Earlier this week, the law school sent out an email to the May graduates, congratulating us again on our accomplishment and informing us that our Juris Doctor diplomas had been mailed. The email included a link where we could view our diploma.
For me, seeing that email, viewing my diploma, was actually more gratifying than the graduation ceremony. At the ceremony back on May 7th, we had not received our exam grades. In fact, just the day before the ceremony, I took a final exam for the class of "Complex Civil Litigation." That last exam turned out to be perhaps the most difficult one of my entire law school experience. Afterwards, I joked to my friends that I ended my academic studies at FSU College of Law "not with a bang, but a whimper." So, there remained for me an uneasy feeling about the exams as I went through the graduation ceremony.
Now, though, I know my grades and my GPA. And while it will be September before final class rankings are issued (due to some students from my class finishing their graduation requirements in summer school), I know my degree is there, permanently.
A few days ago, the Admissions and Records Office printed my transcript, and it was nice to see "Juris Doctor Cum Laude" typed at the end...
There is really no time to enjoy it, though. One month from now is the Florida Bar Exam. For almost every job in the legal field, I need two things: My J.D. and admission to the bar.
I am halfway done with the Kaplan PMBR bar prep course. They are doing a great job teaching me what I need to know, but what I did not anticipate was the volume of information in the course and how fast we have to learn it. It really is very much like getting ready for law school final exams- just stretched out over a longer period. In an earlier blog entry, I said that I could not maintain that kind of intensity for such an extended time frame, but it looks like I am going to have to.
This past week, my class took a six hour practice MBE (which is 1/2 of the whole exam). I got 58% of the questions right.
58%.
While it is slightly comforting to know that we were only expected to get about half the questions right, and that the top people in my class were scoring at 65% or 70%, if I score 58% one month from now then I will fail the bar exam.
I have work to do, and new material from the bar prep course is being put to us every day.
So, this past week I saw my diploma and it felt good. But bar preparation, combined with the stress of the job search makes right now the most anxiety-filled time of the whole law school experience, at least for me.
I will keep moving ahead, though, treating this like an adventure and remembering, as my mom told me, "It is a privileged adventure." Not everyone gets to head down these paths. Really, I am lucky to be here.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Saturday, June 18, 2011
The Day I Played Hooky from Bar Prep
I decided not to go to my bar prep class this past Thursday.
Instead, I set my alarm clock for 4:30am.
It woke me up at the correct time, and I finally managed to get myself out of bed about 20 minutes later.
I shaved, showered, and put on a suit and tie. Then I hopped in my car and drove to the Tallahassee airport, where I boarded a plane for a one hour flight to Charlotte, North Carolina.
After a brief stop in the Queen City, I got on another flight- this one bound for Denver, Colorado.
My seat was just one away from the emergency exit door. Before takeoff, the flight attendant quickly recited some instructions to my row on how to operate the door, which I did not comprehend at all. But when she asked us if we did understand, I nodded my head along with the frail old woman to my right.
Perhaps it was the lack of sleep, combined with the pressurized air popping in my ears, combined with the knowledge that I was moving at a rapid rate through two times zones, combined with my general fear of flying- but something was making my imagination fire on all cylinders.
When we had been in the air about an hour, the guy sitting to my left, immediately beside the emergency door, got up to use the lavatory. As he returned, he tripped over his carry on bag, and his hand
***
hit one of the levers on the door.
A quiet buzz sounded, and a yellow light on the door turned on. An instant later, the door blew open and the poor guy got sucked out with it. As he flew out, his other hand struck me across my face, breaking the bridge of my nose. I lost consciousness for a few seconds, but not before I began to feel the bolts give way at the base of my chair and hear people begin to scream.
When I came to, so much wind was hitting my face and body. Everything around me was hazy blue. A severe tickling sensation in my stomach got my attention, and I realized I was in free-fall.
Below I could see the large green or brown squares and circles of crop fields, though the wind was so intense it was hard for me to keep my eyes open.
I wanted to get out of the chair. I had to get out of it. So, I unhooked my seat belt, pushed the chair away, stretched out my arms and legs and tried to enjoy the rest of the descent...
Of course, nothing below the asterisks actually happened. The guy did slip, but his hand hit the wall beside the emergency door. My imagination took over after that.
Flying can be both exhilarating and terrifying. Dying in a plane crash is one of my more intense fears (especially a plane crash into the ocean at night). So I had a difficult time controlling some of my thoughts. Enough macabre scenes popped into my head on the plane to fill half a novel.
