juris doctor

I am officially a juris doctor! I've graduated from law school. I made it! These past three years were full of struggle, but also full of learning and fulfillment. Most of all, I feel like I went through so much human revolution. I came to know myself and my surrounding, and I built a sense of courage to tackle the next obstacles in front of me. I had a grad party yesterday, mostly with SGI folk, and it was the most fun I've had in quite a while. Being in a room full of celebrating Buddhists is so encouraging. I had so much appreciation for their support over these past three years - I have no doubt that, without their continued mother-like support, I would not have even challenged law school. Instead, I peaced out with a strong sense of self and with a more profound mission.

Okaasan & Otousan!

Forever AD Senpai.

APALSA

Enjoying the Harbor after graduation

This diploma is freaking huge

Post finals

I'm sitting on my bed listening to greeeen and reading Dostoyevsky, sipping on some good tea. Going to see some Schumann with my mom in an hour or so. It's a beautiful day outside and just came back from a home visit. 've been busy working and joyfully participating in SGI activities. Struggling together with my YMD and chanting to breakthrough with them! In this moment, I feel regret free and singlemindedly focused on kosenrufu. This is a damn good way to live.

勝利

I am done with law school, my most painful yet human-revolution-inducing three year experience. It hasn't yet hit me, but I will no longer be assessed based on my grades relative to others, save for the Bar Exam. I am no longer a student!

To my surprise, after taking my last exam, I returned to an email notifying me that I will be receiving a law school award. I'm ecstatic, but all I could think of was, this is for my mentor, my friends, family, and for all the SGI members who take care of me with their entire being. I appreciate them so much. What a complete 180 degrees since my first year.

More to come later.

final assignments & coffee

My [last] semester is winding down and finals are approaching.  Given that I front-loaded my work this semester, as I frequently try to do, I have a vastly easier time than most of my classmates.  In fact, I only have one final exam for Evidence, which I am taking on a pass-fail standard (though I seem to be taking that for granted a little too much).  However, that's not to say that I don't feel my share of discomfort.  

I still have a few more assignments left for my Real Estate Drafting class and for my Teaching Fellow Seminar.  And I'm not exactly a master of the the multiple choice exam, which is the form my Evidence Final will take.  So, I've been a little more strict with myself in terms of studying and finishing up my last few assignments for school.  

This entails drinking coffee.  Today, I found myself going to Starbucks once for a Grande Java Chip Frap, another time for a Tall Mocha Frap, then to the School's Cafe for a Tall Coffee.  Now I feel wired, and I feel good, actually.  I bow down to coffee, though I've been trying hard to get off of it.  

back from DC

That was a little bit of a stressful weekend, and now I'm glad it's done!  Here's how it went down.  My team and I won all of our oral arguments, but failed to advance to the final rounds because our brief score was a little too low. That's kind of surprising considering my incompetence in public speaking but, hey, maybe it's in the eye of the beholder.  In retrospect, I should have spent a little more time on the brief.  We ended up missing out of the final rounds by .222 points.  If we had overcome that hurdle, it would have been substantially easier for us to win the competition because the later rounds only took into account oral argument scores. But what's done is done, and I'm really glad to have participated!

The hotel we stayed at, the "W," was the most pretentious hotel I've ever stayed in. As I blogged about a while back, this is a hotel that's next to the white house, so you have dip-kids and rich fellas staying there and partying.  Everything costed an arm and a leg, but lacked all functionality whatsoever.  It's hard to describe the hotel, but let me just comment that you could hear people getting busy in the next room, and two of my teammates ended up staying in a room with a see-thru shower - haha.

All in all, I really enjoyed my time! The team really connected and I know that I'll cherish the late hours and we spent in our hotel rooms practicing with loose ties and shaggy looks.  Oh, and Harvard ended up finishing as one of the bottom teams.

ready, set ...

Go! I'm going to DC on thursday after preparing endlessly for this moot court competition. My team and I have been hammering our oral arguments left and right day in and day out for that past month, and it's been exhausting. We're finally at the [start of] the finish line. My two other teammates will be arguing on thursday and I will be arguing on friday.  If we advance, we argue three more times on Saturday. It's going to be a crazy few days, but we've prepared so much not to do well.  The good thing is that I seem to have peaked at the right moment. After multiple miserable attempts at arguing my position, I think I have finally have a good handle on all of the issues - now I can simply speak without having to really think so much. So, to the extent that I understand the issue well enough, I feel more relaxed and calm.

