The Finest Choice in Dining for Legal Scholars Everywhere.

On 11th night of December, blowing off my fifth Christmas party of the weekend, I am in the law library yet again, prepping for my finals. Just when I thought life could not be more grand, I decided to treat myself to a vending machine buffet!!!

This is living large in the law school lane.

The coke, btw, was confiscated by the Food Nazis in the library. I mean, years ago when people actually used the books, I think keeping food out of the library made sense. Now that the only thing the books provide is a sense of decor, maybe we can do away with the food rules. How am I going to spend 12 hours of my day in an unsavory section of Los Angeles any other way?

You Know Its Finals When a Dental Exam is a Great Time.

I took a day off from studying today. Okay, so i took a portion of the day off, with some guilt I must admit, and I went to the dentist. I wanted to avoid going to the dentist right before finals because I didn't want to cause myself more pain. However, the tooth finally won.

This all started with the LSATs. I was studying and cracked my tooth on some trail mix -- two years ago -- and finally dealt with it now because the pain was actually worse than sitting in the library for 12 hours. You know it had to be really bad when I gave up precious finals study time for something that had to do with the rest of my life.

And you know that this is all screwed up when you realize, while sitting in the dental chair, and the dentist is installing a new crown, that this is a spa treatment compared to the rest of my life.

Let me set it up for you. My dentist is located in Santa Monica, about ten blocks from the beach -- which is that piece of land I have not seen since way before law school started. Taking a drive out to Santa Monica is a long road trip these days. School is the only reason I use my car at all these days -- god forbid I should go to the gym or visit friends -- so a trip to Santa Monica practically requires a passport.

The dental office is practically a spa already -- it has amazing walls of glass with views of the Santa Monica mountains. You just lay back in the chair and see all of Los Angeles set up beneath you, while some man drills away at your teeth. I knew it was bad when I started to fall asleep when he removed my cavity and installed the new crown. Usually I am on the ceiling at that point bargaining with god -- and instead -- one week before my first final -- I am finding it relaxing. So relaxing that I fall asleep with a drill in my mouth.

My standards have obviously fallen off the charts. Maybe during next finals week I should get an extraction?

Finally -- a Good Use for those old Law Books

Who could believe that someone would come up with such an amazing idea for the Law Books we just walk by every day on our way to the WestLaw print out section? Booze Books -- based in Brooklyn -- is repurposing books and giving them a second life -- and probably with the same people that gave them the first one!!!

Just think, you work your ass off all these years for a JD and finally get out -- only to get hit with the payment plan from the Feds. Who isn't going to take to the bottle then?

Help out our buddies at Booze Books and donate to their start up fund. Donate at http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/benderbound/booze-books or you can wait until you buy your first set!

Apparently Libraries ARE for sleeping....

Day Three of OccupySouthwestern Library.

Let me explain.

It's not about Wall Street -- well not exactly, that would depend on the case. Its "Reading Days" which means that if you have to do all your reading on these days, you are screwed. It's a Sunday night and the library is actually full. The first years are Occupying the library in droves. Finals start on the 8th and panic and caffeine are everywhere. I just looked up from my outlines, mostly because my eyes are doing their own protest, to find the student across from me asleep. I am not appalled, but rather, very jealous. Anyone who can sleep on these hard chairs deserves at least a B. I mean, I have sat in my share of library chairs and these are designed by some S&M fetish freak.

Only 12 days left until we get "raided" and run for freedom. There is a case of tequila with my name all over it just waiting until the Crim exam is over.

Ah, the life of a 1L. And I paid for this.

I made it to the last day and I still have all my hair???

How did that ever happen? I am about to run off to my criminal law class. My very last class of this first semester of this endeavor they call law school. And to think it was just a short time ago I was thinking of running. Okay, so I was thinking of running several times, but I must say, in some very perverse way, I am glad I stayed.

You always remember your first time -- its never what you expected, and it always hurts more than you think it will. But you get through it -- and for whatever reason, get right back up on that horse, and do it again.

Now to survive exams.

Goth? Grunge? Or Law School Finals Look?

I am not a stick thin model, working the catwalk for my living. However, in spite of nearly three weeks to go before my first exam, I DO look like Kate Moss after an all nighter with Marc Jacobs (pre 12 steps that is). These bags and circles under my eyes remind me of the days of traveling pre-911. If I look this way after my first semester, what exactly am I going to look like after the Bar exam? And that question is meant purely rhetorically cause I really don't want to know.

Just like the catering the law libraries should provide (to make the school an even bigger cash cow than it is), I think at the very least there should be some discounts from a local spa. Better yet -- provide one on campus. Again, talk about a captive audience. And with some creative accounting, I am sure we can find someplace for them on our financial aid forms. I mean, do they really want to send grads out into the world looking like something from the AMC's hit THE WALKING DEAD? Bad enough Lawyers got the rep they got, but flesh eating zombie is a phrase I would love to avoid being tossed my way.

If you thought the first three months were bad....

It's that time during your first semester as a law student that you suddenly realize you have a choice to make. Take some much needed rest and finally look like a human again (for a little while anyways), or prep for exams. It's time to get to know very intimately that term you heard so much about this entire semester called outlines. Apparently they weren't' some fictional character like the tooth fairy. If only. Outlines are the ways law students digest their entire semester worth of materials into an easy to refer to format to study from. However, outlines also are something that should have been taken care of all semester and to pull them off over Thanksgiving break is nothing short of the educational equivalent of scoring that $99 flat screen TV at WalMart at 4am.

