Advice for 1Ls

As the summer draws to a close and the school year creeps closer and closer, I've had some time to reflect on that hazing ritual called "1L". Rather, I've had time to reflect, but I've mainly used that time to drink beer on the Terrace. Since I'm such a nice guy, I've assembled a few thoughts to try and assuage the fears of this incoming class:

1. Watch The Paper Chase. In fact, watch it over and over. You may even consider buying a transcript, an outline, and possibly even memorizing it. Not only is law school exactly as it is portrayed, but you will be tested on the movie come exams. In fact, if you don't cite to the movie at least three times on any given question, you've probably failed and will be condemned to spend the rest of your life clerking for Judge Judy.

2. Stress yourself out as much as you possibly can. There is a reason that the inscription over the door to any respectable law school reads "Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter This Place." Because, after all, ulcers are the shit.

3. Beware the Socratic method. At some point in the semester (probably the first day), the professor will ask you a mind-bogglingly difficult legal question that even Chief Justice Rehnquist couldn't answer. After you get it wrong, (which of course you will,) the entire class will laugh at your utter incompetence and throw spitballs at you. The professor will call you names and ridicule you mercilessly. But don't worry - your torment will soon stop. Fortunately, the school is equipped with a trap door underneath every classroom seat which will open and you will fall into sweet, sweet oblivion and you'll wake up several days later in a bathtub full of ice and missing your kidneys.

4. Law school is exactly like high school. Make a bet with your friends to lose your virginity by prom. Try not to have sex with any baked goods, as this will come back to haunt you on the "Character and Fitness" portion of the Bar.

5. Sleep with your professors. Since the grading is anonymous, it may not help you get that A. But hey, it couldn't hurt either.

6. Tell everyone your LSAT score. In fact, post flyers around the atrium with it. People will be very impressed and you will make friends quickly. Actually, flyers may not be very effective. Use spray paint.

7. Take up smoking. If you're already a smoker, take up heroin. If you're already addicted to heroin, just freebase the UCC.

8. Finally, make sure that you say good-bye to your old friends and family. You're not going to see them or speak to them for the next year. In fact, you're not going to see anything outside the library for the next year. As we all know from books like One-L, Law school is a terrible experience and if you have any sort of social life, you will fail out. If you manage to have a social life and still pass your exams, you will still be expelled on principle... Or, you could always just chill the fuck out and enjoy yourself.

Hope that helps.

You don't know Jack (unless his last name is Daniels)

Back when I was on my high school wrestling team, all of the other schools would gather in a circle, chant, scream and otherwise psych themselves up. Not us. We would gather in a circle and quietly, though forcefully, count off, "one - two - three - Cougars."

This wasn't a matter of sportsmanship. Coach Mimms told us that he wanted us to be "quietly confident." He wanted us to focus on kicking ass, not the loudmouthed trash-talking that preceeded it. Victory, he said, was decided on the mat; nothing else mattered. Brag after you've won, not before.

Many law students could benefit from Coach Mimms' advice. No one cares whether you've read Corbin on Contracts, Law School Confidential, the entire Encyclopedia Brittannica, or Harry Potter and the Order of the Coif. Bragging about having read all of your textbooks over the summer doesn't make you any smarter; it just means that you wasted your summer. No one wants to hear about your time in the library unless it's a story about how you had sex underneath the Federal Supplements.

This goes double for 1L's: If you have to brag, at least wait until you have something to brag about, e.g., grades*. (Bragging about how much you drank at Bar Review, however, is perfectly acceptable.) Trying to psych out your classmates, especially this early in the year, is just pathetic. Don't pretend to be Learned fucking Hand after a week of law school.

* - In which case, you're just a jackass.

Library Alarms

I was exiting the law library to work on my Legislation take-home exam over at Starbucks, free from the distractions of the internet. Everything was normal up until I walked through the gate. Suddenly, sirens blared and I was immediately surrounded by what must have been 50 agents from the FBI's special "Library Police Task Force." Protesting my innocence, I struggled valiantly, but they managed to subdue me through several tasers to my testicles and brought me to the law school's "interrogation room" at the point of an M-16. I didn't know the law school even had an interrogation room.

They demanded to know what rare and valuable books I was attempting to steal. Violating every international law against torture, they stretched me on the rack and forced me to listen to Christina Aguilera. But I wasn't going to break. I knew that I was innocent. I whipped out my official Junior Lawyer Badge, and insisted that I would file a § 1983 suit if they did not release me; eventually, they let me go.