When we finally touched down in Denver, the day was 77 degrees and beautiful. The land around the city is completely flat- like Kansas or Nebraska and with no trees. In the distance one can see the snowy Rocky Mountains.
My arrival in Denver was not unexpected. A nice young woman, who could in fact be a gatekeeper to my future, picked me up from the airport to take me to lunch as part of a continuous job interview.
We went to "Ted's" restaurant, where I enjoyed a honey baked salmon. The interview was actually my fifth for the position, but the first in-person talk. I had hoped that this interview would only be a formality before they extended an offer to me.
My hopes were deflated, however, when the young woman told me, "Your flight landed a half hour late. We're going to have to make lunch quick, because there is another person to be interviewed coming in at 2:30."
I later learned that there are still several people in the game for this job.
After lunch, we went to a DoubleTree hotel where the young woman and her supervisor, one of the vice presidents of the company, asked me questions for about an hour. I liked both of them and I thought the interview went reasonably well.
Anyway, I did the best I could. I tried for the close and asked for the job that day, but they were noncommittal.
When we concluded, I climbed in a cab and went right back to the Denver airport.
During the cab ride, I received a phone call to set up a job interview with a completely different employer in Orlando. It looks like I'll have to play hooky again one day next week to make the drive down to that warm city...
On March 3rd of this year, I wrote a blog called "Three Directions." These experiences in Denver and then next week in Orlando are that blog entry at a crescendo...
The flights back to Charlotte and then Tallahassee were even more intense on my imagination than the flights going west. When we touched down in Charlotte, the pilot immediately hit the brakes harder than in any flight I've ever been on. I actually slid forward in my seat, with the belt keeping me from falling out. Instantly, I began to think something was in the runway. I will spare you the description of the other images that popped into my mind about what happened next...
It was well after nightfall when my plane took off from Charlotte to Tallahassee. The aircraft was smaller than the others I had flown in that day.
Immediately after takeoff, we rolled to one side and then pitched back to the other side. My stomach leaped violently, and I honestly thought for a few seconds that we were going down. I remembered the story from a few years ago of a small US Airways plane that crashed in Charlotte immediately after takeoff because they had not balanced the luggage correctly. The airline declined to release the cockpit voice recordings of the pilots' screams before they crashed. It was such a sad story, and the pilot was a beautiful young woman with her whole life ahead of her.
I was sitting in the very back of the plane. Only the flight attendant was behind me. When we straightened out, I looked back at her in time to see her tuck her head between her legs and knock on the wall beside her before she corrected her posture.
"Is that normal for us to roll like that right after take off?" I asked.
Of course she answered, "Yes."
But I wonder. I watched her out of the corner of my eye as we landed smoothly in Tallahassee, and she did not "knock on wood."
I am not sure that what they say about your life flashing in front of your eyes right before you die is correct. For two seconds on that takeoff, I really thought I was going to die. And all I felt was the severe jump in my stomach and a terrible, depressing and sinking sensation that existence was at an end. There were no flashes of memory...
But enough of this dark stuff. Can you tell that I am avoiding studying for the bar exam this morning?
My trip on Thursday was a great adventure, and I enjoyed seeing the Rockies and the rush that the flights gave me.
We'll see what happens. Now I have to get my mind ready for the job interview in Orlando. And for answering practice bar questions on Florida Evidence in the ever-present red, yellow, green game. The roller coaster ride continues...
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Instead, I set my alarm clock for 4:30am.
It woke me up at the correct time, and I finally managed to get myself out of bed about 20 minutes later.
I shaved, showered, and put on a suit and tie. Then I hopped in my car and drove to the Tallahassee airport, where I boarded a plane for a one hour flight to Charlotte, North Carolina.
After a brief stop in the Queen City, I got on another flight- this one bound for Denver, Colorado.
My seat was just one away from the emergency exit door. Before takeoff, the flight attendant quickly recited some instructions to my row on how to operate the door, which I did not comprehend at all. But when she asked us if we did understand, I nodded my head along with the frail old woman to my right.
Perhaps it was the lack of sleep, combined with the pressurized air popping in my ears, combined with the knowledge that I was moving at a rapid rate through two times zones, combined with my general fear of flying- but something was making my imagination fire on all cylinders.
When we had been in the air about an hour, the guy sitting to my left, immediately beside the emergency door, got up to use the lavatory. As he returned, he tripped over his carry on bag, and his hand
***
hit one of the levers on the door.
