10) spousal privilege
9) horizontal privity
8) springing executory interest
7) invading the corpus
6) statement against penal interest
5) adverse possession
4) reciprocal negative servitude
3) Terry stop and frisk
2) the naked summons
1) the wild deed
Sunday, July 18, 2010
In which I complain about the law some more and try not to forget the baby
I haven't posted, not because there is nothing going on, but every time I want to I'm just overwhelmed with everything that is going on.
Right now I'm studying over 12 hours a day. The bar is July 26-28, but we have to leave Mon. morning to drive to Albany, so really I only have a week left to cram all of this law into my brain. The first day is NY. It consists of 200 multiple choice questions on NY law, 3 thirty-minute essays, a lunch break, then 2 more essays and a 90 minute practical task, like writing a memo, brief, or will. Day 2 is the multistate day, which we'll also take in Albany. That's just 200 multiple choice questions. That night we drive down to Secaucus, and the third day is just NJ, which is 7 essays.
NY tests Torts, contracts/sales, NY Practice, Criminal Law and Procedure, Evidence, Real Property, Constitutional Law, Mortgages, Commercial Paper, Secured Transactions, Federal Jurisdiction, Corporations, Agency and Partnership, Conflict of Laws, Personal Property, No-fault insurance, Worker's Comp., Wills, Trusts, Professional Responsibility, and Domestic Relations. The multi-state day and NJ pretty must just test Fed. Jur., Contracts, Torts, Crim. law/pro, Evidence, Real Property, and Con. law.
So that's why I'm kind of a zombie right now.
In other news, Henry is still long and skinny. He crawls very fast, pulls himself up to stand wherever there is something to grab onto, coasts between furniture, eats cheerios and teething biscuits, responds to "jumpin' jumpin' jumpin'" by complying, stops when I say "no", and claps his hands. He loves songs and books and likes to watch Sesame st. for about 10 minutes before he is ready to be on the move again. He also loves to play in the sand on the beach and go for walks with Grandpa.
Right now Greg and Henry are at a pool party with some friends from church, and Mommy is supposed to be home studying, so I'd better get to it!
Right now I'm studying over 12 hours a day. The bar is July 26-28, but we have to leave Mon. morning to drive to Albany, so really I only have a week left to cram all of this law into my brain. The first day is NY. It consists of 200 multiple choice questions on NY law, 3 thirty-minute essays, a lunch break, then 2 more essays and a 90 minute practical task, like writing a memo, brief, or will. Day 2 is the multistate day, which we'll also take in Albany. That's just 200 multiple choice questions. That night we drive down to Secaucus, and the third day is just NJ, which is 7 essays.
NY tests Torts, contracts/sales, NY Practice, Criminal Law and Procedure, Evidence, Real Property, Constitutional Law, Mortgages, Commercial Paper, Secured Transactions, Federal Jurisdiction, Corporations, Agency and Partnership, Conflict of Laws, Personal Property, No-fault insurance, Worker's Comp., Wills, Trusts, Professional Responsibility, and Domestic Relations. The multi-state day and NJ pretty must just test Fed. Jur., Contracts, Torts, Crim. law/pro, Evidence, Real Property, and Con. law.
So that's why I'm kind of a zombie right now.
In other news, Henry is still long and skinny. He crawls very fast, pulls himself up to stand wherever there is something to grab onto, coasts between furniture, eats cheerios and teething biscuits, responds to "jumpin' jumpin' jumpin'" by complying, stops when I say "no", and claps his hands. He loves songs and books and likes to watch Sesame st. for about 10 minutes before he is ready to be on the move again. He also loves to play in the sand on the beach and go for walks with Grandpa.
Right now Greg and Henry are at a pool party with some friends from church, and Mommy is supposed to be home studying, so I'd better get to it!
Monday, June 21, 2010
Doing it All
There's no such thing.
Today I saw Henry for a groggy hour in the morning, during which I tried to coax him into drinking some formula, put Sesame street on for as long as my mommy-guilt would allow, then did my best to persuade him to go back to sleep. I then saw him for about an hour before he went to bed.
Now I'm up studying and while I'm glad that Henry is asleep, I'm also feeling so unfulfilled with how today went. How do those moms do it? The ones that wake up before the baby, make some fresh homemade baby food, do their hair, and go off to work, all before the time I'm pulling myself out of bed in the morning. At this point, I can't even imagine having the wherewithal in the morning to nourish my spiritual side.
