6 days. Now I'll have even more time to focus on school, whatever that means.
Let's review quickly what I think of the firms left in the pool today:
1. Wood Herron and Evans in Cincinnati: The plus is I have a job offer (just kidding), but seriously they do pay better than the others and it's close enough for next summer and I get to see Reds games...the downside is still long-term location but that's not such a big deal anymore.
2. Harness Dickey in Detroit: I think these guys have the best overall summer experience to offer and really have a good IP firm going, but living a half hour north of Detroit sucks. The people were really nice though, and it seemed like I could fit. I do not know the pay for these guys.
3. Greenebaum in Lousiville: This was probably my best job interview after Fish in Dallas, but the one thing that scares me from this firm is that it is GP. I really favor IP boutiques now, and so this factor is crucial even though Louisville is one of the nicest cities I've been to.
4. Leydig Voit in Chicago: well let's see, they are in Chicago. That's about it (they are IP as well). The firm was not the greatest, their recruiting seems out of order, they did not confirm my interview until the day before, they did not get a hotel reservation until I was driving to Chicago the day of, and they were condescending on the phone when I told them they have a week to make a choice as of yesterday...hmmm, much as I love Chicago this has not gone well for this firm so far.
Bowling is going fantastic, and it has been a great season. Daniel and Brodie are crazy, and we do a nice job as a team of freaking out the competition or getting in their head with our antics. Everything from the Dr. Mario Virus dance for three strikes in a row to our mascot the creepy garden gnome to the weekly theme and outfits Brodie and Daniel (and sometimes I) wear...we wreck the competition. Everyone except for Brodie has a much higher average than last year, and we just keep on rolling. I finally made the bowling sheet for the first time last week for 2nd high average in the league at 153, so now we are taking over the sheet as well (Abbie's 187 is holding up nicely as a top game...187 = killed the other team = murder cop code = mens fucking rea). We started the season 1-6 but have ripped off 11 straight and stand at 12-6. I think we will be in first place tonight when the sheet is passed around the bowling alley, so all we have to do is hold serve this evening and we will be division champs. To hell with the playoffs...division champs would be sweet. Can you tell it's bowling night...?
I've successfully put off Appellate Advocacy now and I have 5 days to comeplete my brief. Thankfully all I have to do is minor repairs and mostly grammar, spell checks, and cite checks. One quick oral argument in 2-3 weeks and then that hassle is over. Just in time to start worrying about my 4 exams.
The Schottenstein Center here on campus has been jumping this week. Saturday night was a Daily Show cast and Jon Stewart event for the students at OSU, Sunday Barenaked Ladies played, and Monday Red Hot Chili Peppers played. That's the best three straight days ever at that crappy arena probably. Kelley and I went to see Jon Stewart, and it was a nice funny evening. They showed clips from previous shows, the highlight of which had to be when they followed around a Cleveland area reporter who is known for investigative reporting in a clip called "You Jackin It?" This reporter caught a college kid jacking off in a public library, and then proceeded to hound him and his family for weeks about it on the local news. Not to be trumped, the Daily Show hounded this real life reporter and libraries in the area seeing if they could find more people "Jackin It." Stewart and the gang are taping this week's shows on campus so they can be in the middle of the most important swing state during these midterm elections. Should be good times.
I'm playing a little online poker (down a little again since I talked to you last, but I'm sure the luck will turn around) and some Magic online now...it's nice to have time to play those games and not feel like I'm putting off something (other than App Ad). Also, if anybody has a copy of Mario Party 6 and a gamecue microphone they wish to sell...message me. I don't want to buy the game new and MP7 is good but would be better with a mic (and I think MP 6 which my old roommates have has better mini-games).
Shipman cancelled class today, hope he's doing alright. Especially since that's my primary job for next semester and my best reference until after this summer's employment. This is a good week, as last night we went out to celebrate my job offer, tonight is bowling, Thursday Dell is coming to fix my computer in my house (new motherboard and touchpad among other small things), Thursday night I'm watching Saw III with Tom and Heather and then the WVU-UL football game, and Friday night we are hosting poker and Thomas and Lisa will be down to stay the evening as well. Time for a little payback for Mr. Applebaum :-)
Anyways, class is about to start and I'm sure I've caught everyone up and all they want to know (and more than they ever wanted to know) and my life. To sum it all up...I GOT A JOB. WOO-HOO!
Monday, October 23, 2006
Time!
I did not realize how much time I really had until I stopped going on these callback interviews. Wow do I actually have time to read, go to class, and work on app ad without going crazy? Yes!
The real reason I'm writing this short update. Call the presses, you don't have to worry about me moving across the country. The dream job wrote me a letter, just like every other firm that has given me a final response thus far (that's fancy talk for no offers). So I'm not moving to Dallas. Speaking of Dallas, I am watching the end of a joke on MNF as the Cowboys inexplicably are not playing their starting QB...thanks Cowboys, right when I picked you Parcells goes crazy.
But back to the matter at hand. With the "dream job" out of the pool, I still have five firms I have not heard back from, and I know somewhere out there a job offer will drop in my lap. So firms (if you are reading blogs and facebook profiles like the National Jurist says), the door is wide open for all of you.
If none of those work out, Dom and Everson and I are opening our own law firm. Moving the ildhell out of Ohio and opening our own law firm. Everson, Brook, Fitzgerald, and Geiger. Has a nice ring to it (we are renting Geiger's name as the anchor, but he might join up too). Then we can build a firm and make law students sweat while waiting for rejection letters from us.
And one more thing, I'm cheering for the Cardinals in the World Series...but I've never seen so much ado about nothing last night when Detroit pitcher Kenny rogers had some dirt on his pitching hand in the first inning. The announcers went crazy thinking pine tar, they discussed it, Rogers washed his hand, and then proceeded to give up 1 hit in the next 7 innings (the tigers won easily 3-0 to tie the series). It was obviously not cheating, and why would this veteran try in the World Series where everything is scrutinized...what a joke. Let's all focus on some guy's dirty hands instead of the great effort Detroit put up and the fact that this series looks like it could go 7 games and be very competitive like the NLCS. This just in: I have a little dirt under my fingernail on my right hand (throwing hand)...STOP THE PRESSES, I might be blogging with pine tar under my fingernails.
Have a good week, I'll be busy doing something. I did win $47 in 7 minutes on ultimatebet tonight and got right back offline. Happy to be back where I was 2 months ago before my big slip.
The real reason I'm writing this short update. Call the presses, you don't have to worry about me moving across the country. The dream job wrote me a letter, just like every other firm that has given me a final response thus far (that's fancy talk for no offers). So I'm not moving to Dallas. Speaking of Dallas, I am watching the end of a joke on MNF as the Cowboys inexplicably are not playing their starting QB...thanks Cowboys, right when I picked you Parcells goes crazy.
But back to the matter at hand. With the "dream job" out of the pool, I still have five firms I have not heard back from, and I know somewhere out there a job offer will drop in my lap. So firms (if you are reading blogs and facebook profiles like the National Jurist says), the door is wide open for all of you.
If none of those work out, Dom and Everson and I are opening our own law firm. Moving the ildhell out of Ohio and opening our own law firm. Everson, Brook, Fitzgerald, and Geiger. Has a nice ring to it (we are renting Geiger's name as the anchor, but he might join up too). Then we can build a firm and make law students sweat while waiting for rejection letters from us.
And one more thing, I'm cheering for the Cardinals in the World Series...but I've never seen so much ado about nothing last night when Detroit pitcher Kenny rogers had some dirt on his pitching hand in the first inning. The announcers went crazy thinking pine tar, they discussed it, Rogers washed his hand, and then proceeded to give up 1 hit in the next 7 innings (the tigers won easily 3-0 to tie the series). It was obviously not cheating, and why would this veteran try in the World Series where everything is scrutinized...what a joke. Let's all focus on some guy's dirty hands instead of the great effort Detroit put up and the fact that this series looks like it could go 7 games and be very competitive like the NLCS. This just in: I have a little dirt under my fingernail on my right hand (throwing hand)...STOP THE PRESSES, I might be blogging with pine tar under my fingernails.
Have a good week, I'll be busy doing something. I did win $47 in 7 minutes on ultimatebet tonight and got right back offline. Happy to be back where I was 2 months ago before my big slip.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Playing Four Corners of Ohio
The latter half of my fall break was spent playing four corners with the state of Ohio. Let me explain.
Callback number 7 (Wood Herron Evans) was on Thursday in Cincinnati OH (CORNER ONE, the SW corner). The firm is a good sized boutique, rare in Ohio for sure. The personalities were interesting, and I got to meet a good mix of attorneys. I do not know if I want to end up in that city, but the firm was nice and I on this day realize I really want to work for a boutique or a firm that was a boutique but added a corporate practice just to keep up. So the Louisville firm has a serious knock in it now, but oh well. I drove down in the morning and drove back in the afternoon, was alone with Chip the new dog since Kelley was at choir until late and brought Zach up to our apartment to watch the dog over the weekend. A decent trip, and we will see what they will say.
Woke up dark and early (5:00 AM) on Friday to drive to Troy MI, a suburb north of Detroit for Callback #8 (Harness Dickey). I drove through Toledo OH, the NW and CORNER TWO of Ohio. This is another nice IP boutique, and they seem a little more uptight or professional than all the other firms I have visited. Even being 20 miles from downtown Detroit, the location is not the best. At least there is no BS commute into a high0rise of a big city though, so that’s a big plus. This firm sits in the middle of all my other firms I would not put at number 1, but I would accept a job offer from (and would be happy if they were my only offer). This firm seems a lot more dedicated toward a good summer experience, and I like that the firm goes out to lunch together every Friday.