Please root for us! We'll be going up against the likes of Harvard, so it'll be one heck of a ride, but I'm confident that we'll prevail!

5 cases and a salad

We had our APALSA 2nd annual banquet yesterday and it was a total success. Admittedly, I didn't do much, but I was glad to be a part of something close-to-inaugural. The keynote spoke about re-defining our identities as Asian Americans and looking beyond our events as simple networking opportunities. There was much more to it than that, but in my simple-minded fashion, I've condensed the half-hour talk into a single sentence for brevity and for a lack of time. Although perhaps in direct violation of the keynote's guidance, I was able to meet a partner at a law firm who works in land use - she gave me her card.

I'm juggling five different cases right now, though luckily I'm not arguing all of them.  One is Miranda case, another is a Fourth Amendment with aspects of warrentless arrests and probable cause, the third is First Amendment and Ripeness, another has to do with standing, and yet another is a statutory problem relating to property in the city. This weekend at least one of those will be off my mind after doing oral arguments in DC.  My mind is about to explode with the number of facts I have to remember, but I do feel that I'm getting better at retaining information, which is good considering that I'm taking the ridiculous MPREs again the weekend after next.  

Late nights have been messing up my sleeping patterns for a while. The other day I enjoyed a late night/early morning salad. A big salad.

a fleeting moment of relaxation

It's 12am and it's my new bed time. Today was a whacky day. I stayed up until 4am yesterday finishing a drafting assignment, which was really fun. I never thought that organizing words on a piece of paper could be so enjoyable, but I was clearly mistaken. But because of my late night adventures with my paper and pen, I was forced to skip my 8:45am class today. Actually, my body woke me up at 8am, but it was already too late to get to class on time. And in retrospect, I'm glad that I gave my body a rest.  I got to school around 11am, began my office hours at the writing center, but failed to really do anything productive on an empty stomach.  I later intended to attend a meeting, except that I realized after arriving that the other person had postponed the meeting. Wasted time. Then, I attempted to do my homework for my next class, but the my body gave way and I ended up falling asleep in the APALSA office. I somehow got my homework finished, but I had completely forgotten about our moot court class, which occurs every thursday. How I forgot about a regularly scheduled meeting I can only be due to the wear I am causing my body. Guys, I'm exhausted.

I got home after class, immediately started preparing for a moot we're doing with another team tomorrow, and did the daimoku for about 30 min, until midnight. And now I type away to reveal my day's musings. I don't know how I ended up on youtube before writing this entry, but I randomly found Utada Hikaru's "Goodbye Happiness." I've never heard of the song, but the randomness of it all, and the upbeat tempo helped me relax in way I can't really describe. Here ya go.




And here's one her classics. It reminds me of junior year of college...

MICA. BSO. flute. productivity. drafting.

This morning I visited MICA, or the Maryland Institute College of Art, one the nation's best Art schools. It was so nice to be an environment that is founded on creativity and learning rather than rigidity and competition.  I found the idea of creating art as a homework assignment really .... cool.  The reason I was there was to attend their Buddhist club meeting, which was well-attended, partly due to club leaders' amazing enthusiasm and diligence.  They took me on an a mini-unofficial-tour of the campus - It's a wonder that I've never stepped foot on campus ever since coming back from SUA - MICA's only a 5min drive from my school.

Speaking of MICA, I'll be visiting a nearby symphony center called the "Meyerhoff" to watch the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra perform.  My mom and I bought a "three for $75."  I've always had some appreciation for classical music, but I never knew anything about it.  For some reason "classical" always conjured up images of Charlie Chaplin. In any case, we're going to be enjoying some Rachmaninoff (performed on piano by Yuja Wang, an amazing young pianist who I've seen on youtube - see below), Brahms, and Schuuman.

Meyerhoff Symphony Center. Credits: rocketwords.com

Yuja's Turkish March is particularly good. As for flute music, here are two prodigies below who are famous on youtube. I haven't been able to practice as much as I have wanted to lately, but partly because of the onslaught of recent obligations (see post below).  I need to buy my next lesson book.

Finally, here's a random piece from 耳をすませば, which I randomly found while watching the above videos. Ghibli always makes me feel the world is vast.



