Bad Glacier

I meant to post more this week. I meant to read more this week. I meant to start work on an outline this week. But I’ve been spending an inordinate amount of time (re)discovering eMusic instead of doing a lot of the things I should be doing.

eMusic is a digital music service, like the iTunes store, but without the big downsides of iTunes–the price and the restrictions they put on the song files. You have to pay month-to-month, but you get 40 songs for $10, which works out to a quarter each (or 90 songs for $20, if you go deluxe). Also, you get the songs in mp3 format, so there are no restrictions on how many times you can burn them onto CDs or transfer them to other computers.

eMusic focuses on independent labels, so you won’t be able to find everything you’re looking for, but if you can settle for stuff like The New Pornographers, Spoon, The Decemberists, The Arcade Fire, Hieroglyphics, MF Doom, Blackalicious, Dizzee Rascal, The Mountain Goats, Interpol, Super Furry Animals, classical, jazz, punk, electronic stuff, blues, or anything else that’s not on a major label, this might be your thing. There’s a free trial, so you can get 50 free downloads (you have to give them a credit card number, though).

Seriously, check it out. Especially if you suddenly have moral qualms about copyright infringement now that you’re a law student, like, um… some people… I’ve talked to recently.

Also (here’s where my motivations start to look a little shady), if any of you decide to try it out and really want to be nice, you’ll let me refer you. I’ll get 50 free songs, so will you, and I’ll be in your debt forever. If you want to do this, just shoot me an e-mail and I’ll send a referral back. Awesome.

(By the way, if you’re looking for some new music, I recommend the new Spoon album, Gimme Fiction. If you like happiness, you’ll enjoy it.)

I just overheard someone talking about which of HLS’s twelve student-run academic publications is the “party journal.”

I don’t know what to think of this. My mind has been blown.

Some organizations have started to promote their meetings by specifying that the free food offered at their event will not be pizza.

Others apologize that the free food will be pizza, but point out that it is still free.

I’m just happy that I don’t have to cook dinner tonight.

With the first Legal Research and Writing assignment comes the truth: Harvard Law students are just a bunch of overachieving, ultra-competitive stress bunnies after all. We pretend we don’t really care about grades. We try to act relaxed and laid-back, like we actually believed the Dean when she said, “The competition is over, and you won.”

But the minute we’re told to look up x number of sources on the “inevitable disclosure of trade secrets” doctrine and that it shouldn’t take more than an hour to do, all hell breaks loose. People spend three hours, five hours, a day and a half on it–and this is for the two-credit class that is graded pass/fail. I spent two hours on the assignment, and I feel like a slacker.

The secret’s out. We care. And if you get in our way, we will cut you.

Probably the only reason I’m not as overwhelmed as CM seems to be is that my girlfriend came up to visit this weekend. Instead of spending the weekend chained to my desk, we went to the aquarium (which was awesome–pics up later in the week, hopefully), watched movies, wandered the Cambridge area, and ate at a few area restaurants. Admittedly, I did some reading too, but it was a very relaxing weekend all in all (and I hope you now understand why there haven’t been any posts here since last Wednesday).

And boy, did I need a relaxing weekend. I got called on–and completely taken apart–in class Friday. This professor likes to work his way down the row, and the person beside me was nailed first, so I should have known it was coming. But still, when I heard, “Mr. Josh, what do you think about that?” I didn’t comprehend for a second or two.

I now understand the phrase “deer in the headlights” from an entirely different perspective. There I am, just moseying along through the forest, chewing up a few leaves, writing down the interesting things that are being said, when I notice that something’s wrong. What’s this? The ground is hard and black here, and there are no more trees. And why is the person beside me talking? And then, the headlights. The horn. The large object hurtling at you surprisingly fast. The question on the part of the opinion you almost, but not quite, remember.

The language center of your brain shuts down. Your mouth hangs open. Your hands shake. Your eyes skim over the text too quickly to actually read anything. You forget words like “contract” and “bailment,” and end up saying something like, “Well, the thing the people agreed on, it’s a reason to find for the plaint–defen–the… the car driver person.”

As far as I know, my section, unlike CM’s, hasn’t started forming study groups yet, but after my performance on Friday, it’s quite possible that I’ll be blackballed. Really though, I’m not taking it too hard. It’s been impressed on me too many times now that grades are based on the exam, not in-class performance. Everyone locks up from time to time. It was just my turn.

Anyways, I did better today in another class. Girlfriend and I saw this professor Sunday night when we went out to eat, and I don’t know whether she noticed me (I didn’t want to do the stalker thing and interrupt her meal to say hi), but the Professor did stare intently at the seating chart for several seconds before calling on me. I’m not saying that I was punished for having free time the night before class, but if you’re out on a date and your professor walks into the restaurant, it might not be a bad idea to pull the fire alarm, that’s all.

