palsgraf_polka

I was reading Pearson v Dodd for my torts class, and it is a case about a scandal exposed about Connecticut Senator Thomas Dodd in 1969 or so, and I wondered if he was Chris Dodd's Dad. One quick snap over to the internet and indeed, he was Chris Dodd's Dad. That's not the weird part. According to Chris Dodd's wikipedia page, he dated both Bianca Jagger and Carrie Fisher.

That's really hard to comprehend.

I bought this little frozen Pad Thai meal from Fresh & Easy and I'm eating it right now for lunch. It's really good. I love all the Fresh & Easy food. I'm so excited for its presence in Lompoc.

So, updates:

1) Apparently there is a serial arsonist in Lompoc:

http://www.kcoy.com/global/story.asp?s=10643083

I e-mailed this story to Mom & Dad last night and Dad says he's seen a few of the burned out vehicles while he and Mom are out serving. No wonder the fire sergeant wasn't too worried about the perpetrator coming back - the device was probably a signature of sorts and apparently he(they) pick targets at random. So at least that's good.

2) First night of school! I'm 1L! Tonight is Criminal Law. Woohoo! I'm so excited.

Ok...time to finish my lunch because I have to brief at least one Torts case at lunch today.

We got our course list and book list for the fall term! Contracts, Criminal Law, Torts and Legal Analysis. So far I have these books listed as required:

Criminal Law books:

Casebook - Criminal Law & Procedure by Boyce, Dripps & Perkins
Criminal Law - Quick Review - Sum & Substance by Steven Friedland
Aspen's Case notes/legal briefs for Criminal Law

Contracts books:

Casebook - Contracts by Farnsworth, Young & Sanger
Contracts - Quick Review - Sum & Substance by Robert Brain
Casenote's case notes/legal briefs for Contracts

Torts books:

Casebook - Torts by Prosser, Kelly, Wade & Schwartz
Torts - Quick Review - Sum & Substance by Larry Levine
Prosser & Keeton's case notes/legal briefs for Torts

These books cost me $611.55 tonight. I told Mom & Dad that if they paid for tuition for this first year, I'd pay for the books. Thankfully, these books are for the entire year. But it's still a sizable chunk of change.

So Starting August 24th, I'll be in Criminal Law (interspersed with Legal Analysis) on Monday nights (through December 7th), Tuesday nights will be Contracts, and Thursday nights will be Torts (last class December 10th).

Class tonight was a blast! I love my teacher so much. The banter between us students is great too. I'm so happy.

Ok...I made it through 6 cases and 3 articles tonight. Tonight was concentrated on divorce and the divorce cases were much easier than the marriage cases I was doing yesterday.

So, that leaves me with one short divorce case I can do tomorrow at lunch and then 8 pages of articles to summarize and I'm good for class for tomorrow night.

Then I get a few days break, as we don't have class for 2 weeks due to spring break. So, I have 2 weeks to brief 8 cases. If I have time, I might brief ahead so I don't feel rushed later. I need to seriously try to break myself of this procrastination, as I won't be able to do this come Fall and I'm taking 3 classes and have to brief 20 a week.

I do find it interesting though that just in a couple of weeks of reading case after case my brain is whipping through legalese much better than it was before. Before I agonized with the writing and had to read something 2 or 3 times before I got the meaning, but now it reads like a novel, which is good. I'm hoping by the time Fall comes around this will be so easy it'll be a snap.

Anyway, I know I'm probably boring you with this stuff. But some of these cases are really interesting. I read one tonight, Aflalo v. Aflalo where an Orthodox Jewish woman wants a divorce from her Orthodox Jewish husband, but he won't give her a get which is a traditional Jewish decree, in writing and in Aramaic, that releases her from being his wife/property/slave and allows her to remarry. If he does not give her the get, if she has sex with or remarries another man, she is considered an adulteress, any subsequent children are considered illegitimate and cannot marry Jews, and she will be shunned by her peers and social groups. Usually this is used as a ransom so that the husbands can get more money or custody of children, but in this case, the husband genuinely did not want a divorce, but to reconcile. He did say though, that if the Beth Din, the Rabbinical court ordered him to give his wife the get he would, but that case wasn't being heard yet before the Beth Din. The wife wanted the court to order her husband to give her the get before the Beth Din ordered him to do so (among a few other items which I won't go into because it's boring and legal), but the court refused on 1st Amendment grounds saying that they cannot interfere with one's practice of religion (unless it is a dire possibly life threatening situation). The justice quoted Thomas Jefferson and it was a very interesting and well written opinion.

I tell you, I love this shit.

I am sitting in class waiting for it to start. And there's wifi! Tonight is the orientation where a 4th year student comes to speak to tell us about how we should brief cases, what to expect, etc.

Talk to you all later!

So yesterday I woke up with a sore throat which dogged me all day. I awoke at 2am this morning with my throat on fire. It got progressively worse, so I went to urgent care this afternoon where they declared it probable strep throat and the culture will be ready in 48 hours. Anyway, I don't believe in taking antibiotics unless I have to, so i am quarantining myself at my home until the culture comes back. Wednesday is my day to do all of my volunteer work at Legal Aid, so I e-mailed my attorneys and the director that I was going to be home sick. So, the director wrote back to me:

"Feel Better - and go to Law School"

So my final exam is tomorrow. What am I doing tonight? Writing a 7 page research paper on adoption and foster care issues in California and a research paper on whether or not sellers have a duty to disclose that a GHOST resides on the real property they are selling (approx 4 pages).

I finished the big paper, and now I'm taking a 5 minute break from writing the smaller one on the ghost.

FUCKING A I should be a better student. Seriously.

At least I have Cuban music. I love Cuban music.

I need scotch. But if I start drinking I won't finish my paper.

Bah.

I just registered for my Spring classes! I am taking:

Ethics for Paralegals

and

Organizing and Analyzing Evidence

I cannot wait for the evidence class. I am so excited.

And the ethics class is only 1 credit, and is only 3 sessions. So, I'm going to find a legal aid society to volunteer at so I can A) get experience for a future resume and B) parlay this volunteering into my Paralegal Internship class I will be taking in the Summer quarter. I'm going to start investigating the volunteering now so after classes get out on 03/15/08, I can start. For the internship, I only need 3 hours a week, so I'm going to see about what I can do. I would love to work with the legal aid society and help out the people who can't afford it. Oh god I'm becoming so fucking liberal. Next I'll become a vegan and stop using deodorant.

I found out today that I got an A in my Fundamentals of Paralegals class, which was a tough class! I already knew I had an A in Case Management, and now I'm just waiting to see what I get in the dreaded Civil Litigation. So, yay me, and a bright spot in my crappy day.

I'm spending my evening making Civil Litigation flash cards for my mid-term on Wednesday.