A quiet buzz sounded, and a yellow light on the door turned on. An instant later, the door blew open and the poor guy got sucked out with it. As he flew out, his other hand struck me across my face, breaking the bridge of my nose. I lost consciousness for a few seconds, but not before I began to feel the bolts give way at the base of my chair and hear people begin to scream.
When I came to, so much wind was hitting my face and body. Everything around me was hazy blue. A severe tickling sensation in my stomach got my attention, and I realized I was in free-fall.
Below I could see the large green or brown squares and circles of crop fields, though the wind was so intense it was hard for me to keep my eyes open.
I wanted to get out of the chair. I had to get out of it. So, I unhooked my seat belt, pushed the chair away, stretched out my arms and legs and tried to enjoy the rest of the descent...
Of course, nothing below the asterisks actually happened. The guy did slip, but his hand hit the wall beside the emergency door. My imagination took over after that.
Flying can be both exhilarating and terrifying. Dying in a plane crash is one of my more intense fears (especially a plane crash into the ocean at night). So I had a difficult time controlling some of my thoughts. Enough macabre scenes popped into my head on the plane to fill half a novel.
When we finally touched down in Denver, the day was 77 degrees and beautiful. The land around the city is completely flat- like Kansas or Nebraska and with no trees. In the distance one can see the snowy Rocky Mountains.
My arrival in Denver was not unexpected. A nice young woman, who could in fact be a gatekeeper to my future, picked me up from the airport to take me to lunch as part of a continuous job interview.
We went to "Ted's" restaurant, where I enjoyed a honey baked salmon. The interview was actually my fifth for the position, but the first in-person talk. I had hoped that this interview would only be a formality before they extended an offer to me.
My hopes were deflated, however, when the young woman told me, "Your flight landed a half hour late. We're going to have to make lunch quick, because there is another person to be interviewed coming in at 2:30."
I later learned that there are still several people in the game for this job.
After lunch, we went to a DoubleTree hotel where the young woman and her supervisor, one of the vice presidents of the company, asked me questions for about an hour. I liked both of them and I thought the interview went reasonably well.
Anyway, I did the best I could. I tried for the close and asked for the job that day, but they were noncommittal.
When we concluded, I climbed in a cab and went right back to the Denver airport.
During the cab ride, I received a phone call to set up a job interview with a completely different employer in Orlando. It looks like I'll have to play hooky again one day next week to make the drive down to that warm city...
On March 3rd of this year, I wrote a blog called "Three Directions." These experiences in Denver and then next week in Orlando are that blog entry at a crescendo...
The flights back to Charlotte and then Tallahassee were even more intense on my imagination than the flights going west. When we touched down in Charlotte, the pilot immediately hit the brakes harder than in any flight I've ever been on. I actually slid forward in my seat, with the belt keeping me from falling out. Instantly, I began to think something was in the runway. I will spare you the description of the other images that popped into my mind about what happened next...
It was well after nightfall when my plane took off from Charlotte to Tallahassee. The aircraft was smaller than the others I had flown in that day.
Immediately after takeoff, we rolled to one side and then pitched back to the other side. My stomach leaped violently, and I honestly thought for a few seconds that we were going down. I remembered the story from a few years ago of a small US Airways plane that crashed in Charlotte immediately after takeoff because they had not balanced the luggage correctly. The airline declined to release the cockpit voice recordings of the pilots' screams before they crashed. It was such a sad story, and the pilot was a beautiful young woman with her whole life ahead of her.
I was sitting in the very back of the plane. Only the flight attendant was behind me. When we straightened out, I looked back at her in time to see her tuck her head between her legs and knock on the wall beside her before she corrected her posture.
"Is that normal for us to roll like that right after take off?" I asked.
Of course she answered, "Yes."
But I wonder. I watched her out of the corner of my eye as we landed smoothly in Tallahassee, and she did not "knock on wood."
I am not sure that what they say about your life flashing in front of your eyes right before you die is correct. For two seconds on that takeoff, I really thought I was going to die. And all I felt was the severe jump in my stomach and a terrible, depressing and sinking sensation that existence was at an end. There were no flashes of memory...
But enough of this dark stuff. Can you tell that I am avoiding studying for the bar exam this morning?
My trip on Thursday was a great adventure, and I enjoyed seeing the Rockies and the rush that the flights gave me.
