Once, for the record

I totally understand if my constant worried frenzy and obsession about the bar exam seemed overblown and more dramatic than necessary. If I weren't in it, I might think so too.  I totally understand the inclination of others to say, "Don't worry.  You're smart.  You'll do great."  In fact, I understand the meaning behind those words and appreciate them.  The fact is, though, this test wasn't like other tests in both format and grading.  That means that none of my previous successes really bear much weight in terms of predicting the outcome.  A number of people have asked how I thought it went, or how I think I might have done.  I have no idea.

I can, however, explain how it works.  The Tennessee Bar exam is two parts.  The first day is two hundred multiple choice questions.  They were horrendous, to say the least, and not at all similar to the ones I had been given in practice exams by my bar review course.  In TN, each examinee must pass a minimum number on the multiple choice.  If you don't make that minimum score, no matter what you do on day two won't matter.  This is my biggest concern.  I've never been great at multiple choice, and I felt completely unprepared for the types of questions that were asked.  If I didn't pass, I feel fairly strongly that it will be because I didn't score well enough on the first day.

The second day is twelve essay questions.  The number that you have to pass is determined by your score on the multiple choice test.  They are each written by a separate bar examiner and that examiner grades all of the answers to that question.  I feel like I did much better the second day.

I'm still recovering now, not from the test, but from the studying.  I graduated May 14th, and my bar review course started May 18th.  For the first month, it was five days a week.  Starting in July, I studied every single day of the week, for at least eight hours.  I'm not a lunatic and I didn't over study.  It takes that long to adequately study each topic covered on the test and to read sample essays and take practice exams.  It was one subject a day.  It is terrifying to go to sleep each night knowing that everything you'll know in a given area is what you were able to get to that day, and that there won't be a chance to do more.  By the way, these are huge topics--as in, some are separated into two semesters in law school.  Even a basic subject like Civil Procedure, a first year course, has a thousand balancing tests, rules with three elements, and specific time limits, etc.  You have to actually know them.  It was physically and mentally exhausting. 

The terror wasn't from actually taking the test.  The pressure is what causes the fear.  First of all, the bar review course that everyone takes costs $2500.  Not to mention, many places (including the one I want to work) won't hire anyone until they have passing  bar results.  That means you're not making attorney money, but your law school loans come due in November.  That also means that you have to get a temporary job, only to quit, to study again for two and half months for the February exam.  The Bar exam itself costs about $650 in total.  That's no small sum and is the reason I cringe when people say, "Well, you can just take it again."  That's another thing, you can't just take over and over and over.   They will deny you.  The Bar doesn't have to give you permission to take the exam.  Lastly, it is embarrassing to fail and to have to tell people that you failed.  In fact, in Tennessee, you don't really have to tell people because a pass list is posted online.  Everyone already knows.

There.  I said it.  I've explained everything I know.  Hopefully I'll pass and I'll never have to worry about again.  Hopefully, all the fear and studying and hard work and money was worth it.  I'm cautiously optimistic about my results.  Being completely honest, I didn't feel good about the first day.  Fortunately (I guess), I've heard other people say the same thing.

Anyway, this is the last I hope to say about the thing until October.  I know no one else wants to hear anymore about it, anymore than I want to discuss it.  I so very sincerely appreciate all of the support that I received.   The only thing to do now is wait.  The results are supposed to be posted October 8th.

This might be a bad sign

I found out last night that I've been misspelling broccoli my entire life.  I woke up yesterday sure of the letters in my favorite fruits and vegetables, and went to sleep in world where broccoli has but one lone L.  I am humbled.  Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to resume my panic attack.  Six days until the bar exam.

Error Message

My name is Laura, and I'm a big nerd.  Now, you all say, "Hi Laura" and we'll all share, have some cookies, and hug on the way out.  Sigh.  If it only it were possible to be a nerd anonymously.  I'm a happy nerd, though.  These are some common mistakes that make me giggle.  I should say, before you read them, that I think there is a time and place for rules and a time and place for suspending them.  The key is knowing what the rules are, so the choice is yours to make.  It's like setting a proper table.  If you choose not to, that's your business, but if you don't know how you'll always be self-conscious in front of company.  Blogs, Facebook statuses, casual conversation, and the like are fine places, in my opinion, to relax the rules of grammar and pronunciation.  For example, in this blog I end sentences in prepositions all the time because that is the way we speak.  I want my writing to be informal/funny so I disregard the general rule against it.  You'll also frequently see sentence fragments.  For emphasis.  See what I did there? That being said, the following list is all in good fun:

1.  There is no such thing as chester drawers.  No, there really isn't.  It's a chest of drawers.
2.  It's height and width, not heighTH and width.
3. You didn't "literally" die when such and such happened.  You also didn't "literally" throw up all over the place.  Literally means, well, literally.
4.  The words libel and liable mean very, very different things.  You can be liable for libel, but not the other way around.
5. Especially, not expecially.  That makes my skin crawl, literally.
6.  Here's one:  It's not a huge deal to say, "A whole nother" in a conversation, as long as you know that nother is not a word.
7.  Similarly, orientate isn't a word.  It's orient.  That's just making more work than necessary.
8.  Technically, spitting image is incorrect.  It doesn't matter much.  Most people never write that phrase.  For the record, though, it's spit and image.
9.  Crayon has two, distinct syllables and doesn't rhyme with crown. 
10.  This one is from Craig and was news to me.  Nauseous means provoking nausea, as in, "The smell of cabbage is nauseous."  The feeling that we get of an upset stomach is properly stated as, "I am nauseated."  So, they aren't synonyms.  Next time that you say you feel nauseous, think about what you're saying. 
11.  Periods are important.  It's better to have short, choppy sentences that make sense than flowing prose if you don't where to end it.  I'll demonstrate.  The following sentence is entirely fictitious (trust me), but is  inspired by sentences that I've seen.  Imagine this is the caption to a photo posted online:  "This is my baby Doodad she love me an shes' so cute we love her can't believe she is so big."  This is so very sweet.  It's just that I have to read it like a robot to make sense of it.  Try it this way.  "This is my baby, Doodad.  She loves me and she's so cute.  We love her, and can't believe she is so big."  The periods and commas tell me how I should process the words that are written.
12.  These are two syllable words that are often pronounced with three: realtor, ticklish, athlete. 
13.  Here's a tip I used when I was teaching phonics.  'There' has the word 'here' in it, which tells you it refers to location.  The dog is over there.  'They're' is a contraction of the words 'they' and 'are.'  If you can say, "They are going to the store," then you can also write, "They're going to the store."  Lastly, as a helpful hint for the grammatically challenged (we all have our weaknesses), 'their' has an 'I' in it, which can be a hint that it refers to a person.  Check it: "Their dog is over there." "They're going to walk him."
14.  This is one of my personal favorites.  Intensive purposes is a mispronunciation of the phrase, intents and purposes, e.g. For all intents and purposes, this blog is nonsense.  
15. Once, at a Rhodes writing camp (of all places), I saw a girl write "eye ronic" in her paper.  That just goes to show that bad habits plague all of us.  She scored like an eleventy trabillion on her SATs and actually knew the proper use of the word ironic, which is rare, and still couldn't spell it. 

Whew! That was fun.  I can only get who/whom correct in writing and I definitely get comma-happy, so I'm not the grammar police.  I know I've sent emails with errors and have not thoroughly proofed everything I've ever written.  I definitely get carried away when I type too fast and slaughter the correct usage of 'its' and 'it's' as a result.  Again, though, I think you can only break the rules when you know them.  Otherwise, it's just wrong.   Thank god there is never any reason to solve a math problem in an email, or my own weak spots would be horrifyingly obvious.  I was the last kid in my class to learn my multiplication tables and usually have to make the portion size called for in a recipe if I need to make less than half.  My geography knowledge is weak and I passed chemistry in high school by making the periodic elements into nonsense words in the order they appear on the table.  H He Libe BC  Nofne namg alsipsclar.  That is no lie.

Photo from here:  svana.org/.../knuth_don_has_a_grammar.jpg

**I was corrected (maybe) by an anonymous commenter who let me know that my claim about spit and image is incorrect.  Not one to ignore correction, I did a little further research.  Apparently, there are differing opinions as to the correct phrasing.  That being said, I suppose neither is incorrect.  However, I was thoroughly creeped out by the idea of an anonymous commenter and so have now changed the settings so that comments can't be made without a name attached.  Sorry Anonymous, if that is your real name.