Bullshit, you say? Well, maybe it's a bit of an exaggeration. So I wasn't actually "tortured." And yes, maybe no FBI agents actually "came." But I did set off the alarm. Apparently, the DVD's I rented from Blockbuster are incompatible with the law library's security system. Who knew?

Fuck it, back to my exam.

Missing an Issue (and Possibly a Kidney)

Fuck. Not five minutes after I left my Criminal Appeals exam did I realize that I had completely neglected to talk about sentence modification as a potential ground for post-conviction relief. Not that the fictional judge was likely to have granted it, as my fictional client had no fictional cards in his fictional hand, but fuck - I missed an issue.

I have two choices at this point. First, I can start studying right now for my last final and do my damnedest to get the top grade in the class to try and make up for my idiocy. Alternatively, I can get mind-blowingly drunk, have anonymous sex with a strange girl who looks remarkably like a hot Margaret Thatcher, wake up in Panama, tied-up in a bathtub full of ice sans kidneys, stow away on a ship passing through the canal while unaware that it's actually a pirate vessel bound for Indonesia, and spend the rest of my days pillaging fat merchants and using my three semesters of law school to revolutionize efficiency in the white slave-trade.

Is there a happy medium between these two extremes? Absolutely not.

UPDATE: As it turns out, I did get the top grade in my other class. And more importantly, I still have both of my kidneys. Fucking sweet.

It's Finals Time

I can't believe how quickly this semester just flew by. Wasn't I just buying books yesterday? Well, yes - but that's besides the point. Luckily, I only have two finals. Of course, this is because I mainly took writing classes, which cumulated in a 72 hour paper-writing binge that ended yesterday afternoon.

Anyway, since law school thrives on the competitiveness of the curve, students face a dilemma: How do you honestly say "good luck" to your friends? You want your friends to do well... just not as well as you. So last December I came up with an honest form of well-wishing:

"May you fall just below me on the curve."

You want to be number one, but you hope that the recipient of your good wishes is number two. It's the most genuine way that one law student can express their goodwill towards another at exam time.

Now, I've heard other people saying it too, so I guess it caught on. (That, or like the Theory of General Relativity, I discovered it independently and just thought I was original.)

So fuck it, back to work, and may all y'all fall just below me on the curve.

Harry Potter and the Reasonable Wizard

I read Harry Potter books like I drink: with a total lack of self-control or ability to stop that has often left me waking up next to a girl whose name I don't know. Ok, maybe not. I usually know the girl's name after I go on a Harry Potter bender...

Anyway, the point is that, instead of pacing myself and savoring Book 6 like a fine sipping bourbon, I basically started chugging literary goodness straight from the bottle and my hangover's fucking killing me. Alternately, it might just be the Jager. Whatever. Either way, I still have to wait two fucking years for J.K. Rowling to hook me up with my next fix.

In one of my rare moments of sensitivity, I'll refrain from discussing the book in detail for now. I know I'd be fucking pissed if someone told me that Professor Flitwick gets thrown in Azkaban for molesting Hogwarts students, or that the judge was the murderer. (If you get that reference, I'll be fucking impressed.) However, I will say that Book 6 fucking rocks.

I've also realized that the whole fucking Harry Potter series should be on any incoming 1L's summer reading list. I'm fucking serious. Harry Potter can teach you just as much about law school as fucking One-L:

1. Just like at Hogwarts, law school teaches you to use magic words. Hell, the law is full of fucking incantations, and if you wave your hands around and mutter a bunch of silly Latin phrases magic happens. For example, "res ipsa loquitur" will conjure liability out of thin air.

2. Everyone loves gunners like Hermione Granger. Of course, most of the gunners in law school are not like Hermione Granger. For example, your typical gunner will not have sick fucks creating countdown-until-he/she-turns-18 websites about them. Also, unlike your typical gunner, Hermione Granger will probably go on to a satisfying and fulfilling life after she graduates.

3. Watch out for professors that have Dark Wizards growing out of the back of their heads. They tend to have tough curves.

4. Try out for your law school's Quidditch team. To do this, take hard drugs until you think that you can fly. Then fucking kill yourself because you think that Quiddich is a real sport. Jesus fucking Christ, what's wrong with you?

5. As demonstrated by the Weasley Twins, everyone loves a good practical joke. Although you probably can't do magic, you can still surprise everyone with bangs and smoke if you set off fireworks indoors. People will particularly appreciate this during exams. In fact, you might not have to bother with that whole "bar exam" thing and you'll have all the big firms just dying to pay you to sit around and snort blow off a Veela's ass. I don't know where I was going with this one.

6. Expect several important characters to die by the time you're ready to take the bar.

I need a fucking nap.