Thursday, June 12, 2014
Score!
Got my letter from the office of financial aid today. I get to go to school next year for free!
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Summer Associate
Two and a half weeks into my summer associate gig at a big law firm here in San Diego. It's very interesting. A lot different than what I was expecting, but I think I am adjusting to it and have gotten into a groove.
The social aspects of interacting with the other summer associates, the associate attorneys, the partners, and the support staff is heavily emphasized. As I've come to realize, the summer associate experience isn't really so much about the work that you do, as much as it is about getting to know everyone. At this point, after getting your foot in the door, everyone there realizes that you are capable of doing the work and being an attorney, otherwise you wouldn't have even received an offer as a summer associate. The emphasis is finding out what kind of person you are, your personality and whether or not you are going to be a good fit for the practice group that you'll be working with.
A large aspect of being an attorney, has a lot more to do with being able to interact and socialize with the clients without coming off as a complete tool, and being able to carry an intelligent interesting conversation. And if the objective of the firm is to hire associates they hope will eventually become partners, the types of associates they want to hire are those that are going to be assets to the firm in both their work product and eventually those that are capable of growing the business by procuring new clients. And if you can't ingratiate yourself and get to know and be comfortable with the other attorneys in the office, how are you ever going to be able to do business generation and get new clients? Makes sense, and attorneys work long hours, and if you're not the kind of person they are going to like hanging out with and working closely with, it's not going to be a good fit. So all those social events, there's an underlying motive behind them. Which means you're kind of under a microscope at all times. That part is a little distasteful, but it is what it is.
Got my spring grades back, and I rocked it. A+, A, A, A, A-. The A+ was in my favorite class last semester. I suspect that I got the highest grade in the class, but am not sure. I'll find out later, when the CALI awards for the spring semester are announced. But I am most proud of the A that I got in a different class. I bombed the midterm as apparently I was completely lost in the subject. Initially at the time, I thought I did well on the midterm, until I got it back. For the final, I studied my butt off, essentially taught myself the subject from reading a lot of different sources, since the professor for the most part was useless. And after I re-read my midterm, I realized that I got the score I deserved, because as my understanding of the material coalesced into coherent knowledge, I realized my midterm essay was a complete pile of crap. So for me to pull of an A, I must have really rocked the final.
Class ranks were released today, and I am happy to say that I should be going to school for free next semester and hopefully the entire year. Not sure if any future scholarship awards are contingent on continued academic performance, but I suspect that they are. But I see no reason as to why my performance would substantially decline, so I am not overly concerned about that. However, that means I spent an inordinate amount of time doing the write-on competition for law review, as my grades have guaranteed me an invitation. C'est la vie. Extra practice writing a legal memo, I suppose.
As you might suspect, all of these other life events have really put a damper on my poker playing. Haven't played a hand of 40/80 in over a month, and may not until August, assuming the game is still alive come August. Otherwise, I guess I'll be playing 8/16 just for fun a few weekends a month on Saturday nights just to relax. I might try and get up there this Friday evening after work, if I don't go out for drinks with the attorneys from the office. But even if I do make it up there, there is certainly no guarantee that a 40 game will even still be going at that time.
I get the 4th of July off from work, and it's on a Friday this year. Might see if I can sneak a trip to Vegas for a few nights. Alternatively, depending on summer interviews for next year I might be able to sneak a trip in after my summer gig is up and before classes start in the fall. Or maybe both.
The social aspects of interacting with the other summer associates, the associate attorneys, the partners, and the support staff is heavily emphasized. As I've come to realize, the summer associate experience isn't really so much about the work that you do, as much as it is about getting to know everyone. At this point, after getting your foot in the door, everyone there realizes that you are capable of doing the work and being an attorney, otherwise you wouldn't have even received an offer as a summer associate. The emphasis is finding out what kind of person you are, your personality and whether or not you are going to be a good fit for the practice group that you'll be working with.