Engagement Photos

Craig and I are approaching our first anniversary next month so I decided to post some of our long lost engagement pictures.  They got buried in the to dos and I dos of the wedding and I never shared them.  Here are a few!

It's Gone to the Dog, Maxwell Franklin Beanpotts

Sometimes I wonder if I have any business possibly being responsible for a little life one day in the future.  It's sort of irrelevant for the time being, but I do hope that my canine mothering isn't an indication of what the future could look like.  I don't neglect him and I try to be firm to keep him from hurting himself.  I play with him as regularly as I'm able to, so,  I'm not a terrible pet owner.  The issue is that he cracks. me. up.  Recently, he tore through the contents of a Tampax box that he pulled from the bathroom into the living room because, duh, where else would he do it? I got most of it away from him before he could do too much damage, but he got in a little.  I started to commit manslaughter, which at common law, is the unlawful killing of another without malice aforethought*.  Take that Bar exam.  I know one thing.  Booyah! Anyway, Mr. Beanpotts stood next to his little project and looked at me like, "Vut, joo no like? Eet ees performance aurt.  Joo are suppozed to be deesturbed!"  Seriously, that's what he sounds like.  I almost lost it.  Fortunately, I was able to maintain long enough to make sure that he got the dishes and the laundry done.

*To any law students/lawyers who feel the need to remind me that "another" only refers to human beings, remember this: people already don't like lawyers.  Let's not give them another reason, mkay?

Confessions

When I was in kindergarten I had a recurring nightmare that I was with a group of people, not unlike Scooby Doo's Mystery Inc., and we were running from place to place and hiding from this witch.  We were all running, but she was really after me.  They were more like my protection, but what could they really do?  She was a witch. Of course it doesn't sound scary now, but it was terrifying at the time, and I got to the point that I dreaded going to sleep because of it. My Mamaw told me that if you tell someone about your nightmare, it'll stop being scary and you won't have it again.  I always admired her and thought of her as the perfect lady.  Not only did she have a multitude of fascinating products in her gray train case, she also said things like "over yonder" and had an enormous amount of scripture committed to memory.  She could dole it out like so much medicine at exactly the right time.  She wore coral lipstick and said my name in the most distinctive way, Lawra.  She was so special to me and I knew that she must also be right about this dream situation.  So I told her all about it, realizing for the first time that dreams don't sound scary on retelling, and that you really can take the sting out of frightening experiences by sharing them with someone else.  Maybe, that realization indirectly lead to this blog for me.  By inviting people along as I find my way, each hurdle seems less intimidating.  Anyway, I never had the dream again.  The small act of sharing my childish fear made it go away.

Confessing my shortcomings and sharing my weaknesses and fears is a common way that I deal with them now as an adult.  In my opinion, it's a bonus if you can find the humor in it.  For all of my openness, I still embarrass really easily (see my first post).  It doesn't happen in the moment, but in those quiet moments before sleep.  I'll start to wince at a comment made casually or at the fact that I get so excited and run off at the mouth.  I always want to be one of those girls that can sit there quietly and resist the urge, if they have it, to tell a dumb story.  That's just not me, though.  As Craig would say, "thems the brakes."   Or maybe he would say, "if you're gonna be a bear, be a grizzly," or "this ain't that."  He's a poet.  Instead, I'll just have to deal with my embarrassment as it comes and share the things that redden my cheeks too much.

And then to the point, because why say a little when you can say a lot?  Yesterday Craig and I had a meeting with a nun at our church for reasons that aren't important.  She is his choir director and we both like her a lot.  When the three of us were leaving the music office, I noticed a yellow and black tote bag on someone's desk.  It was the kind that drug reps give doctors with the name of their product written on it.  As we walked past, I casually said, "That's one of the drugs that my mom uses."

Let that soak in.  Nun. Mom. Drug user.

And then came the flood.  I started sputtering about how my mom isn't a drug user or addict.  She's an anesthetist.  No, Sister, she doesn't use them, I said.  She professionally administers them.  I don't say that to be funny for you.  I didn't say that to be funny for her.  I said professionally administers because I was drowning in my own, completely over blown, embarrassment.  Sheesh.

