Awkward.

Once upon a time, NYU had an orientation week for overeager 1Ls.  En masse, green 1Ls were warned about the pitfalls of blawging. In the middle of this cautionary tale, i don’t wear skinny jeans was given an implicit shout out when the topic moved to reasons behind mandatory fun and blawgers who playfully poked the mandatory fun bear (of which I am guilty). When the topic shifted to revoking scholarships from students for blawg content, I cringed (though I have no scholarship to lose). I immediately stormed through my archives to hunt for hazardous content.

Although my posts read like they are written by an infant who grabbed the nearest crayon and started scribbling in a journal, I censor posts. Given the indiscretion with which I write, you may wonder what I’m censoring (who knows!).  But I write this blawg under a sheer sheet of anonymity and try not to write posts that I’d be mortified of having tied to my name. Whether I’ve managed that is unclear (If you think any of my posts cross The Line, please let me know). The point of this digression is that the person who gave this speech of woe on blawging will be my professor for Constitutional Law next semester.

As mentioned before, 1Ls at NYU take Lawyering, Administrative and Regulatory State, Criminal Law, and one elective in their second semester of law school. At NYU, you bid on elective classes and leave it to statistical magic to decide which course you get enrolled in. I bid on Constitutional Law, Property, and Corporations. I was excited when I found out I got Constitutional Law for my elective.  Then I realized ConLaw probably frowns on my blawg and pictured this exchange:

ConLaw: idw, I mean, Student X, what do you think about this case?
idwsj: *yelp*
ConLaw: Don’t even think about blawging about this.

But I’m still looking forward to this class.

When You Say Nothing At All
*in a shocking turn of events, a girl approaches idwsj*
Cute Girl E: Hey, you look really familiar! I’ve seen you before, I think, but I don’t know where.
idwsj: I think I’ve seen you before as well. Did you go to School Z?
Cute Girl E: Yes! Maybe we had a class together.
idwsj: Yeah . . . umm . . . so . . .*how am I this smooth?*

True Love
Yesterday, I saw two kids (who were probably around 5-8 years old) walking down the street. Mid-step, the boy tries to hold hands with the girl. The girl, without breaking step, brushes the boy’s hand aside and picks up the pace. The boy, disappointed, scampers after the girl. My heart sank.

I met my first True Love when I was in 1st grade. I remember precious little about my life in 1st grade, but I remember The Field Trip. For some reason, our class took a field trip to a farm. I guess taking kids to farms to see cows and play with hay builds character. When we got there, I found myself marching up the path to The Farm side by side with The Girl. Emboldened by the smell of manure, I decided to make my move. I asked The Girl if she wanted to hold hands. She said yes. We held hands for the entire trip. It was the best day of my 1st grade life.

Unfortunately, the relationship was short-lived. The next day, I decided to throw erasers at The Girl to express my affection which she, strangely enough, did not take kindly to. We broke-up. I wasn’t too disappointed because I figured sooner or later, we’d have to break-up anyway because of cooties. Few things in life are absolute deal breakers with your True Love, but cooties is one of them when you’re in 1st grade.

With a full heart,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

Stop looking in the mirror!

Soapbox Time.
The longer I’m in law school, the more self-obsessed I become. I’m turning into that guy that walks by the mental mirror and can’t stop looking at himself. When friends ask me about law school, I vacillate between measured answers like “it’s interesting, but a lot of work” and an outpouring of embarrassing stories, stresses, and worries that ends only when I’m done venting. Somehow, I’ve come to think that my work and my problems are the only things that matter in life. I was on the phone with one of my best friends yesterday and only at the end of the conversation did I realize that I hadn’t asked my friend about her life, her new job, or anything about her life.  This happens whenever someone calls or messages me to find out how life is going. What happened? I don’t care how busy you are or think you are, there is no justification for being this self-centered.

Sometimes, you end up in a “conversation” with each person talking past the other person. You might as well be talking to yourself. You might as well be blawging.
Person 1: I have so much reading to do, I have to start outlining, I have to write this memo…
Person 2: I need to get three cases read by tomorrow, start my research project, and then…

I’m putting a permanent ban on indulging myself when I talk to people in law school or outside of law school. Simultaneous soliloquies are not the hallmark of humanity. Maybe I’m old fashioned, but if you’re talking to someone, you should talk to that person.  That’s the last you’ll hear about this.

Off the soapbox, onto outlining.
I began with an outline for each course. I moved to two outlines: a full and a short outline. I’ve since deleted my full outline and have moved to a short outline and, low and behold, an even shorter outline: a table of contents. By the time Thanksgiving arrives, my outlines will be reduced to three commas and a period. Outlining is like interior decorating. The theme is minimalism. When, at long last, you’ve reduced your outline home to maximum minimalism, your only option is to move what’s left of the furniture around. Don’t like that unsightly Promissory Estoppel next to your Consideration Coffee Table? Move it next to the Restitution Rug. Perhaps you prefer Negligence Per Se in your entry hallway of Breach, rather than buried in the recreation room. I don’t know how your outlining home looks, but mine could sure use some sunlight.