A large aspect of being an attorney, has a lot more to do with being able to interact and socialize with the clients without coming off as a complete tool, and being able to carry an intelligent interesting conversation. And if the objective of the firm is to hire associates they hope will eventually become partners, the types of associates they want to hire are those that are going to be assets to the firm in both their work product and eventually those that are capable of growing the business by procuring new clients. And if you can't ingratiate yourself and get to know and be comfortable with the other attorneys in the office, how are you ever going to be able to do business generation and get new clients? Makes sense, and attorneys work long hours, and if you're not the kind of person they are going to like hanging out with and working closely with, it's not going to be a good fit. So all those social events, there's an underlying motive behind them. Which means you're kind of under a microscope at all times. That part is a little distasteful, but it is what it is.
Got my spring grades back, and I rocked it. A+, A, A, A, A-. The A+ was in my favorite class last semester. I suspect that I got the highest grade in the class, but am not sure. I'll find out later, when the CALI awards for the spring semester are announced. But I am most proud of the A that I got in a different class. I bombed the midterm as apparently I was completely lost in the subject. Initially at the time, I thought I did well on the midterm, until I got it back. For the final, I studied my butt off, essentially taught myself the subject from reading a lot of different sources, since the professor for the most part was useless. And after I re-read my midterm, I realized that I got the score I deserved, because as my understanding of the material coalesced into coherent knowledge, I realized my midterm essay was a complete pile of crap. So for me to pull of an A, I must have really rocked the final.
Class ranks were released today, and I am happy to say that I should be going to school for free next semester and hopefully the entire year. Not sure if any future scholarship awards are contingent on continued academic performance, but I suspect that they are. But I see no reason as to why my performance would substantially decline, so I am not overly concerned about that. However, that means I spent an inordinate amount of time doing the write-on competition for law review, as my grades have guaranteed me an invitation. C'est la vie. Extra practice writing a legal memo, I suppose.
As you might suspect, all of these other life events have really put a damper on my poker playing. Haven't played a hand of 40/80 in over a month, and may not until August, assuming the game is still alive come August. Otherwise, I guess I'll be playing 8/16 just for fun a few weekends a month on Saturday nights just to relax. I might try and get up there this Friday evening after work, if I don't go out for drinks with the attorneys from the office. But even if I do make it up there, there is certainly no guarantee that a 40 game will even still be going at that time.
I get the 4th of July off from work, and it's on a Friday this year. Might see if I can sneak a trip to Vegas for a few nights. Alternatively, depending on summer interviews for next year I might be able to sneak a trip in after my summer gig is up and before classes start in the fall. Or maybe both.
Wednesday, March 26, 2014
Update
Life is going well. Law school is keeping me extremely busy. First quarter of the year is almost in the books. I think I will get one more poker session before the quarter ends this Friday. I've been looking over my limit holdem results for year to date, here are the raw stats:
Big Bets Won : 240.8417
Total Hours Played : 124.9167
Weighted Hourly Big Bet : 72.2962
Big Bets / Hour : 1.928019
So overall, not bad stats for a little over 100 hours. In reality, it doesn't mean much. It's such a small sample size, and in terms of actual dollars I'm not actually winning all that much due to one bad 75/150 session. And of course in terms of dollar amounts, that one bad 75/150 session dominates the actual dollar results, but in terms of the overall statistics doesn't have that large of an effect. C'est la vie.
Things will get interesting as we move into the home stretch of this semester. During the month of April, I should be able to get some more significant hours in, but once May hits and finals start, I'll be pretty much out of action. And then I start my summer job on May 27. That runs for 10 weeks until August 1, and then a few weeks off before the fall semester starts again on August 25.
Will the game survive my absence? I certainly hope so. If not, I'd better get my fair share before it dries up any more than it already has.
Big Bets Won : 240.8417
Total Hours Played : 124.9167
Weighted Hourly Big Bet : 72.2962
Big Bets / Hour : 1.928019
So overall, not bad stats for a little over 100 hours. In reality, it doesn't mean much. It's such a small sample size, and in terms of actual dollars I'm not actually winning all that much due to one bad 75/150 session. And of course in terms of dollar amounts, that one bad 75/150 session dominates the actual dollar results, but in terms of the overall statistics doesn't have that large of an effect. C'est la vie.
