Working: thoughts of attorneys' value

I think the value of the attorneys is in their creativity that can create something out of nothing, when people of other professions would possibly just give up.

A pro se plaintif responding to the motion

The clerk advised a pro se defendant on possible consequences if he failed to adequately respond to motion for summary judgment.   The defendant filed a "Petition for Abatement" in which he asserted that the complaint fails to name him as a party on the grounds that his name appears in all upper case letter.

The court's response: "This filing by defendant does not respond in any form to the arguments raised in the Government's motion for summary judgment, and the respondent has failed to otherwise respond to the motion."

United States v. Renfrow, 2009-2 USTC para. 50,580 (E.D.N.C. 2009).

Hey

I have not been here for a while, right.  Actually as always. 

Update is such: three weeks of school left, got part-time job (legal research) but hope that I will be able to find something in tax controversy.  Love tax, and this is the fact.

Summer is passing quickly and I do not feel it is the summer except for the weekends when I sweat at home (from both weather and intensity of studying).

I put sport kind of behind because of time and possibly laziness.  Still do some runs for 30-35 minutes but regretfully no swimming.

That's it.

Saturday's run

I had my morning run today. It was awesome: rising sun, morning light, empty streets and roads, and a disco music in my headphones.

I think I did not tell before that I used to run for about 8 years almost every morning until I got to a law school and started stressing out and complaining about lack of time.  I quited running but then decided to return and at the first day of my "coming back" I injured my knee.

For more than a year, I envied every runner I saw on a trail or side of a road.  I tried to get back a couple of times, but a sever pain in my knee was stronger than me.  But then overcoming my fear of knee pain, I went to a physical therapist and with help of several exercises and hours of training I returned back to my 35-minutes runs. Unfortunately, one day I tried to run during strong winds and a knee pain returned bringing back my fear of pain and uncertainty that I can run again. 

In last month I have realized that physical exercises mean a lot to me: they bring energy to my body and happiness to my life.  So I have decided that I need get back to my running routine because I feel it is important to me to be able to do it without fear of failure.  

Now I can run only 13 minutes on a trail and about 15 minutes on a tread mill in a gym.  Luckily, I do not have a knee pain, yet <knock on wood>.  But I hope to increase my time to at least 35 minutes. Who knows, maybe one day I will decide to run a marathon :-)))

Today is Friday

A few minutes ago I hang out on FB. Looked at the list of people who is online and then asked myself: who are those people? Seriously, my biggest mistake I made while in a law school was a failure to get more contacts with my classmates. I know faces, but have hard time to place names to those faces. Yeah, I feel bad. Today I spent 6 hours working on my clinic work, even though I planned to spend only 2-3 hours. Sometimes clinic work sucks you into working mood. Finally, I did some cleaning and Santa Claus is gone to a shelf in my closet. I know, it is April, but honestly, I did not have time for a house cleaning.

The end of March

So I have a beginning of a third quarter. The last quarter was stressful, especially exams. I still have nightmares about me failing. Those dreams are the worst crap I ever had seen in my dreams. Horrible. Surprisingly, I did well in one exam and did very-very well in another. When I checked the results for the first two exams, the grades for the third one were not posted. Today I have learned that they are up. But I am so scared to look at them. It is not that I am afraid to fail. Not at all. I think I did well enough not to get the grade lower than B. But I need A soooo much and I am stressing out about it. Even now, while writing this post I am thinking whether I should go and look. But then I am afraid that if I got B, I will not be able to sleep and my nightmares will be worth than I have now. Hell, no, I am going to wait till tomorrow. ... oh should I??? Imagine, I wrote a last sentence and went to check my grades. O, God, help me!!! ........... ok, checked. Got A but with a low points score. A little upset, since would like to have a better score, since I thought I knew a little bit more than it needed for a solid A, although (being honest) not enough for a high score. rrrrr.... I am going to sleep, hopefully with sweet dreams.

Exam

The frustrating part of school is that you may go to the exam with a confidence that you know the most of the material, and that you will do very well. But then you are walking out of that exam with a feeling that much more studying could be done, and that "I know the material" was very deceitful feeling.

This is what I felt yesterday after a Corporate Tax exam. No, I am sure that I did not fail. But, damn, I could do better.

