Long overdue update

Okay, so I don't update often because law school is like prison in one regard: lots of routine. At least, I've found that's the best way to approach it. If you can stay on top of a regular schedule, you can get all your work done and still have plenty of time for extra-curricular activities. I'll leave it to your imagination what those are, though without a job, resources limit what those activities can be. Anyway, since I last posted, much has happened, but I'll only comment on a few.

Unless you live under a rock (or possibly in Utah), you know that Sunday was the 79th Academy Awards. On the whole, I was fairly pleased. Ellen DeGeneres wasn't as horrible as I thought she would be, in fact she managed to get in a few lines. Generally, she gave a slight edginess to her typical talk-show warmness, which works well for the Oscars. I could not have been happier with the top awards, at least given the nominees. I only saw two of the five Best Picture nominees (The Departed and Little Miss Sunshine) though I had read extensively about the others. Given that limited exposure, I agree with The Departed winning Best Picture. Of Martin Scorcese's recent offerings (The Aviator, Gangs of New York, etc.) this one was hands down the best. While the story isn't original, it's one that deserved to be transported from Hong Kong (and thus relative obscurity) to mainstream American cinema. Only a giant like Scorcese could have taken a project like this and maintain enough independence form the studio to make it the right way, and he nailed it. Accordingly, he also (finally) won Best Director. The film also won Best Editing and Best Adapted Screenplay. Ultimately, winning Best Picture was a foregone conclusion, since it had already won these three awards. My real beef with the Academy was that Children of Men wasn't nominated for more awards. It was much better than Little Miss Sunshine (which was good), and Clive Owen was simply amazing. I don't see how he was nominated for Closer but not this. Alas, my beef with the Academy fuels my love of the Oscars as much as anything.

From the big screen to the small screen. As posted here before, this fall I was hugely anticipating Aaron Sorkin's new show Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Despite a couple of bad reviews (wtfuck is wrong with you Entertainment Weekly?) it has generally been warmly accepted by critics. This, of course, is nothing new for a Sorkin show. Also, the pilot garnered more than 12 million viewers and almost cracked the top 20 for its week, pretty good for opening week. I thought for a second that Studio 60 might follow in The West Wing's footsteps and be a critical and commercial success. Boy, was I wrong. Sorta. The show's ratings have steadily fallen since the pilot and has plateaued around 7 million viewers a week. Rumor has it that because of this, NBC is pulling the show in favor of Paul Haggis' (Crash director) new show The Black Donnely's. Well, now I'm pissed. Finally NBC gets its Thursday night lineup right (see my call a few posts ago about lining up Scrubs, The Office, and My Name is Earl), but now you do this?! NBC should take more of Jordan's (the president of the fictional NBS network on Studio 60) and try to make more money by putting up better programming, a la HBO and Showtime. To steal one of her lines, quoting Pericles, "All things good should flow into the broadway," meaning the best of American television should be available to everyone for free. The Nielsen ratings show this strategy works on a financial level. While Studio 60 is flaling around the 60 spot for the week, it attracts a huge number of alpha-buyers, educated viewers with tons of cash to spend. Each of these viewers counts for five normal, American Idol-watching plebians. Ultimately, the show is still profitable, as far as I've read, so I see no reason to pull it. Once the awards start rolling its way, it will get more pub, and thus more viewers. Studio 60 is one of the few bastions of educated, network television, and pulling it would make the American Idols and Apprentices of the tv landscape loom all the larger.

So I don't end my post on a huge diatribe here's a short list of what I've been listening too lately: Bloc Party - A Weekend in the City, The Arcade Fire - Funeral, and the new Modest Mouse - We Were Dead When the Ship Sank. I resent a comment I heard regarding the new MM record as mere "college music." While everyone is entitled to his opinion, this album is different from their previous offerings, and, I think, more accessible. So, even if you don't like their other stuff, it's worth a listen. Also, Arcade Fire = amazing. Enough said. Bloc Party is a bit of a diversion for me, which is precisely why I listen to it. I fell into a hippy music trap a few years ago and am trying to avoid the same pit in my new genre of choice ... well ... college music. As the beginning of this post makes apparent, I am a law student.

It's about time

I come away from this year's elections with reserved excitement, if such a feeling exists. As of today, the Democrats have taken control of both the Senate and the House, which should make the final two years of W's presidency much better than the first six. My excitement, however, is mitigated by the type of Democrats who were elected. Perhaps by necessity, in states like North Carolina, Indiana, and Pennsylvania the DNCCC decided to put up many moderate if not conservative candidates. These candidates obviously lured away much of the independant and moderate Republican vote, which played a big role in their getting elected and thus the Democrats taking back control.