Productivity.  I've had to adjust my demanding schedule and so, I've been sleeping at midnight and waking up at 5:30 over the past two weeks. It actually feels wonderful. I've also been trying my best to eat [large] salads for lunch, and eat breakfast.  It was difficult at first to discipline myself to do this, but once I got rolling, it was easy.  I had a lot more energy and could concentrate on my work for longer periods of time.  I also cut out coffee, which does wonders.  In sum, I'm evolving into an aged woman.  One thing I could still use is some exercise, though.  Between interning, SGI activities, and school, it's impossible to find time to exercise.

I'll finish up this post by stating just how fun drafting is.  Litigation is over-rated.  It's extremely fun, but it takes a toll on you.  You have to constantly deal with people, but I get a social-overload between all my other activities lol.  So, I prefer having fun organizing words on paper.

tumblr reluctance and my schedule

I am reluctant to switch over the tumblr, despite its sleek templates. The biggest problem with tumblr is that you can't follow blogs that are not, as they call it, "tumbleblogs." That's a little disappointing, and a little too commercial in nature for me. Also, there's something about tumblr that makes me more prone to post shorter and no-brainer posts. That's not to say that I post anything particularly meaningful here, but at least I attempt to write somewhat longer posts. You don't really get the same feeling of a "blog" on tumblr; it feels more like a impromptu brain-splatter of sorts. It's twitter on steroids.

Blogger has not caused me any trouble, and in fact, I kind of like the free form of it all. I have faith in Google that it will make any changes necessary to keep pace with competition. 

Aside from all this talk about blogs, I'm in a little bit of a rut right now. There are so many things to do...

(1) moot court competition: practicing oral arguments before the competition in DC during the last week of Feb

(2) work as the advocacy chair: Coordinating oral arguments for first year students and fixing up the 

(3) Writing Fellow work: Preparing a presentation on "motion-memo to appellate brief," and scheduling sessions with my students in Section D2 by end of Feb.

(4) Finishing projects for my internship at City Law Dept by the end of Feb.

(5) MPREs (again!): I need the last week of Feb to study for it

(6) Multiple class tests/projects: Evidence test and Real Estate drafting

(7) March 16th meetings

(8) GKI exhibition preparation

(9) Bar applications: Why the heck do I need to submit a traffic citation docket report from seven years back in Laguna Hills?

(10) job search: the never ending and looming boulder atop my head!

I need to shorten my hours at my internship. Otherwise, I'll never be able to do all of this! NMRK.

electric typewriters

I never knew there was such a thing. But alas, I see my supervisors using them all the time at work. Yes, they use typewriters.  I was shocked . . . except that when I remembered how poorly funded the city was, I decided not to ask my boss about it.  But my bewilderment must have shown because she smiled and told me not how useful they still were. Apparently, the attorneys use it when they are handed a physical form to fill out and they need to type out in the information.

So I told her how I used to use a typewriter when I was young, but more for purposes of having fun of course... Anyway, I remember having to manually scroll the wheel on the side in order to move the paper up and pushing the bar back to the left to position the keys; in other words, the combination of those tasks acted as the "enter" key. I also remember having to line up the holes on the sides of the paper with the spikes on the interior side of the wheel of the typewriter.

But then my boss showed me the typewriter she was using. Yes, it was an electric typewriter. I've never heard of such a thing ... They are a lot bulkier and look more commercial than its mobile counterpart. Instead of a wheel and a bar, the electric power has the 4-D keypad like laptops, which allow you to position the keys in the proper location. I started to see how the typewriter slowly but surely evolved into the modern day computer.

Okay, enough about the typewriter. My boss also took me around to some of the other locations I would need to go to for work, such as land records, accounting, etc. Most of these places were located in the circuit court for Baltimore city, which is located immediately west of city hall. I wasn't expecting too much, but I had forgotten that this building was listed as a historic site. It is over 100 years old, and it looks absolutely beautiful. Think DC architecture on the outside and Hogwarts on the inside (including some scary pictures of old people on the walls).

Alright. It's snowing heavily outside, and I've been lucky enough to have some time to catch up somethings I need to get done. Which reminds me that I've been so exhausted these past two days because it takes me an hour and half to get from my door to work (30 min of walking)! That essentially means I get up at 5:30am, which, for many working people, is not so bad.  Except that my body has not yet adjusted, it's cold as hell outside (5-10F), and the additional school work at night is killer. Though I'm sure I'll be alright.

i could get used to this

I may have forgotten to follow up about the three interviews I had for spring semester jobs. Two were with law firms and another was with the city. I got the city one, and I love it.