Stressful times

Two days ago while sitting in a school's study room, which I had shared with other two students from my program, I heard their worries about approaching finals.

Being frank with you, till that day I was thinking of exams, but I was not freaking out. But a chain reaction from their talks passed to me quickly, despite my angry resistance.

I have less than two weeks before time when I have to pull out my outlines and spend 3.5 hours writing answers. My two outlines are half-done, one outline looks as a blank page. As always I had planned to catch up on a weekend, and as always I did not. I feel the energy is leaving my body and I have no time to replenish it.

Anyway, I guess my point is I begin worrying and I know it is no good.

Inspiration --> motivation --> I am here

I have got an inspiration to start blogging again. Since my life is mostly spent with books and in communication with people who do not care much about events in my life, I have decided to annoy my blog abandoned for so long time with my silly thoughts.

Since a school is a center of my life, I will begin with it. Last quarter ended with good grades (my points received were not excellent, but high enough to get As). This quarter I am taking Estate and Gift tax, International Taxation and Corporate Tax I. International Taxation is most complicated and boring (BTW, this is what I am avoiding to do at this moment but creating this blog entry). I also continue working in a clinic, a time-consuming but interesting stuff.

Beyond-the-school life is boring - TV, shopping, cooking and rare meetings with friends (and by "rare" I mean I did not see them for more than a month). Physical exercises are on my to-do-list but by the end of the day they end up on my things-not-done list. This continues from the beginning of the quarter. It is a pity, because my body looks terrible - fat and ... no, I am not going to talk about gross things.

Now, update is done and I have no excuses for not studying.

By the way, the reason I decided to write is that a February bar exam is approaching, and I see many people with BarBri books in the library and in the school's halls. So what I wanted to say is that I am SO HAPPY that I have passed the bar exam and I am SO GLAD, that rather than studying Con Law or Criminal law or whatever, I need to do my homework for International Taxation. Thank you, God!!!

Outlines online .... and I can use it!

Finally I am studying a class (classes) for which I can fearlessly use Internet sources.  You know what class it is? Individual Tax.  Web site www.irs.gov provides information in most readable and understandable manner.  :-)

As a continuation of my previous post

So I was talking about relation between grades in a law school and a future career. A couple of days after my post, where I talked about a lesser impact of the law school grades after five years into the legal career, I received another monthly issue of job postings from my law school. Skimming over postings I noticed one from a large law firm--Holland & Hart. They were seeking a corporate attorney with a legal experience of not less than 8 years... [now, bitting of drums, most interesting part] ... and among required documents for an applicant to submit was an unofficial transcript from a law school.

So, yes, I must say, if you want to be in a large law firm, get good grades.

Do bad grades impact your success on the bar exam?

While I was waiting in a law school’s cafe for my lunch to warm up in a microwave, an article in magazine drew my attention. As it appeared later, a magazine is one of those cute magazines for law students that try to give so-called “smart” advices (unfortunately, very often too stale and useless) to law students, trying to convert them into “real” professionals.

An aforementioned article talked about grades in a law school. The article’s point was that grades will follow you during all your life. Some law school professors concluded that law school grades have both short-term and a long-term impact on student’s life. Put it differently (as I understood that article), if you are a C student, you are going to be a loser for all your professional life. [Indeed, I may have biased view on such issues, since I am one of the “not-in-the-top-50%-of-the-class” students.]

I believe there is some truth to such statement, as I was convinced by my own experience of rejections for job interviews (I am not even talking about getting an interview) and since I am more than sure that rejections occurred because of my crappy grades.

From my communication with practicing attorneys, I learnt that the grades definitely have a short-term impact: as a job applicant and a young attorney you do not have an experience and your grades are what a potential employer will look at with hopes to find out about your diligence in work and learning. However, after getting some experience, it is your professional skills that is important for an employer but not your grades you have received five years ago.

But who knows, maybe I do not know much about current legal job market and I am wrong about long-term impact. I will let my future to prove the accuracy of article’s conclusions.

What made me upset, mad and irritated is this article’s statement: grades impact student’s success on the bar exam. According to the author, grades constitute 70% of student’s chances to pass a bar exam. What? What bullshit? [Pardon my French]. Here I am, a no-so-good student with crappy grades who passed the bar exam from the first time, and there are students, who had much better grades than I do and they DID NOT pass. How will the author [or whoever made that conclusion] explain my situation?