This basically leaves the most liberal of us a bit disappointed. The next Congress will have no chance addressing issues like same-sex marriage, abortion, and gun control. Many of the newly elected Democrats are gun-friendly, pro-chocie, and anti-gay marriage. Granted, the federal government can't do much about marriage rights, and abortion is in the hands of the court. I suppose it's time to accept that such progress can only come with time, much in the same way women's and black rights finally came to be realized. Hopefully this Congress can make progress in cleaning up Washington, providing health care for everyone, and fixing the mess in Iraq.

In the end, we should still be hopeful. This election has forced President Bush to realize his mistakes and work with Democrats in running the country. Hopefully both parties can reach some common ground. This is subject to the public, however. For so long, politicians have had to appeal to their most extreme members, and any voice of compromise runs the risk of political downfall. Hopefully people can get past their idealogies and see facts and reality, though I wouldn't hold my breath for many of the extreme religious right.

Looking ahead to 2008 (it's always about the next election), the Democratic leadership will have to make the most of this opportunity. They have been calling out the Republicans on many issues, but have yet to really vocalize many solutions. I'd classify the hold they have as tenuous at best, so if they can't fix the problems facing our nation, the White House and Congress will be up for grabs again.

New Sounds

Here's a special thanks to Dorian and Dave O. for cluing me in on some really good bands. Respectively they have introduced me to Surfjan Stevens and The Decemberists, and I can't stop listening to Illinois and The Crane Wife. Hopefully I can someday fill them in on some similarly talented bands.

Also, as a follow up to something from a couple of posts ago, I remembered to whom else I needed to give dap, Stephen K., better known as Mr. "I don't want to mess up your last name." None of us know what's so difficult about his name, but that's neither here nor there. Anyway, why he deserves dap. He gave me a fairly funny line one of the first nights we hung out together, which may explain why I didn't remember it. It goes, "There are two things you want when you are drunk at 3 A.M., and one of them is food." It spawned from a discussion regarding Taco Bell and turned into a discussion about something all together different. So, here's your dap Stephen, for whatever it's worth.

As a parting suggestion, everyone should go see The Departed, the latest Martin Scorcese flick. I saw it alone on a total impulse, and I'm very glad I did. I respect Scorcese's work, but he's neve been one of my top directors, and even after this movie, I still wouldn't put him up there with Woody Allen and Steven Soderbergh. Nonetheless, this movie is excellently shot and paced along with some terrific acting. The story has a couple of holes, but they are minor at worst. There are a bunch of good movies coming out, and I suspect by the end of the season this will be one of the best.

I've succumbed

I've finally given in to the quasi-evil phenomenon of digital social sprawl. By this I mean either Facebook or MySpace. I've chosen the former, since pretty much every person in my class here at Akron is a member. I know a few people who are only on MySpace, but I am drawing a firm line here: I will only join one of these two possible horsemen of the apocolypse. There are a bunch of interesting features, but I don't have the time to invest into any of them, so I am joining groups and such just as a display for the things I believe in. This means mostly policitically-oriented groups, candidates, and the like. Obviously its utility to keep in touch with people is unmatched, so that's helpful as well.

While I'm here I'd like to give a shout out to Russell Latino. Those of you from Centennial know who he is of course, and a few of the others may have met him or know him through reputation. Russ just found out that he passed the Mississippi Bar. In addition he's engaged to be married. I really don't know which is more significant. I'm not joking. At any rate, grats bud.

For some odd reason, I think I told someone else that I would also post a shout out for him or her, but I can't remember at the moment. Feel free to not only remind me who you are and why I was going to give you dap but to chastise me as well.

Disaster Strikes

Some of you know this already, but a couple of weeks ago my brand new, smokin' laptop was stolen out of my car along with my iPod and Contracts book. They were all in my bookbag which was in my car. Just the day before my window would not roll up because the regulator was shot, and I had not had the time to fix it. While my car was parked outside a bar downtown, someone saw the bag, presumably, got into my car and took it. Needless to say, I was pissed. Not only was I out a laptop, but it sort of made me question what I am doing here. Chances are the person who stole it is of the sort (the less fortunate) that I want to help as a lawyer. So something like this makes me think, "What's the point?" Alas, I am over it and still on track to one day, hopefully, help the same sort of people.

In much better news, I've made some pretty good friends here. Without going through each of their individual histories, suffice it to say they are right up my (our) alley. First of all, they are all left-wing idiots like me. Second, they are all very intelligent, and thus assholes, also like me. We sit around and judge passers by without impunity while taking digs at each other for no other good reason than we have nothing better to do. For the most part these people are all in my section, so we also talk shit about the other day, full-time section, setting up a West Side Story situation. The scence from Scrubs (docs vs. surgeons) comes to mind.

