The Pennsylvania Bar Exam results were posted today. A list is released, and on that list are all the names of people who passed the test…

I was on the list.

Wow, take two years between updating the music section of the web site and then I get right back at it four days later!

Anyway, there are demo-sounding versions of “Ain’t It a Shame,” a song I recently wrote, and “China Girl” in the music section now. I sing on both of them, so that should satisfy those of you that had gripes about the lack of my vocals.

Okay, so I haven’t really updated this site in about two years. But today I made a minor update. I added two songs to the “Music” page (you can find the link at the top of this page… it says “Music”).

The two songs are both covers, but they are from the band I am in (I do not sing on either of these tracks, though I do sing on other things we do). They are live recordings from when we were hosting an open mic night, but I think they are not too bad. They will be the songs listed lowest on the page (”Come Together” and “Little Wing”). And just so you know, they are pretty big file sizes (both about 9mb).

Does the band have a name? Yes, it does. I’ll post an announcement about that later on… we are planning a bit of a party for it.

So, we’ve continued to play the open mic night at Canal Street (Mondays) for eight or nine months running now. But last week we had a drummer play with us. We had only practiced with him once before, but it was pretty cool to have a much fuller sound. I, however, need to get used to there being a drummer because I’m not familiar yet with not really being able to hear what I’m playing (drums are LOUD when you’re a few paces away from them). But, hey, we’re evolving!

Oh, and we don’t play that “American Band” song. It just seemed like a cute headline to use.

Well, I took the bar exam in July… preparing for it was painful. In Pennsylvania there are 22 subject areas that can be tested. That meant basically relearning and reviewing courses I had already taken (most from the first year of law school), as well as learning about subject areas I never had classes on. But the 22 subjects are for the Pennsylvania portion of the bar exam. You see, it is a two-day test with the second day being the Multi-State Bar Exam (a collection of 200 brain-hurting multiple choice questions). The MBE only tests on 6 core subject areas (at least that’s what is advertised… I think I saw one or two questions more in tune with other areas of law).

So how did the bar exam go? That’s a question I get a lot, and the answer is I don’t really know. Results from the exam will not be available until sometime in October. During the exam I felt okay (not great, but okay) for the first day and a half… the last half day was a WTF experience. In the interests of not being foul mouth, I’ll just abbreviate that. I dearly hope and pray I passed the damn thing because I don’t want to have to go through that again. Weeks and weeks of preparation to the exclusion of doing anything resembling fun followed up by two days of testing misery is not something I want to repeat (the test will next be administered in February).

So where am I now? I’m working! I have a job and will soon receive an actual paycheck (something I have not seen in a long time). Of course, if it should turn out that I didn’t pass the exam… well, I’ll probably be clearing my desk off a week or two before my benefits would have kicked in.

Pending any unforeseen colossal mistakes on my part, I will graduate from law school in less than a month. If you have any interest in the graduation ceremony and related information, please feel free to read on!

Temple Law School has finally gotten around to giving me details regarding the graduation ceremony to be held this year (which is May 17). And now I pass this exciting information on to you! Feel free to do with said information as you see fit. Note that my graduation is open to the public and no tickets are needed to attend, which means you can come watch me and however many other people that are graduating receive their juris doctors (or whatever piece of paper they hand you on the stage). What follows is “official” information from Temple Law School:

Graduation Invitation Text (only 10 originals available):

The Faculty and Dean of The Beasley School of Law
Request the Honor of Your Presence at
THE DELIVERY OF DEGREES CEREMONY
Thursday, May 17, 2007
6:00 PM
The Forum at the Liacouras Center
Broad Street and Montgomery Avenue
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Unfortunately the invitation really does not give enough information, so I’ll provide you with move information made available from a blue sheet of paper I was given during my graduation exit interview:

The Law School’s delivery of degrees ceremony will take place at 6:00 p.m. in the Liacouras Center. There is no limit to the number of guests allowed at the Law School ceremony. If you are making plans for later in the evening, the ceremony usually lasts two and one-half hours… The parking garage adjacent to the Liacouras Center has been reserved for our use during the Law School Graduation ceremony. Entrance is on 15th Street between Montgomery & Cecil B. Moore avenues. Guest parking will be available in the Liacouras garage and all other campus lots at $10 per car. Please be sure to leave enough time to get to the ceremony, as traffic will be unusually heavy on that day.