I think I'm just going to have to face facts: I'm no super-mom. If I'm going to survive next year, it's going to have to be by forgoing my plan to work. I know. I could get child care. But every job that I would have wanted is not an 8-hour a day, get home in time for dinner sort of gig. Before I got pregnant I was looking into working for tax firms, corporations, maybe even the IRS. While there are tax jobs out there that aren't as bad as the Big Law jobs, none of them are quite flexible enough for the kind of mommy that I want to be.
I might be able to do it all, but I certainly couldn't do any of it very well. So it looks like things are about to get interesting as we plan to become a one-income family of three.
Today I saw Henry for a groggy hour in the morning, during which I tried to coax him into drinking some formula, put Sesame street on for as long as my mommy-guilt would allow, then did my best to persuade him to go back to sleep. I then saw him for about an hour before he went to bed.
Now I'm up studying and while I'm glad that Henry is asleep, I'm also feeling so unfulfilled with how today went. How do those moms do it? The ones that wake up before the baby, make some fresh homemade baby food, do their hair, and go off to work, all before the time I'm pulling myself out of bed in the morning. At this point, I can't even imagine having the wherewithal in the morning to nourish my spiritual side.
I think I'm just going to have to face facts: I'm no super-mom. If I'm going to survive next year, it's going to have to be by forgoing my plan to work. I know. I could get child care. But every job that I would have wanted is not an 8-hour a day, get home in time for dinner sort of gig. Before I got pregnant I was looking into working for tax firms, corporations, maybe even the IRS. While there are tax jobs out there that aren't as bad as the Big Law jobs, none of them are quite flexible enough for the kind of mommy that I want to be.
I might be able to do it all, but I certainly couldn't do any of it very well. So it looks like things are about to get interesting as we plan to become a one-income family of three.
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Old Friends
I went to a bridal shower today and ran into some old friends I hadn't spoken to since middle school. It was interesting, once I got past the initial small talk, to look at them and try to answer the questions.
The questions, however they were actually phrased, were these: "Who are you? What have you done with what you had all those years ago? How did you grow up? What did you care about enough to work for?"
In some ways the answer was easy. I wasn't embarrassed to say I was happily married, with a beautiful baby boy. That I had just finished law school and was studying for the bar. But part of me was disappointed. I thought back to how I was back then, so hopeful, so sure that everything I wanted would work out. I talked to a friend who had always shared my love of literature and dream of one day becoming a writer. (I say "becoming" a writer to mean writing full time. I still maintain that you are a writer if you write, published or not).
For a number of reasons, this dream has always been put on the back-burner for me. I didn't have time, I didn't have experience, I couldn't afford it. And now, with school over and the end in sight (the end of constant studying, that is), many of those excuses will be stripped away, and the deeper reasons will be all that is left. These are that I am insecure, that I am afraid of being judged, that I am afraid that I will never be able to express what I have to say.
One of the hardest parts about writing is that the more you do it the more you find to criticize about yourself. This can be good, but it can also be so hard. The tough part is not the ideas; the inspiration. I can honestly say I've never had writer's block. The tricky part is the labor. The organization, the editing, the nitty gritty toothbrush-scrubbing work of fixing individual sentences. Basically, it's hard work.
But it's also familiar and comforting. It's one of the only things that I feel like I was born to do. And when I do get an hour to write, it's like coming home, or like catching up with an old friend.
The questions, however they were actually phrased, were these: "Who are you? What have you done with what you had all those years ago? How did you grow up? What did you care about enough to work for?"
In some ways the answer was easy. I wasn't embarrassed to say I was happily married, with a beautiful baby boy. That I had just finished law school and was studying for the bar. But part of me was disappointed. I thought back to how I was back then, so hopeful, so sure that everything I wanted would work out. I talked to a friend who had always shared my love of literature and dream of one day becoming a writer. (I say "becoming" a writer to mean writing full time. I still maintain that you are a writer if you write, published or not).
For a number of reasons, this dream has always been put on the back-burner for me. I didn't have time, I didn't have experience, I couldn't afford it. And now, with school over and the end in sight (the end of constant studying, that is), many of those excuses will be stripped away, and the deeper reasons will be all that is left. These are that I am insecure, that I am afraid of being judged, that I am afraid that I will never be able to express what I have to say.
