Let the drinking commence!

It's Friday and there have been an extraordinary amount of alcohol-related events this week, so I thought I'd give you guys a little update.

Tuesday night the Chicano-Hispanic Law Student Association had a mixer with the Hispanic Bar Association. Part of something that CHLSA does is set up law students (I think mostly first years) with lawyers to "mentor", whatever that means. I met my mentor there, and he seems like a really cool guy. His name is Jesus and I believe he is a partner in an oil and gas firm. I think what we're going to do is to have me follow him around some day and go to discovery or a depostition to see what it's like. It's unclear what we're actually supposed to be doing with each other, other than drinking at mixers. I also met this really fun, sweet woman named Gloria, who gave me her business card and said to let her know if I needed anything.

Thursday night, we had an event with the Women's Law Caucus called Wine About Law School. It was held at this bar called Speakeasy in the Warehouse District, which is as trendy and tries as hard to be cool as it sounds. The bar itself was very cool, and there were some women lawyers there. I ran into Gloria there too, and we started talking about law school, etc. and she gave me the advice to just have a good time my first year and not get too caught up in a relationship when I really should be meeting people. At some point during this conversation, she said "You know, you really just need to fuck around, have a good time. I did, and I wish I had done it more." I tried to keep a very straight face, but I don't know how well it came off. A short while later, I excused myself in slight disbelief and got another drink... because I needed it.

Later on that night was Bar Review #2 for the year, held at Six, on 4th street (I believe). It was a pretty good time, and I may or may not have called Nips at 2:30 in the morning to tell him that nobody cares about Minnesota football. Only his voicemail holds the answer.

Also, I was called on today in Criminal Law. It figures that the time that I only read the case once and on the bus on the way home and show up practically hungover that I get called on. Other than a few technicalities, I got most of it right though, it wasn't too horrible of an experience. But right as I got called on, both Bryce and Philip started IM'ing me. In my panic, I couldn't respond and was afraid that somehow the prof would know that I had little IM windows on my screen and punish me for that too.

As for this weekend, I think I just need to sleep. And I got Crash on DVD today, so I will probably watch that at some point - and all of you should too. And then go hug a black person. And a person of every race in the world.

Rita is a ho

First of all, let me say that the main reason I haven't updated is because unless you are in law school, most of the stuff I'm doing is totally uninteresting. In fact, it's probably still uninteresting. Law-school semi-fun stuff I've done has mostly had to do with mentor group activities. Last Friday we had Race Judicata, or Society Olympics. The best competition was probably the Tug of War. I competed in the bat spin relay, and we came in second in that, but ultimately the McKormick Society came out victorious. At least we got to run around in 100-degree heat. Oh God, it's so miserable right now. It was 104 today and it's supposed to be hotter tomorrow - how is this even possible? This weekend we're supposed to have a "cool front" where it might dip down to the 80s.

The first Bar Review of the year was this Thursday, which was a lot of fun. For those of you who don't know, Bar Review is not quite reviewing for the Bar Exam - the Student Bar Association scouts out bars and convinces them to give us drink specials on Thursday nights. We went to Blind Pig on 6th and then to Red Fez for a little while. Let me tell ya - there are a lot of sketch people around. But as long as you have a few token males to ward off the super-creeps, it's not too bad. At the chill places like Blind Pig, it's cool, but at Red Fez, which is more of a dance club, watch out. I also had my first high school sighting at a bar on Saturday night, which was pretty funny.

In other recent news, yes, my family evacuated Houston in the imminent doom of Hurricane Rita. We live in the northwest part of the city, but they didn't want to risk it. My parents left Thursday morning at 4 am, and didn't get into Austin until 3:30 pm. Let me remind you that the drive to Austin is usually 2 and a half hours - not 11 and a half. They made it in okay, though and thankfully the hurricane went down in intensity and pretty much side-tracked Houston. Part of our fence got blown down, but that's it. My parents stayed with friends here in Austin, which meant I got all the privledges of having my paernts in town without the inconveniences of having them stay with me. Lots of good meals out, a fridge stocked with food, and car usage for several days? Me gusta. They finally got back today.

Finally, last night's episode of Arrested Development was probably the craziest and most non-sensical episode ever. However, I was pretty excited about the family-wide chicken dancing. It never gets old! I love it. I can't wait until next week for some Scott Baio and Charlize Theron action on Arrested Development. They have the best guest stars ever on the show. I thought they couldn't top Carl Weathers. But Chachi? Brilliant.

Only 2 and a half weeks until I head to Notre Dame for the ND-USC game!

Nerd!

