Derogative Inflation

The single biggest drawback to referring to the 1Ls as freshmen (as in "So it turns out the freshman really hate it when you call them freshmen. Who knew?") is that I have no handy word when the MAC is under renovation and our beautiful gym is overrun by actual undergraduates.

I had to satisfy myself with muttering darkly about "damn kids."

Calendar Coup

I staggered out of Entertainment Law at 6:45, barely able to stand after an academic day that began at 8:15 in the morning. But a flash of insight struck, my spine straightened, and the spring returned to my step. It was already the weekend.

I Am Queens Boulevard!

I took the truly awesome Trial Advocacy Workshop over winter term, and fortunately Emily wrote a bunch of really detailed posts about what it involves, so now I don't have to. The high point for me was the jury trial where I played at witness, and my portrayal of a victim of a New York police shooting brought tears to the eyes of one juror. Despite the artificiality of the proceedings, she later told us she was convinced that I had actually been shot.

To be fair, the jurors were sixth graders, but if you can fool them, you can fool anybody.

I've Got a Case

Between my three Tuesday classes and can't-miss programming 24, Heroes, and Studio 60, I wind up having alot to do on Monday nights.

Administrative Law

Quoth the Admin casebook:

It is often remarked that the Supreme Court last used the nondelegation doctrine to invalidate a federal statute in 1935. It is less often remarked that the Court first used the nondelegation doctrine to invalidate a statute in 1935. We might therefore say that in American law, the nondelegation doctrine has had only one good year.

We have a whole class about this?

Cambridge Communist

The HLS Parody, a venerable insitution with a history of alumni much more talented than myslelf, wrapped the 2007 script tonight. It goes to the printer tomorrow, for the first cast read-through on Thursday.

Clearly, a party was in order.

However, treasured law school landmark Cambridge Commons, conveniently located at the end of my block, apparently has a policy that a table can only order one round of shots every half an hour.

This limitation was an entirely unacceptable constraint on our creative freedom, especially since the Drama Society was paying for the party. I urge future generations of celebrants to be wary of CC's deliberately slow service.

Next time, I'm pushing R.F. O'Sullivan's all the way.

How do you like that 75-68 defeat UCLA?

ESPN says of my alma mater, "Maybe now it's the Cardinal's turn to earn a ranking."

Hell yeah.

Congratulations Are In Order

He told me earlier this week, and I didn't want to be the first to write about it, but Mikey got into Harvard Business School. This is awesome for him, of course, and it means that he'll be here in Cambridge next year. Which is good, because our flag football team needs another wide out with some legs.

Congrats, Mike.

My First Outline

Fully halfway done with this busines, I try my hand at outlining for the first timne.

It's easy to get distracted.

Agency Cost FTW

After reading the first chapter, Corporations actually sounds pretty cool.

Is it wrong to say that?

Handyman

"Hey Trevor, do you have a drill?"
"A drill? No."
"Are you sure?"
"Of course I'm sure. Why would I have a drill?"
"Um."
"Where would I keep it? Do I seem like the kind of person who does a lot of drilling?"
"No, I guess not."
"Jeez. A drill."
"It's just I thougt you bought one when you put up those racks in the kitchen."
"Oh! That drill! Check in the black case right there."
"The one on the shelf four feet from your head?"
"Yeah. I think there's a drill in there."

There was.

Prescription Drugs

Reliable sources told me tonight that the anti-arthritis drug Celebrex is a perfect hangover prophylactic. Apparently, that's what they're learning in Health Care and the Law. My curriculum remains more traditional.

Ha-HA!

Barack Obama is Running for President

Apparently, he's on a mission to save American Politics from ... American politics. Or something. Check it out for yourself: http://www.barackobama.com/video/

Honestly, I agree. It's time for a change. America deserves leaders who went to HLS instead of Yale. That means you too, Mr. Kerry and Mrs. Clinton.

Financial Aid

I just borrowed twenty-five thousand dollars, online, in under ten minutes. Online application, instant credit check, e-sign with my Master Promissory Note. I cannot decide whether my ability to do so is a good or a bad thing.

Well, Citi is giving me prime minus an eigth, so it can't be all bad, right?

iCovet

Damn. I know what I'm spending the first $600 of my summer salary on.

Try Me

As PBB notes, The Trial Advocacy Workshop begins today in a little over an hour. I spent an ungodly amount of time on planes and in airporst over break (more on that later), so I had plenty of time to master the sample cases. One is even a Massachusetts landlord-tenant case, the kind of thing I spent all last semester working on. I'm pumped.

In Which I Get What's Coming to Me

From the excellent comic xkcd.

"Hey Trevor" you say, "shouldn't you be working on your paper right now instead of browsing the archives of geeky math-themed webcomics?"

Yeah, well fuck you too.

Why I Will Never Become a Professor

These long-form, open-ended essays, like the one I'm currently struggling to write, are the most excruciating assignments imaginable. "Say something interesting about the themes of the course" becomes very hard when you don't really have anything interesting to say. One of the things I like about law school is that the problems in law come ready-made, and you can focus on dealing with them. Somebody screwed up, and they need real answers. Writing without that kind of purpose comes out scatter-brained and unfocused, and I go half mad trying to corral enough garbage to fill fifteen pages into any kind of coherence in my head. And of course it's grindingly depressing to struggle at something you know is fundamentally useless.

Worst of all, they seem to get harder to write every time, even controlling for length and subject matter complexity. Extrapolating from current trends, I figure I have maybe two or three good academic papers left in me lifetime. The way costs are trending, by the time I wring that last paper out of a battered laptop, I'll emerge from weeks of solitude broken and crumpled, babbling nonsense fragments before collapsing in a wretched heap upon the floor. So look for that to happen around June.