We'll see what happens. Now I have to get my mind ready for the job interview in Orlando. And for answering practice bar questions on Florida Evidence in the ever-present red, yellow, green game. The roller coaster ride continues...
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Time to Buckle Down
Even though I am keeping up with the Kaplan syllabus for bar review fairly well, the low percentage of answers that I am getting right makes me feel guilty today about how much fun I had this weekend.
Like I said in my blog post on May 28, my new residence can be quite the social scene. Yesterday, we organized a tailgate party for the NCAA baseball super regionals. Florida State is taking on Texas A & M in a best of three games series. The winner goes to the College World Series in Omaha. I spent hours out in the sun yesterday, enjoying grilled burgers and talking to friends before we went inside the stadium to watch our team.
It was after dark when we finally packed up the grill and headed back to the house. So, I was ready to call it a day. I needed to study. But peer pressure can be tough, sometimes. My friends convinced me to go out with them to a club downtown. I think I could have said no to my guy friends, but when there is a jaw-dropping gorgeous woman with big brown eyes sitting on your couch asking you to go out with them, too... Well, I'm just not that strong.
Long story short, I finally collapsed onto my bed around 4 am last night. I'm not sure that I was fun to hang out with at the club, as I mainly just stood against the wall and people watched. But I had a good time. My friends are awesome dancers.
Also this week, my friends convinced me to play a round of golf with them at the Jake Gaither public course in Tallahassee. It was the first time in my life that I have ever set foot on a golf course. The results were better than I hoped, probably due to the golf class I took as an undergraduate years ago. The lessons on how to grip the club and what to be thinking when you hit the ball all came back to me. I met my main goal of not swinging and missing. Even better, I was pretty good out of the sand traps. Becoming good enough to use golf as the background while business gets conducted is the goal of everyone who invited me to play. My friends are already at that level, I think. It was pleasing to see that I am not that far off, either, and I was grateful for their invitation.
However, earlier this week I took a checkpoint quiz for Constitutional Law, and I am only getting 50% of the questions right. After extensive review and watching tutorial videos, I am still only getting 55-60% right. The work keeps getting piled on, too. I only got 64% of the Criminal Law/Procedure questions correct on a quiz yesterday morning, and so I have to do review exercises for that as well.
But I am up and about. It is 9:30 on a Sunday morning. This blog entry only took 20 minutes to write. Now it is time to get started and show some more discipline when it comes to having too much fun.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Like I said in my blog post on May 28, my new residence can be quite the social scene. Yesterday, we organized a tailgate party for the NCAA baseball super regionals. Florida State is taking on Texas A & M in a best of three games series. The winner goes to the College World Series in Omaha. I spent hours out in the sun yesterday, enjoying grilled burgers and talking to friends before we went inside the stadium to watch our team.
It was after dark when we finally packed up the grill and headed back to the house. So, I was ready to call it a day. I needed to study. But peer pressure can be tough, sometimes. My friends convinced me to go out with them to a club downtown. I think I could have said no to my guy friends, but when there is a jaw-dropping gorgeous woman with big brown eyes sitting on your couch asking you to go out with them, too... Well, I'm just not that strong.
Long story short, I finally collapsed onto my bed around 4 am last night. I'm not sure that I was fun to hang out with at the club, as I mainly just stood against the wall and people watched. But I had a good time. My friends are awesome dancers.
Also this week, my friends convinced me to play a round of golf with them at the Jake Gaither public course in Tallahassee. It was the first time in my life that I have ever set foot on a golf course. The results were better than I hoped, probably due to the golf class I took as an undergraduate years ago. The lessons on how to grip the club and what to be thinking when you hit the ball all came back to me. I met my main goal of not swinging and missing. Even better, I was pretty good out of the sand traps. Becoming good enough to use golf as the background while business gets conducted is the goal of everyone who invited me to play. My friends are already at that level, I think. It was pleasing to see that I am not that far off, either, and I was grateful for their invitation.
However, earlier this week I took a checkpoint quiz for Constitutional Law, and I am only getting 50% of the questions right. After extensive review and watching tutorial videos, I am still only getting 55-60% right. The work keeps getting piled on, too. I only got 64% of the Criminal Law/Procedure questions correct on a quiz yesterday morning, and so I have to do review exercises for that as well.
But I am up and about. It is 9:30 on a Sunday morning. This blog entry only took 20 minutes to write. Now it is time to get started and show some more discipline when it comes to having too much fun.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Saturday, June 4, 2011
The Red, Yellow, Green Game
Right now is probably the most stressful time of my entire law school experience.