Other things you should know (or at least I think you should know):

* Attendees can begin finding seats in the Liacouras Center at 5:15 p.m.
* The “processional” begins at 6 p.m. (or so they say)
* If you really want to be there in enough time to be seated by 5:15 p.m., I would suggest (if you are driving from the Reading area) to leave by 3 p.m. at the latest (I can already see how this is inconvenient from the standpoint of having a job that doesn’t let out until after 4 p.m. — and watch that traffic will be absurdly light that day and people will be there an hour ahead of time with nothing to do)
* The guest speaker is Philadelphia DA Lynn Abraham
* This is a Thursday night and the ceremony will last until probably after 8:30 p.m., which means you should eat an early dinner or a late lunch.
* Also, it seems somewhat unrealistic to make plans to do anything (like get dinner) following the ceremony since you can’t expect to be getting out of Philly until at least 9 p.m., especially considering most everyone has work or school the following morning (note: It’s a Temple tradition to have graduation on a Thursday)
* There is a university wide graduation ceremony at 10 a.m. the same day as the law school specific graduation. I will not be attending this.
* Here are the official directions to Temple’s main campus (you may still want to mapquest it): http://www.temple.edu/maps/directions/main.htm
* Here is a PDF map of the main campus: http://www.temple.edu/maps/maps/main.pdf
* The degree I am getting is a Juris Doctor, which is a doctoral level degree. Much argument exists as to whether it should be considered as impressive as a Ph.D. or a M.D. All I can tell you is the American Bar Association will sue places if they don’t give it equal treatment to a Ph.D.
* Temple’s law school is named after James Beasley. Beasley graduated from Temple Law School in 1956 and worked as a successful personal injury lawyer in Philadelphia. He made a lot of money and left a $20 million endowment to the school, and now it is named after him.
* I’m very glad to be done with law school. Undergrad was engaging, enlightening, and expanding. Law school was expensive.

Thanks. If anyone would like more detailed information, I’ll do my best to answer your questions.

I’ve posted the a new link under “Pot Luck.” This would be for a site of an artist by the name of Brandon Bird. I don’t know how to categorize this other than to say it is all over the place and made my friend Marlene and myself laugh ourselves silly for a bit while sitting around in the law library. There is a level of non sequitor, kitschy, screwed up genius that I can appreciate in all of this.

There are some highlights, in my opinion:
Letters to Walken
Two Warriors Come Out of the Sky
Law and Order (coloring book)
Law and Order: Special Valentines Unit

How’s this for strange (I have no idea if it is useful):

My Scrabble© Score is: 45. What is your score? Get it here.

It occurs to me that I haven’t written anything on my site in a while (okay, a few months). But things have been busy (and I’ve been lazy with the net thing). So I’ll recap, and then I guess I’ll get back to posting when things strike me as interesting.

Law School
This is my final semester at Temple Law School. I absolutely cannot wait for this to be over. I had a lot of fun in undergrad when I studied literature… I wouldn’t describe law school as fun. It’s a necessary means to an end (the end being enormous debt and taking the bar exam). That is not to say that going to law school and finishing it does not hold great meaning to me. Accomplishing this is an important thing. It has taken a lot of time, work, and dedication to get to this point. I believe it further illustrates my capabilities.

Music
The amateur rock duo I am in is moving along quite well. At this point we basically act as the host group for the Monday night Open Mic at Canal Street Pub & Restaurant (every week from 9-midnight). When last I posted about it, we played like four songs. Since then there have been nights when we’ve played for one to two hours (dependent on how many acts turned out). We’d still like to find a bassist and drummer, but we’re quite happy with how things are going thus far. If we expand into a fuller band at some point, it will happen when it should happen.

Family
My grandmother (my mother’s mother) passed away last month. It was the end of a tough holiday break. Considering the situation, her passing was not a complete shock, but it came much sooner than I would have expected. These things are always difficult, but at least she did not face a long, lingering suffering. It will be strange for all of us that she is no longer with us. I should probably write more about her, but I’m still trying to come to sorts with the entirety of it. Losing my grandmother hurts, but I think it may be more painful knowing my mother has lost her mother (if that makes sense).

Work
At this point, I do not actually work for money. I am however working in a prosecutor-type role, and expect to find such employment after taking the bar exam. It is my decision that I will not mention any details regarding my work on my site. It is not that what I do is not interesting, sometimes it is rather entertaining and/or emotionally compelling. The issue is rather that where I work and what I do are not appropriate topics for Internet bantering on a blog. If you want to hear about what I do, talk to me in person!

Weddings
This is what happens when you get older. Everyone you know seems to wind up getting married or planning a wedding. That being said, I’m single and there are no wedding bells in the near future for me. Please do not have the mistaken belief that my goal is to be a life-long bachelor. This is simply how things are at this time.

Check back later, I’m sure there will be something new to see soon.

Okay, so I haven’t posted anything here for a while. That’s partially because I didn’t have anything to say and because I was too lazy to do so. But I thought I’d mention that I just got back from playing an open mic night with my friend Dan.

We’ve been working on playing different songs for a while and this was our first outing into a public setting. Unfortunately (fortunately?) not many people were there tonight (we played at Canal Street). However, it was a good time. We played two songs I wrote the basic structures to, and two covers - “Wild Horses” and “The Wind Cries Mary.”

I’d tell you what the original songs were, but I haven’t actually named them yet. At present, the plan is to play out again in two weeks at the same place… next Monday is Eagles vs. Packers, and I don’t miss watching games with my father!