Entry 15-01.26.25 in Book Two: The Fifteenth Year of the Third Millennium of the Common Era

Oh… nightmare! Not literally… at least I hope not. But the last thing I did last night was a quick 32 question Contracts/Sales Bar Prep Quiz. Even without getting the results, the quiz pissed me off. Seriously… why, oh why, do Bar Questions have to (1) be two pages long if they only ask one multi choice question? (2) Be multiple choice when I can tell them specifically what law applies and how… but the wording isn’t there?! Seriously, this is such an issue that all of the Bar Exam Tutors say the following: When answering Bar Questions, never look for the right answer… it may not be present; simply look for the best answer. Uhm… dude, no. If I am going to be a lawyer, I’m going to tell my clients the RIGHT answer … why should I have to be forced to chose the “close” answer just to be a lawyer? Frustrating.

So… my day… my glorious studying day:

9:30 am
Started later than I’d prefer but… if I am getting sick, a late start is okay. I began with my usual… which means checking in on Facebook Games, Messages and News Stories, grabbing a teeny tiny food source in lieu of a full breakfast… then straight into reviewing the quiz I ended last night with. 18 correct answers out of 32 Questions… better than 50% but still a long way to go… and that’s only in one category! The way I review these quizzes is that I look at the questions I got wrong, write out the correct answer and the reason given for why my answer was incorrect. Then I search out the rule of law that the question dealt with and write that rule down. All-in-all… one wrong answer has the potential to take up to 30 minutes reviewing.

Noon:
My legs and back were starting to kill so, despite a desire to press on, I had to get up… stretch a little… frankly… lay down. Not lie down to sleep, but spend some significant (ish) time flat and stretched out as opposed to hunched in a chair like a little studious hamster ball.

1:30 pm
Yet another lecture video! This time it was the end of Real Property and Landlord Tenant Law! As it was the last video in the Real Property Series… a comprehension evaluation was provided immediately upon finishing the video. So between video, quiz, and quiz review… quite a lot of time invested. And to bring it all home… quiz target shifts between 50 and 55% per program expectations… my score was: 45%. So- YIKES! I feel confident in saying my big struggles were Deed & Mortgage.

5:30 pm
Hungry! But also… I have one more video I really want to finish today… and some printing… and some essay prep. VIDEO time! Federal Civil Procedure… barring any unforeseen interruptions, the video should take a little more than 3.5 hours. Which means, my wife will be coming back from work when I have at least 30 to 60 minutes left of the video. Hopefully, that will all work out in the end… as I would still like to finish that essay prep exercise.

9:08 pm
Not surprisingly… I missed “Jog, Shower, Dinner.” Now to paperwork which is less “strict” as to timing… but of course, for some reason… the essay prep has just been terrifying me this whole Bar Prep time. Something about… knowing the law but not being able to explain it the way Bar Examiners want. I’ve always prided myself on being able to explain the law to lay people in order to best provide for their needs… trying to “puff it up” again to try to impress non-practicing attorneys? Just… something about it bothers me in a strangely fundamental way. The essay didn’t go well. Allegedly, it will be graded… I can imagine what the grader will say/think! On the one hand- hooray. Last time I studied for the bar exam; nobody looked over my practice essays so there really was no idea how I was doing. On the other hand, I know I’m not doing well on those essay preps.

BOY! Crikey… the day would have been a lot better had I gotten up when I had wanted to… imagine if my day had started 3.5 hours earlier! Something for me to keep in mind, I guess!

Epilogue: It is funny, for a few brief minutes today I actually thought “Gee… in a few weeks, I won’t have this exam dominating my life. It’ll be weird. I’ll have time to see friends, look for an actual occupation, and worry about my marriage. Maybe, in a few ways, I’d rather just keep studying for the test!”

Though that being said… I miss interacting with people. I mean… it isn’t like I had a whole lot of human interaction anyway… but the intensity with which I am studying has limited me to brief contacts via PS4; Facebook, and Prose Box. It would be nice to interact with a person and have a legitimate conversation IRL… though, the more I think about it… the more I have no idea with whom I could even do that!

Last updated January 27, 2015