Kelley got lost in northern suburbs shopping, so we went to the hotel and checked in at the Drury. Nice hotels, lots of extras like free bar drinks every evening and free popcorn and pop all afternoon and evening. We chilled in the hot tub and pool for an hour, then caught up on a little sleep before going out for the evening. We shopped for warm clothes and alcohol for tailgating the next day, went out to dinner at Outback, saw the area in general, then went down to Greektown Casino in downtown Detroit for a nightcap. We had never been to a real casino, so this was new for us. Table games are so expensive, so going to have to wait until I make bigger bucks to play in these casinos. The slots were plentiful and fun though, and we did play one table game I just had to try (War). What a simple silly game, but mildly entertaining anyways.
Saturday morning we started slowly and got on the road for East Lansing, about a 90-minute drive up the road. We get there and manage to find a parking garage not too busy (we just beat the rush). We bundle up, get our coke and rum ready, and go walking around to find the Buckeye Bob tailgate. Took us about a mile of walking some in the wrong direction and a hour, but we find the tailgate right when the fries and steak are coming off the burners…so yummy stuff not missed. Good sized group of us there, and Kelley and I downed a half bottle (BIG BOTTLE) of Bacardi and coke together in the course of an hour there and an hour back at the car. Finally stumble into the game around halftime, sit in the MSU band section while they are on the field, get kicked out up to our upper deck seats for the second half. A little chilly up there due to wind, but not crowded because a lot of MSU fans left at halftime since they were already down 24-0. I personally needed to get plastered in the middle of the law school term after being done with interviews and so on, so I am not sorry about missing what must have been a boring first half (barring Teddy’s punt return for TD). OSU goes on to win, I go on to get sober, and we hit the road for home again. We drove through Cleveland OH (The NE CORNER, or CORNER #3) on the way to Marietta.
Sunday I woke up around noon right before Kelley got home from church and watched TV with her stepfather for a while. We chilled in Marietta for a while (CORNER 4, the SE CORNER) on Sunday, then finally went back up to Columbus to do some grocery shopping and let Zach finally go home. Chip was happy to see us, and we were happy to see him except for him tearing up the blinds in our room. The end of a long but good relaxing weekend and fall break, and while I was not quite ready to go back to class…Monday calls.
The first day back in class was not too shabby. Shipman has had good lectures and good reading assignments…starting to feel like accounting is a good class. I’m totally just reading the nutshell guide and outlining the course at the end of the semester based on that and the HW problems. Tax was rather boring, but patent law was actually engaging for the first time since the first week of class (because we were doing sample exam or patent bar questions on the unit we just finished). Went out with Dan after class and caught up on fall break stuff (and there was some serious stuff). Seems like the job search for everybody other than Jonathan and I has slowed down and not many people are walking around with offers. I know I have the most callbacks to hear from in my group of friends, so I would hope my optimism that I will get 2-3 offers is not misplaced. Think I’m calling Dallas this afternoon to see if they held their meeting and to see where I stand since it has been quite some time. Going out to dinner at Quaker Steak tonight with brother-in-law and fiancée this evening, as it is wing night.
The ACC-Check does not look so bad this time around, a little shorter. Time to get back to that and perhaps revising my AA brief for oral argument season.
Oh one more note while I am thinking about it. I for the first time in six years, completely disagree with the President and I am very unhappy with his actions. Not about the war or anything like that, but the port security bill he signed into law last Friday which tries to kill online gambling for US citizens by blocking bank and credit card transfers from US banks to gambling websites. Now I know my site has already in place a work-around (UltimateBet), but how long before some goon in the US Attorney General’s office goes after these big boys? I have enough money on there that I do not have to reload anytime soon and so I should be able to keep playing casually…but sneaking this overbroad and ridiculous legislation in a security bill republicans in Congress and the President are forced to pass politically is WRONG. I have no problem if the government wants to regulate these online casinos like the offline ones, as I am one of millions of players willing to pay reasonable taxes on deposits…but to try and quash them completely is an impediment to freedom in this country. I know some of my readers will completely disagree with me here, but most of my readers will be happy to see me finally upset with Prez W over something.
Callback number 7 (Wood Herron Evans) was on Thursday in Cincinnati OH (CORNER ONE, the SW corner). The firm is a good sized boutique, rare in Ohio for sure. The personalities were interesting, and I got to meet a good mix of attorneys. I do not know if I want to end up in that city, but the firm was nice and I on this day realize I really want to work for a boutique or a firm that was a boutique but added a corporate practice just to keep up. So the Louisville firm has a serious knock in it now, but oh well. I drove down in the morning and drove back in the afternoon, was alone with Chip the new dog since Kelley was at choir until late and brought Zach up to our apartment to watch the dog over the weekend. A decent trip, and we will see what they will say.
Woke up dark and early (5:00 AM) on Friday to drive to Troy MI, a suburb north of Detroit for Callback #8 (Harness Dickey). I drove through Toledo OH, the NW and CORNER TWO of Ohio. This is another nice IP boutique, and they seem a little more uptight or professional than all the other firms I have visited. Even being 20 miles from downtown Detroit, the location is not the best. At least there is no BS commute into a high0rise of a big city though, so that’s a big plus. This firm sits in the middle of all my other firms I would not put at number 1, but I would accept a job offer from (and would be happy if they were my only offer). This firm seems a lot more dedicated toward a good summer experience, and I like that the firm goes out to lunch together every Friday.
Kelley got lost in northern suburbs shopping, so we went to the hotel and checked in at the Drury. Nice hotels, lots of extras like free bar drinks every evening and free popcorn and pop all afternoon and evening. We chilled in the hot tub and pool for an hour, then caught up on a little sleep before going out for the evening. We shopped for warm clothes and alcohol for tailgating the next day, went out to dinner at Outback, saw the area in general, then went down to Greektown Casino in downtown Detroit for a nightcap. We had never been to a real casino, so this was new for us. Table games are so expensive, so going to have to wait until I make bigger bucks to play in these casinos. The slots were plentiful and fun though, and we did play one table game I just had to try (War). What a simple silly game, but mildly entertaining anyways.
Saturday morning we started slowly and got on the road for East Lansing, about a 90-minute drive up the road. We get there and manage to find a parking garage not too busy (we just beat the rush). We bundle up, get our coke and rum ready, and go walking around to find the Buckeye Bob tailgate. Took us about a mile of walking some in the wrong direction and a hour, but we find the tailgate right when the fries and steak are coming off the burners…so yummy stuff not missed. Good sized group of us there, and Kelley and I downed a half bottle (BIG BOTTLE) of Bacardi and coke together in the course of an hour there and an hour back at the car. Finally stumble into the game around halftime, sit in the MSU band section while they are on the field, get kicked out up to our upper deck seats for the second half. A little chilly up there due to wind, but not crowded because a lot of MSU fans left at halftime since they were already down 24-0. I personally needed to get plastered in the middle of the law school term after being done with interviews and so on, so I am not sorry about missing what must have been a boring first half (barring Teddy’s punt return for TD). OSU goes on to win, I go on to get sober, and we hit the road for home again. We drove through Cleveland OH (The NE CORNER, or CORNER #3) on the way to Marietta.
Sunday I woke up around noon right before Kelley got home from church and watched TV with her stepfather for a while. We chilled in Marietta for a while (CORNER 4, the SE CORNER) on Sunday, then finally went back up to Columbus to do some grocery shopping and let Zach finally go home. Chip was happy to see us, and we were happy to see him except for him tearing up the blinds in our room. The end of a long but good relaxing weekend and fall break, and while I was not quite ready to go back to class…Monday calls.
The first day back in class was not too shabby. Shipman has had good lectures and good reading assignments…starting to feel like accounting is a good class. I’m totally just reading the nutshell guide and outlining the course at the end of the semester based on that and the HW problems. Tax was rather boring, but patent law was actually engaging for the first time since the first week of class (because we were doing sample exam or patent bar questions on the unit we just finished). Went out with Dan after class and caught up on fall break stuff (and there was some serious stuff). Seems like the job search for everybody other than Jonathan and I has slowed down and not many people are walking around with offers. I know I have the most callbacks to hear from in my group of friends, so I would hope my optimism that I will get 2-3 offers is not misplaced. Think I’m calling Dallas this afternoon to see if they held their meeting and to see where I stand since it has been quite some time. Going out to dinner at Quaker Steak tonight with brother-in-law and fiancée this evening, as it is wing night.
The ACC-Check does not look so bad this time around, a little shorter. Time to get back to that and perhaps revising my AA brief for oral argument season.
Oh one more note while I am thinking about it. I for the first time in six years, completely disagree with the President and I am very unhappy with his actions. Not about the war or anything like that, but the port security bill he signed into law last Friday which tries to kill online gambling for US citizens by blocking bank and credit card transfers from US banks to gambling websites. Now I know my site has already in place a work-around (UltimateBet), but how long before some goon in the US Attorney General’s office goes after these big boys? I have enough money on there that I do not have to reload anytime soon and so I should be able to keep playing casually…but sneaking this overbroad and ridiculous legislation in a security bill republicans in Congress and the President are forced to pass politically is WRONG. I have no problem if the government wants to regulate these online casinos like the offline ones, as I am one of millions of players willing to pay reasonable taxes on deposits…but to try and quash them completely is an impediment to freedom in this country. I know some of my readers will completely disagree with me here, but most of my readers will be happy to see me finally upset with Prez W over something.