Really, I've got nothing to complain about. The weather is warm and beautiful, and my health is good. I go for nice jogs around the football stadium and up part of Saint Marks Trail. Tonight, I will probably watch Florida State take on Alabama in the NCAA baseball tournament. My new residence is close enough to walk to the baseball game, and my roommates are all great guys.
But weighing on my mind like a sack of stones is the job search.
Something good will come through eventually. I just graduated with honors from a quality law school. When I pass the bar exam, I will be even more employable.
Recently, I had a series of interviews for a job that I really wanted. The talks seemed to be going well, and things were moving along quickly and positively. But then... silence. And waiting. And more silence.
During the interview process, you get your hopes up and start thinking about what your life will be like if you land that job. As the days after the interviews wear on though, and you hear nothing, you are forced to re-start your thinking. You have to go back a few steps, to where you were weeks before, and begin looking at other options again.
But who knows? Maybe that job will come through. We will see... This is all a great exercise in maintaining a mental and emotional balance. It tests my ability to stay happy within myself, without depending on external factors that I can not control.
The whole thing is quite a roller coaster ride, though.
In an effort to distract my mind from the ups and downs of where life is going after July, I am trying to delve deeply into the bar preparation process. Though getting ready for the bar exam is also quite stressful, I like Kaplan PMBR's system. They use a combination of printed books and on-line resources to get me ready. I am more comfortable using their paper materials, but the on-line tools are neat in that it makes bar prep a sort of game.
At various intervals in the course, I take an on-line quiz to check my progress. The results break down my performance into statistics and colors.
We just finished a section on contracts. Overall for contracts, I am answering 67% of the questions correctly. This is coded yellow, which means moderate review is needed. Getting more specific, I am answering 90% of the questions on contracts consideration correctly. This puts me in the green for that subsection, and no review is needed. However, for contract conditions, I am only answering 40% of the questions correctly. This marks me in the red- extensive review needed. Thus, I have to watch a tutorial video, review the printed material again, and do more exercises exclusively on contract conditions. As we go along, Kaplan's on-line system is creating my own personalized pie chart and bar graph.
The goal is to get every section and subsection into the green. This is much easier said than done. Despite the hours that I am putting in, for the whole course I am answering questions correctly only 65-67% of the time.
So, after I finish this blog entry, I will watch a tutorial video on contract discharge and excuse- another subsection where I am in the red.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Really, I've got nothing to complain about. The weather is warm and beautiful, and my health is good. I go for nice jogs around the football stadium and up part of Saint Marks Trail. Tonight, I will probably watch Florida State take on Alabama in the NCAA baseball tournament. My new residence is close enough to walk to the baseball game, and my roommates are all great guys.
But weighing on my mind like a sack of stones is the job search.
Something good will come through eventually. I just graduated with honors from a quality law school. When I pass the bar exam, I will be even more employable.
Recently, I had a series of interviews for a job that I really wanted. The talks seemed to be going well, and things were moving along quickly and positively. But then... silence. And waiting. And more silence.
During the interview process, you get your hopes up and start thinking about what your life will be like if you land that job. As the days after the interviews wear on though, and you hear nothing, you are forced to re-start your thinking. You have to go back a few steps, to where you were weeks before, and begin looking at other options again.
But who knows? Maybe that job will come through. We will see... This is all a great exercise in maintaining a mental and emotional balance. It tests my ability to stay happy within myself, without depending on external factors that I can not control.
The whole thing is quite a roller coaster ride, though.
In an effort to distract my mind from the ups and downs of where life is going after July, I am trying to delve deeply into the bar preparation process. Though getting ready for the bar exam is also quite stressful, I like Kaplan PMBR's system. They use a combination of printed books and on-line resources to get me ready. I am more comfortable using their paper materials, but the on-line tools are neat in that it makes bar prep a sort of game.
At various intervals in the course, I take an on-line quiz to check my progress. The results break down my performance into statistics and colors.
We just finished a section on contracts. Overall for contracts, I am answering 67% of the questions correctly. This is coded yellow, which means moderate review is needed. Getting more specific, I am answering 90% of the questions on contracts consideration correctly. This puts me in the green for that subsection, and no review is needed. However, for contract conditions, I am only answering 40% of the questions correctly. This marks me in the red- extensive review needed. Thus, I have to watch a tutorial video, review the printed material again, and do more exercises exclusively on contract conditions. As we go along, Kaplan's on-line system is creating my own personalized pie chart and bar graph.
