Reasons why I may fail the bar exam - Part II

The rule against perpetuities.

It's a bitch.

Yes, I studied it in law school, but I don't remember it being this complicated! Certainly I never had to learn anything about vested interests or contingent springing defasible options subject to open executory interests or any of that crap.

Now, I know I'm not stupid, I deal with all kinds of complicated crap at work all day, every day, but somehow I just cannot get all these stupid interests in my head.

I suspect that my preparation tactic in this respect will be to just memorise everything and not even bother trying to understand it, since that currently seems like a totally pointless exercise...

To-do list

Ok. I have two weekends left before Themis starts on 3 Dec. That is including this weekend and noting the fact that next weekend I MUST go Christmas shopping and today I am only just starting to study because I had to go grocery shopping in the morning and then my flatmate's parents were here.

So now I'm cracking on and here is the to-do list before I can start bar prep lectures:

Reading

1. Criminal (about 50% left)
2. CivPro (this one's a killer, over 100 pages)
3. Real property
4. Trusts

Outlines (to be combined with reading where reading not already done)

1. Contracts
2. Torts
3. Remedies
4. PR
5. Con law
6. Criminal
7. CivPro (see above)
8. Real property
9. Trusts

I also have a bunch of first-year and upper level lectures to listen to and do the handouts on, this includes finishing up real property and civpro handouts and finishing lectures and handouts on corporations, evidence, wills and trusts.

Obviously all of this is NOT going to happen before 3 December, but I'm going to give it a damn good go! Watch this space!

Reasons why I may fail the bar exam - Part I

Reason 1: I can't get myself out of bed.

I go to work in my Big Law job every day so I already don't have a whole bunch of time to study. I usually roll up at the office around 9.30, so the key is to study in the mornings, get an hour or so in before work as after work my brain is not usually still functioning.

So far, for the last couple of weeks, I have woken up without fail at 6.30, not feeling too sleepy, thinking "perfect, I can get up and study now". Yet, somehow, so far this is yet to happen.

Therefore, if I fail the bar exam, my inability to motivate/terrify myself into action in the mornings instead of pressing snooze repeatedly, will most likely have been my downfall.

In other news, I was allocated to Pasadena, which was my first choice, and I've booked myself into a hotel. So at least that part is done. Just need to learn the law now...

Where's The Fear?

I'm lacking The Fear. I'm sure it will come, but so far I haven't been able to get on top of things.

My plan has been to do all the reading and outlines before the bar review lectures start on 3 December, but I am WAY behind. Here's where I am:

Outlines completed: Evidence, wills, agency, community property, crim pro, partnerships

Reading done: PR, corps

Not even touched: civ pro, con law, trusts, remedies, real property, contracts, torts, remedies, sales, criminal

The logic was to start with the subjects that are completely unfamiliar to me, so evidence, wills and CP, and leave the 'easier' stuff until later, being things like contracts and torts which are basically exactly the same here and in CA so, in theory at least, it would take me less time to get to grips with them.

Now, obviously I am not going to get through all this material in three weekends, so I must get more done during the week, but somehow this is just not happening. It may be the case that I would only do the reading and not the outlining, but then at some point I WILL have to do the outlining... bah.

This is somewhat unfamiliar to me, as I have always been so efficient with my studying, but various stresses with stupid boys and work have somehow derailed me this time... watch this space!

Kick start

The vacation is over (sniff!) and it's time to get down and dirty. The week before I went I did NOTHING. I am behind my schedule big time and need to catch up. This week at work was unpleasant to say the least, so this weekend I must get on top of things. Fortunately I made my schedule pretty loose so I have a bit of time...

I've filed my bar exam application, which makes it all a little terrifying. I filled out my form, forked up $1200 and picked my preferred exam locations. So now there is no going back and I have to actually learn all the stuff, eek!

So here we go. Crim Pro this weekend. I've done the reading, just need to do the outline. Sadly I fear that will take me more than the five hours I have between now and when I have to go and buy a last minute Halloween costume!

I've lost a little bit of momentum this week on the bar study front, mainly for two reasons.

1. The bureaucracy involved in moral character applications is making me super depressed. I get that I need to give you my fingerprints, despite the fact that the US government has my fingerprints in many many many places. I get that I have to go and get it done at the police station. I also get that you have to have a specific FBI form to put the fingerprints on.

What I don't get is that it is IMPOSSIBLE to get these forms from anywhere. You won't send me one, the police station doesn't keep them, so the only option is to PRINT one off the internet. This to me seems like a very bizarre solution considering the difficulty in obtaining these forms in the first place.

So anyway, I'm going to print the bloody form and we will see what happens... I'm sure that won't be the end of it.  But this whole process has depressed me as it's making me feel like maybe this is too much effort.


