argumentum ad kretzium

2Ls, post sake bombs, pre-rudy's:

KD:
"Sometimes, you make me wish I was gay."

AK:
"YOU make me wish you where gay."

Colloquial Douchebaggery

JD/PhD 2L on douchebags:

"I think the bluebook is the height of colloquial douchebaggery."

Nothing Like Finals to Fuel a Procrastination Epidemic

http://legalryangosling.tumblr.com/

Oooor, you can join the revolution...

A little light reading for the procastintationally inclined...


"Let me ask you this: Have you even tried to wrap your mind around the English common law system of easements and servitudes? It’s perverse. It’s the kind of perverse that makes you want close your copy of the Restatement, put the caps back onto your rainbow highlighters, and then proceed to organize a paramilitary overthrow of one of the most democratic and legally equitable societies ever established in the history of humankind."
Complete post at McSweeney's Internet Tendency

Settling for Sufficiency

Holiday Party Time

In case you were wondering who was headlining this year's faculty/staff Holiday Party...
And, in case you were wondering what is hidden in the top of Barnum Towner...

Good Luck 1L's!

Why do I fear...

That something very similar occurs with SLATA outlines?
(not that such a fact would compel me to abandon them!)

http://xkcd.com/978/

You Know It's Finals Time When. . .

You're canned food is now alphabetized and you've decided its high time you dust and vacuum your vacuum.

What's YOUR favorite way to procrastinate?

MarxRemixed

2L's re: Law Talk - 

Student 1: 

"I think DEMOCRACY may very well be the opiate of the masses."

Student 2: 

"Possibly....but what an opiate it is!"

Finals Prep

Boy scouts aren't the only ones who know how to be prepared...

Survival Skills

Law Talk QOTD:

"Law school is stressful. Get a plant. It helps."

simulation and simulacra

In honor of my current class:

The Simpsons - Season 07 - Episode 18 - Amendment Song from Daniel Farenzena on Vimeo.

In-Class Indictments

Crim Law professor to student


"You are guilty of a first degree felony of using the passive voice"


-Submitted by KR...thanks!

Best of All Possible Worlds

Prof on the first day of class:


I've never actually practiced law, and if all goes well, I never will!

SLS LOL Needs You!

I need your help preparing for the 2011 OCI Swag Awards which will be posted at the end of next week here on SLS LOL and will honor the ingenuity and inanity of law firm marketing.

So, please send me pictures of your law firm swag (and, if you're really creative, comical pictures of you using those highlighters, stress balls, water bottles, jump drives, and custom-printed candy).... and if anyone can send me a picture demonstrating the true value of a carabiner-USB-drive, you will have my undying devotion!

Second, a big SLS LOL shout out to the new SLS class of 2014! 1L's, we at SLS LOL are always looking for submissions and guest bloggers. So send your favorite quotes (overheard in class, in the hallways, at bar review, etc.), funny stories, ridiculous hypos, haiku poetry, lawyer jokes, awesome YouTube videos, political agendas and candidates, comical rantings and musings, and the like to slslolblog@gmail.com. (and don't worry, we never use names...unless you're Dan Rojas.)

First Things First

2L, around 11am in the courtyard:


I'm going to study now so I can drink later.

Summer Enrichment

Overheard in a munger living room:


So, you know what I learned watching Jersey Shore this summer?

In Retrospect

2L, Reflecting on the Application Process

I considered using [an application coach] until I realized there aren't that many gay, black orphans scoring in the 99th percentile on their standardized test.

-DB

Beware of Wooing

As my compatriots prepare for OCI, and the enticements that will follow, a little cautionary tale courtesy of KO:


One day while walking down the street, a highly successful partner in a law firm was tragically hit by a bus and died. Her soul arrived up in heaven where she was met at the Pearly Gates by St. Peter himself.


"Welcome to Heaven," said St. Peter. "Before you get settled in though, it seems we have a problem. You see, strangely enough, we've never once had an law firm partner make it this far and we're not really sure what to do with you."


"No problem, just let me in," said the woman.


"Well, I'd like to, but I have higher orders. What we're going to do is let you have a day in Hell and a day in Heaven and then you can choose whichever one you want to spend an eternity in."


"Actually, I think I've made up my mind...I prefer to stay in Heaven", replied the woman.


"Sorry, we have rules..." And with that St. Peter put the law partner in an elevator and which slowly descended to the depths of Hell.


