Advice for 1L's (taken from the Docket)

Tips For 1L’s

1. As a grizzled veteran of the 1L year/ordeal/civil war, I’d like to offer some advice to the bright-eyed/blissfully unaware of their coming doom/bushy-tailed Class of 2011. It’s not as bad as everyone makes it sound, and if you follow my sage advice it will be even easier. Here are 8 tips to help you make it through: Briefs. Don’t write them. Or wear them. (Wait, I might have to re-think the latter. You’ll eventually need to pass something called “Character and Fitness,” and I don’t think a Britney Spears-esque picture would reflect well on either.) A lot of your professors and friends might tell you that you need to brief every case. Not true. You’re not going to need them come exam time if you take good notes, and who cares if you look like an idiot in class? If anything, your apparent idiocy will lull your classmates into a curve-loosening false sense of self-confidence.
   
2. AEP. I don’t know what this is, since I’ve never actually gone to a meeting. I always thought it was that Jewish fraternity, AEPi, but I think it actually stands for Academic Enhancement Psssssssh. If you’re completely clueless on how to study it could help, but I think you’re better off friending an upperclassmen who already had the professor, buying him/her/me a beer and getting the lowdown (I had Leatherberry, Mehlman and Katz, FWIW).
3. The Law Library elevator is incredibly slow, but if you manually push the door closed and then press the “CLOSE DOOR” button, it actually moves at a decent speed. What, you didn’t think I could give actual useful advice without a bit of snark or sarcasm, did you?
4. Spam. Tired of getting Case Daily emails, emails about refrigerator cleanup, and those initially tempting and then always disappointing “Minority Scholarship” emails? If you’re like me and don’t have a diverse bone in your body (except for my left elbow, which is actually very diverse- part titanium), why not set up an email spam blocker? Set it up so that every time the words “minority scholarship,” “refrigerator,” or “Final Paper due” show up it immediately goes to trash. This will save time, and prevent you from getting upset at your mom for sleeping with your Anglo Dad instead of that Portuguese carpet cleaner, killing any chance of you being diverse. Or maybe it’s just me that thinks that.

If you’re like me and weren’t born in raised in Cleveland or Shaker or any other locality on the “Northern Coast,” you may have to make some adjustments.

1. As tempted as you’ll be to make “Cleveland steamer” jokes, please don’t. I’d like to think that as grad students that we’ve reached a level of maturity that we don’t need to resort to cheap bodily excrement jokes to get a laugh. Fartburpcrap.
2. There’s a local football team in town that you may have heard of? Browns or something like that? Everyone from Cleveland loves them like that ex-boyfriend or girlfriend who treated you like garbage but still has a spell on you. No matter how awful their behavior is, and how bad she is at pass coverage when Ben Roethlisberger gets time to throw, you can’t shake your love for them. I made the mistake of wearing Lions gear to a Browns game last year. In spite of it being preseason, and that the two teams play in different conferences, and that the only rivalry they have is for who can get an earlier draft pick, they still pointed and chanted “a$$h@!#” at me. If I was wearing Steelers gear and it was regular season, I imagine I would be eating through a tube right now.
3. If you’re from a state that has a sensible speed limit (ie any state but this one), you may be surprised by the glacial speeds people drive here. I’ve seen 5-lane roads with a 25 (!) mph speed limit. Not only are the speed limits low, but the police (Cleveland Heights cops especially) patrol for speeders like the Stasi for anti-socialists in East Berlin (didn’t get that reference? Rent “The Lives of Others.” You’ll thank me later.) So you have two options: drive at a normal speed and pay a lot of tickets, or make like the Romans do and live with moving at what can only affectionately be referred to as “Amish speed.” Your choice.
4. Panini’s. No matter how hard you try, you’re going to end up at that godforsaken place most weekends. Accept that fact, live with it, and don’t worry if the next morning you have to re-assess who you had thought you were. That disturbing feeling will eventually pass. Unfortunately, the “1L Fifteen” you’ll gain from all those $2.50 rum and cokes probably will not.