Bug Those Alums!
Back in the top law school days, I would aimlessly read about what was important to look for in a law school. I read numerous threads about how alumni networks were or were not important. I don’t know how integral alumni networks at NYU will be in looking for a job, but NYU harps on it enough to make you take notice.  Do you want a job at the Department of Justice in Area X?  Find an NYU alum that works there and start chatting.  Do you want experience litigating, writing memos, and researching?  Find an NYU alum that practices in your area of interest, contact them, and get networking.  The idea of disturbing the peace contacting alums has been impressed on me to the point that if I’m craving a cheeseburger, I wonder if I should look up an NYU alum who knows where to get good cheeseburgers.

For someone who came to law school with a cart blanche list of networking contacts, the droves of NYU alum working in every corner of the world provide a great resource for annoying keeners future lawyers looking for information about potential career avenues.  But we’re all different with how comfortable we are reaching out to strangers with an open palm and a thinly veiled pretense. I prefer not to reach out to strangers unless I have a legitimate interest in an organization other than “because I need a job.” That may have to change, but hopefully only as a last resort.

Hip hop hooray,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

Karmic vengeance.

I asked for it.  Before law school when I was naively brimming with hope and happiness (now I am skeptically brimming with hope and happiness), I yearned for drama, gossip, and all the fascinating delight that was absent in my life.  When I got to law school, I was disappointed when 1Ls maintained the status quotient of the everyday people.  I didn’t wait long enough. The Gossip Mill is officially in overdrive, perhaps precipitated by Fall Ball.

What is it about law school that makes gossip and rumor such divine currency? In past lives before law school, 0Ls were normal people, normal people who perhaps occasionally participated in Water Cooler Chatter. But 0Ls were unlikely mired in gossip. The commencement of law school seems to unleash an unquenchable thirst for juicy gossip, or, for carnivores, an insatiable hunger for meaty rumors (pick your preferred food metaphor). This desire for all things Other People’s Business is twinned with a propensity to make egregious decisions, myself not excepted. The fiery crucible of law school seems to collectively diminish our ability to make sound choices. Or, more likely, we were never cable of doing so, and law school simply bares our missteps for the world to see.

I cast no aspersions at the drivers of The Gossip Mill, nor at those who provide fodder for it.  It’s not like we’re burning down memorials.  I am, however, enthralled by how efficient the whole process is. Two people depart from a party together and moments later, everyone knows about it. Student Z does something one night and by sunrise, people who don’t know Student Z know everything Student Z did. I don’t know many people in my section, but at the same time, I know everything about everybody in my section. I don’t indulge what I hear these days, but it is remarkable how ubiquitous the gossip is.

Of people I don’t know (hypothetically):
Student A dislikes Students B-Z.
Student B likes Student C who likes Student D.
Student E likes Student D as well.
Student X asked out Student Q . . . to roller derby.
Student L and Student H are secretly dating. Or maybe just hooking up.
Student R has three fingers.
Student F is getting frisky with Student E, G, L, and R.

I don’t care if rumors like these (again, all hypothetical) are or are not true, my classmates can do whatever they want – it’s none of my business. But the fact that I don’t know these people (the people I know are interesting enough!), try to avoid getting muddled up in their admittedly entertaining lives, and still hear all this information says something about the quirky world of law school.  Is it the mounting anxiety from exams?  Maybe it’s swine flu, which has invaded NYU (who seem ill prepared to handle the invasion).  Some people in my section purportedly have or had swine flu. Whoever those people are, I hope you feel better soon.

Another day, another step closer to finals,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

Inspiration in odd places.

Finals are bearing down on us and some may begin to tear their hair out.  Naturally, I’m concerned about finals-induced-baldness.

But yesterday, randomly in the middle of class:
Classmate X: You have a nice shaped head. When you go bald, you’ll be ok.

Happily, I can now lose hair without consequence.  Phew!

With the oncoming freight train of Finals approaching, practice exams seems like the only way to brace for impact.  But when are students supposed to start practicing?  We haven’t finished classes yet, but if we wait until we’ve covered all the material, we’ll only have a couple days to practice before finals.

idwsj: It’s a beautiful day. Do you want to take practice exams together?
Student X: Why are you taking practice exams already?
Student Y: You haven’t started taking practice exams yet?

Up until now, I’ve avoided study groups.  But exams are loaded with issues.  If you’re practicing exams under time pressure (and even if you’re not), you’ll miss a lot of issues.  Having a study group to discuss practice exams with after can help everyone discover missed issues.  Now, I just need an exam study group.  Someone?  Anyone?