2. I'm going on vacation in a week's time! Beach, cocktails, dancing the night away. This is far more exciting than bar study at this point. Yesterday I spent all day out shopping and picking outfits to take. This is exhausting, I will have you know. This morning I have finished up the packing prep and now I am finally sitting down to write my community property outline.

Well, the sun is shining, so maybe I will also go for a walk a bit later on...

Odds and ends

According to the statistics published by the NCBE, in 2011 the CA bar general pass rate was 51%. Just over half of the applicants passed. This doesn't sound so bad.

The pass rate for foreign-educated applicants (ie including foreign attorneys), the pass rate was 17%.

I am hopeful that most of the people in the 83% who failed, were from non-common law jurisdictions.

A girl can hope, right?

Book day!

My books arrived today! I had been like a child at Christmas waiting for them but I suspect that will soon wear off.

There are four. One multi-state outline book, one California outline book, a practice MBE and practice PTs. The practice PTs book weighs about as much as a small rhinoceros yet there are no practice essays or practice MBE questions in print. Apparently this material will be available online but I would have preferred practice MBE questions at least to work from on paper.

All that aside, I'm excited to be getting started. Work has been relatively horrendous this week but i managed to escape "early" today and leave at 8pm. Big law really has a whole different idea about time, huh...? Anyway, the point is I got home and started looking at my books.

I'm starting with evidence since I have never studied it plus apparently it is H.A.R.D. I can see how - they don't make it easy. For example, the court may exclude a witness subject to exceptions. One of said exceptions is that the witness is a natural person.

I don't know what kinda crazy ass court cases they have in California, but here they only let people testify. I mean how exactly does anyone give evidence who is NOT a natural person? Animals? Cyborgs?

It may be time to put down the book and go to bed...

Pre-review...

In anticipation of my bar review books (UPS reliably informs me they are in Indianapolis) I signed up a couple of weeks ago for the free Themis courses on the basics. I figured this can be no bad thing since law school was some time ago (four years, yikes!) and obviously there is a lot of US law I just don't know. I mean subject matter jurisdiction? It's not really an issue when you just have one layer of courts.

Anyway, I've downloaded all the lectures and I have been listening to them on my walk into work in the morning - less so on the way back in the last week when I was staying late almost every night - and then trying to fill in the handouts.

There are two observations to be made here.

1. A lot of the law is (for obvious historical reasons) the same. Offer, acceptance, duty, breach... So memorising it will be the bigger challenge rather than understanding that many new concepts.

2. Jurisdiction aside, torts is dull. I never liked torts and it would seem that this has not changed over time. I do not feel much affection for criminal law either. Or fundamental rights. Dull, dull, dull. Strangely, however, despite the fact that I never wanted to be a litigator and am indeed now a transactional lawyer, civil procedure is pretty fun. I put this down to the word 'procedure' which appeals to my innate sense of order...

Now hurry up, UPS, I have outlining to do!

Blog reboot

If I called myself a sporadic blogger, that might be a gross overstatement. Whilst in law school, I was somehow able to sustain a relatively regular pattern of posting and indeed managed to even garner a few regular followers (not that this is the point of blogging). However, once law school was over and I was in the great wide world of BigLaw, it all fell by the wayside and even my best efforts resulted in only managing about thirty posts over two years.

In hindsight, the trouble may well have been the lack of a focal point to blog about. Law school was an obvious one, but BigLaw less obvious with the inherent risks of outing myself/blogging about employers etc. And, let's face it, working in BigLaw doesn't really leave much time for doing exciting things outside of work and still having time to blog about them.

I've decided to return to blogging as I actually have a short-term goal to provide a suitable subject: the California Bar Exam. Now, one might be forgiven for thinking that this must mean I am certifiably insane and should consider voluntary confinement somewhere where they use padding instead of wallpaper. However, I'm doing it and I'm pretty excited about it.

Considering I'm already an attorney, the CBX doesn't bring with the usual 'my life is over if I don't pass this exam' feelings, but all the same I would of course rather pass it the first time around since (1) I am a huge overachiever and hate failure with the same passion most people reserve for Chris Brown and (2) it's really goddamn expensive!

So, here I am. Today is day 1 (sort of) of the bar prep extraordinaire. I have signed up for Themis bar review - the books arrive next week - and tomorrow I will sit down and figure out a study plan/to do list. Discipline and time management, I suspect, will be key, particularly as work has obviously now kicked into a very high gear and everyone is just. too. busy. But in my nerdy overachiever way, I actually enjoy the prospect of studying again, so I almost feel (at the moment) that it will be fun and will balance out the work stress.

This will not, I'm sure, be the case in January when I am working 14-hour days and trying desperately to memorise the elements of mens rea or suchlike.

So, day 1, here we go!