Things will get interesting as we move into the home stretch of this semester. During the month of April, I should be able to get some more significant hours in, but once May hits and finals start, I'll be pretty much out of action. And then I start my summer job on May 27. That runs for 10 weeks until August 1, and then a few weeks off before the fall semester starts again on August 25.
Will the game survive my absence? I certainly hope so. If not, I'd better get my fair share before it dries up any more than it already has.
Monday, March 17, 2014
Spring Break
My spring break from law school was uneventful. I had jury duty one day and took care of that. It was a minor criminal matter, and I never got into the jury box. Pretty sure I would have been dismissed anyways. I studied for two days and then got to play some pokers on Wednesday night and Thursday. My wife had her sisters in town, and they spent the weekend in Los Angeles, so I had the kids the rest of the weekend.
Thursday night was an interesting night to stay the least. Machine gun Peter was in the house and lagging it up in the 8/16 game with a big stack of chips. I, of course get a seat in the game, and have minor position on Peter (8) vs (2). Most of the players in that game have no idea how to deal with Peter's aggression and fold way too much to him, or play back at him at the wrong times and allow Peter to own them.
I, however, get to simply own Peter, over and over again. And he doesn't seem to adjust. I end up winning $1,441 in 3.5 hours. Eventually Peter gets moved over to the main game, and I follow him over about 30 minutes later. In the main game, Peter's big stack is now down to less than a rack. Peter's been chirping all night about getting a 15/30 6-max game fired up.
Eventually the game goes at 12:30am, starting 6 handed. This time Peter has position on me (1) v. (5), but it doesn't matter. He literally DID NOT FOLD A HAND PREFLOP for the 4 hours that I played. When you're up against Machine Gun, you need to make a hand.
I ran good, won $1,565 in 4 hours and booked it and got into bed a little after 5 am. Always seems to happen, when I need to be up early the morning, a great game breaks out that I have to leave early. Probably for the best anyways, but I really didn't want to leave that game. I would've left earlier, but Cabbie Dave made a cameo appearance and blasted off his deposit in about 40 minutes.
Back to school starting today, thankfully.
Thursday night was an interesting night to stay the least. Machine gun Peter was in the house and lagging it up in the 8/16 game with a big stack of chips. I, of course get a seat in the game, and have minor position on Peter (8) vs (2). Most of the players in that game have no idea how to deal with Peter's aggression and fold way too much to him, or play back at him at the wrong times and allow Peter to own them.
I, however, get to simply own Peter, over and over again. And he doesn't seem to adjust. I end up winning $1,441 in 3.5 hours. Eventually Peter gets moved over to the main game, and I follow him over about 30 minutes later. In the main game, Peter's big stack is now down to less than a rack. Peter's been chirping all night about getting a 15/30 6-max game fired up.
Eventually the game goes at 12:30am, starting 6 handed. This time Peter has position on me (1) v. (5), but it doesn't matter. He literally DID NOT FOLD A HAND PREFLOP for the 4 hours that I played. When you're up against Machine Gun, you need to make a hand.
I ran good, won $1,565 in 4 hours and booked it and got into bed a little after 5 am. Always seems to happen, when I need to be up early the morning, a great game breaks out that I have to leave early. Probably for the best anyways, but I really didn't want to leave that game. I would've left earlier, but Cabbie Dave made a cameo appearance and blasted off his deposit in about 40 minutes.
Back to school starting today, thankfully.
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
Random Musings
Things are going well for me. I successfully finished my first semester of law school. I rocked it grades wise. I received a CALI award for one of my classes. I had heard about these in passing but didn't really know what it was until I got an e-mail indicating that I had received one. Apparently, it's somewhat of a big deal, so that's cool. And I got an invitation from the school to be a legal research assistant, based on at least one professor's recommendation. So that's cool, too. Although I am worried about committing too much time to different things next year, so I haven't really decided if I am going to do that, yet.
