Ricks v. 1L (with the help of "A New Name For Everything" by The Weakerthans)

Wow. I don't really remember the last time I wasn't anxious about something. This has been quite the life-changing experience. I'm generally one to keep a positive attitude, even when I'm feeling negative about something, but my first 1L semester has made my answers to the most common questions change. "How's it going?" or "How are you?" used to be the simplest question in the world for me to answer. Now I hesitate EVERY time I'm asked that, and my answer now usually is similar to, "I'm surviving." It isn't all that bad really and I'm not unhappy, but 1L has come with many a challenge. When people ask me if I like law school, I usually respond that I do, but truthfully I don't have an emotion either way. It's what I chose, and it's just happening. I don't have time to really stop and think about my feelings about the whole thing, so perhaps this is me snapping in the midst of my studies to take a typographical breather and just reflect. I'm going to steal the words of a favorite song by The Weakerthans to help me explain... because, why not?

"When the bus shelter windows and napkin-dispensers surprise with distorted reflections; it's never the someone you're hoping to recognize." --Sadly, (or perhaps smellily) I don't think I've had my morning routine steady enough to get in a daily shower for a straight week since September. I hold on to sleep for every last minute I can grasp in the mornings (this probably isn't anything new, but the lack of showering at least 6 times a week, certainly is). Hence, I find myself on many mornings quickly assembling whatever high-fashion ensemble of clothing falls out of my dresser, making some attempt to brush, and at least rinse my hair and then I'm on my way out the door. I am often disgruntled as I'm walking from my parking garage to the school to see in my reflection off the shiny-granite walls of a neighboring building that my hair has dried in some funky Mohawk/Alfalfa/Dennis the Menace-esque style.

"When the... borders of night start to give."--Yeah, this is not a new problem, but, for those of you who know me, you'll be shocked to hear that it's WORSE. I don't know what's wrong with me, but I cannot sleep at normal hours. I apparently broke or seriously offended my internal clock because it definitely isn't telling my body the time anymore. It's not just that I stay up late (as I've done most of my life), now I never know when I'll be awake or asleep. It's not healthy, or fun. Sometimes I'll get home in the late afternoon, I'll get dinner, and then after a bit of studying I'll zonk out. Then when I wake up at midnight it's pretty confusing trying to figure out how I should divy up my sleep and homework time. Would someone teach me how to sleep like most humans? Thanks.

"When the one-ways collude with the map that you've folded wrong and the route you've abandoned is always the path you probably should be upon."-- This has less to do with 1L and more to do with living in the DC area. I get lost. This is not a problem I'm used to. Even in Georgia I could always find my way. (Perhaps God was helping me then.) Before moving here I could just check a Google Maps map and I'd be just fine. I'm pretty good with maps. However, DC is a serious conundrum because signage is terrible here! You can't rely on the signs to tell you where you are, where you need to go, or if they do tell you where to go, it's rarely with enough time to get to the proper lane to get there! GPS? Perhaps.

"When you can't save cash or conviction..."-- I've never been in a situation where I have a lump of money that just steadily disappears. I actually am pretty good at budgeting, but I don't like it at all. I go between thinking, "Oh, I've got enough money that I could actually get that!" and "Crap... it's not money, it's debt." I'm a much bigger fan of just having a steady income where I know exactly what I can and can't spend. Trying to stretch my money now is a lot of guess work, and I'm not a huge fan of feeling like there's a chance that I'll just run out of money.

"When the... threads of your fear are unfurled with the tiniest pull."-- It's pretty funny when I'm having a conversation at lunch with my classmates from my section and I realize that there are 2Ls or 3Ls listening in. Sometimes we 1Ls can get very uptight or panicky about pretty stupid things. It doesn't take much for us to worry we aren't doing enough, or could be disadvantaged in some way. Personally, I tend to worry more about big picture things. I don't know if you've noticed, but apparently the economy isn't great. This doesn't help me feel super secure all the time. I can be having a great week and feel like everything is totally fine, and then I'll struggle to answer a question in class or read a discouraging article and then suddenly I'm convinced that I'm not going to make it. I'll never get a job! Of course I know that isn't true. I'll get a job. I might have to mow lawns until I die to try to pay off my law school debt, but the point is that no matter what, things will work out. I know this, but it doesn't take much to cause me a brief fit of "I'll never make it because I couldn't remember the prima facie case for defamation"-syndrome.