Why am I saying all this? I think I understand good motivations of the author for writing that article—he/she wanted to develop in 1Ls that desire to get “good grades” that by all means will assist a future young attorney to find a decent job that will help to pay student loans. This is a good intention, no doubt. But what the author did not take into account, is that there are B- and C students who need different motivation and may read that unsupported crap and believe in failure on the bar exam and, later, in profession.

In other words, think positive, law students whatever grades you have. There are thousands of examples, that show different reality. Professor, on the other hand, should stick to their Socratic Method.

International Tax Blog: International Financial Scams - Overseas Investments, Lotteries, Inheritances, Gifts, etc.

I cannot believe that there are people who continue to believe in those scams! So much is written, so much is talked about...

International Tax Blog: International Financial Scams - Overseas Investments, Lotteries, Inheritances, Gifts, etc.

Supreme Court Seating Game - The Washington Post

Supreme Court Seating Game - The Washington Post

Brief Update: the life is going on

So among several goals I have recently created for myself, I have included "writing posts to Blogger more often."  Since there were periods when I wished to post about current events and some thoughts but at the same time I felt it is not appropriate to do that without at least some mentioning what is going on in my life, I posted nothing.  In fact, I was waiting for the time and day when I briefly describe at what stage of my life I am now but, unfortunately, I have been postponing that day finding an excuse in "my busy life," which is, actually, was not that busy, to spare a couple of minutes to write what I am writing now.

Taking my story back to summer of 2010, I will repeat that June and July were HELL because of preparation for the Bar Exam and the exam itself.  August, however, was more relaxing.  Unfortunately, we did not travel as much as we did last year.  But Utah's national park and local lake were great.  The weekdays I spent cleaning a house and watching TV.  Unfortunately, I did not do much of reading, which I had planned to do after the bar exam. I explain this fact by a want to recover from a disastrous "brain damage" bar preparation caused to my delicate mind.

Starting from September I am a full-time student pursuing an LLM in Taxation degree.  I am enjoying studying tax.  It does not seem boring to me at all, as might seem to many other people.  It is not so easy either. But most important I love it.  The program is intense and that makes it not much different from a law school program. As a result I am often tired by the end of the week.  But successful passing the bar exam and following swearing-in ceremony are the best motivation for me and my efforts in being successful.  It was very hard to believe that I made it so far. But I did and hopefully will keep the same pace.

7 Ways to Smash Procrastination | Lateral Action

7 Ways to Smash Procrastination Lateral Action

I passed the Bar Exam!!!

I passed!!! I did it!!! I cannot believe it!!! I do not know what to say except maybe that I never ever should lose a confidence in my abilities. The fact that I PASSED shows that studying hard will be paid off sooner or later [better sooner, of course]!

Article Florida Law - Writing Letters

An excellent article on the subject of writing letters by attorneys to non-lawyers.

Article Florida Law - HOW TO WRITE LETTERS NONLAWYERS WILL READ

Bar Advisor

I was in the midst of my deliberation whether I should post about my feelings as to the bar exam I have taken three days ago. After reading an article (see below) I have decided to follow the advice of the author and limit my story to the following: "this was hell!" Anyway, the life is going on and you will see later how it goes for me . :-)))

Bar Advisor: "do not blog (publicly) about the bar exam until AFTER you have passed it.

Why do I say this? To begin with, a blog requires lots of psychic energy to maintain. When you draft a post, you want it to be interesting,
well-written, and timely. You worry about it before you send it off into the blogosphere where anyone can read it. When you are studying for the bar
examination, you do not have time for such a distraction and drain of mental resources.

Next, constant and public worry about failing the bar exam (which is what the majority of these bar-exam blog posts contain) will begin to infiltrate your mind and create an expectation of failure. You may not believe it, but it is true. And, guess what, if you fail, you'll be able to continue blogging about how much you hate the bar exam and your loyal readers will keep reading your posts. This is a sick form of codependency."

Court strikes down FCC indecency policy | Reuters

Court strikes down FCC indecency policy Reuters: "The U.S. Federal Communications Commission's indecency policy is unconstitutionally vague and could create a chilling effect beyond 'fleeting expletives' heard on broadcasts, an appeals court ruled on Tuesday in a major win for broadcasting companies."