The goal is to get every section and subsection into the green. This is much easier said than done. Despite the hours that I am putting in, for the whole course I am answering questions correctly only 65-67% of the time.
So, after I finish this blog entry, I will watch a tutorial video on contract discharge and excuse- another subsection where I am in the red.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Saturday, May 28, 2011
An Upgrade
When I came to law school, I knew that I was not going to have any income to speak of for the extent of my enrollment. So, the past three years have been an exercise in how to save money. I lived simply and alone in a sparsely furnished apartment. In part to avoid distractions and in part to avoid the expense of cable, I did not bring a television with me to Florida.
This summer, however, the opportunity arose for me to sublease a nice townhouse with three guys who also just graduated. I moved in with them about a week ago.
I like the changes. There is a lot more living space. The ceiling in my bedroom is so high that I can not reach the control cords for the fan. Also, the house is close enough to the law school that I can walk to my Kaplan bar prep classes. In addition to having a dishwasher, a washer and dryer, and a large HD TV with huge speakers and about 500 channels, the townhouse also gets many more visitors than my apartment ever did.
There were a couple of parties that I attended here during law school. This house was one of the more popular places for law school students to gather for Florida State away games on TV.
I won't lie. It was rather nice to come downstairs from my bedroom to do laundry a few days ago and discover four beautiful women sitting on the living room couches, talking and laughing.
Though my new home is certainly more comfortable, it is also considerably more distracting. Making myself study the bar prep material is going to take effort.
I don't watch much television, but a TV with 500 channels can hit my Achilles heel- sports and good movies.
Right now, the ACC baseball tournament is happening. Florida State has made it to the championship game, and I can watch all of the games on the Florida Sports Network. Yesterday, I caught myself avoiding studying by watching Utah vs. New Mexico State in a Mountain West Conference baseball game airing on some obscure channel.
HBO is also a huge temptation. Last week, I was almost late to bar prep class because I became interested in Robert Downey's performance in Sherlock Holmes.
And then there are my friends. Living with outgoing fellow students suddenly means there is much more socializing to do- not that I'm complaining.
One of my roommates is from Miami. He is a huge Heat fan. When their basketball games come on, he cranks up the speakers on the TV and makes the walls shake. I enjoy watching the games with him because he is such a passionate fan. After every Heat victory, his tradition is to open our balcony doors and blast the Pitbull remix of Don Omar's "Danza Kuduro" into the streets.
After the Miami Heat clinched the Eastern Conference championship on Thursday around midnight, he shouted at me, "Nathan! Put on your shoes! We are going out!"
"C'mon, man," I replied. "We've got class at 9am tomorrow."
"This is not an option!" he yelled.
Yes, my living situation has changed substantially from a couple of weeks ago when I came home to a small, rather empty apartment in a very quiet neighborhood. Even now, as I type this blog entry in my bedroom, one of my roommates is booming dance music by some female artist unknown to me. I don't mind. It is a nice change, an upgrade to my quality of life. I think I can maintain enough discipline to get my bar studying done, and everything is fine.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
This summer, however, the opportunity arose for me to sublease a nice townhouse with three guys who also just graduated. I moved in with them about a week ago.
I like the changes. There is a lot more living space. The ceiling in my bedroom is so high that I can not reach the control cords for the fan. Also, the house is close enough to the law school that I can walk to my Kaplan bar prep classes. In addition to having a dishwasher, a washer and dryer, and a large HD TV with huge speakers and about 500 channels, the townhouse also gets many more visitors than my apartment ever did.
There were a couple of parties that I attended here during law school. This house was one of the more popular places for law school students to gather for Florida State away games on TV.
I won't lie. It was rather nice to come downstairs from my bedroom to do laundry a few days ago and discover four beautiful women sitting on the living room couches, talking and laughing.
Though my new home is certainly more comfortable, it is also considerably more distracting. Making myself study the bar prep material is going to take effort.
I don't watch much television, but a TV with 500 channels can hit my Achilles heel- sports and good movies.
Right now, the ACC baseball tournament is happening. Florida State has made it to the championship game, and I can watch all of the games on the Florida Sports Network. Yesterday, I caught myself avoiding studying by watching Utah vs. New Mexico State in a Mountain West Conference baseball game airing on some obscure channel.
HBO is also a huge temptation. Last week, I was almost late to bar prep class because I became interested in Robert Downey's performance in Sherlock Holmes.