The rejection I received from the small law firm was the nicest rejection I have gotten. The guy actually called me to tell me that I didn't get the job, but explained to me exactly his reasons for choosing someone else. Even  during the interview I felt like this was someone I could work with. I definitely felt the collegiality of the small law firm culture. Although I would have liked to have worked for them, it may have been a little far. It's in Annapolis, and driving their a few days a week would be hell. A very long and congested one at that.

The bigger law firm, like most other established private firms, did not call back. The interviewer was surprisingly nice, but I felt like he did not want to become too invested in the interview. I mentioned this a couple of posts back, but this firm was not one that practiced in the field that I was interested in, so perhaps it was a good thing that I wasn't going to be stuck doing something that I didn't enjoy. Actually, that's a very good thing.

However, I got the semester job with the City working on land use issues, and I have fallen in love with it. I had said earlier that I felt somehow uncomfortable with the marble flooring and the sparkling nameplates I found at the larger firm above. This place, for the obvious reason that it's the city government, is not on same bandwidth. Instead, city hall is architecturally beautiful, but the interior looks like an apartment building from the early 90s. Not-quite-white walls, warm lighting, unpolished windows, and a lot of brown folders - the ones with the string attached to them. I love it - it feels like we're doing something valuable.

More importantly, the work I'm doing is extremely interesting. The specific practice group I work with is the Land Use Practice Group. They work on eminent domain (takings, condemnation, expropriations, whatever you wanna call it), zoning and planning (variances, special exemptions, conditional uses, etc), and environmental assessment (environmental impact statements, building codes, etc) in the context of urban real estate development. That... is exactly what I want to do! I could get used to this!

the beginning of the end

The 2011 spring semester has started. This is my last semester of law school, hopefully. To be very frank, I'm done with school. As much as I enjoy the idea of setting my own schedule, that freedom has largely been undermined by my need for experience. This semester, as always, I've committed any available time outside of class to extern.

credits:  cheesyflix.com

Once again, I'll have to face the obstacle of constantly transitioning between work and school, which is, for some reason, very difficult for me. When I study, I do it rather awkwardly. For whatever reason, I understand the material better if I binge study and rest, on and off. For example, I will study a particular subject for hours, then rest for long periods of time , as opposed to balancing my time studying throughout the day or week. I guess this allows my brain to soak it in and understand on a subconscious level. Whatever the science says, this is my ideal style of studying. Let me just make clear here that I used to beat myself up for "resting" and I would force myself in front of the desk. But I soon discovered this to be counter-productive, and that, in fact, during my "resting" period I was actually thinking deeply about the material (like a mad man, I wake up in the middle of the night more often than I would like because my brain is, I believe, trying to make sense of everything).

However, working obviously takes time. And since I cannot afford to refrain from studying, I will dedicate my "resting/soaking in" time to work, simply because I need more experience (side note: the pains of attending law school directly out of college - I HIGHLY recommend working beforehand, or obtaining a useful degree if the financial circumstances are ripe). Thus, the problem is clear: I have time to binge study, but no more time understand the material because I have to work.

Study or Work. Must do both! But this day marks the beginning of the end of such a time.

International & Comparative Law Clinic

I'm happy to announce that the University of Maryland School of Law became one of the premiere public interest law schools in the nation.  As many of you know, I had the fortune to be able to pioneer the international and comparative law clinic at my school.  I went to China with my professors and dug deep into some research regarding microfinance development in the country.  We met with underprivileged citizens, government officials, nonprofit leaders, and bank officials.

The clinic is one of the a kind because it actually sends students abroad to do legal work.  Other students went to Namibia and Mexico to work on labor laws.  Truly, this is one of the few instances where students can actually practice "international law" - the nebulous and amoebic field.  You can catch our story on page 3 and 25-30 of Pre-Law magazine, which you can find HERE.  I am planning to send a copy to Sensei.

footnote

I switched to chrome. It's beyond fast, but it's missing a few things. For example, why can't I make my bookmarks "bar" into an icon? The extra line is unnecessary. Also, why isn't there an easy accessible zoom button? Com'mon google, let's keep pace.

I've also been MIA for a few days because I had to finish a brief with my moot court teammates. The content is good, but as always, we gave ourselves a heart-attack by submitting it 4-min before its due. We were also forced to priority-overnight ship the physical bound copies. The school better reimburse. 