I haven't been playing much lately. With my school schedule being so full, I have been scheduling all of my interviews for Fridays after my morning class, so I haven't gotten too many hours in since I started interviewing. Since January 31st I have had three interviews on each successive Friday. Two in San Diego, one in Los Angeles. I feel like all of them went really well, but we'll see. The LA firm called me back today and let me know they'd be sending me an official offer letter in the mail. Not sure how much time I'll have to respond. Hopefully, enough that the other firms will still have time to give me an offer so I can choose wisely. No interview scheduled for this Friday, but I am really interested in at least two other firms and I am still working on getting interviews with them as well.
Poker-wise, I've only put in 19.5 hours of play in since January 31st. I have won 11.25k in that time span, but am still stuck 4 figures on the year. Go figure. Why? One bad session of 75-150 will do that to you. Oh well. Last Friday, Valentine's Day, I wasn't even planning on playing. I got home around 6:30 from my interview and had dinner with my family. Unfortunately, my wife wasn't feeling the greatest, and she went to bed early. I figured I would too, when I got the magic text that the game was super good and I needed to get my butt up there.
So I did, and I won a little over 5k in 4 hours. That's pretty good.
Spring break is coming up soon, my appellate brief is due before then, and then just oral arguments are left and then Legal Writing & Research will be done for the semester. Which will free up my Fridays after that, so I should be able to start the 40 games on Fridays. During spring break, I have jury duty scheduled for Monday. That should be an interesting experience, particularly if I actually make it into a jury box and have to go through the potential juror interview. And my wife is planning a trip to Los Angeles to visit her sisters for the weekend, so I will have the kids all weekend. If everything plays out ok, and I can massage my wife, I might try and sneak in a trip to Vegas. Probably not, but I'll keep my fingers crossed. Even if I don't, my birthday gift from myself via my wife's blessing, of getting tickets for opening weekend of March Madness at Viejas arena in late March makes up for it.
Ok, that's enough of an update for now. Run well, know when to value bet ace-high, and when to fold middle pair and you'll never be a loser.
I haven't been playing much lately. With my school schedule being so full, I have been scheduling all of my interviews for Fridays after my morning class, so I haven't gotten too many hours in since I started interviewing. Since January 31st I have had three interviews on each successive Friday. Two in San Diego, one in Los Angeles. I feel like all of them went really well, but we'll see. The LA firm called me back today and let me know they'd be sending me an official offer letter in the mail. Not sure how much time I'll have to respond. Hopefully, enough that the other firms will still have time to give me an offer so I can choose wisely. No interview scheduled for this Friday, but I am really interested in at least two other firms and I am still working on getting interviews with them as well.
Poker-wise, I've only put in 19.5 hours of play in since January 31st. I have won 11.25k in that time span, but am still stuck 4 figures on the year. Go figure. Why? One bad session of 75-150 will do that to you. Oh well. Last Friday, Valentine's Day, I wasn't even planning on playing. I got home around 6:30 from my interview and had dinner with my family. Unfortunately, my wife wasn't feeling the greatest, and she went to bed early. I figured I would too, when I got the magic text that the game was super good and I needed to get my butt up there.
So I did, and I won a little over 5k in 4 hours. That's pretty good.
Spring break is coming up soon, my appellate brief is due before then, and then just oral arguments are left and then Legal Writing & Research will be done for the semester. Which will free up my Fridays after that, so I should be able to start the 40 games on Fridays. During spring break, I have jury duty scheduled for Monday. That should be an interesting experience, particularly if I actually make it into a jury box and have to go through the potential juror interview. And my wife is planning a trip to Los Angeles to visit her sisters for the weekend, so I will have the kids all weekend. If everything plays out ok, and I can massage my wife, I might try and sneak in a trip to Vegas. Probably not, but I'll keep my fingers crossed. Even if I don't, my birthday gift from myself via my wife's blessing, of getting tickets for opening weekend of March Madness at Viejas arena in late March makes up for it.
Ok, that's enough of an update for now. Run well, know when to value bet ace-high, and when to fold middle pair and you'll never be a loser.
Sunday, January 26, 2014
I'm still alive
Don't worry. I am still alive and kicking. Just been extremely busy. I know that I owe you all a trip report from my Vegas jaunt in December, and it will be forthcoming here eventually. Let's just say it was a profitable trip. I made legendary craps status twice for 50/100/50 on this silly bet. First time I hit it, I need to roll 1,1. Second time I hit it all I had left was 6,6. Fitting and symmetric, so I was stoked about that little bit of yin-yang in my gambling life.
