but i don't start work for another month!

. . . aaaaand I just got my first student loan bill. Hi, splash of real-life cold water in the face.

obligations

Bar/Bri continues apace. Today’s lecture was WAY too long and the lecturer spends too much time repeating the stuff in the notes instead of highlighting the nuance. He is, at least, entertaining. I have given up on the Paced Program for the time being and am instead just trying to keep up with the reading.

Work is heating up—I have four cases on my desk including two court appearances scheduled for Monday, and everyone keeps giving me more responsibility. It’s actually very cool—people seem to trust that I can handle the matters they’re giving me and that gives me confidence that I, well, actually CAN handle the matters they’re giving me. 🙂

Also, my last set of grades came in today, which means I can no longer procrastinate on my clerkship applications. This weekend, therefore, is set aside not for doing practice questions but instead for writing cover letters, polishing up my writing samples, and building my online applications. Right now, it doesn’t feel quite real—I’ve been telling myself for months that I’ll send my applications once grades come in; well, grades are in, so I guess have to back that up. ((I realize this makes it sound like I don’t actually want to apply for clerkships. I actually DO want to apply for clerkships; it’s just the reality of actually having to write the cover letters and get my writing samples ready that I balk at. I think cover letters are just another opportunity to screw up, and as far as writing samples goes, I hate that I have lots of really good stuff that’s either cowritten, and so inappropriate to send, or too long, or not doctrinal enough, or is just too short. I have been looking for that perfect 10-12 page writing opportunity forever, and I have never quite achieved it. Everything I have that length is cowritten or or casual memo. Gah.))

Oh, and yes, grades are in, which means I am officially done. Even though my degree audit doesn’t actually indicate that I’ve completed my last two requirements, I know I have and I know I’m done. I am officially a Juris Doctor. Hallelujah!

money talks

I believe this is the latest I have ever done my taxes. I intended to do them over the weekend, but that whole internet being down thing meant I couldn’t, since I do my taxes online. ((Note that I’m posting in the evening, which would indicate that our internet is back up. Yes, it is back up, and thank God.))

So I did my taxes, and, being half of a married student couple means that we did not owe a red cent and we got back everything we paid in, plus what seems like a little extra, which can’t be right, but I haven’t taken tax, so I don’t know. In any case, I finished my taxes, transmitted them online (well, federal taxes; apparently, I have to file by mail in this state, since we’ve never filed in this state before and don’t have whatever little identification number we have to have to file online. Boo. That goes in the mail tomorrow or Wednesday, I think), and even completed my FAFSA. (I would be more worried about La FAFSA except I know I’m not going to get anything but loans from my school because that’s all they EVER give me. Boo.) In the spirit of being fiscally responsible and productive, I even filled out my school financial aid paperwork.

Part of me feels bad about not getting this done sooner–I’ve always gotten my financial aid stuff done super early, so I can be as eligible as possible for as much money as possible. But two years at my school–and the anecdotes I’ve heard during that time–has taught me that it’s really not going to matter. My school gives awards out during the application process and whatever award you get then is what award you have for the rest of your time in law school. This means really, really, really good students who didn’t happen to have the LSAT and GPA numbers to get a scholarship offer when applying to law school end up with full loans for three years. And that pretty much sucks. It sucks more for those really, really, really good students than it does for me, but it’s still really pissy for me. Still, there’s nothing I can do about it, so I’ve accepted it.

And that’s why I didn’t do my financial aid documents sooner. That and the fact that the school didn’t send my W-2 to me and I had to request that they send me a duplicate. (Actually, the same thing happened to Mr. Angst–we have crappy, crappy, crappy mail service–so I wasn’t able to actually DO the taxes early on. But I could have done my FAFSA with estimated numbers. Eck. I didn’t.)

OK. I have to do a little work before I go to bed. Ta!

even a dying man gets to choose his last words

I take my last exam tomorrow. That means, of course, that I spent tonight finalizing my outline and preparing it to be well-used, should I need to use it. (The best sorts of exams are the ones where the issues jump right out and you never need to use your outline. So I hope I won’t have to use my outline tomorrow, but just in case, I want it READY.)