Monday, October 09, 2006
In Chicago and Waiting
So I'm sitting in my hotel's lobby on a super-comfy sofa enjoying free wi-fi (when you charge $250 a night, charging for wi-fi is in my opinion undignified). Decided to not go out around downtown last night, just ordered in room service which was not as good as the price had hopefully suggested. At least I ordered a lot so I could be picky and choosy instead of starving. Enjoying this brief respite from even thinking about law school, well except for when interviewers ask about it of course. Next week I'll have to start again on appellate advocacy so I am not scrambling before final submissions the first week of November.
You might ask why I am sitting here blogging at 1:18 in the afternoon (12:18 local time)? Because check-out was noon and my interview starts at 1:30 with McDonnell Boehnen a few blocks from here. Better to sit here with free wi-fi than look like a terrorist with my big garment bag just sitting around a corporate office building lobby or showing up to the interview too early. Let's review this crazy interview season...
35 first interviews at Loyola Patent Program and OSU OCI August 3-September 14.
52 unsolicited letters to chicago and texas firms.
8 callback interviews thus far (#6 today, #7 Thursday, #8 Friday).
16 rejection letters from first interviews...and 12 firms have not responded yet amazingly.
1 rejection letter from callback interviews.
0 offers.
I believe this is where Mastercard would say "Priceless."
Fish and Richardson in Dallas TX - (Loyola Patent Program) Callback was 9/1, no response.
Maginot Moore and Beck in Indianapolis IN - (OCI) Callback 9/6, no response.
Brinks Hofer Gilson and Lione in Chicago IL - (Loyola Patent) Callback 9/22, quick rejection letter.
Leydig Voit and Mayer in Chicago IL - (Loyola Patent) Callback 9/29, no response.
Greenebaum Doll in Louisville KY - (OCI) Callback 10/6, no response.
McDonnell Boehnen in Chicago IL - (Letter!) Callback 10/9
Wood Herron Evans in Cincinnati, OH - (OCI) Callback 10/12
Harness Dickey in Detroit, MI - (Loyola Patent) Callback 10/13
Seven fishing lines still in the lake, perhaps there will be more added but hopefully I can catch a fish or two in the next couple weeks. I fully expected to hear from the first three firms on the list this week, but Brinks went above and beyond by letting me know last week they did not want me :-) At the time I was having trouble deciding whether I would take that offer or another top one on my list, so that clears the order up a bit.
The Greenebaum interview impressed me, and I really like Louisville if I choose to settle in a smaller city. South enough to not be awful weather for 6 months, on the Ohio River, nice driving distance to Columbus, Cincy, Indy, Chicago, and Nashville. If I had to make a snap judgment or list of firm preference right now, they would be number 2...but further consideration will be merited if I get multiple offers.
The OSU-BGSU game was one of the more boring contests I've witnessed at Ohio Stadium, and it marked my 30th OSU game overall. On a stretch of 5 straight weekends with the Iowa trip and MSU trip, so looking forward to seeing the Bucks defend their number 1 ranking this month and getting ready long-term for the showdown with Michigan for the Big Ten title and a likely berth in the BCS title game. As last week proved though, undefeateds are falling quickly (13 last week, 4 of them lost so 9 left). OSU has to avoid the upset bug...
I forgot to mention this last week because I was too busy rushing home and finishing the brief for app ad and then going to bowling, but I witnessed a squirrel on Chittenden Wednesday that made me about roll off the sidewalk laughing. This squirrel was going hardcore on a piece of pepperoni pizza left by drunk undergrads in the grass, and I for some reason found this sight so funny. Since when do squirrels go for Papa John's? The way it was tearing into the pizza kind of reminded me of quite a few 1L's and undergrad students I know :-P
So Zach (my brother in law) is home finally this week from the Air Force after being forced out due to a kidney stone. Now he is back spending tons of time with fiancee Sarah in his room at his Mom's house. My father-in-law, grandparents-in-law, mother-in-law, stepfather-in-law, and wife are all supportive but all of them do not seem to completely trust Sarah. I kind of feel the same way, and I am definitely worried Zach will do something dumb now that he's home like get married really soon or have a kid. He needs to continue with his life plan and go to school somewhere...as maturity (which I'm sure he got some in basic training) comes from life in college and depending on yourself and not living at home. Kelley and Bruce (and I) are a little pissed Zach's mom lets them hang out all day in Zach's room until 3 AM alone, whereas Kelley was not allowed to be in her room with guys at all. Well I just hope he makes good decisions, as he is definitely a smart guy and has more computer skills than I ever care to have. The only thing that keeps me from saying stuff to him is that I HATED the crap I got from family about my own wedding, so I don't want to be that guy. Things have seemed to work out great for me, so hopefully the same to him.
I got measured for my tux for Tom and Heather's wedding the other day, which got me to thinking...what the hell am I going to say as the Best Man toast? Tom had his moments when I though his speech would be a disaster, but he pulled it all together and I loved it. I just hope I can do the same...and I am totally looking forward to the honor. Wish we could get out and play tennis before it freezes over, but with all these interviews it probably will not happen till next week. I'll hope for sunshine, even if we have to play in sweats.
Went to Chi Alpha this week, nice to see the old gang and the new people. Pastor Jim just had his second kid, so big news there. Saw Pastor Jeff and grabbed coffee with him randomly earlier that day as well, so that was nice. With Zach coming back and going to contemporary Lutheran services now...we both might be able to influence the worship and music committee or whoever runs this shebang that changes need to be made. You cannot make everyone happy and the contemporary service IS a big improvement over the regular liturgical worship, but the darn service is still confined by liturgy (on the powerpoint slides mind you). If they want to draw in new members and non-Lutherans to see attendance actually grow, they need to change it up a little bit. I'm not saying exactly like Zach's basic training contemporary church service or my Chi Alpha services, but make it a lot more like those and start over instead of basing it strictly on liturgy. I do not know why I should care just like why should I care about who wins elections in Ohio when I'm moving out of state in two years...but something makes me want to stand up to the hardcore Lutherans and tell them to be open-minded. Just like when I "stole" communion from the not open-table Missouri Synod Lutheran church my father attends...but that's another story for another time.
For some reason, after rushing to finish the app ad brief and not revising it at all, I looked it over Thursday morning and was proud of it. I know it will be ripped apart by my adjunct professor, but for a few days I can be proud of my work.
Well it is time to go hail a cab and get on with this interview. More fun on this trip other than having this mid-day wait was having to re-schedule my flight tonight since I thought the interview was in the morning and so I set up the 5:30 flight out of town. It's now the 7:30 flight because there is NO WAY you can have an interview at 1:30 and make it to O'Hare by 4:30. Just impossible. Especially if I bring home Giordano's ;-)
Have a good week, I may be on here more as the week off progresses.
You might ask why I am sitting here blogging at 1:18 in the afternoon (12:18 local time)? Because check-out was noon and my interview starts at 1:30 with McDonnell Boehnen a few blocks from here. Better to sit here with free wi-fi than look like a terrorist with my big garment bag just sitting around a corporate office building lobby or showing up to the interview too early. Let's review this crazy interview season...
35 first interviews at Loyola Patent Program and OSU OCI August 3-September 14.
52 unsolicited letters to chicago and texas firms.
8 callback interviews thus far (#6 today, #7 Thursday, #8 Friday).
16 rejection letters from first interviews...and 12 firms have not responded yet amazingly.
1 rejection letter from callback interviews.
0 offers.
I believe this is where Mastercard would say "Priceless."
Fish and Richardson in Dallas TX - (Loyola Patent Program) Callback was 9/1, no response.
Maginot Moore and Beck in Indianapolis IN - (OCI) Callback 9/6, no response.
Brinks Hofer Gilson and Lione in Chicago IL - (Loyola Patent) Callback 9/22, quick rejection letter.
Leydig Voit and Mayer in Chicago IL - (Loyola Patent) Callback 9/29, no response.
Greenebaum Doll in Louisville KY - (OCI) Callback 10/6, no response.
McDonnell Boehnen in Chicago IL - (Letter!) Callback 10/9
Wood Herron Evans in Cincinnati, OH - (OCI) Callback 10/12
Harness Dickey in Detroit, MI - (Loyola Patent) Callback 10/13
Seven fishing lines still in the lake, perhaps there will be more added but hopefully I can catch a fish or two in the next couple weeks. I fully expected to hear from the first three firms on the list this week, but Brinks went above and beyond by letting me know last week they did not want me :-) At the time I was having trouble deciding whether I would take that offer or another top one on my list, so that clears the order up a bit.
The Greenebaum interview impressed me, and I really like Louisville if I choose to settle in a smaller city. South enough to not be awful weather for 6 months, on the Ohio River, nice driving distance to Columbus, Cincy, Indy, Chicago, and Nashville. If I had to make a snap judgment or list of firm preference right now, they would be number 2...but further consideration will be merited if I get multiple offers.
The OSU-BGSU game was one of the more boring contests I've witnessed at Ohio Stadium, and it marked my 30th OSU game overall. On a stretch of 5 straight weekends with the Iowa trip and MSU trip, so looking forward to seeing the Bucks defend their number 1 ranking this month and getting ready long-term for the showdown with Michigan for the Big Ten title and a likely berth in the BCS title game. As last week proved though, undefeateds are falling quickly (13 last week, 4 of them lost so 9 left). OSU has to avoid the upset bug...
