Good Bar News

Not only did my friends pass said bar, but Pepperdine's bar passage rate was 84%. This makes me feel all sorts of warm fuzzies inside. During orientation when I was a 1L, I was told to pick out someone a year ahead of you. Pick the stupidest person you could find. Once you have them in mind, think to yourself, if they can do it, so can I. This mantra has served me well. And with me picking several 3Ls who just took (and passed the bar), if they can do it, so can I.

So here I sit, five finals between me and my last full time semester of law school. Wow. I guess I could say time flies when you're having fun, which would explain why law school lasts forever.

Costa Rica?

Costa Rica for spring break? Hmmm...sounds fun.

Fingerprints

Today I was fingerprinted for the California Bar. I have been fingerprinted before for other things (my job at the DA's office), but this was different. I'm getting extraordinarily close to finally being done.

For the past seven years of my life, I have changed apartments seven different times. It's gotten to the point that I don't even bother bringing that much out to my apartment each year, as I'm just going to have to haul it back in nine months.

The walls in my apartment right now are white. No posters. I have a picture on my desk of when I graduated high school. I have a picture on my bookshelf of when my brother got married.

That's it. But for those, my apartment would be as generic as possible. Law books in the bookshelf, law papers strewn across the room. Absolute minimalist.

Along with the empty apartments, there is a sense of uncertainty. My mind drifts back to my senior year of college. It was one month before I graduated, and I still had no idea where I was going to be that fall.

My mind goes back even further to my senior year of college. It's September. For the first time in my life, I have no idea where I would be a year from now. (Better get used to that feeling little one).

But alas, seven years later, and there is finally a plan. A long term path has been carved out. If I want it.

So finally, some semblance of permanency is beginning to enter my life. I feel like my life has been put on hold for the past seven years, and now it has been given back to me.

Back to the fingerprints. Why do we have them? It's to make sure I'm not a criminal offender. That's right, me working at the DA's office isn't enough for me to pass the background check.

Also, the form for the moral character portion of the bar requires me to list every address I have lived at over the past eight years. This can be quite a problem seeing as how I have lived at a different place every year for the past eight years. Sigh. Certainly not looking forward to filling that out.

Anonymous Democrat and Britney

First off, to the anonymous democrat who posted anonymously and called me a crybaby two posts ago. Go ahead and hide behind your veil of anonymity and call be a crybaby. At least I put a name on what I say (albeit my middle name). But alas, you are right, the market did end up. We'll see what the economy does over the next two years. Although, we both know that the economy has a long lag period. By that I mean it takes time for any change a President or legislature makes in order to see it have some measurable effect in the economy. Note this applies to tax cuts and NOT to entitlements given out.

More importantly, on to the real reason I posted! For those of you who have been living under a rock the past two days, Britney Spears has filed for divorce!!!! Yes, I know. Truly a momentous day. And for those of you who like CNN (probably anonymous demoncrat...i mean democrat included), what was the top story on election day? Not Pelosi, not Bush, not anything to do with the election. Instead, the top story was that K-fed and Britney were no more.

Being a Malibu resident, I truly feel bad for yet another relationship gone bad. Maybe it's something we put in the water here? Haha...what's that little birdie on my shoulder? It's the money. Ahhhh right you are. Anyways. With Britney as a newly single, this changes how much me and the hot singer have in common. I have updated my previous list (which I had to change when she got married) and alas, here is how it reads:

Things Britney Spears and I have in common

1. We were both born in December.
2. We were born in the same year (1981).
3. We were both in Washington D.C. in the summer of 2003. I was interning for a congressman and she was performing at the National Mall (I actually saw her perform too).
4. We both reside in Malibu.
5. Disney played a big part in our upbringing (she was on the Mickey Mouse Club and....well my parents subscribed to the Disney channel...I don't think I watched it that much...other than Heavyweights...and Goonies).
   
6. We both have cases pending in Los Angeles Superior Court (her divorce case...and her action to get a restraining order against me).
7. We both like Subway (I spotted her there one day).
8. We both hate Kevin Federline (I boo'd him off stage at his Halloween performance and...well she divorced him).
9. And my favorite, we both like to kiss girls.

Democrats good for the economy-(pause)-(pause)-NOT!

I think that it is funny how the stock market is linked to real world news. Monday U.S. financial markets surged on news that Republicans were making a last minute push in the polls. Wednesday, the stock market started off down and was shook even further when it was revealed that the Democrats would pick up another seat in the Senate.

The Heat is On and Story Poles

It's November and it's frickin' hot. The high was 88 degrees. I almost went to the beach. Instead my roommate dragged me down to the track, and we ran. I did get some satisfaction watching him hack up a lung afterwards. It is never a good idea to run. Even moreso when the Santa Anna wins are blowing. You learning your lesson roommate. Let's not make the same mistake again.

On another note, driving around here in Malibu, I quite often see long wooden poles with stretchy orange netting on top. It's funny. They kind of make the skeleton of a square or some other shape. I, in my wonderful speculation powers, assumed that this was to mark the location of future buildings. In a place like Malibu where the view of the ocean is quite important, a device like this is necessary to allow neighbors and others to identify how the new building will affect their view. They are called story poles and help stuffy Malibu residents decide how pissed off they should be at their new neighbors based on how much of their view they will be blocking.

It's nice to guess and be right.

Bar Advice

When meeting attorneys and forced to engage in small talk, I have decided that an excellent question to ask is if they have any advice about taking the bar. I get various answers. It is a good question to ask because of the diversity of the answers. I get good pieces of advice, like exercise daily. Take an hour off. I also get random pieces of advice--like stay in a hotel so you can walk to the bar. Don't talk to others about the test, and don't study during the test.

Today's piece of advice from a lawyer I met: "I had a good real property teacher. I knew the rule against perpetuities. So when I sat down to sit through that lecture for my bar review course, it dawned on me that the lecturer had no idea what he was talking about. So I grabbed my friend, we quietly left, and we went to see a movie." She said I need to remember that the lecturer may not know what he's talking about. This scares me. I doubt I will heed her advice.