I had this brilliant idea that, since I’d spent some time color coding certain things in my outline–highlighting for some things and font colors for others–that I would just pop down to Kinko’s to print it off in color. We have a laser printer at home, and it doesn’t print in color and I wanted COLOR, dammit!

But I did not want color enough to spend ONE DOLLAR PER PAGE to have my 47 page outline printed in beautiful, glossy, laser-printed color. No sirree. I hauled my butt–IN THE RAIN–down to the Kinko’s only to discover that color prints cost a f–king DOLLAR EACH. And, frankly, I didn’t feel like spending FORTY-SEVEN DOLLARS on my outline. No matter HOW pretty it is. I mean, 90% of it is BLACK, so the $47 I would spend to get that 10% color seemed unreasonable.

Back home I came, then, and printed it out in black and white–and it’s not nearly so pretty, even though I attacked it with multicolored highlighters so I get at least SOME of the same effect. But it was FREE to print at home, and that, I suppose, makes it all OK.

I’m off to bed, now, to get as decent a night’s sleep as I can (still debating whether or not I should take some Nyquil; I think I’ll just take a regular Sudafed, except the “regular” Sudafed doesn’t actually have any Sudafed IN IT), before I wake up early and go get this thing over with.

By the by, I know I was tagged with the Christmas song meme, and I PROMISE I am going to do it. I’ve just been really, really swamped over the last few days, what with doing all this learning and outlining (and last-minute Christmas shopping and shipping, too).

Happy holidays, all! I’ll be back tomorrow, likely somewhat tipsy.

apartment update two

The management company for our new apartment is seriously unprofessional. I suppose that’s obvious, given the prior problems we had, but it’s reaching new levels.

I have been trying to get our leasing agent to fax us a copy of our amended lease ALL WEEK. She was supposed to send it yesterday, before I left the office, and didn’t. She was “with people all afternoon.”

So she called this morning and left me a message, saying she was making getting us the contract a super-duper high priority (yes, those were her words) and to call her and let her know if I wanted her to fax it to a different number or overnight it.

I called back and said she should overnight it. She could fax it to my dad’s office, but I’d need to tell someone there to expect it, and I don’t want to have to deal with that. She said she’d call me when she was in her office (she was on her way) and get the address.

That was two hours ago.

I called again, got her voicemail, and left our address. I told her to call me when she’d sent it. If this is “super-duper high priority,” no wonder we’ve had so many problems!

Frankly, if we don’t have a copy of the paperwork before we get there, it’s not the end of the world. But it’s mighty annoying! And unprofessional! And just reinforces, over and over, my dislike of this management company and their employees!

Sigh. Off for coffee and—you guessed it!—more packing.

they want me to go crazy, i just know it

So, OK, Law School sent me some paperwork to fill out and return (loan stuff, ugh) and they were kind enough to provide a self-addressed envelope in which to return these papers.

Except that only in some weird universe where paper stretches would I be able to fit all the stuff I have to send them into this envelope. I think I’d be hard-pressed to get a single piece of paper to fit in this envelope. As it is, I have six sheets of paper—not onion skin paper, either!—and I can barely get them IN the envelope. Once they are in, though, the flap won’t close. I mean, unless I want to glue the flap to the papers and not to the envelope.

Plus, the papers I was trying to shove into the envelope gave me a wicked paper cut. Those papers suck, and not just because they’re loan papers!

Sigh. How hard is it to order the regular, #10 size envelopes instead of the smaller, business-reply mail size?

apartment update

Tell me how bass-ackwards THIS is:

Our future management company sends out lease renewals to tenants. If the current tenant doesn’t renew, the company assumes they’re moving out and RELETS their apartment. But what if the tenant decides, oh, TWO WEEKS before they’re supposed to move out, that they don’t WANT to move out? THEY DON’T HAVE TO. The company just “accomodates” the people moving in by putting them in a similar or better apartment, with rent discounts if necessary.