I forgot to mention this last week because I was too busy rushing home and finishing the brief for app ad and then going to bowling, but I witnessed a squirrel on Chittenden Wednesday that made me about roll off the sidewalk laughing. This squirrel was going hardcore on a piece of pepperoni pizza left by drunk undergrads in the grass, and I for some reason found this sight so funny. Since when do squirrels go for Papa John's? The way it was tearing into the pizza kind of reminded me of quite a few 1L's and undergrad students I know :-P
So Zach (my brother in law) is home finally this week from the Air Force after being forced out due to a kidney stone. Now he is back spending tons of time with fiancee Sarah in his room at his Mom's house. My father-in-law, grandparents-in-law, mother-in-law, stepfather-in-law, and wife are all supportive but all of them do not seem to completely trust Sarah. I kind of feel the same way, and I am definitely worried Zach will do something dumb now that he's home like get married really soon or have a kid. He needs to continue with his life plan and go to school somewhere...as maturity (which I'm sure he got some in basic training) comes from life in college and depending on yourself and not living at home. Kelley and Bruce (and I) are a little pissed Zach's mom lets them hang out all day in Zach's room until 3 AM alone, whereas Kelley was not allowed to be in her room with guys at all. Well I just hope he makes good decisions, as he is definitely a smart guy and has more computer skills than I ever care to have. The only thing that keeps me from saying stuff to him is that I HATED the crap I got from family about my own wedding, so I don't want to be that guy. Things have seemed to work out great for me, so hopefully the same to him.
I got measured for my tux for Tom and Heather's wedding the other day, which got me to thinking...what the hell am I going to say as the Best Man toast? Tom had his moments when I though his speech would be a disaster, but he pulled it all together and I loved it. I just hope I can do the same...and I am totally looking forward to the honor. Wish we could get out and play tennis before it freezes over, but with all these interviews it probably will not happen till next week. I'll hope for sunshine, even if we have to play in sweats.
Went to Chi Alpha this week, nice to see the old gang and the new people. Pastor Jim just had his second kid, so big news there. Saw Pastor Jeff and grabbed coffee with him randomly earlier that day as well, so that was nice. With Zach coming back and going to contemporary Lutheran services now...we both might be able to influence the worship and music committee or whoever runs this shebang that changes need to be made. You cannot make everyone happy and the contemporary service IS a big improvement over the regular liturgical worship, but the darn service is still confined by liturgy (on the powerpoint slides mind you). If they want to draw in new members and non-Lutherans to see attendance actually grow, they need to change it up a little bit. I'm not saying exactly like Zach's basic training contemporary church service or my Chi Alpha services, but make it a lot more like those and start over instead of basing it strictly on liturgy. I do not know why I should care just like why should I care about who wins elections in Ohio when I'm moving out of state in two years...but something makes me want to stand up to the hardcore Lutherans and tell them to be open-minded. Just like when I "stole" communion from the not open-table Missouri Synod Lutheran church my father attends...but that's another story for another time.
For some reason, after rushing to finish the app ad brief and not revising it at all, I looked it over Thursday morning and was proud of it. I know it will be ripped apart by my adjunct professor, but for a few days I can be proud of my work.
Well it is time to go hail a cab and get on with this interview. More fun on this trip other than having this mid-day wait was having to re-schedule my flight tonight since I thought the interview was in the morning and so I set up the 5:30 flight out of town. It's now the 7:30 flight because there is NO WAY you can have an interview at 1:30 and make it to O'Hare by 4:30. Just impossible. Especially if I bring home Giordano's ;-)
Have a good week, I may be on here more as the week off progresses.
Monday, October 02, 2006
Iowa Weekend
Left after appellate advocacy on Thursday for Chicago. Stopped at half price books and got some new ones to read finally, keep the wife happy :-) Did reading on the way out. Got there late at night and went out to Hard Rock Cafe for some dinner and a new bear for my collection. It was a concert night, so no tables for dinner means we moved on. Red Lobster closed, Rainforest Cafe closed...not going to McDonald's on the firm dime. We then turn the corner and see Melting Pot, the fondue restaurant from home that got us hooked on fondue (we have two pots of our own and fondue all the time now). Well, since the firm is paying...might as well make it like a second honeymoon and get the dinner there while enjoying the $300 a night hotel room downtown. The interview was OK, but this firm probably will not beat Brinks in Chicago if both give offers, but it is a perfectly good firm as well.
Spent the rest of the day at Navy Pier, doing the big Ferris Wheel. Nice view of Chicago if you ever go. After dinner at Giordano's, off to Iowa.
Iowa game was fantastic, as the Buckeyes are starting to play like the dominant team in college football. We shall see if they make it undefeated to Michigan which they certainly should. 44 point favorites against BG this week (the Buckeyes have covered all 5 spreads against them this year), and that is unbelivable. I think I was at the biggest blowout in the Jim Tressel era and that was a 43 point win over San Jose State 50-7. I'm seriously tempted to take the Falcons plus 44...it's a near certainty even with OSU dominance. We will back it off if we get up by 28.
Anyways, Iowa fans lived up to their reputation as the nicest in the Big Ten. Mostly. A lot of fans went out of their way to greet Kelley and I and welcome us to Iowa or wish us a safe trip back or have fun at the game. A few drunken idiots (all students) as usual before the game. Of course the assholes who made fun of Kelley for her weight really ruined it for her as we were walking back to the car. One carful of fans ruining all the outstanding work of the other Iowa fans, who were gracious even in defeat. I did not care if they drop to personal attacks because words don't mean anything to me in that instance, but she cried all the way back to the car and I wish I did not have to worry about passing the bar (no incidents of law allowed)...I totally wanted to go run my key across their Escalade and throw a punch or two to shut up the assholes. For me it was a perfectly fine trip but for her this probably ruined a great day. Went to dinner at Perkins with Dad and Patti afterwards, had our good adult chat without the siblings around.
I forgot to mention we got to see Samantha and Cassandra play volleyball and smash some competition Saturday morning. I feel so lucky to have seen one of CJ's soccer games, these volleyball games, and other extracurriculars...as Dad did not get to see mine and I know how much it probably means to them to have me there at least once in a great while. I enjoy seeing them play as well of course.
Sunday we played a little MP7 with the kids before having to hit the road for Ohio. Got home late and passed out so I could wake up in time to go to lunch with Everson today. Got all my reading done through the first classes after fall break, so all my attention tomorrow and Wednesday will be on app ad draft two. Lunch with Everson was nice...hard to not lose track of friends with my awkward school schedule (everybody else is leaving while I am in my first or second class of the day). We are both looking for our first offers, and it is nice to bounce interview stories off each other. He's off to another this week so Kelley will get to bowl which is good because she has the itch to bowl again (I was planning to go on fall break if nothing else) and will get to sub most likely. Looking forward to that as that marks the end of app ad till after break and the end of law school really till after fall break.
So until then...I write. But then I will binge on all things not law school, including time with Kelley and time with things like Lost...Xbox...Gamecube....and whatever else tickles my fancy.
Spent the rest of the day at Navy Pier, doing the big Ferris Wheel. Nice view of Chicago if you ever go. After dinner at Giordano's, off to Iowa.
Iowa game was fantastic, as the Buckeyes are starting to play like the dominant team in college football. We shall see if they make it undefeated to Michigan which they certainly should. 44 point favorites against BG this week (the Buckeyes have covered all 5 spreads against them this year), and that is unbelivable. I think I was at the biggest blowout in the Jim Tressel era and that was a 43 point win over San Jose State 50-7. I'm seriously tempted to take the Falcons plus 44...it's a near certainty even with OSU dominance. We will back it off if we get up by 28.
Anyways, Iowa fans lived up to their reputation as the nicest in the Big Ten. Mostly. A lot of fans went out of their way to greet Kelley and I and welcome us to Iowa or wish us a safe trip back or have fun at the game. A few drunken idiots (all students) as usual before the game. Of course the assholes who made fun of Kelley for her weight really ruined it for her as we were walking back to the car. One carful of fans ruining all the outstanding work of the other Iowa fans, who were gracious even in defeat. I did not care if they drop to personal attacks because words don't mean anything to me in that instance, but she cried all the way back to the car and I wish I did not have to worry about passing the bar (no incidents of law allowed)...I totally wanted to go run my key across their Escalade and throw a punch or two to shut up the assholes. For me it was a perfectly fine trip but for her this probably ruined a great day. Went to dinner at Perkins with Dad and Patti afterwards, had our good adult chat without the siblings around.
I forgot to mention we got to see Samantha and Cassandra play volleyball and smash some competition Saturday morning. I feel so lucky to have seen one of CJ's soccer games, these volleyball games, and other extracurriculars...as Dad did not get to see mine and I know how much it probably means to them to have me there at least once in a great while. I enjoy seeing them play as well of course.
Sunday we played a little MP7 with the kids before having to hit the road for Ohio. Got home late and passed out so I could wake up in time to go to lunch with Everson today. Got all my reading done through the first classes after fall break, so all my attention tomorrow and Wednesday will be on app ad draft two. Lunch with Everson was nice...hard to not lose track of friends with my awkward school schedule (everybody else is leaving while I am in my first or second class of the day). We are both looking for our first offers, and it is nice to bounce interview stories off each other. He's off to another this week so Kelley will get to bowl which is good because she has the itch to bowl again (I was planning to go on fall break if nothing else) and will get to sub most likely. Looking forward to that as that marks the end of app ad till after break and the end of law school really till after fall break.
So until then...I write. But then I will binge on all things not law school, including time with Kelley and time with things like Lost...Xbox...Gamecube....and whatever else tickles my fancy.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
A midweek entry
Hey, why not two entries in a week! Put my article up on SCS just now, looks decent but not my usual ramble. This one is more like last season's articles, and I do not know if that is good or not. All I know is I am PUMPED for the Iowa game. Cannot wait for Saturday.