Getting there together, one question at a time,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

It was the class before Fall Ball . . .

When all through the halls, law students were chomping to get their feet stomping.  And this is how it happened.

Class finishes at 4:00 PM on Thursday.  I burst out of the classroom, only to pause at the Halloween decorations that have begun going up around Vanderbilt Hall.  NYU is not wasting any time in turning The Law School into The Fall Ball (8:00 PM).  But there is no time to dawdle – I race home to finish my reading for CivPro, the only class on the docket for Friday.  Compared to the looming party, the shiny appeal of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure  is dulled.  I read about amending pleadings and mentally plead with CivPro to let me go and get ready for Halloween.

I clean up, get dressed, and head out the door to join the pre-Fall Ball celebrations.  After racing around the streets in full costume for 2 minutes, I realize how impractical Halloween costumes are in warm temperatures.  I’m standing on the subway, sweating more than a healthy person should, when a girl starts staring at me like I’m having a heart attack.  I assure her I’m not dying.  I try to explain that my excessive wardrobe and seeming heat stroke are all because of  Halloween, except it’s not Halloween.  It’s Thursday, October 29th.  She continues to stare at me like I’m insane.

I arrive at a friend’s house to put the finishing touches on our costumes.  We head out the door, gather up some other 1Ls, and join pre-Fall Ball (7:00 PM).  1Ls in an assortment of colorful costumes bounce around the room on the joy of pre-Fall Ball.  After what seems like an eternity of celebrating, everyone thinks it’s 12:00 AM.  We look at our watches and it’s 8:30 PM.  With that, everyone shuffles out the door and heads over to The Fall Ball.

Once inside The Fall Ball, I am, once again, amazed at the lengths that NYU has taken to turn The Law School into a home for teetotal, well-mannered, and high-minded fun.  The furniture has been rearranged so that Greenberg Lounge, a room where 1Ls listen to debates by leading scholars and town hall meetings, contains nothing but beer serving bar staff and a dance floor.  1Ls and beyond are dancing around the room for a hazy period of time when the music eventually shuts off.  The students stumble and bumble upstairs to continue the merriment.

Upstairs, there is tarot card reading, food, karaoke, and all sorts of other things.  It’s bizarre seeing Vanderbit Hall in Halloween garb.  Cameras are flashing and students are drinking what can only be water out of red cups.  Fall Ball is reputed to be the last joyful touchstone before finals where students make new friends with some and become more than friends with others.  But I won’t delve into details of The Good Clean Fun that was had, only because The Fall Ball seems to operate under The Vegas Holding: what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.

But I won’t leave the slate completely bare – some innocuous events did not go unremembered.  Inspired by another 1L blawger, I talked to Random Girl X and proceeded to have this conversation:

idwsj: What time did you get here? Are you having fun?
Random Girl X: *says something*
*2 minutes later*
idwsj: So . . . are you having fun?
*Random Girl X looks at idwsj oddly*
Random Girl X: *says something*
*2 minutes later*
idwsj: So . . . are you having fun?
*Random Girl X ponders if idwsj has brain damage, then laughs*

Eventually, The Fall Ball formally comes to a close.  It feels like 3:00 AM.  I look at my watch and it’s only midnight.  I spend some time outside with someone from class.  It’s strange that you can see people in class everyday, but not really know them only because you don’t sit next to each other.  But maybe that’s why there’s Fall Ball.  Later, I get some food with a friend before falling asleep.

The next morning, I am shocked at how little evidence there is of last night’s party.  NYU eviscerated every trace of The Fall Ball.  By sunrise, Vanderbilt Hall had returned to Law School form.  In class, we try to understand a world after Twombly and Iqbal, cases that have muddied the crystal waters of notice pleading. Having lost my mental faculties during Fall Ball, everything CivPro says sounds like Latin.

But CivPro, Torts, and Ks are starting to make sense – I finally see how the doctrinal jigsaw fits together.  At the same time, I’m increasingly aware how little relation there is to understanding the material and doing well on an exam. But that is neither here nor there.

In search of daylight savings,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

Thank goodness for chickens.

Every now and then, you stumble across a case that reminds you just how funny law is.  Frigaliment Importing Co. v. B.N.S. International Sales Corp. is such a case. I will say nothing other than it opens with this seminal remark: “The issue is, what is chicken?” – Judge Friendly.

I feel like chicken tonight,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

Blush.

Watts v. Watts
A case involving the shocking moral depravity of premarital cohabitation. Those glorious days of yore were about more than bubblegum and sunshine.

K: You can have sex and still have a contract!
idwsj: *giggle*

I also giggle when I walk past pugs and bulldogs.  I’m not sure what the connection is.