As for law school, first semester grades are in and I rocked it. 3.85 GPA. Here's how that compares to last year's class after first year classes. A in Criminal Law. A in Civil Procedure. A- in Torts. A- in Legal Writing and Research. I am very stoked about the A- in Torts. I got a B on the midterm in that class, and to pull off an A-, means I must have absolutely rocked the final! And I am very happy with the A- in Legal Writing and Research. I did very middle of the pack on our first two graded assignments in that class as well, as I adjusted to how to properly do legal writing, and I rocked the final paper, getting the second or third highest grade in the class.
As to be expected in a competitive law school, there is a flip side to that coin. For everyone who did well, there is likely someone who did not do as well. And there really is no upside to disseminating your grades to others in your class. If you did extremely well, it only breeds contempt, jealousy, and other potentially negative feelings. If you did poorly, well everyone is going to think you're an idiot. So if anyone asks, the best response to give is a well thought out neutral response, such as, "I think I got the grades that I deserved and am happy with how I did." Hopefully, that's neutral enough.
I am well into my summer job search. Given my background, I have been using a different strategy than is typical for most 1L's. After extensive consultation with the career services offices, I have been applying for the nation-wide and very competitive diversity fellowships and patent fellowships that various big law firms offer to 1L's. I think I have reasonable chance, but am for sure not banking on that. I have been contacting partners directly who are in charge of the practice groups, or are big enough fish to have some clout at their firms. I have had about a 50% response rate of some sort from all e-mails I have sent out. I have already had one phone interview, have a second phone interview tomorrow, and an on-site interview with the same firm that phone interviewed me already on Friday, and I'm in the process of lining up another interview in Los Angeles too. All with top tier big law firms in the intellectual property space. So I am super stoked about that. I'd like to have all my employment stuff wrapped up before spring break, so I can just enjoy the break and focus on my studies and finals and not worry about where I'll be working for the summer.
All right, break over. Time to read some Constitutional Law, which by the way, is by far the most interesting class I have this semester.
As for law school, first semester grades are in and I rocked it. 3.85 GPA. Here's how that compares to last year's class after first year classes. A in Criminal Law. A in Civil Procedure. A- in Torts. A- in Legal Writing and Research. I am very stoked about the A- in Torts. I got a B on the midterm in that class, and to pull off an A-, means I must have absolutely rocked the final! And I am very happy with the A- in Legal Writing and Research. I did very middle of the pack on our first two graded assignments in that class as well, as I adjusted to how to properly do legal writing, and I rocked the final paper, getting the second or third highest grade in the class.
As to be expected in a competitive law school, there is a flip side to that coin. For everyone who did well, there is likely someone who did not do as well. And there really is no upside to disseminating your grades to others in your class. If you did extremely well, it only breeds contempt, jealousy, and other potentially negative feelings. If you did poorly, well everyone is going to think you're an idiot. So if anyone asks, the best response to give is a well thought out neutral response, such as, "I think I got the grades that I deserved and am happy with how I did." Hopefully, that's neutral enough.
I am well into my summer job search. Given my background, I have been using a different strategy than is typical for most 1L's. After extensive consultation with the career services offices, I have been applying for the nation-wide and very competitive diversity fellowships and patent fellowships that various big law firms offer to 1L's. I think I have reasonable chance, but am for sure not banking on that. I have been contacting partners directly who are in charge of the practice groups, or are big enough fish to have some clout at their firms. I have had about a 50% response rate of some sort from all e-mails I have sent out. I have already had one phone interview, have a second phone interview tomorrow, and an on-site interview with the same firm that phone interviewed me already on Friday, and I'm in the process of lining up another interview in Los Angeles too. All with top tier big law firms in the intellectual property space. So I am super stoked about that. I'd like to have all my employment stuff wrapped up before spring break, so I can just enjoy the break and focus on my studies and finals and not worry about where I'll be working for the summer.
All right, break over. Time to read some Constitutional Law, which by the way, is by far the most interesting class I have this semester.
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