Because our schedules didn't match, my team and I collaborated over google docs, which is the absolutely amazing.  I always knew hat you could collaborate real-time, but actually doing it is an entirely different story. With that being said, when we copied our text from google docs to WORD, there were a few things that didn't translate over (if any of you care - if you save the google document as a pdf or doc instead of copying into Adobe Acrobat or Word, it will indeed transfer all data correctly). The most heartbreaking thing was that, in our rush to submit our brief, we didn't realize that my footnote didn't transfer over.

I can't explain to you how disappointed I am about my footnote. I will not be humble. It was an amazing footnote. It was well-research, well-cited, well-written and discussed a controversial issue of individual constitutional rights. I even cited a case in which Nike was involved. I know you all think I'm going crazy, but this footnote was the work of a saint, and it was my baby.  I will never live this up. 

overindulgence

I am waiting for a journal article to print from WestLawNext (a new god-like legal research system. West - you are in the same company as google, my friend), so I'll take a moment to share my two cents on the hotel my team and I are staying at in later february for a moot court competition. The venue is the nation's capital, and I believe the competition is taking place in the DC Superior Court. The hotel we're staying at is the "W Hotel," owned by starwoods hotels - a titan in the hotel industry. It owns Le Meridien, Westin, Shertaon, and many other brands. Here' s a pic:

credit: http://www.lusix.com/

Here's a piece describing the hotel in its 2009 debut:

"[T]he W Hotel in Washington, D.C opened this past Thursday with a giant bash. It was a jam-packed party full of the town's political elite, including Presidential Aide Reggie Love and the President's personal secretary Katie Johnson, as well as celebs like Emmy Rossum who flocked to hear an intimate performance by John Legend. In an event that brought Versailles to Washington, the party was full of Marie Antoinette models sporting powdered wigs and opera glasses while guests sipped on pink cocktails and munched on cotton candy."

I don't know about you, but I am not a political elite. And I certainly cannot afford $350 a night. I'm not sure why law schools insist on fooling themselves into thinking that its students are entitled to great luxury. As I see it, we are ill-trained lawyers-to-be competing in a tournament that is based on fiction. How much more can we lie to ourselves? Apparently, enough to believe that we are in the same company as Obama.

credits: http://www.kimbercymarie.com/

credits: http://www.kiwicollection.com/

Why we need such accommodations I do not know. I am baffled. But since this is being paid for, I say "keep it coming!" Justin had the the idea of shooting a documentary during my multi-day competition. I will follow his guidance.

festivities

I haven't written in this digital diary in a while, so here's a bit of an update. Christmas happened. I don't remember what I did aside from doing some work, but I did eat some おでん that my mom made. There is perhaps nothing better on a winter day than crowding around a boiling plate with japanese vegetables crammed into it. The daikon was especially good.

I wrote holiday cards to chapter and district leaders, but my hand is about to fall off.

Sachiko also came by and we did the DC thing. She didn't seem to interested in the Smithsonians, which is a bummer given that DC is known for its museums and politics. But Eppon joined halfway and we made it fun. However, we watched the most boring IMAX film that ever existed. The movie was entitled "Legends of the Flight, 3D." It was about the evolution of airliners. And no, it did not have to be in 3D. In fact, Sachiko, Eppon, and Justin all fell asleep - though, to be fair, we were tired from walking 20,000 steps across the National Mall, according to the iPhone.  In addition to the DC tour, we joined my momin making some もち (mochi), which are japanese rice cakes. I also went undefeated in Othello and Checkers against Sachiko.

もち

 

@ the small chinese restaurant we ate at in chinatown. The food was delicious. Though, when the owner spoke to me in Mandarin, I froze up. I am ashamed. 



@ the National Archives.  Spady would love this.

I had another interview with a small firm in Annapolis, and really, I am looking forward to hearing back from them. They do work both in litigation and land use, which is a perfect fit for me. After reflecting on the interview, I wanted to redo it because I felt I spoke with some pretence, as if I catered my answers to the interviewer's liking - though in fact I was attempting to be myself. But what is done is done, and I can only chant that receive positive feedback.

I received my score back from my MPRE, an attorney ethics exam required in most states, but I didn't do so well. Apparently I am not ethical. In any case, I'm not too concerned about these results because the exam is not requried in Maryland (though it is in the majority of states). I will take it again in March, unless the recheck of my scores that I requested comes back with more positive results.

With all that being said, let's usher in the new year of Capable People and Dynamic Development! Let's make our SGI family worthy of the title "Soka Youth Gakkai"!

the city is not a place for kids, Rocky, Pengin

There are so many things wrong with cities, at least for a kid from the 'burbs. I just had my interview with the city (which went surprisingly well... more on that and my interview with the firm on friday to come at a later post) and I needed to be at the school for a moot court meeting at 5pm - five hours after the end of my interview. Okay, no big deal, I'll just park somewhere.