With a flushed face,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

Don’t worry, 1L won’t be as bad as you think.

Back in the day during law school orientation, the vice dean cautioned 1Ls to limit themselves to one activity, maybe two.  The 1Ls laughed.  The 2L and 3L panelists doling out sugar sweet advice to 1Ls laughed.  Don’t limit yourselves to one activity, they chortled.  Oh.  No.  You.  Didn’t.  I won’t belabor who gave the better advice, but a brief glimpse around the blawgsphere shows you how much gleeful free time 1Ls have.

I’ve always wondered why late night study sessions are so glamorous in movies (but maybe it’s not just in movies).  The hero has an upcoming test or assignment due and many sleepless nights ahead.  The hero dons the study gear, cracks open a two-four of Coke, and begins to pound on the computer keyboard to the backdrop of inspirational theme music and poignant narration.  That’s how I envisioned my life in law school.  But instead of Coke, I’m drinking water to avoid tweaking out from caffeine overload.  Instead of inspirational theme music, I turn off iTunes because I can’t read my casebook with the latest song from Grey’s Anatomy droning out of my speakers.  Instead of the mellifluous voice of a third person narrator, I jabber to myself about how having to read CivPro before I sleep is a privilege, not a pain.  Instead of fashionable study sweats, I’m in . . . unfashionable study sweats.

But on Saturday, I channeled my Inner Tort and told high school students about negligence, contributory negligence, and assumption of risk.  Coincidentally, topics we just covered in Torts. It’s like being on a pulpit.

idwsj: And I say to you, leaders of tomorrow, what was the duty owed by the soccer player to the other soccer player?
Students: Reasonable care!
idwsj: And tell me again, did the soccer player breach this duty?
Students: It depends!
idwsj: And did this breach cause the harm?
Students: Maybe!
idwsj: Amen! And how can we counter this claim of negligence?
Students: Contributory negligence! Assumption of risk!
idwsj: Preach on, students, preach on.

Halloween is coming
At NYU, Halloween means fall ball – a celebration extraordinaire on Thursday.  What an Erie Thursday party will due to Friday’s CivPro class remains to be seen. There will, I hope, be some people who roll right out of Thursday’s party right into Friday’s class.  I would love to see a pirate on call.

CivPro: Student X, can you tell us what this was was about?
Student X: Arrh, matey, it’s a Twombley!
CivPro: What the . . .?

Thankfully, for every casebook stress, there is an equal and opposite rom com therapy,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

When worlds collide.

Some things aren’t meant to co-exist.  Matter and anti-matter, LexisNexis and WestLaw, law school and a social life, and Columbia 1Ls and NYU 1Ls.  I’ve always thought I would explode if I bumped into a Columbia 1L.  But I’ll concede that my theory may be wrong.

On October 22, 2009, alternate universities universes will become one.  As Soleil points out, this week’s Student Bar Association  “Bar Review” will have NYU and Columbia law students mingling the night away.  Bar Review happens every Thursday and is a chance for law students to drink beer and, occasionally, get to know other law students.  I don’t usually go to Bar Review (a night out for me consists of an enticing casebook and romantic desk lighting), but this week I will.

The possibilities are endless and too good to pass up. I could meet the Columbia version of idwsj. I could crack awkward and unfunny jokes all night long without repercussions, since I won’t see these Columbia 1Ls ever again in class tomorrow. I could see if Columbia 1Ls wear skinny jeans.

Where?  House of Brews, 302 W. 51st St.
When? 9 PM.

We’re all in this together now,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans

It’s that wonderful time of the year.

Fellow jello 1Ls, this is a public service announcement.

It’s no coincidence that mid-October is both the death knell of many blawgs and a time when 1Ls become less discrete about their lascivious intentions to each other. We’ve crossed the halfway mark on our march to finals, stress is mounting, and work is beginning to overwhelm us. We stop blawging. We contemplate dropping out of law school. We’re a little scared that the road to success that used to be so clear has become murky and uncertain.

What do overanxious 1Ls do to cope? Study more? Breakdown? We hook up. By now, we’re familiar enough with each other that discretion, etiquette, and caution are no longer safeguards against hooking up. Heck, quirky laws may not even be enough to stop us now. If you can’t find solace in your books, find solace in your fellow 1L. My section is finally starting to mingle with each other, other sections, 2Ls, 3Ls, and people outside of law school. Love is in the air. Well, maybe more high schoolish debauchery than love.

But it’s not just about hooking up. It’s also about friends. I love the idea of people connecting with each other, whatever the reason. Law school and life are too tough to navigate alone. You should be the little electron wandering around the world looking for protons to attract. Find people you enjoy spending time with, and spend time with them. That’s it.

This concludes our public service announcement.

I remain, as always, an outside observer looking in,
i.don’t.wear.skinny.jeans