Only a week and a half in, and I think I’ve gone to more speakers, meetings, and events than I did in four and a half years of undergrad. The amount of things going on here is astounding. So far this week, I have seen author-journalist Anthony Lewis (who wrote Gideon’s Trumpet, which I read this summer), Judge Guido Calabresi (former Dean of Yale Law School, currently on the Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit), and former Senator/Governor Bob Graham. And it’s freakin’ Wednesday.

I have a feeling I’m going to be a time-management genius in three years.

UPDATE: Oh, and according to Trevor, I missed Seth Abramson. Damn.

Has anyone else noticed the Fake Hand-Raise in their classes? People will raise their hands while someone else is talking, but quickly lower them and avert their eyes as soon as the person stops or the professor looks their way.

Is this an attempt to appear more intelligent to the other students, or are people trying to control their innate gunnerism? Intimidation? Habit? Are their thoughts being pre-empted by the person talking? I saw this move all the time last week, but it’s becoming less frequent now. Maybe people are becoming more comfortable in class and more willing to share their less well-thought-out ideas. I dunno.

Any thoughts?

I have a problem. Which OSU quarterback gets the blame for tonight’s loss? Do I hate Justin Zwick for fumbling, or do I hate Troy Smith for getting sacked in the end zone shortly afterwards? The fumble lost us the game, but the safety really lost us the game. Zwick sucked it up last year, but did well in the Alamo Bowl and in last week’s game. Smith beat Michigan, but got himself suspended. All I know is I can’t hate the kicker. Not everyone can be Mike Nugent. Fifty yards is a long way. He can be forgiven for barely missing that one.

Y’know… it’s Zwick. Gotta be Zwick. That bastard.

Some things I may or may not[1] have heard around the snack table yesterday:

“These cookies have been abandoned, right?”
“Well, they don’t appear to have been mislaid or lost.”
“I’m taking control of this brownie with intent to possess it.”
“But do you have possession of all the brownies as the first taker?”
“Is a bite necessary to reduce the cookie to my control, or is the act of placing it on my plate sufficient?”
“It is the custom of law students to eat food that has been left out…”
“In the absence of this longstanding custom, the entire first-year class would probably starve to death.”

[1] At least some of this was actually stated by one of my classmates, but I refuse to admit how much of it only occurred in my head.

Ha!

Sighted on the way home from class this afternoon: two people walking around in Stanford sweatshirts.

It’s 80 degrees and sunny today. Seriously, people. If you’re chilly already, you might as well give up now.

So I got called on today. It was a simple question, relying only on reading comprehension, but on a part of the reading I had thought was background material. I didn’t expect to be asked about it, and so I hadn’t read it as carefully as I should have. My mind blanked and I stumbled around, managing to hit on a couple things that were almost–but not quite–correct. The encounter went something like this (with my thoughts in brackets):

Professor CivPro: “Mr. Josh, where do the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure come from?”

[Ha! I know this! It’s the Supreme Court. Wait, it’s a committee. The Judicial Conference? But that’s appointed by the Supreme Court, isn’t it? Crap.]

Me: “Uh… the Supreme Court appoints a committee…”

“And what gives them the power to do that?”

[2072! But how do you say it? Act 2072? No. Section 2072? I don’t know. Better just leave it out altogether.]

“Uh, Congress passed a law… 2072 from the reading, I think…”

“The Judicial Conference recommends rules to the Supreme Court, who can take their advice or not. Then what happens?”

“Uhhhhhh[Okay, the proposed changes go to Congress, who doesn’t need to act for them to become effective. But what happens if Congress disapproves of the rules? Can they modify the proposal? Do they have to accept or reject it as a whole? Must they pass a law to do so? Crap.]hhhhhhhh…”

Luckily, someone else bailed me out at this point and I was able to breathe again. All in all, I did about as well as I expected, and class was more interesting than I had hoped.

One day down. High-five!

Sorry about the radio silence, people. Orientation has been reasonably fun, but I don’t really have much to say about it. I learned a few things, one being that I’m better with names than I previously thought. I’m not great, but I’m at least average. I just never really put in the effort before, I guess.

Also, I met Trevor yesterday during super happy picnic games fun time. He’s tall. Our volleyball team was unstoppable good better than the other team.

Tomorrow’s the first day of class, so I just watched The Paper Chase. It seemed like the right thing to do. It didn’t scare me, but neither did One L. Law school doesn’t seem that bad. Maybe Civil Procedure will change my mind tomorrow. I’ll let you know.

Only one day in, and I’m feeling pretty orientated already. Not all of yesterday’s events were really necessary, but all in all things are going well. I now have an ID card, Lexis and Westlaw accounts, a stack of papers to wade through, a cool little USB memory stick thing with the Harvard shield on it, and most importantly, a check for my loan money. Not a bad first day.