I really wrote to speak of my day. This was a bad day, despite no reading and getting to start my day with tennis. First Kirkland and Ellis calls, says they are SO SORRY because they sent the wrong letter to me and I actually do not have a callback. As if that unprofessional behavior did not get it going (and that is really what got in my craw as the day went on), the other phone calls of the day set it off. Fish from Dallas called back, and it turned out to be a good call as they are meeting October 10 to make final decisions so I will know for sure in 2 weeks. It is nice to know finally when that will be, but still I wait for my first offer. Then Leydig (my callback for Friday) FINALLY got a fourth attorney for me to interview with Friday and confirmed my interview at 5 PM today. I'm leaving for Chicago tomorrow at 11 AM and I get confirmation of the interview at 5 PM the day before I leave. Considering they had 3 and a half weeks from when we tenatively scheduled the callback...I find their conduct unacceptable. You cannot make someone wait until the day before they have to leave to set up the interview! I mean I am happy I have a callback, but they are behind Brinks and Fish based solely on how they have acted thus far. And so much for not making last minute travel plans...I do not have a hotel reservation for tomorrow night. Well I am pissed, but I'll call them tomorrow morning and they better answer the phone so we can work this all out before we hit the road.
I do not know what pisses me off more: Kirkland being unprofessional or Leydig being such a pain. If only I had an offer...
On the bright side it was bowling night, and we were bowling against Applebaum's team. Aaron has been talking trash all week and so have we. The team theme this week (we're crazy) was Holy Rollers so Daniel and Brodie dressed up in suits and acted like crazy southern baptist preachers. I had on my Halloween costume, Roman Catholic Cardinal. Abbie totally should have dressed like a rabbi, but she did have the MFR shirt on. Well anyways Aaron and I were focused on beating each other individually as the best players on the team...and he beat me by 2 first game 162-160...more painful was our team losing by 2 pins as well. 1-6 on the season. Then game two I took off my outfit so we had two baptist preachers and the more subdued members of the team in MFR shirts...well we got revenge for game 1. I bowled a little worse (but still beat Aaron 146-143 and the one pin win over two games means I've got bragging rights) but Abbie totally carried the team getting her first ever turkey of her life and 7 marks in 7 frames (2-9) to go get a 187. GO ABBIE! 96 pins over average, and like I said she carried the team as won the second by a dominating 97 pins and the series by 95. We are only 3-6, but we are bowling so much better. I do not know if Abbie can keep it up (or me, having the third or fourth highest AVG in the league)...but Daniel has been consistent and Brodie has been bad so he could easily carry us the rest of the way. Bowling totally turned the day around, and I get to keep my 153 average another week.
One final thought: Is it scary I bowl better in a cardinal dress where I have to bowl with backwards spin than when I bowl a normal game in normal clothes? Yeah I thought so too.
I really wrote to speak of my day. This was a bad day, despite no reading and getting to start my day with tennis. First Kirkland and Ellis calls, says they are SO SORRY because they sent the wrong letter to me and I actually do not have a callback. As if that unprofessional behavior did not get it going (and that is really what got in my craw as the day went on), the other phone calls of the day set it off. Fish from Dallas called back, and it turned out to be a good call as they are meeting October 10 to make final decisions so I will know for sure in 2 weeks. It is nice to know finally when that will be, but still I wait for my first offer. Then Leydig (my callback for Friday) FINALLY got a fourth attorney for me to interview with Friday and confirmed my interview at 5 PM today. I'm leaving for Chicago tomorrow at 11 AM and I get confirmation of the interview at 5 PM the day before I leave. Considering they had 3 and a half weeks from when we tenatively scheduled the callback...I find their conduct unacceptable. You cannot make someone wait until the day before they have to leave to set up the interview! I mean I am happy I have a callback, but they are behind Brinks and Fish based solely on how they have acted thus far. And so much for not making last minute travel plans...I do not have a hotel reservation for tomorrow night. Well I am pissed, but I'll call them tomorrow morning and they better answer the phone so we can work this all out before we hit the road.
I do not know what pisses me off more: Kirkland being unprofessional or Leydig being such a pain. If only I had an offer...
On the bright side it was bowling night, and we were bowling against Applebaum's team. Aaron has been talking trash all week and so have we. The team theme this week (we're crazy) was Holy Rollers so Daniel and Brodie dressed up in suits and acted like crazy southern baptist preachers. I had on my Halloween costume, Roman Catholic Cardinal. Abbie totally should have dressed like a rabbi, but she did have the MFR shirt on. Well anyways Aaron and I were focused on beating each other individually as the best players on the team...and he beat me by 2 first game 162-160...more painful was our team losing by 2 pins as well. 1-6 on the season. Then game two I took off my outfit so we had two baptist preachers and the more subdued members of the team in MFR shirts...well we got revenge for game 1. I bowled a little worse (but still beat Aaron 146-143 and the one pin win over two games means I've got bragging rights) but Abbie totally carried the team getting her first ever turkey of her life and 7 marks in 7 frames (2-9) to go get a 187. GO ABBIE! 96 pins over average, and like I said she carried the team as won the second by a dominating 97 pins and the series by 95. We are only 3-6, but we are bowling so much better. I do not know if Abbie can keep it up (or me, having the third or fourth highest AVG in the league)...but Daniel has been consistent and Brodie has been bad so he could easily carry us the rest of the way. Bowling totally turned the day around, and I get to keep my 153 average another week.
One final thought: Is it scary I bowl better in a cardinal dress where I have to bowl with backwards spin than when I bowl a normal game in normal clothes? Yeah I thought so too.
Monday, September 25, 2006
Two more weeks...
It is only two more weeks until fall break at school, and wow has the time flown by. I am kind of in a rut as far as classes go (less motivation to read, even less motivation to pay attention in my boring classes...but at least Morgan and E. Lee have good classes to look forward to). I doubt I'll do any catching up over that week, but maybe things will get turned in the right direction as I hope to have 2-3 callbacks scheduled that week and finish those off so that I do not have to bother with those anymore. If I could just get an offer from Fish... :-)
My callback with Brinks Hofer in Chicago went well, until today. I'll explain later. Anyways, the interviews were only 20 minutes long so they were a little too rushed for my tastes, but I did get to see 7 attorneys and the recruiting coordinators. The firm is growing slowly (like every other firm in america) and is currently at about 140 attorneys. Everyone I talked to has a balance of patent litigation and patent prosecution work. I like that aspect, and the tougher interviews were the last two because these guys worked in the power and/or nuclear industires before going to law school (and so grilled me on my NE classes which was a change). The lunch was very nice at a place I currently cannot afford, but when the firm buys you steak you eat steak. I also like how they had 2 first year associates who just started 3 weeks ago take me to lunch, as they know the summer program and could answer all of my pressing realistic questions. Of course both of these people were ND undergraduates and UM law students. Go figure...and we start talking about why The Ohio State University insists upon the "THE" at the beginning of their name. LOL. I got payback over dinner when I asked them, "so since you graduated from both universities how did you like the UM-ND game?" Both visibly cringed, so obviously I struck a blow into the Irish hearts...oh well. They said a week and a half to get back with me, and I have a suspicion this is legitimate. So I should hear from F&R by no later than next week and Brinks said then as well. Now you ask how did it go bad today? Well I was rushing to class and grabbed the reimbursement letter (form and original receipts for food and taxicab fares the firm pays for while you are there) out of my backpack and threw it in the US mail drop box at school. As I let it go I notice there is no stamp on the damn thing. Great. So I rush off to class after checking the pickup times (10 AM each day) and figure I'll come back after class and dig it out (the mailbox is not easy to reach into but with a newspaper you can reach the mail in there). So after class I go check the mailbox and it is empty. I call the USPS and they say it will be delivered with a postage due stamp on it...so I left a phone message with the recruiting coordinator apologizing in advance for my brainiac moment. It's probably no big deal, but I do not want to throw the job away on something silly like that.
I will be so happy when I get that first offer. I know with 7 callbacks now I'll get one, but it will feel better to have one nonetheless. It seems like the job market is opening up for all my friends now, as most of us are getting callbacks and waiting for offers (except for Jon, but his PHD in bioscience gives him a huge leg up on the rest of us, even us patent lawyers). It finally seems realistic that by November 1, most of us will know our summer plans and probable futures.
Met with my adjunct today about my app ad paper, as the next draft is due already next week. Craziness will ensue, but he's a really nice fellow and we had a good chat. He ran away from his family by moving to a Boston law firm with no ties to the area, so he was encouraging about my wanting Texas and Chicago. I also told him while I was stuck in OHare coming back from the interview for 4 hours, a lady traveling to Cedar Rapids IA (my hometown) sat down beside me and we chatted about Iowa. She was from Seattle, and had kids get assigned by the racial tiebreaker in my app ad supreme court case. Small world huh...getting to speak with one of the parents I am advocating for was a unique opportunity. It doesn't help the paper, but Pierce (my adjunct) thought it was neat, and said "you know in life, there are no accidents." How true.
I forgot my combination for my locker at school. Not that I use it anymore, but I used it over the summer and did not use it for 4 weeks, now I cannot figure out the damn thing. I wrote it down in my planner last year to remember it, but I cannot find that either. Eh, not a big deal but I keep going back every few days and trying new combinations. Hmmm...
In life there are no mistakes. What a strange concept, but so believeable. Having Kelley as a third wheel at junior prom (obviously led to marriage)...moving to the border between high school districts (allowed me better opportunities in Marietta)...getting rejected by my dream school MIT (probably changed my life plan entirely)...well I am sure we all have moments that seem like they mean less than they actually do in the long run. Well I don't blog about philosophical issues, so back to something more concrete.