Yeah, I'm a nerd:

YOU ARE RULE 20(a)!

You are Rule 20, an important part of the Federal
Rules' policy of permissive joinder. You are
designed specifically to allow as many parties
in an action as can be tried efficiently, and
you'll include someone as long as there is some
factual overlap between a claim involving them
and the rest of the case at hand. You are
popular, out-going, and are never far from
friends. However, your overly gregarious
nature and magnanimous approach do make things
a bit crowded--you're the reason that lawsuits
are often cluttered with innumerable parties
and even more numberous claims for relief.
Still, despite the crowds that you attract, you
can't argue with the efficiency of getting
everything done at once!


Which Federal Rule of Civil Procedure Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Law school = high school

I've found a lot of similarities between high school and this institution of higher learning that supposedly is preparing us to be the leaders of the free world. According to all the orientation seminars, we'll basically be running the country in three short years.

Anyway, one of the main similarities to high school is the reintroduction of lockers. Now don't get me wrong, without my locker I would be carrying a combined 50 lbs of books every day back and forth from here and home, but it definitely makes you feel like you're back in the good old days of hanging out by the lockers and figuring out which locker your crush has and just happening to hang out near it because your friend Sheila's locker is there. For someone who is supposed to be intellectually superior than the rest of you puny minds out there (or so we were told at orientation), I had the hardest time with my combination lock. Not only are the lockers a little condescending, I also bring my lunch every day. In a lunchbox! Right now our cafeteria/lounge is being remodeled, so it's either that or spend way too much on some stale sandwich from a poser coffee shop on the corner near the law school. Needless to say, I feel super cool carrying my big red lunchbox around campus.

Secondly, I take the bus to school. If that doesn't drudge up bad memories of people demanding that the bus driver put the radio on the hip-hop station and random knife-fights, I don't know what does.

Finally, the cliques here are probably even worse than in high school. Except in high school, your clique was based on a) how cool you were or b) what activities you were in. Here, it's just based on what section you happened to be placed in. I met a girl here in April over Prospective Students' Weekend, and we wanted to meet up sometime. After 3 weeks here, I finally ran into her on Wednesday. If you're not in the same classes as someone, you literally never see them.

There are some major exceptions, of course. For example, right now, I'm heading to my Contracts professor's house for a keg party. Drinking before 5pm with a professor? I like it.

The free stuff

As anyone who has applied to law school knows, there are lots of fees involved. And trust me, it doesn't get any cheaper when you start law school. Want to join the Women's Law Caucus? That'll be $35. How about the Intellectual Property Law journal? That'll be another $30.

However, there are some perks. As of now, I've received 2 Nalgene bottles, 3 coffee mugs, 6 days' worth of free breakfasts, and at least six social events with free alcohol.

In other news, I want a foosball table. Maybe the law school will pay for that too.

Our Contracts professor invited us over to his house on Thursday for a keg party. That's right, a keg party. Basically the point of law school is to get us to study hard, and drink lots of alcohol from complimentary Westlaw and Lexis mugs. Not too shabby.

Too soon?

Yes, I know it is definitely too soon to be making hurricane jokes. But, The Onion beat me to it, and this short article is pretty funny in its startingly accurate account of Houston (except the food really does rock).

Refugees Moved From Sewage-Contaminated Superdome To Hellhole Of Houston

HOUSTON—Evacuees from the overheated, filth-encrusted wreckage of the New Orleans Superdome were bussed to the humid, 110-degree August heat and polluted air of Houston last week, in a move that many are resisting. "Please, God, not Houston. Anyplace but Houston," said one woman, taking shelter under an overpass. "The food there is awful, and the weather is miserable. And the traffic—it's like some engineer was making a sick joke." Authorities apologized for transporting survivors to a city "barely better in any respect," but said the blistering-hot, oil-soaked Texas city was in fact slightly better, and that casualties due to gunfire would be no worse.

I still want my black shirt back. Jerks.

We get national holidays off??

That is so foreign to me. I'm in Houston, enjoying the Labor Day weekend and putting off all the tons of reading I have to do for next week. Last night, I met up with Dixie, who is in Houston for a while after getting the hell out of New Orleans. We watched the ND-Pitt game at Champps with the alumni club of Houston, so it was great to get to see her and see a very solid Irish victory.

She tells me that, as I suspected, I left a black, stretchy Gap t-shirt in Florida and someone has it. To you, I say, quit holding my t-shirt ransom. I want it back. I have never even worn it.

I think I need to make up for all the sleep I'm not going to get all semester this weekend. So... zzzzzzzzzz....