And then there are my friends. Living with outgoing fellow students suddenly means there is much more socializing to do- not that I'm complaining.
One of my roommates is from Miami. He is a huge Heat fan. When their basketball games come on, he cranks up the speakers on the TV and makes the walls shake. I enjoy watching the games with him because he is such a passionate fan. After every Heat victory, his tradition is to open our balcony doors and blast the Pitbull remix of Don Omar's "Danza Kuduro" into the streets.
After the Miami Heat clinched the Eastern Conference championship on Thursday around midnight, he shouted at me, "Nathan! Put on your shoes! We are going out!"
"C'mon, man," I replied. "We've got class at 9am tomorrow."
"This is not an option!" he yelled.
Yes, my living situation has changed substantially from a couple of weeks ago when I came home to a small, rather empty apartment in a very quiet neighborhood. Even now, as I type this blog entry in my bedroom, one of my roommates is booming dance music by some female artist unknown to me. I don't mind. It is a nice change, an upgrade to my quality of life. I think I can maintain enough discipline to get my bar studying done, and everything is fine.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Week 1 Assessment
After the first week of bar preparation classes with Kaplan PMBR, I realize that my work is cut out for me.
This past Monday through Saturday, we had class from 9am to 3:30pm. Each day was a different subject: Torts, Criminal Law, Contracts, Property, Evidence, and Constitutional Law. The pattern for week 1 was to answer 50 multiple choice questions in the morning, questions that were supposed to be somewhat easier than what we will actually see on the exam. Then in the afternoon, a professor went over the answers using power point slides for almost every question.
Unfortunately, this first week taught me that I am not as ready for the bar exam as I had hoped. I am very glad to be doing this bar prep class. There would probably be no shot at passing that little quiz without it.
It was somewhat disheartening to see how many questions I am getting wrong. For example, in Evidence, a subject I consider to be perhaps my strongest, I missed 27 out of 50 questions. For other subjects such as Property, there were whole swaths of questions in areas that I never studied in law school, such as landlord-tenant agreements and mortgages.
The first week of bar prep also made me appreciative of the subjects I took in law school which are also tested on the bar exam. Because I had Evidence in law school, I do not have as far to go in order to start getting more questions right. For many of those questions that I missed in Evidence, I picked the second best answer. But I had no idea what to do in areas of landlord-tenant agreements and mortgages, because these are doctrines and concepts I am seeing for the very first time. Taking a class in Real Estate Finance would have helped with mortgages, but there are only so many electives in the three year program. I needed to take courses that would make me a better litigator as well, and Real Estate Finance was not on that list.
The encouragement comes when the instructors give us the slides explaining the correct answers. I can study these slides and fix many of my weak areas, though it is easier when the subject is already familiar to me.
To be completely honest, it also helps my morale to see many of my fellow students also struggling. I am not sure that anyone is lighting up every subject at this point.
The Florida Bar Exam is probably one of the three most difficult to pass in the whole country- right up there with California and New York.
Yes, this is going to be more intense than every day life in law school. There is enough work in these materials to make it as intense as studying for final exams, but then I would suffer a burn out after a couple or three weeks.
Bar prep is going to be a marathon: Steady discipline and determination to put in the hours without overdoing it in any particular stretch. The concepts will not be too terribly difficult to learn, I think. It is just that there are so many concepts and doctrines and rules to get into my head in the next two months.
Onward and upward. Tomorrow at 9am (actually today as it is now past midnight), is our first session on "Florida" law in Torts.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
This past Monday through Saturday, we had class from 9am to 3:30pm. Each day was a different subject: Torts, Criminal Law, Contracts, Property, Evidence, and Constitutional Law. The pattern for week 1 was to answer 50 multiple choice questions in the morning, questions that were supposed to be somewhat easier than what we will actually see on the exam. Then in the afternoon, a professor went over the answers using power point slides for almost every question.Unfortunately, this first week taught me that I am not as ready for the bar exam as I had hoped. I am very glad to be doing this bar prep class. There would probably be no shot at passing that little quiz without it.
It was somewhat disheartening to see how many questions I am getting wrong. For example, in Evidence, a subject I consider to be perhaps my strongest, I missed 27 out of 50 questions. For other subjects such as Property, there were whole swaths of questions in areas that I never studied in law school, such as landlord-tenant agreements and mortgages.