The undergraduates are back. In force. All 22,000 or more of them. It gives campus a nice lively feel and I'm not that far removed to love all that goes on when they come back, but my fellow law students don't like it much and this year I can agree a little. I much preferred my parking possibilities before they came back, the first week is hell because you cannot walk down high street without having some stupid young'un run into you, and no longer can you grab lunch somewhere not busy. Law school is just another planet, as I suspect you ask most OSU undergrads where the law school is located and they probably would not know.
This weekend the PSU-OSU game was great, and looking forward to the Iowa trip this weekend after my Chicago callback. It will be the only time in a while I'll see the siblings as well. Hopefully I'll be a happy Buckeye fan for the drive home Sunday, but we shall see. This will be the biggest game in Iowa City in two decades probably, so should be an electric atmosphere.
Sunday was fun, as the new Magic set came out. They have the normal big set which brings back a lot of old mechanics such as flanking and flashback and buyback, but the big news was a subset of cards (121 bonus cards, 1 in each booster pack) are reprints of old cards with purple expansion set symbols and printed in the old cardface. It was nice to open up a pack and get a Mystic Snake, another with a Lightning Angel, another with a Grinning Totem...so the nostalgia theme looks awesome. Shep and I playe din the 2HG on Sunday, 44 teams of which only about 5 could be considered true threats and only 2 other teams with players as good as us. We get paired round 1 against one of the good teams and lose because both our decks get stuck on mana issues. We win two rounds against awful competition before losing again due to my deck and more mana issues (you'd think with a 10-8 split of mana I'd get both...). We decided to stay in and smashed the last two opponents, but got 10th on tiebreakers (6 percentage points behind the tied 8th and 9th place teams). It's a shame, and more of a shame is they ran out of pre-release cards so we did not get a promo. Considering that was the only thing I wanted...that kind of sucks. I quit competitive Magic and they bring out arguably the best two blocks in 5 years including one with nothing but nostalgia. Damn them. Extended and 2HG seasons in 2007 should be fun.
One more thing, guess I saved the best for last. At the tournament Tom let me know I'm going to be his best man in March. That is such an honor, and I feel like it is so undeserved even though we lived together 2 of the last 3 years, and he was my best man. You know how I said there are no accidents in life...well I ran this little thing called Marietta Magic League my senior year of high school, and the best player (the only player better than I) in the area and the only guy who finished better than me in the overall standings was Tom. We became friends thorugh Magic and because I started the league and he saw the ads for the tournaments...and now we are each other's best man six years later. Funny how this world works.
Going to be two more bachelor parties next year, one I'm planning and one someone else is planning for Burton. I can only hope I do as good of a job as Tom did for me this year. Well enough for now...
My callback with Brinks Hofer in Chicago went well, until today. I'll explain later. Anyways, the interviews were only 20 minutes long so they were a little too rushed for my tastes, but I did get to see 7 attorneys and the recruiting coordinators. The firm is growing slowly (like every other firm in america) and is currently at about 140 attorneys. Everyone I talked to has a balance of patent litigation and patent prosecution work. I like that aspect, and the tougher interviews were the last two because these guys worked in the power and/or nuclear industires before going to law school (and so grilled me on my NE classes which was a change). The lunch was very nice at a place I currently cannot afford, but when the firm buys you steak you eat steak. I also like how they had 2 first year associates who just started 3 weeks ago take me to lunch, as they know the summer program and could answer all of my pressing realistic questions. Of course both of these people were ND undergraduates and UM law students. Go figure...and we start talking about why The Ohio State University insists upon the "THE" at the beginning of their name. LOL. I got payback over dinner when I asked them, "so since you graduated from both universities how did you like the UM-ND game?" Both visibly cringed, so obviously I struck a blow into the Irish hearts...oh well. They said a week and a half to get back with me, and I have a suspicion this is legitimate. So I should hear from F&R by no later than next week and Brinks said then as well. Now you ask how did it go bad today? Well I was rushing to class and grabbed the reimbursement letter (form and original receipts for food and taxicab fares the firm pays for while you are there) out of my backpack and threw it in the US mail drop box at school. As I let it go I notice there is no stamp on the damn thing. Great. So I rush off to class after checking the pickup times (10 AM each day) and figure I'll come back after class and dig it out (the mailbox is not easy to reach into but with a newspaper you can reach the mail in there). So after class I go check the mailbox and it is empty. I call the USPS and they say it will be delivered with a postage due stamp on it...so I left a phone message with the recruiting coordinator apologizing in advance for my brainiac moment. It's probably no big deal, but I do not want to throw the job away on something silly like that.
I will be so happy when I get that first offer. I know with 7 callbacks now I'll get one, but it will feel better to have one nonetheless. It seems like the job market is opening up for all my friends now, as most of us are getting callbacks and waiting for offers (except for Jon, but his PHD in bioscience gives him a huge leg up on the rest of us, even us patent lawyers). It finally seems realistic that by November 1, most of us will know our summer plans and probable futures.
Met with my adjunct today about my app ad paper, as the next draft is due already next week. Craziness will ensue, but he's a really nice fellow and we had a good chat. He ran away from his family by moving to a Boston law firm with no ties to the area, so he was encouraging about my wanting Texas and Chicago. I also told him while I was stuck in OHare coming back from the interview for 4 hours, a lady traveling to Cedar Rapids IA (my hometown) sat down beside me and we chatted about Iowa. She was from Seattle, and had kids get assigned by the racial tiebreaker in my app ad supreme court case. Small world huh...getting to speak with one of the parents I am advocating for was a unique opportunity. It doesn't help the paper, but Pierce (my adjunct) thought it was neat, and said "you know in life, there are no accidents." How true.
I forgot my combination for my locker at school. Not that I use it anymore, but I used it over the summer and did not use it for 4 weeks, now I cannot figure out the damn thing. I wrote it down in my planner last year to remember it, but I cannot find that either. Eh, not a big deal but I keep going back every few days and trying new combinations. Hmmm...
In life there are no mistakes. What a strange concept, but so believeable. Having Kelley as a third wheel at junior prom (obviously led to marriage)...moving to the border between high school districts (allowed me better opportunities in Marietta)...getting rejected by my dream school MIT (probably changed my life plan entirely)...well I am sure we all have moments that seem like they mean less than they actually do in the long run. Well I don't blog about philosophical issues, so back to something more concrete.
The undergraduates are back. In force. All 22,000 or more of them. It gives campus a nice lively feel and I'm not that far removed to love all that goes on when they come back, but my fellow law students don't like it much and this year I can agree a little. I much preferred my parking possibilities before they came back, the first week is hell because you cannot walk down high street without having some stupid young'un run into you, and no longer can you grab lunch somewhere not busy. Law school is just another planet, as I suspect you ask most OSU undergrads where the law school is located and they probably would not know.
This weekend the PSU-OSU game was great, and looking forward to the Iowa trip this weekend after my Chicago callback. It will be the only time in a while I'll see the siblings as well. Hopefully I'll be a happy Buckeye fan for the drive home Sunday, but we shall see. This will be the biggest game in Iowa City in two decades probably, so should be an electric atmosphere.
Sunday was fun, as the new Magic set came out. They have the normal big set which brings back a lot of old mechanics such as flanking and flashback and buyback, but the big news was a subset of cards (121 bonus cards, 1 in each booster pack) are reprints of old cards with purple expansion set symbols and printed in the old cardface. It was nice to open up a pack and get a Mystic Snake, another with a Lightning Angel, another with a Grinning Totem...so the nostalgia theme looks awesome. Shep and I playe din the 2HG on Sunday, 44 teams of which only about 5 could be considered true threats and only 2 other teams with players as good as us. We get paired round 1 against one of the good teams and lose because both our decks get stuck on mana issues. We win two rounds against awful competition before losing again due to my deck and more mana issues (you'd think with a 10-8 split of mana I'd get both...). We decided to stay in and smashed the last two opponents, but got 10th on tiebreakers (6 percentage points behind the tied 8th and 9th place teams). It's a shame, and more of a shame is they ran out of pre-release cards so we did not get a promo. Considering that was the only thing I wanted...that kind of sucks. I quit competitive Magic and they bring out arguably the best two blocks in 5 years including one with nothing but nostalgia. Damn them. Extended and 2HG seasons in 2007 should be fun.
One more thing, guess I saved the best for last. At the tournament Tom let me know I'm going to be his best man in March. That is such an honor, and I feel like it is so undeserved even though we lived together 2 of the last 3 years, and he was my best man. You know how I said there are no accidents in life...well I ran this little thing called Marietta Magic League my senior year of high school, and the best player (the only player better than I) in the area and the only guy who finished better than me in the overall standings was Tom. We became friends thorugh Magic and because I started the league and he saw the ads for the tournaments...and now we are each other's best man six years later. Funny how this world works.
Going to be two more bachelor parties next year, one I'm planning and one someone else is planning for Burton. I can only hope I do as good of a job as Tom did for me this year. Well enough for now...