OK. Hold on. Isn’t the proper way to manage tenants completely OPPOSITE of the above method? Every apartment I’ve EVER lived in assumes the tenant is staying unless the tenant gives written notice that they’re leaving! That would seem to be the logical way to manage tenants, at least to my mind. But hey, what do I know about property management?

So we’re working on a solution.

The building has already reserved a different unit for us—same floor plan, five floors lower in the building. (We were supposed to be on the top floor, with no one above us.) I have two big issues with this: (1) there is an increased likelihood of noise, having an apartment above us, (2) the laundry and exercise room would have been ONE flight of stairs up for us; now they’ll be either FIVE flights up or a VERY SLOW elevator trip up. (The elevators are ridiculously slow.) I was hoping to avoid the elevators except when going OUT; now we’ll have to use them to go UP also, for laundry and exercise. (Mr. Angst suggests that the five flight trek will be a good warm-up for working out. I am not convinced. That also doesn’t improve the laundry situation.)

Our leasing agent is meeting with the regional manager this afternoon to find out what sort of additional “accomodations” they’ll offer us, since we’re getting an apartment that’s equal on a floor that’s not as good. In other words, what kind of monetary discount are we going to get? And then, I suppose, we’ll have to sign a new lease, or a lease addendum, since our current lease is INVALID.

After all of this is worked out, the apartment locator we worked with is getting a negative review from me about this building and management company. I hope they will refuse to work with them in the future. They specialize in helping graduate students find housing and I imagine this kind of crap is just what they’d like to avoid as they grow this portion of their business.

things i don't know anything about

Does anyone have any opinions on LIBOR vs. Prime?

drowning in a sea of paper

Law School Health Center requires that I send them my immunization records. This poses a small problem, since they require that my physician fill out the immunization records section of my health forms. Unfortunately, my physician doesn’t have my immunization records on file because, duh, she hasn’t been my physician my whole life.

I have a copy of my immunization records that I somehow obtained from my undergraduate school’s heath center. But I don’t trust that they still have my records on file, and I don’t trust them to send any forms to Law School Health Center.

My physician says they will take my copy of my immunization records (an original, stamped copy) and Xerox it and forward it to Law School Health Center along with the rest of the form that they’re supposed to fill out (or that I think they have to fill out; more on that below). But they can’t certify any immunization dates and records for shots that they didn’t administer. And I haven’t had any shots done by my physician.

How do people get this stuff done? Unless you’ve been going to the same doctor your whole life, how can you get your immunization records certified? I know I’ve had all my shots—after all, I was allowed to enroll at my undergraduate institution, and they required all the shots—but how do I prove this to Law School when I’ve changed doctors so many times over the course of my life?

I guess I have to call Law School Health Center and find out if I can bring that stamped, original copy of my immunization records to them in person (thankfully, the deadline for turning it in is not until September 30) to fulfill that requirement. Meanwhile, I have to figure out which parts of the other forms are required—the main instructions say, “Law students don’t have to fill out Part II,” and page 2 says, “Law students don’t have to fill out this page.” But page 2 has part II (not required) AND part III (required?). I have no clue. And those pages are required by July 15!

Gah! Bureaucracy! Infuriating!

Update: Law School Health Center was wonderful. The guy I spoke to laughed when i said my doctor wouldn’t sign the form because they didn’t give me any of my immunizations. He said, if that copy of your immunization records has been signed at some point by a doctor or nurse practitioner, we just need to see a copy of it (not even the original!). And I don’t have to have my doctor fill out part III on page 2. I just have to fill out pages 1 and 4 and attach that copy of my immunizations and I’ll be done with it. Relief! Joy!

signing on the dotted line

It’s really happening! Law School wants paperwork: my official undergraduate transcript and a certification of enrollment. (I got to check the “I will be enrolling and I have removed my name from all other schools’ lists” option. That was nice.)

I’ll pop my transcript request in the mail today, and Law School should get it by the end of the week if the post is cooperative; I think I can email the the certification form.

In other news, I completed my other loan applications last night, so I have asked for all the money I need for the school year. I’ll have a few more pieces of paperwork to sign later this summer, but I’m essentially done even with that chore.

It’s getting more real by the moment.