One of the hardest parts about writing is that the more you do it the more you find to criticize about yourself. This can be good, but it can also be so hard. The tough part is not the ideas; the inspiration. I can honestly say I've never had writer's block. The tricky part is the labor. The organization, the editing, the nitty gritty toothbrush-scrubbing work of fixing individual sentences. Basically, it's hard work.
But it's also familiar and comforting. It's one of the only things that I feel like I was born to do. And when I do get an hour to write, it's like coming home, or like catching up with an old friend.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Dear Karem Alvarez of Trenton NJ
Why did you cash my money order that was supposed to go to the NJ Board of Bar Examiners?
BUSY!
Finished up finals, graduated from law school, had great graduation party.
Started BarBri classes.
Henry turned 7 months, sits up, stands holding onto something, eats cookies.
Started BarBri classes.
Henry turned 7 months, sits up, stands holding onto something, eats cookies.
Friday, May 21, 2010
Back in the Saddle
Where are the posts? You may ask.
Well... I actually have been writing posts, just not publishing them.
You see, I decided as we neared the finish line with law school finals to try and kick start a little weight-loss program. I bought the 30-day shred and began doing it, writing posts each day about what I ate, what I weighed, and how I felt doing the work-out. But...
After day four we left for our typical end of the year vacation to Lancaster, Pa. I was all set with my dvd, mat and weights in tow. However, when we arrived we couldn't get a dvd player and Henry went to bed too early and our room was too small to do it anyway. So I thought, o well, I can use the gym while I'm here. But the resort that we've been going to since before I was born has decided to sell half of itself to Double Tree, meaning that to get to the gym I have to go to another building, which would not open with my room card/key thingy.
Ok no biggy, I figure I'll take a brief hiatus from the working out, it's probably good to let my muscles recuperate from all that stuff anyway, right?
Right?
Well, on vacation Henry gets a killer cold, making him cranky almost the whole trip, and he gives it to me by the time we get home, and for the past week I've been lying around the house in a Nyquil induced stupor using up a Costco sized pack of tissues but unfortunately very few calories.
So there you have it. It's supposed to be like day 20 of my awe-inspiring post-lawschool transformation, and instead of planning my return to pre-lawschool jeans, I'm wondering if I can scrounge up a dress to squeeze into for graduation next week.
So what do I do now? I guess get back in the saddle. I've gained about 10 lbs for every time I've gone through finals. Think about it: over three years, that's a lot of study weight. Now it's time to rise like the phoenix from the pile of ashes that was once my corporate tax outline, and emerge the much more educated, much more cynical, slightly smarter, definitely more stretch-marked 25-year-old version of myself. Would it be too much to hope for if this new and improved Grace could ever again wear the contents of those boxes in the attic marked "skinny"? Only time will tell.
Well... I actually have been writing posts, just not publishing them.
You see, I decided as we neared the finish line with law school finals to try and kick start a little weight-loss program. I bought the 30-day shred and began doing it, writing posts each day about what I ate, what I weighed, and how I felt doing the work-out. But...
After day four we left for our typical end of the year vacation to Lancaster, Pa. I was all set with my dvd, mat and weights in tow. However, when we arrived we couldn't get a dvd player and Henry went to bed too early and our room was too small to do it anyway. So I thought, o well, I can use the gym while I'm here. But the resort that we've been going to since before I was born has decided to sell half of itself to Double Tree, meaning that to get to the gym I have to go to another building, which would not open with my room card/key thingy.
Ok no biggy, I figure I'll take a brief hiatus from the working out, it's probably good to let my muscles recuperate from all that stuff anyway, right?
Right?
Well, on vacation Henry gets a killer cold, making him cranky almost the whole trip, and he gives it to me by the time we get home, and for the past week I've been lying around the house in a Nyquil induced stupor using up a Costco sized pack of tissues but unfortunately very few calories.
So there you have it. It's supposed to be like day 20 of my awe-inspiring post-lawschool transformation, and instead of planning my return to pre-lawschool jeans, I'm wondering if I can scrounge up a dress to squeeze into for graduation next week.
So what do I do now? I guess get back in the saddle. I've gained about 10 lbs for every time I've gone through finals. Think about it: over three years, that's a lot of study weight. Now it's time to rise like the phoenix from the pile of ashes that was once my corporate tax outline, and emerge the much more educated, much more cynical, slightly smarter, definitely more stretch-marked 25-year-old version of myself. Would it be too much to hope for if this new and improved Grace could ever again wear the contents of those boxes in the attic marked "skinny"? Only time will tell.
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