Monday, September 18, 2006
Day 1 of the Workout
Well hard to belive it has been 10 days since I blogged, but then I think about last week and it is easy to see. We went home the weekend of the 9th and went to Kelley's mom's place to watch Texas get whooped on the big screen. That was a sweet game, if a little boring. Nice payback for them ending our long streak of home victories the year before. I was tempted (with the trip to Texas being officially cancelled and airfare to use within the next year) to go ahead and book airfare for Phoenix Arizona for the national title game...but we will wait. Like rational fans who know there are 9 games left on the schedule. Anyways, the only other thing of note last weekend was Shep coming over to help me move the behemoth of a TV into the Tracker we were borrowing from Zach while he's in Texas and Kelley's car was in the shop. The thing must weigh over 300 pounds and has no handholds at all (a slippery box basically). But we got the TV up to Columbus and Kelley and I very slowly got i where it needed to be downstairs. Thanks thanks thanks to the grandparents moving, as we could not afford a big TV but God do football games and Xbox games and TV in general looks great on that big thing. Now the guys have something to watch on poker night too.
Speaking of TV's, been working with a local paralegal (why do all the people I deal with on Craigslist end up being attorneys, lawstudents, or paralegals?) to get her big TV for $35 before she moves to San Diego in 3-4 weeks. Well she finally got in touch with me after 2 weeks of phone tag and said she would sell it to us but not until the week she leaves in about a month, but she will off it for $10. Hey, I have no problem waiting :-)
School was busy as could be last week. I barely kept up with things and let a couple readings go which I will not go back and do since the professors basically went over the reading in class. But my first draft of App Ad is done and I think I've done pretty well. I go meet with my adjunct (the guy who grades it) on next Monday and then I will throw together the second draft for the following week. I might even work on it a little this week, but don't count on it since App Ad is at the bottom of my list until a draft is due. So that kept me busy.
Somehow wrote an article by deadline Wednesday, but did it during patent class. Of course I think it's my best article of the year and I have pretty good patent notes...maybe I should multitask all the time. OK maybe just in Shipman's class, where I am now of course. I do not need 2 days to go over a problem I did in a little under an hour...but whatever. I did not get everything 100% right, but I'm doing pretty well. Speaking of SCS, have no idea what to write about this week...but I've got more important things before deadline on Wednesday.
Last Wednesday I had my App Ad paper turned in the night before the night it was due, but that was just because I was so busy. Interviews in the morning and early afternoon, classes 2-5:30, dinner at Dean Rogers' house at 6-8:15, and rush to first week of bowling. Dean Rogers has a very nice house, but really who is surprised there? I realize now that IPLS has the most insignificant meetings and agenda of pretty much all the Moritz student organizations, but can you fault us? Get the people info about patent law and copyight law, the patent bar, and encourage them to go to the Patent interview fair (which got 2 of the 4 IPLS board members jobs by the looks of it assuming one of my 4 callbacks works out), and call it a year. Not too hard.
Bowling was fantastic. Brodie was late because Vorys was busy buying him dinner and sucking his proverbial nuts (class rank means a lot to them), so Kelley got to bowl the first game for him. She rolled a 116, Brodie shows up and rolls a 117 in the second game...who's going to know it was not him the first game lol? I got a 128 and then a 149, so right around my average for last year which was 140. Our averages for next year are cute, they take 20 pin steps (Me 138, Brodie 117, Abbie 97, Daniel 78). Isn't that cute? Well we lost 2 out of 3 because out two games were within 6 pins or so, while our opponents improved by about 160 pins between games (one guy rolled a 66 game one and a 167 game two, WTF). We are definitely taking the cake for strangest team to bowl against, and that suits us perfectly. Mens Fucking Rea, if you know what I mean.
Thursday I had my final OCI interview, and thank God. 35 first interviews from August 3 to September 14 was enough to make you sick of the little make conversation game. I got two more callbacks, so no more striking out in OCI! And they said I would be more prepared after learning the ropes in Chicago...hell I did so much better in Chicago. Anyways, Chicago Patent program is like this (4 YES, 4 NO, 5 DO NOT KNOW YET) with 2 callbacks done (Fish in Dallas and Maginot in Indianapolis) and 2 not done (Leydig in Chicago and Brinks in Chicago). The OCI stats are (1 YES from Louisville, 10 NO, 11 DO NOT KNOW YET). Woot.
Feels good to get the App Ad monkey and the interview monkey off my back. Of course I still have callbacks and getting offers to worry about, but the hard part is done in my opinion.
Friday was my birthday. Yay 23. Spent it at Mongolian BBQ getting free stir fry AND free dessert and then at Lodge Bar getting tons of free stuff and drink specials. Kind of lame because nobody came, but oh well. Good times.
Weekend was not all that interesting, but since Shipman ended class early I have to finish this up. Kelley and I started working out today by playing tennis and walking, hopefully we get in at least 30 minutes of walking/running or more than an hour of tennis every morning until we lose a little weight. Eating healthier too, but that's gradual. Yay Law School 1L 60 punds...gotta go away. So day 1 of the workout...just blogging to make sure I keep it up :-)
Oh and I got tickets to the Michigan State road game and we are going to the Iowa game as well in 2 weeks, so I have tickets to 6 straight Saturdays counting the 4 home games around those. I need to get rid of two of those games probably, so anyboyd need tickets? Should be fun roadtrips though.
Back to the grind, I'm next up to be called on in tax class so I better go get ready. Have a good week everyone (oh I forgot, JDR had a mixer on Thursday night that was decent and now we have ACC-Checks again this week due Thursday...hooray to fixing authors).
Speaking of TV's, been working with a local paralegal (why do all the people I deal with on Craigslist end up being attorneys, lawstudents, or paralegals?) to get her big TV for $35 before she moves to San Diego in 3-4 weeks. Well she finally got in touch with me after 2 weeks of phone tag and said she would sell it to us but not until the week she leaves in about a month, but she will off it for $10. Hey, I have no problem waiting :-)
School was busy as could be last week. I barely kept up with things and let a couple readings go which I will not go back and do since the professors basically went over the reading in class. But my first draft of App Ad is done and I think I've done pretty well. I go meet with my adjunct (the guy who grades it) on next Monday and then I will throw together the second draft for the following week. I might even work on it a little this week, but don't count on it since App Ad is at the bottom of my list until a draft is due. So that kept me busy.
Somehow wrote an article by deadline Wednesday, but did it during patent class. Of course I think it's my best article of the year and I have pretty good patent notes...maybe I should multitask all the time. OK maybe just in Shipman's class, where I am now of course. I do not need 2 days to go over a problem I did in a little under an hour...but whatever. I did not get everything 100% right, but I'm doing pretty well. Speaking of SCS, have no idea what to write about this week...but I've got more important things before deadline on Wednesday.
Last Wednesday I had my App Ad paper turned in the night before the night it was due, but that was just because I was so busy. Interviews in the morning and early afternoon, classes 2-5:30, dinner at Dean Rogers' house at 6-8:15, and rush to first week of bowling. Dean Rogers has a very nice house, but really who is surprised there? I realize now that IPLS has the most insignificant meetings and agenda of pretty much all the Moritz student organizations, but can you fault us? Get the people info about patent law and copyight law, the patent bar, and encourage them to go to the Patent interview fair (which got 2 of the 4 IPLS board members jobs by the looks of it assuming one of my 4 callbacks works out), and call it a year. Not too hard.
Bowling was fantastic. Brodie was late because Vorys was busy buying him dinner and sucking his proverbial nuts (class rank means a lot to them), so Kelley got to bowl the first game for him. She rolled a 116, Brodie shows up and rolls a 117 in the second game...who's going to know it was not him the first game lol? I got a 128 and then a 149, so right around my average for last year which was 140. Our averages for next year are cute, they take 20 pin steps (Me 138, Brodie 117, Abbie 97, Daniel 78). Isn't that cute? Well we lost 2 out of 3 because out two games were within 6 pins or so, while our opponents improved by about 160 pins between games (one guy rolled a 66 game one and a 167 game two, WTF). We are definitely taking the cake for strangest team to bowl against, and that suits us perfectly. Mens Fucking Rea, if you know what I mean.
Thursday I had my final OCI interview, and thank God. 35 first interviews from August 3 to September 14 was enough to make you sick of the little make conversation game. I got two more callbacks, so no more striking out in OCI! And they said I would be more prepared after learning the ropes in Chicago...hell I did so much better in Chicago. Anyways, Chicago Patent program is like this (4 YES, 4 NO, 5 DO NOT KNOW YET) with 2 callbacks done (Fish in Dallas and Maginot in Indianapolis) and 2 not done (Leydig in Chicago and Brinks in Chicago). The OCI stats are (1 YES from Louisville, 10 NO, 11 DO NOT KNOW YET). Woot.
Feels good to get the App Ad monkey and the interview monkey off my back. Of course I still have callbacks and getting offers to worry about, but the hard part is done in my opinion.
Friday was my birthday. Yay 23. Spent it at Mongolian BBQ getting free stir fry AND free dessert and then at Lodge Bar getting tons of free stuff and drink specials. Kind of lame because nobody came, but oh well. Good times.
Weekend was not all that interesting, but since Shipman ended class early I have to finish this up. Kelley and I started working out today by playing tennis and walking, hopefully we get in at least 30 minutes of walking/running or more than an hour of tennis every morning until we lose a little weight. Eating healthier too, but that's gradual. Yay Law School 1L 60 punds...gotta go away. So day 1 of the workout...just blogging to make sure I keep it up :-)
Oh and I got tickets to the Michigan State road game and we are going to the Iowa game as well in 2 weeks, so I have tickets to 6 straight Saturdays counting the 4 home games around those. I need to get rid of two of those games probably, so anyboyd need tickets? Should be fun roadtrips though.
Back to the grind, I'm next up to be called on in tax class so I better go get ready. Have a good week everyone (oh I forgot, JDR had a mixer on Thursday night that was decent and now we have ACC-Checks again this week due Thursday...hooray to fixing authors).