On that note, apparently NBC has pushed back the premiere of Scrubs. In its place they have put forth the Howie Mandel masterpiece "Deal or No Deal." /vomit. While I've heard it's entertaining, if for no other reason the 40 hot women who handle the prizes, it is clearly no Scrubs. As I've said before, a Thursday lineup with The Office, My Name is Earl, and Scrubs is my television wet dream, but NBC has again showed why they are incompetent. Anyway, I guess when it does replace whatever shit, Wednesday show that just started, it will at least have back-to-back episodes like last year. I can't find any information on this though, so anyone who can will have my kudos for a few minutes. Also in television news, Studio 60 did premiere this week. It is going to be amazing. Please watch it.

Second Impressions

Law school is hard. This is a simple statement, but nothing more clearly characterizes the nature of law school. The amount of work expected of us is staggering, and in the process of doing this work, allegedly our brain will be transformed. Just about everyone in my section seems to be just as talented, if not more so, than me, which is an incredible blow to my ego yet inspiring at the same time. This is a situation I've wanted to be in all my life, where I was truly surrounded by my peers. I could be completely off base with this observation, but I typically get pretty good reads on people fast. This makes me think I really should give poker a real go, rather than law school, but I think my mother would have a stroke, so I'll stick to statutes and opinions instead of flops and raises.

To help manage the burden of this endeavor, I'm approaching this like a job. I get up at 7, and until 5 or 6, I'm either in class or studying. Unlike my experience initially at LSU, I can't blow this, as second chances in law school are incredibly rare. Of course, my experience at LSU makes it all the less likely that I won't. I may not keep my scholarship (the aforementioned smart people play a large role in that), but I will give it my best shot, and there's no reason I can't continue law school if I lose it.

Ultimately, my anticipation of law school has been confirmed. Prior to law school, I was scared and excited at the same time, and that feeling owns me throughout the day. Every time a professor asks a question, it frightens me to know that I probably don't have the right answer, but I am excited to know that I ultimately will, and that knowledge will enable me to help people in ways most people never approach. Speaking of my professors, they have bachelor's from Notre Dame, Stanford, Brown, and Ohio State and J.D.'s from the likes of Harvard and Yale; most of the faculty carries the same academic pedigree. Once again, this reinforces the dichotomy of intimidation and inspiration.

I feel I have the right mind set about this, so I rarely worry, but utter anxiety does creep up occasionally. I am able, however, to reassure myself and continue to plug away.

My Big Move

As most, if not all of you know, I've relocated my person and meager belongings to the Buckeye state. I've been here about 10 days, and there's not too much to report. Since this is a blog, however, it seems to me I should report it here.

I am renting a house in Fairlawn, OH (though my address is still Akron), which is a township west of Akron. I'm all of 1500 ft. from Akron city limits, though. I share the house with my roommate Scott, who is a graduate of Akron law and is currently practicing law in Cuyahoga Falls. Scott has certainly lived up to my first impression of him; he's a super nice guy who shares my love of baseball and all other sports. It will also be nice to have someone who can explain the stuff I have to read daily for class.

I've not done too much since arriving here. When Stephen was in town, we made it up to Cedar Point and had a blast. While the new coasters were all amazing, we had the great fortune of being there on the hottest day of the year; allegedly the heat index reached 113. We visited the water rides to remain cool, and I managed to avoid a sunburn, so no harm no foul really. Also last week I joined Scott and his friends for their weekly poker game. They have a point-system tournament going over the weeks but also play for a weekly pot. I came in third and got my $10 back, so it was some cheap fun.

I've bought most of my books already, which will total over $550, and have begun reading. It's pretty much what I expected, but a little harder. My expectation that this will require extreme dedication has been reinforced. Orientation kicks off on the 21st, during which there is a slew of planned activites and an Intro to Legal Studies class. It ends with a dart tournament at the tap room downtown, which is fitting.

I have run into some slight trouble while here, as I lost my check card at Cedar Point. No one takes out of state checks, so my inactivity has been complemented by a lack of available funds. These go hand in hand very well for those who didn't know. Part of me also wishes I had not come up this early, as I miss Kellie very much, but in the end I think it's the best. I'm getting acclimated and have had plenty of time to work out all the logisitics.

Also, I've come to the conclusion that I will have to rollback severely, if not cut altogether, my Warcraft time. If I were to simply play 15 hours a week, it would be the only thing I can do, and I would like to live a more balanced life. I'll probably keep my account active for something to do when I need cheap entertainment though may cancel it if the money becomes too much or I find myself tempted to play.

Sorry for the time it took to update, especially considering I've not had much better to do. Nick (an EQ friend) told me tonight he had read it, which reminded me to update. Fear not, my next update will not take so long.