Wish me luck. My dignity already left months ago. My eyesight is on its way out. I think the next thing left is basic hygiene. Great.

I would strongly suggest staying away from any law school exam rooms --- we might be used to it by now -- but like the rest of law school, its not for the faint of heart.

Why Don't they have Catering in the LIbrary?

You would think that law schools would take a lesson from the airlines and take advantage of a captive audience. I mean, here we are sitting for hours in this building, barely getting up for a bathroom break, much less a meal. It would be cool to have a lunch cart or something like the 2011 version of a cigarette girl at a club. I can see it now -- Granola Bar? Doritos? Diet Coke? If you think the movie theaters mark up, just wait until you see these prices. And all purchases could be conveniently charged to your school account. Schools certainly don't have to worry about the damages to the books, cause lord knows nobody uses those anymore.

I think its time to have a food truck for the law libraries! Talk about an electronic contracting practicum!!!!

My Bible

I have succumbed to the free pizza.

I tried. I really did. But the temptation was just too great. Free food after days without cash. Its not that there isn't money in the bank -- i just can't find the time to get to the ATM. Its across the street from the library and all, but the library just acts like a vortex and I can't escape.

The school throughs these student activities meetings all day -- and in order to get you out of your studying stupor, they tempt you with free food. We are graduate students after all right? Most of us can't boil water much less fix oatmeal. Free food is what keeps us going. Except me. I would religiously go up to the (mediocre) cafeteria for their salad bar. Gotta keep that first year ten off my (slightly) older than the rest of them's ass.

But the temptation was too great -- and my bankcard had cracked. Free pizza it was. Now everyday I hunt down the freebies, justifying it with the fact that I am saving money, but in reality its about the win. You see, battles are won few and far between in law school; you have to take those wins where you can. And I, well I am taking mine out on the free pizza. By taking the free pizza, I feel like, today anyways, I have won. Small victories matter these days.

Let's review:

1. Apparently I get my mail at the library.

2. I can't even make time for ATM runs -- lord knows what the rest of my life looks like.

3. And I think by swiping a few slices of pizza I have achieved a victory.

Welcome to my first year. Hopefully next semester they teach a class on regaining your dignity.

Thursday is the new Friday -- in MY mind

Thursday is the new Friday, in my head anyways. Thursday mornings I just want to stay in bed and have a leisurely breakfast with my partner, Todd. Thursday mornings, I just want to take all of the extra time and get to class on my terms. As we know that is not the case. Class still starts the same time, even if my head is on the weekend.

I have fallen in love with the bad coffee in the school's cafeteria. That is serious. I have truly let all of my values fall to the wayside in the now digital, formerly paper, chase.

Here's to hoping the weekend comes fast, bringing with it a crash course with Emily Post.

Coffee, the saving grace of all law students

One quick note before those hypos. Coffee is the lifesaver of all law students. I was told that before I started. My friend Janeen said, "You will be addicted to coffee by the middle of your first semester." I thought not. Wrong. Coffee is my friend. Coffee is the god to which I now worship. Coffee jump starts my legal engine. Howard Schultz should be a patron saint. Remind me to send that letter to the vatican. Somewhere in between my legal writing paper and outlining.

Surviving the Contracts Midterm

Exhaustion, confusion, and, then, of course, panic. Was it an option agreement? Was it a firm offer? Was it Promissory Estoppel? Don't even both trying to comprehend those terms. Unless you need an attorney, and honestly, for most of you, I hope that never happens. Hiring an attorney, for the average American, usually means something went completely wrong in your life and it needs "fixing". Adlai Stevenson said it best: "Law is not a profession at all, but rather a business service station and repair shop."

Back to Contracts. We did survive the midterm, and we all seemed to survive it rather well. In fact, we gained more than knowledge. We learned who those people are that sit across the lecture room from us. With nearly 100 students in one section, one tends to be territorial with one's friends. That means you typically hang with the students that sit near you. Midterms break down these fictional boundaries. Its the midterms that bring you across country lines. Nothing bonds more than fear and panic -- and bond we did.

Now if you will excuse me, I need to prep those Criminal hypos I have been avoiding for three days.

Mid Terms Make You Closer

No one understands what another law student is going through than another law student. That is incredibly evident during exam time. Combine that with a first draft of your major paper due the same week and you have the perfect law school storm. That is exactly the week we have had here at Southwestern Law School. On Monday the first draft of our final papers were due and today we have a Contracts mid term. It was blatantly obvious that our social graces have left us by our behaviors at a Student Bar Association Luncheon. This crowd of first years just ran into the room, grabbed as much food as they could carry, and just started stuffing it into their mouths on the way out. The event was not so much attended but rather pillaged. Our contracts review classroom was filled with 1Ls with food all over their faces. It was rather funny, but it was also a big realization what law school had done with our lives. Let me put that another way -- it was evidence of how very intensely involved we had all become with our studies. We gave ourselves over to this out of the ordinary, demanding everything you have and then some, and when our hitting your bottom, to give even more, experience.

And yet we love it.

More after the Contracts mid term.