The first week of bar prep also made me appreciative of the subjects I took in law school which are also tested on the bar exam. Because I had Evidence in law school, I do not have as far to go in order to start getting more questions right. For many of those questions that I missed in Evidence, I picked the second best answer. But I had no idea what to do in areas of landlord-tenant agreements and mortgages, because these are doctrines and concepts I am seeing for the very first time. Taking a class in Real Estate Finance would have helped with mortgages, but there are only so many electives in the three year program. I needed to take courses that would make me a better litigator as well, and Real Estate Finance was not on that list.
The encouragement comes when the instructors give us the slides explaining the correct answers. I can study these slides and fix many of my weak areas, though it is easier when the subject is already familiar to me.
To be completely honest, it also helps my morale to see many of my fellow students also struggling. I am not sure that anyone is lighting up every subject at this point.
The Florida Bar Exam is probably one of the three most difficult to pass in the whole country- right up there with California and New York.
Yes, this is going to be more intense than every day life in law school. There is enough work in these materials to make it as intense as studying for final exams, but then I would suffer a burn out after a couple or three weeks.
Bar prep is going to be a marathon: Steady discipline and determination to put in the hours without overdoing it in any particular stretch. The concepts will not be too terribly difficult to learn, I think. It is just that there are so many concepts and doctrines and rules to get into my head in the next two months.
Onward and upward. Tomorrow at 9am (actually today as it is now past midnight), is our first session on "Florida" law in Torts.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
Sunday, May 15, 2011
The Week in Between
Tomorrow, I start my two-month bar preparation classes with Kaplan PMBR. I suppose that I will keep writing entries here at least through taking the bar exam, as it is also a huge part of the law school experience.
The week in between graduation and the start of bar prep, I got a chance to relax a little before the intense study kicks up again. One of my friends stayed for a few days after watching me graduate. We had a nice visit, dined at some good restaurants, and went to Panama City Beach. It was my first trip to the shore since coming to law school. Specifically, we went to the beach at St. Andrews State Park. It was absolutely gorgeous. I’d seen white sand and turquoise blue water before (Bradenton, Florida in 1996), but the experience in Panama City Beach dazzled my friend. It was the most beautiful beach she had ever seen in her life. She called her mother in south Texas to say, “L’agua esta azul, azul, azul!”
During the trip, I decided that Bay County and Panama City would be a neat place to work. I will keep it in mind when sending my resume to trial attorneys…
But tomorrow, I will be in class from 9am to 3:30pm in Tallahassee. Then it is study, study, study tomorrow evening before rising early to be at class again at 9 am.
Students who have been through bar prep before warned me about the drudgery of what is ahead. We'll see. If bar prep is as intense as getting ready for final exams, then they are right. There is no way that I can sustain that kind of effort for two or three months straight. Exam season, at least for me, is like engaging the afterburners.
Not counting "exam season," however, law school on a daily basis was actually enjoyable. I imagine that the intensity of bar prep will fall somewhere in between the two poles of daily law school life and "exam season." Hopefully, by the end of the day tomorrow- or at least by the end of the week- I'll have a good read of what is required.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
The week in between graduation and the start of bar prep, I got a chance to relax a little before the intense study kicks up again. One of my friends stayed for a few days after watching me graduate. We had a nice visit, dined at some good restaurants, and went to Panama City Beach. It was my first trip to the shore since coming to law school. Specifically, we went to the beach at St. Andrews State Park. It was absolutely gorgeous. I’d seen white sand and turquoise blue water before (Bradenton, Florida in 1996), but the experience in Panama City Beach dazzled my friend. It was the most beautiful beach she had ever seen in her life. She called her mother in south Texas to say, “L’agua esta azul, azul, azul!”
During the trip, I decided that Bay County and Panama City would be a neat place to work. I will keep it in mind when sending my resume to trial attorneys…
But tomorrow, I will be in class from 9am to 3:30pm in Tallahassee. Then it is study, study, study tomorrow evening before rising early to be at class again at 9 am.
Students who have been through bar prep before warned me about the drudgery of what is ahead. We'll see. If bar prep is as intense as getting ready for final exams, then they are right. There is no way that I can sustain that kind of effort for two or three months straight. Exam season, at least for me, is like engaging the afterburners.
Not counting "exam season," however, law school on a daily basis was actually enjoyable. I imagine that the intensity of bar prep will fall somewhere in between the two poles of daily law school life and "exam season." Hopefully, by the end of the day tomorrow- or at least by the end of the week- I'll have a good read of what is required.
Until Next Time,
Nathan Marshburn
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