Except that all street parking anywhere remotely close to my school was taken. Okay, I'll go look for a garage. Do you know how many garages need student permits? (I had one, except that we entered winter break). Alright, two strikes - I'll go look for a garage a little farther away that doesn't need a permit. Twenty dollars?! Gimme a break. I then took an unnecessary tour of the city looking for a spot that would welcome my 94 civic.

After some time, I was fortunate enough to find street parking right across my school, but alas, it was two hours. Bmore, my friend, can you lend a ninja some slack? Being lazy, I acquiesced and just parked my soon-to-die 'Queen Elizabeth' at the spot, knowing very well that I had to come out every two hours to feed the meter. Oh, and I forgot to mention that I can't park here from 4-6pm, so I'll have to recon the city again.

So I sit here in school pouting over some Mickey Dee's Crispy Chicken, and thinking, what am I doing in the law library during winter vacation? Ah~, I feel like Rocky in Rocky Balboa, going up against a challenge I'm not conditioned for and competing with students that are on a different level. But then I am reminded that Rocky was only worried about "getting stronger":




Julie, with her love forwedding songs, shared this single by Pengin (feat. U, who I believe is Yamada Yuu, the actress) with me. It's catchy. Enjoy!

winter vacation?

I can't tell if I'm on vacation or not. On one hand, I'm not attending class, but on the hand, I'm doing just as much work as if it was still October! But admittedly, I am enjoying the white december and reading Dostoevsky instead of a majority decision packed into these unnecessarily thick hardbacks. And, I get to enjoy the niceties of staying within the borders of my cosy home, including the きつねうどん (is this not the mark of youth?)

It is cold. Extremely cold. But as I shiver into infinity, I can't help but think that my days of drinking coffee while doing school work will come to a halting stop in May.

By the way, would anybody have some recommendations for some good quality headphones? Not for running, but to sport with my future mp3 player/phone and for my computer? They don't have to be audiophile headphones, nor do they have to really heavy duty. I'm looking for something I keep around my neck, but nothing that looks breakable. Any suggestions are appreciated :). Generally, I like stuff from audiocubes.

interviews with myself

I have two interviews. The first one is for a law clerk (a term for short-term associate, usually during school) position with a D.C. metro firm doing litigation and estate planning. That is on Friday. The second one is for an externship position with the city working on land use and real estate issues. That is on Monday.

Sorry I can't be more specific - it's not because I don't want to share, but it's because I am, in a certain respect, not allowed to. As an aside, I'm in a bit of a quagmire with respect to writing a blog because there are employers who hound the Internet for info.

But let me digress a little. I got both calls over the last week, and while it feels awkward, it feels right. I've been dishing out resumes and cover letters left and right and it was, at first, a viciously unnerving experience. However, as I continued to bring these setbacks into the context of my faith and chanted for the happiness of myself and my YMD, I felt a sense of mission to turn poison into medicine. As some of you may know, entering prof school was a ride, to say the least, but as my law school career comes to an end, I can clearly identify the moments where I broke through my own karma to create tangible results. My point is, whether these interviews go well or not, I intend to show who I have become through these experiences to the interviewers - to that extent, these are interviews with myself.

Now, back to the actual jobs. I went to the firm's office today, just to make sure I knew where it was, and jeez... you can definitely see the difference between the private and public sector... Marble flooring, glass everywhere, shiny nameplates, and a mammoth building. I felt out of place with my American eagle checkered shirt. The job entails a lot of research and writing, which I am confident in doing, but it is also admittedly in a field that I am not too familiar with - estates and trusts. But they know that based on my application, so I know there is a reason they want to speak with me. Litigation, on the other hand, is something I have substantial experience in, albeit not in the private sector. On a more general level, I'm really excited about interviewing here. This is a mid-size and growing firm, and it's conveniently right outside DC.

The city job is in a field that I am extremely interested in (land use). I've had a fair amount of academic training in the field as a research assistant and clinic student, but not professional experience. But, if I'm able to step my foot in here, it would be invaluable insofar as land use law is practiced on the municipal level. To make a comparison, if someone wanted to make themselves the most marketable to get a federal tax law job, it would be in their best interest to work for the IRS, or perhaps the SEC.

Time to chant and face myself!