What did I tell you?

World's Oldest Person Dies...again

The curse is unstoppable! Watch out, Yone Minagawa!

Couldn't he try a little harder?

The trouble with being named the world's oldest person is that it carries with it a curse...

World's Oldest person dies at 115

The Devil's Law Dictionary - Entry one

So far in Torts, we have spent the bulk of our time learning about negligence. One key aspect of negligence law, as we are learning, is determining whether the defendant owed a duty of care to the plaintiff. In Canada, there is a test (known variously through time and space as the Anns, Anns/Kamloops, Kamloops, and Cooper tests - for reasons that I will not get into) for determining whether such a duty exists. It is a two-step procedure, the first step (essentially) being to assess if a duty exists, and the second being whether there are any policy reasons why this duty should be negated. One such reason is 'indeterminate liability' - basically, the court says "if we let you sue, even though the defendant owed you a duty, there is nothing stopping just about anybody from suing, so you can't do it."

The lesson for the Devil's Law Dictionary:

Indeterminate Liability (n) - If you are not going to fulfill a duty, make sure you owe it to as many people as possible.

Second-half kickoff

Well, Christmas break is over - gone are the days of the things that truly matter; the three F's - family, friends, forgetting everything learned in fall semester...and it's back to class today.

A fresh breath of air in Constitutional law today; instead of having a lecture, we were eased into the semester with our meager exam marks (which thankfully didn't add a fourth 'F' to the list enumerated above) and suggestions on how to improve upon them come April. It's still better than continually re-organizing a warehouse, which is what I spent the past three weeks doing.

Well, it wasn't that bad - I wasn't feeling all that great when I wrote the Constitutional exam - I was content with it after leaving the exam, but I hadn't hit my exam-writing stride (which lost wind by the time I wrote Property) yet. So, to get a reasonably above-average mark seems OK, even if it only sets me up for disappointment when the rest of them roll in over the next little while.

The next week will be spent trying to learn how to read law books again, as well as trying to recapture a fragment of the greatness that I firmly believed that I possibly possessed going into the second week of exams. Then, it's only 12 more weeks of class until April exams!

No place like home for the holidays...

Alas, exams are over and the break from school is here. Three whole weeks to spend in the Fraser Valley working at the old employer, opening gifts, drinking eggnog, and spending time in the company of friends and family. Certainly good times shall follow...

As for school, now that I'm a little bit removed from writing exams and have spent two days gaining perspective while hauling dressers and sofas around, I'd have to say that the past three-and-a-half months were the most enjoyable educational experience that I have had. There was a time, albeit brief, where I was actually enjoying studying for and writing law school exams. Don't expect to read about the same kinds of feelings come April.

The biggest challenge for me has been essay writing, which is somewhat odd since I've spent most of my post-secondary life writing essays. However, one tends to become a tad verbose writing history papers for seven years (not that this is evident from reading these posts) and having to cut law school papers down to size has been a particular challenge. UBC has incorporated a strong writing component into its classes this year, which resulted in nine written assignments, three of which were fairly substantial. The final paper for Transnational consisted of two essay questions (each divided into two parts), with a 1500 word limit for each. Oh, and about 10% of the mark came from discussing how you would have researched had this been a research exam. After much editing, I ended up with totals of 1498 and 1491 words, give or take a 'the'. By the end, I probably took out as much as I put in...I can only hope that the mark justifies the work (we'll see come January).

But, for these three weeks I will push aside the books and focus on quality warehousemanship, poor gift-wrapping, and much too much Christmas baking!

Blind leading the blind, then shooting them...

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - A Texas lawmaker is aiming to allow the blind to hunt. Texas State Representative Edmund Kuempel has introduced a measure that would allow blind people to hunt any game that sighted people can currently pursue.

Lawmaker aims to allow the blind to hunt

Only in Texas, I suppose. Yes, they would only be allowed to hunt if accompanies by a sighted hunter who looks through the sight over their shoulder and tells them where to aim (an important safety measure, albeit one that takes any of the skill out of the hunting for the blind person and reduces it to its essence - killing defenceless animals or people that the sighted hunter thinks are deer).

I suppose this is a manifestation of the spirit of freedom that has permeated throughout all of American history. Still, blind people firing guns in the woods.

"Give me liberty and give me death!"

First semester recap

So, some things I've noticed after one semester in law school:

1. It hasn't been as hard as I thought it would...so far.
This might come back to haunt me when marks hit in January, but I haven't been that worried through the process of studying for December exams, which is likely suggested by the fact that I have my Contracts final tomorrow and here I am blogging away. I don't know - there where times this semester (mostly in Property) where I felt completely lost, but in studying over the past couple of weeks (even Property), things seem to be making sense. This means either that I actually know the content well, or I have completely missed the boat. Again, we'll find out in January.

2. I am very, very grateful for my laptop.
I wasn't sure about this at the beginning of the semester - I never used (or owned) a laptop in undergrad and never brought it to class in grad school, and I had always thought that those who did were either pretentious or overcompensating for something. But, I brought it with me and I have been happy with it, notwithstanding the fact that it gives me the Blue Screen of Death (TM) once in a while, for no discernable reason. I have never been a great note-taker, and I found that with my laptop, I pretty much get down everything substantive that is mentioned in class. Now, this in and of itself is not great, but what I found in going over my notes at the end of the semester is that by writing everything down, I have been able to re-create the lecture in my mind when I re-read the notes. So, while 90% of my notes are devoid of any substance that might be relevant on the exam, I can juxtapose the 10% of good stuff against it. When most of one's notes are complete crap, the important points jump out like a diamond in a cesspool (or something like that.)

3. I am also very glad that I didn't work much (at a job) this semester.
This one I'm very serious about. Throughout undergrad and grad school, I worked either part-time or (predominantly) full-time, mostly at a job completely unrelated to school (it was all right when I worked as a research or teaching assistant, except for having to deal with first-year undergrads). The first few weeks of school this year, I worked a shift or two, but since then I think I worked two days total. If you can pull this off, do it. There is nothing worse than having no time whatsoever to do anything, or feeling like you're always headed from one place to the next, trying to budget your studying time into a set space, &c., &c. You're (probably) going to be making decent money in a few years. Bite the bullet, get the student loan, eat up some of the line of credit. If you're young enough and able to (and your parents don't loathe the thought of having you), live at home.

4. If you can, marry/date somebody who is also a professional student.
OK, this one might not be so easy to accomplish, but if you can do it, it just might be the study tool you need. Your spouse/boyfriend/girlfriend is never going to be tugging at your shirt trying to get you to do something while you're knee-deep in the usufructory nature of riparian rights (which no longer even exist in BC, or so they say...) if they're just as busy learning things twice as hard as you (if they're a medical student). Everyone wins! Especially the banks, when it comes time to repay the loans and credit lines that are necessary to support such an arrangement. But, they could use the money.

5. Do stuff at school.
Just because it's fun. And not just drinking, like most law students. Join the hockey team. Get involved with the legal journal. Make a fool of yourself in front of the whole class in the Guile debate (only available at UBC). They're drunk anyway. They'll laugh at your feeble attempts at humour and forget everything by the next morning.

I don't know - some people claim that first year law school is ultra-competitive, with everyone clawing at each others' throats in attempts to get ahead. I haven't seen it this way, and I suspect that the people that feel as such are those who are ultra-competitive, clawing at each oth...you get the idea. Perhaps things change after the first round of marks come in. Maybe in a month, I'll be singing a different tune...