"Stand with your hands in your pockets and stare at the smudge of a newspaper sky and ask it to rain a new name for everything. Fire every phrase. They don't want to work for us anymore."-- Words have seriously become very different to me now. Not that I talk differently, but I've found through my studies that there are a lot of words that I've always used incorrectly, been oblivious to, or that I've known existed but never knew of their meaning. I didn't know what "torts" meant before I started law school. I'd heard it a lot, but I had never actually known what it was about. Now I have an entire class about torts. (In short, it means wrongs done by an actor to another.) I learned that you don't get a mortgage, you give one. There are also many words that have differing regular and legal meanings. And there are words that are funny to get away with saying (i.e. bastardy.)

"So put on those clothes you never grew into and smile like you mean it for once."-- I have a lot of events that require that I wear a business suit. I presently own one suit. It's from my mission. It didn't fit then, and despite my addition of a layer or two, it still doesn't fit. I've been meaning to go get me a nice new suit. Speaking of the events that require a suit, the other day I got to feel really intimidatING, even as a lowly 1L. How you ask? I was a judge in a national mock trial competition for undergrads. It was fun! Not everyday that a 1L get's to don a judge's robe!

Anyway, I don't really think this song worked all that well, but it's a good song that you should listen to. Uh...pretty sure there was more to talk about, or at least more interesting things that I should have previously written, but whatever. You already know what I'm like. I'm hungry, so you're stuck with this crappy post. K, see ya.

Conan O'Brien in His First Post-NBC Interview

Conan O'Brien is Love
Originally uploaded by WestlifeBunny

First of all, I think Jay Leno is a jerk. I haven't ever been a big fan of his, and always have favored watching David Letterman over Jay Leno. However, sometimes I have watched Leno's show(s). For the last while ever since Conan's brief job hosting The Tonight Show went south, I have effectively boycotted Jay Leno. I haven't watched one minute of him on TV. I think he's a JERK for taking a job back after leaving it. Granted, it's not all his fault. NBC is very much to blame as well. I think they handled the whole thing unwisely. Anyway, Conan just filmed his first interview and he pretty much says what I feel. In the interview Conan said that he would not have "surrendered 'The Tonight Show' and handed it over to somebody publicly and wished them well -- and then ... six months later [taken it back]... But that's me, you know." I think Conan's totally right that Jay was pretty lame in doing so.

Anyway, I think Conan's hilarious. I hope his new TBS show does well.

On to much more important things in my life, I'm kinda sorta graduating this week. It's really weird. Everyone asks if I'm excited, and I don't really know how to answer. I know I should be, but I guess the actual emotion just isn't there. I think I'm pretty freaked out about law school and that is why graduating isn't really sinking in. I am pretty excited about doing new adventurous things, but I just don't feel much about actually graduating. It's odd.

I've applied for my loans and stuff at George Mason, so that's about a done deal. I still feel like I'll go to BYU and possibly Utah if they take me off of their waiting lists. It's hard to not accept a much much cheaper offer from a school that is ranked the exact same and probably can get me a job just as well.

Speaking of jobs... does ANYONE out there have one for me? I really really don't want to end up with a lame summer job again. Especially now that I'm all awesome and have a college degree, (hahaha). I don't feel like a college degree is helping me out much, especially because it's in history. What do I do with that? I think I'm just going to have to settle for a not-so-great job and just suck it up. We'll see. If only I could make more money with this blog. Thus far I've managed to rake in about 40 bucks. Woot!

Well, I think that's about it. See y'all later!

Bye.

Applying to law school: My thoughts, frustrations, opinions.