Friday, September 08, 2006
Delaying App Ad a while longer
This has been an interesting week at school. Labor Day was pretty laid back for me which was kind of unexpected, but I finally bought insurance for myself from Progressive. Boo on paying for insurance while in school :-) I also painted all the new poker room chairs black, but it was late at night when I ran out of spray paint so I had no idea how well I had done them. Kelley reapolstered the cushions from ugly orange to a nice red pattern. The chairs are so comfy too. Anyways, forgot Miami and FSU were playing but found out the next day the game was not worth watching really.
Tuesday I left early to go to the BMV to get my new title since I now own my truck officially, a new registration with new plates, and a new driver's license since I intend to stay in this apartment till my license expires in 2008 (at which point I better be settled somewhere with a law firm job). Well I couldn't find a bank on the way there, so I figured I would suck it up and pay the ATM fees again at the BMV like we did when we got Kelley's new license after the wedding. Well this branch of the ol' BMV does not have an ATM, and the nearest one is half a mile down the road. When you only take cash, you should have an ATM. Anyways, I look at the fee schedule and get a ticket for the title office which I did not have to wait for at all...they tell me I need 6 dollars. It is 60 for a year registration and 20 for a new license, so I figure 100 would cover it. I run to the Shell station, get my money with stupid fee...and back to the BMV. I get a new ticket for the title office, and apparently they got rushed since I was 11th in line now instead of walking right up 20 minutes before. Ugh! So I wait patiently and finally get called up and get my new title. Now at least they transfer you over to the BMV people so you don't have to wait for 50 more people to go, so I go right up to the other desk. We get all the registration and license forms filled out and she says, "is there any way you could wait 10 days until your birthday to get the registration?" Ummm, since the registration on the truck runs out today (Sept. 5), I guess not. "Well I hate for you to pay a prorate for only 10 days." I asked her what the prorate was, and it was 30 dollars. What? 30 damn dollars because my birthday falls 10 days after my mom's. Nice. So now I do not have enough money and she holds the info while I go back out into the driving rainstorm (Ohio is lovely) and back to the Shell station to get charged another ATM fee. So counting ATM fees and the whole shebang, it cost me 130 dollars for a new license, title, and registration for 375 days. But now I have new plates and a new license plate cover I just had to have. I ended up skipping Shippy's class because the whole mess took over 2 hours, much longer than I had thought.
Wednesday I had to skip class again because of hectic interviews. The first of my regular OCI interviews was with a great Chicago firm (Fish and Richardson's top IP litigation competitor) and then I had to leave immediately to drive to Indianapolis for a callback. This firm (Maginot, Moore, and Beck) is a small 8 person firm much like the WV office I had a callback with last school year, so I knew how to play it. They like FR have a beautiful office in the tallest building in their city, and I spent my whole callback in their conference room with a view. I met all the partners and none of the associates, but the interviews went very well. I am a little suspicious that all I saw of the office was the lobby and the conference room, but maybe they did not want to clean off the desks or maybe they thought it more convenient for me to just stay in one place. Regardless I enjoyed the experience and will seriously consider an offer there if I get one around the end of September. Speaking of, we are 5-6 days away from when I am supposed to hear from F&R...I am on pins and needles since I think I will just cancel everything but the Brinks callback if I get an offer (which will simplify my schedule). Of course other than 3 OCI interviews next week, I have no other callbacks yet so no big deal.
I hate missing Shipman all week, that stinks. Labor Day, Stupid BMV, and Callback. I fell behind a bit in classes this week, but I'll stay on top of things I think. App Ad is getting largely ignored despite my macro draft being due in 5 days and JDR will have another acc-check next week to keep me busy. At least it sounds like we will not be going to Texas, so I will not have to BB and TMS while on vacation at least.
Speaking of Texas, my article previewing the big game went up this morning on southerncollegesports.com. I think my article is better than my co-workers who also wrote about the game, but if you want full coverage beyond ESPN check us out.
Held our first social event at the new apartment, and with the exception of a TV or two we are done decorating and bringing things in finally. We had my first of hopefully many poker nights this year last night. 11 people showed up, and it was like a couples atmosphere really since 4 couples were there (Chris and Connie from Cinci, Tom and Heather, Mike and Leah, and of course Kelley and myself). A couple law students did show up (Aaron and AK) and throw in Olwen and there's 11. It sucks Carl, Shep, and Villa had to cancel out but hopefully I run enough of these get togethers that missing one here and there will not feel so bad. The event went really well as we ordered in pizza and snacked on chips and alcohol all evening while watching the Steelers kick off the NFL season. Poker play was good, but I got canned in 10th place out of 11. Details of hands later on my poker blog. Aaron (the poor, poor law student) won the whole thing and Connie got second, with Kelley just missing the cash in third. I'm happy it was successful as hopefully we can do poker night and maybe even have people over for games of other kinds (Palabra, Settlers, Risk, the like) as well down the road. Fun times.
I just realized I am 7 days away from being 23. I'm getting old...just kidding. But I did get a coupon for a free meal at Mongolian BBQ for my birthday, so that's awesome.
GO BUCKS! BEAT TEXAS (for real this time please).
Tuesday I left early to go to the BMV to get my new title since I now own my truck officially, a new registration with new plates, and a new driver's license since I intend to stay in this apartment till my license expires in 2008 (at which point I better be settled somewhere with a law firm job). Well I couldn't find a bank on the way there, so I figured I would suck it up and pay the ATM fees again at the BMV like we did when we got Kelley's new license after the wedding. Well this branch of the ol' BMV does not have an ATM, and the nearest one is half a mile down the road. When you only take cash, you should have an ATM. Anyways, I look at the fee schedule and get a ticket for the title office which I did not have to wait for at all...they tell me I need 6 dollars. It is 60 for a year registration and 20 for a new license, so I figure 100 would cover it. I run to the Shell station, get my money with stupid fee...and back to the BMV. I get a new ticket for the title office, and apparently they got rushed since I was 11th in line now instead of walking right up 20 minutes before. Ugh! So I wait patiently and finally get called up and get my new title. Now at least they transfer you over to the BMV people so you don't have to wait for 50 more people to go, so I go right up to the other desk. We get all the registration and license forms filled out and she says, "is there any way you could wait 10 days until your birthday to get the registration?" Ummm, since the registration on the truck runs out today (Sept. 5), I guess not. "Well I hate for you to pay a prorate for only 10 days." I asked her what the prorate was, and it was 30 dollars. What? 30 damn dollars because my birthday falls 10 days after my mom's. Nice. So now I do not have enough money and she holds the info while I go back out into the driving rainstorm (Ohio is lovely) and back to the Shell station to get charged another ATM fee. So counting ATM fees and the whole shebang, it cost me 130 dollars for a new license, title, and registration for 375 days. But now I have new plates and a new license plate cover I just had to have. I ended up skipping Shippy's class because the whole mess took over 2 hours, much longer than I had thought.
Wednesday I had to skip class again because of hectic interviews. The first of my regular OCI interviews was with a great Chicago firm (Fish and Richardson's top IP litigation competitor) and then I had to leave immediately to drive to Indianapolis for a callback. This firm (Maginot, Moore, and Beck) is a small 8 person firm much like the WV office I had a callback with last school year, so I knew how to play it. They like FR have a beautiful office in the tallest building in their city, and I spent my whole callback in their conference room with a view. I met all the partners and none of the associates, but the interviews went very well. I am a little suspicious that all I saw of the office was the lobby and the conference room, but maybe they did not want to clean off the desks or maybe they thought it more convenient for me to just stay in one place. Regardless I enjoyed the experience and will seriously consider an offer there if I get one around the end of September. Speaking of, we are 5-6 days away from when I am supposed to hear from F&R...I am on pins and needles since I think I will just cancel everything but the Brinks callback if I get an offer (which will simplify my schedule). Of course other than 3 OCI interviews next week, I have no other callbacks yet so no big deal.
I hate missing Shipman all week, that stinks. Labor Day, Stupid BMV, and Callback. I fell behind a bit in classes this week, but I'll stay on top of things I think. App Ad is getting largely ignored despite my macro draft being due in 5 days and JDR will have another acc-check next week to keep me busy. At least it sounds like we will not be going to Texas, so I will not have to BB and TMS while on vacation at least.
Speaking of Texas, my article previewing the big game went up this morning on southerncollegesports.com. I think my article is better than my co-workers who also wrote about the game, but if you want full coverage beyond ESPN check us out.
Held our first social event at the new apartment, and with the exception of a TV or two we are done decorating and bringing things in finally. We had my first of hopefully many poker nights this year last night. 11 people showed up, and it was like a couples atmosphere really since 4 couples were there (Chris and Connie from Cinci, Tom and Heather, Mike and Leah, and of course Kelley and myself). A couple law students did show up (Aaron and AK) and throw in Olwen and there's 11. It sucks Carl, Shep, and Villa had to cancel out but hopefully I run enough of these get togethers that missing one here and there will not feel so bad. The event went really well as we ordered in pizza and snacked on chips and alcohol all evening while watching the Steelers kick off the NFL season. Poker play was good, but I got canned in 10th place out of 11. Details of hands later on my poker blog. Aaron (the poor, poor law student) won the whole thing and Connie got second, with Kelley just missing the cash in third. I'm happy it was successful as hopefully we can do poker night and maybe even have people over for games of other kinds (Palabra, Settlers, Risk, the like) as well down the road. Fun times.
I just realized I am 7 days away from being 23. I'm getting old...just kidding. But I did get a coupon for a free meal at Mongolian BBQ for my birthday, so that's awesome.
GO BUCKS! BEAT TEXAS (for real this time please).
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