The second that I need to share so as to lighten the load for myself, also happened at church.  I'm a greeter, which basically means that I stand at the front door, say hello, and pass out bulletins.  I also tell a lot of people where the restroom is.  At the front with me are usually the deacons or their wives.  On this one morning there was a deacon's wife and one of my favorite people over seventy.  Seriously, I would invite him to my birthday party.  Anyway, this girl came up to me on that morning and asked where the confessional was.  FYI to non-Catholics, confession isn't really supposed to be optional.  You're 'posed to do it.   I don't.  I have many times, but I don't.  I never have at the church we go to.  Oh god, as I type this I feel my face burn.  Anyway, she asked me this in front of our church leaders who are always praising Craig and I for being so great for going to church every weekend and starting our family on the right foundation and being a good example for other young Catholics and I couldn't even tell her where to go!  I had to say that, no, I had no idea where she might go confess.  So, I guess in the end I was telling on myself anyway.  Oh, this one still hurts.  It's so much worse then the time we left the Presbyterian church and I accidentally dipped my hand in the trash can to cross myself, thinking it was the receptacle for holy water like at our church. 

What is this burning?  Is it my face, or is this what being smited feels like?

Cosmo

Did anyone else ever read Cosmo?  If not, then it's probably for the best 'cause I'm convinced now that all women are either too old or too young to read it.  It's like daisy dukes, or hot pants, or short shorts, or is she serious about those right now, or whatever you call them. It's all the same.  There really is no appropriate age.  Or maybe there is, but it happened on some random Wednesday night years ago and I slept through it.  I went to bed too young for such trash, and woke too old for that nonsense.  What I do remember, from when I was too young, was that they had a section about things that were alright to do, which I guess meant that even though they weren't really cool, you could still do it and be okay with yourself.  For that month, anyway.  It was always stuff like, "It's okay to secretly hate your boyfriend's sister," or "It's okay if you drink out of the milk carton when no one's looking."  There were a lot of implied winks and giggles which, at the time, I thought were pret-ty clever.  It was the part I could read and think, yeah, I'm totally like that.  It helps that it was sandwiched by articles about how to contort yourself like a sexual Gumby (albeit, not through walls) and others about outfits that were equally cute at the office and at the club.  Well, considering I was all of fifteen and stumbling on each awkward bump of adolescence, I found the list the easiest to relate to----that, and the "What Color is Your Essence" quizzes that I would take until I got the result I wanted.  I'm a red, but so, so badly wanted to be a yellow.  Anyway, I was killing time at Walgreens recently and was poking through a Cosmo.  I was interested because they had this article on the cover about what foods men really like, and I had to see because my husband likes whatever I cook, because he's a genius.  Not so long story, and not so short, I never read that article, but I did stumble onto the "It's Ok" list.  It wasn't very memorable, but I thought I'd start my very own list of not cool things to do, but that I still find unabashedly acceptable. I hope it will be added onto. 

It's Ok....

....to say neat, in public, with zero irony.  Zero.
....to find your way to someone's facebook album who you don't know and keep on looking at strangers.
....to get emotionally invested in the Real Housewives of...everywhere.
....to talk to your dog, and love him, and kiss the top of his teeny head.
....to rehash conversations in your mind and think of all the snappy remarks you should've said.
....to weep cry during Father of the Bride (I and II) and Steal Magnolias even though you could recite each.
....to have doubted all those bra color facebook statuses. I bet, red sparkles.  You know it was nude cotton.
....to make huge life decisions three minutes before falling asleep and then never think about them again.
....to quit your diet everyday at three o'clock.
....to sing in the car, not like nobody's listening, but like everyone is.
....to have just a touch of hypochondria, or mono, or a heart condition, or an impending aneurism, whatever.
....to feel like a teachers' table dork in new social situations.
....to pick a wedgie if you've got one, the dance is so much worse.
....to talk to yourself for a good bit before you realize it (at least I hope this is ok??)
....to cry when you're mad.
....to change your clothes, you hair, your mind, and your life plan over an hour.
....to change it all back before your husband knows what's hit him.
....to play a little dumb sometimes.  I'm looking at you Autozone.
....to blog about your personal thoughts and self-indugences without too much embarassment : )

P.S.  I realize I've been, um, prolific this month in the frequency of my posts.  I would fully understand if you'd like to hide me on Facebook so as not to be inundated by my activity.  Just don't tell me.  What else am I supposed to do, study?