Wow.  I have a lot of crazy stuff on my mind lately.
DC was a blast last week.  I had a tough time returning to the cold here in Utah.  The weather was absolutely perfect the whole time we were out there.  Low 70s-ish the whole time, and sunny.  It was great.  I came back here, and we've had a bitter cold wind going on.  Not great.
I really enjoyed getting to see George Mason Law.  It's a tiny little campus.  It was also under construction, so there wasn't much to see.  They have one big building, and they're building a second.  That's about it, plus, I may have already mentioned this, but I kept smelling cigarette smoke all over the campus.  It's in a nice area of Arlington, though.  I really love the DC area.  I think that I'd enjoy living there a great deal, however, it's not exactly cheap.  I would want some decent assurance I could pay off the debt of living there and of going to George Mason without a scholarship.

Random interruption to discuss the photo above.  That's me and Ty on one of our three flights on the way out to DC.  I had only had about 3 hours of sleep the night before, but I can't sleep on planes.  Ty, as you see, was not having the same problem.  That trip was seriously fun though.  The flights weren't comfy, but getting to go somewhere was tremendous.  I'm really glad that Spencer and Ty went with me as well.

Anyway, so I'm struggling with the George Mason choice, even though I really want to live there, and it's the best school that accepted me.  I just worry that I'll get tons of debt and then struggle to get the types of jobs I would need to pay it all off.

I just learned that BYU sent out a bunch of decision letters today, including mine.  What with the timing of their response, and the fact that there are a bunch of them at once, I'm fairly certain that at best I'll be waitlisted.  If they had accepted me, I would definitely go there at this point.  It just doesn't seem like I'd be accepted this late in the game.

I haven't thrown out Loyola, but it seems really unlikely.  Cincinnati and Houston are pretty much out.  (Houston could change my mind if when they offer scholarships next week they give me a great offer.)

Now, my current thoughts:  I'm actually really considering Arizona State.  When I applied I didn't think too much about going there, but now it's looking like one of my best options.  To make it affordable, I'll have to establish residency after my first year.  They've offered a scholarship for only my first year, in order to bring me down to below resident tuition.  Then if I could actually establish residency it would be almost as affordable as Loyola with the big scholarship that they offered.  It's a tough decision, and I need to make it in the next couple weeks, provided I don't want to waste any seat deposit money.

I've been pretty frustrated with getting waitlisted at U of Utah.  I thought I'd get accepted, but it was never a for sure thing, obviously.  Anyway, I'm surprised that I probably don't even have the option to stay in Utah for school after all.

I'm anticipating a lot of news tomorrow.  I have a few letters on their way.  I'll know more tomorrow.  Wish me luck, again.

K, bye.

BYU Law School is CHEAP!!!

So, as you, my many faithful readers, know, I've been applying to law school.  (Was that enough commas in one short sentence for you?)  So far I've now been accepted to two schools: George Mason, and Loyola Law School.  I was very excited about Loyola's letter to me because it said that I will receive an estimated $84,000 worth of scholarship money over the three years.  That sounds GREAT, right?  Well... when I considered that the latest tuition rate at Loyola is about $40,000 per year, and that living expenses plus fees, etc will amount to another $20,000 or so... I'd still actually have almost $32,000* of debt every year!

Ok... so then there's BYU.  It's in Provo, UT.  Yeah, PROVO.  That's significantly cheaper to live in than Washington, D.C. or Los Angeles.  (The locations of GMU and Loyola)  So living expenses/fees etc. will probably be significantly lower than $20,000 for BYU.  (Their website actually estimates additional costs at $15,070.)  Then there's the tuition.  Without a scholarship it's only $10,280 per year.  So what does this all mean?  Even though BYU would never in a million years give me a scholarship for $84,000, their regular cost is far cheaper for me than Loyola Law School.  Who is significantly lower-ranked, and has again, offered 84 freaking thousand dollars.  Let's hope I get into BYU Law.  $25,000 of debt per year sounds a little better than the $32,000 per year I'd get at Loyola, and it sounds MUCH better than the $55,000 of debt I'd have each year at George Mason.  Ugh.  Money sucks.

K, see ya!


* Actually, I made some errors in calculation of living expenses.  It would be $37-38,000 of debt actually.