When the doors opened, much to her surprise, the woman found herself stepping out onto the putting green of a beautiful golf course. In the distance was a country club and standing in front of her were all her old friends -- including lawyers that she had worked with who had passed away -- and they were all dressed in tuxedoes and evening gowns and cheering for her. They ran up and greeted her warmly, and they talked about old times.


After an excellent round of golf, and at night they went to the country club where she enjoyed an excellent steak and lobster dinner. She met the Devil who was actually a really nice guy (kinda cute) and she had a great time telling jokes and dancing. She was having such a good time that before she knew it, her day was over and it was time to leave. Everybody shook her hand and waved good-bye as she got on the elevator back up to Heaven.


The elevator slowly rose, and eventually opened back up at the Pearly Gates, and she found St. Peter waiting for her. "Now it's time to spend a day in heaven," he said. So she spent the next 24 hours lounging around on clouds and playing the harp and singing. It was very soothing and peaceful, and she had a great time. Before she knew it, her 24 hours were up.


St. Peter came and got her and said, "So, you've spent a day in hell and you've spent a day in heaven. Now you must choose your eternity."


The woman paused for a second and then replied, "Well, I never thought I'd say this, I mean, Heaven has been really great and all, but I think I had a better time in Hell."


St. Peter escorted the woman back to the elevator and again she descended to Hell. When the doors of the elevator opened she found herself standing in a desolate wasteland covered in filth. Her friends were burning in towers of flame, as demons prodded them with pitchforks. The Devil came up to her and welcomed her back.


"I don't understand," stammered the woman. "Yesterday I was here, and there was a golf course and a country club and we ate lobster and we danced and had a great time. Now all there is a wasteland of filth, and all my old friends are miserable."


The Devil looked at her and smiled. "Yesterday we were recruiting you; today you're an associate."

Metaphorically Speaking

Who says legaleese is stuffy?

And such news of an amicable settlement having made this Court happier than a tick on a fat dog because it is otherwise busier than a one legged cat in a sand box and, quite frankly, would have rather jumped naked off a twelve foot step ladder into a five gallon bucket of porcupines then have presided over a two week trial of the herein dispute, a trial which no doubt would have made the jury more confused than a hungry baby in a topless bar and made the parties and their attorneys madder than mosquitoes in a mannequin factory; it is therefore ordered and adjudged b the court as follows: 1. The jury trial scheduled herein for July 13, 2011 is hereby canceled.

Simon would never argue for that...

The latest comes from one of SLSLOL's favorite rising 2Ls. While summering in NYC, he was working on a motion with terrible facts:

Advising Attorney: "You work with the facts you're given."


Summer Associate: "Well, the facts aren't supportive, but the motion is well formed."


Advising Attorney: "Its like American Idol, when the contestant is horrible and Paula Abdul says 'Well, you look great!'"

On Statutory Language

"Lawmakers are bozos...Funny how one comma can equal one day's work"

-Rising 2L Summer Associate, ruminating on a very busy (but not necessarily very productive) day saving the world from injustice.

Funny Ha Ha

In the library:

Student 1: Remember that case, "Toilet Goods"?

Student 2: Yeah...about ripeness?

Fashion Police

ConLaw study group conversation:


"There may be a compelling state interest in outlawing skinny jeans."

The Road Less Taken...

Gotta love the end-of-quarter advice from our profs like this gem from LRW. You never know what pressing social issues might strike your fancy at SLS:

Don’t feel restricted to the typical summer internships. Read the newspaper. You'll be surprised how often you'll say to yourself, "Geeze, I didn't realize albino kids in Africa are being kidnapped and their organs sold. Maybe I want to do that this summer."

*Submitted by B.E.

Temperate Semperate

Prof: Alright, who's got a practical argument against review?

Student: Uh, I've got a more *temperate* argument....

Prof: You're the Justice Department! I don't want a temperate argument!

*Submitted by the awesome JM

Legal Briefs

Overheard at SLS:


"I'm just saying, you could totally go to CafePress and design some underwear that said BOOK and that happened to be be both blue and spiral-bound."


*Submitted by JM, who knows a thing or two about stylin' undies 

Not Your Cup O Tea

This is what happens when a ConLaw Professors requires students to play devil's advocate and argue the merits of Obamacare... ah, irony!

Point, but not so much Power

Prof, during lecture:

"This is probably the most boring slide I will put up in this entire class..."

Rojas Prevails!

SLS remains a place where grassroots political movements can change the world. Reporting on the most recent of such victories, SLS's endorsed candidate for GSC Dan Rojas, SLSLOL is proud to welcome Guest Blogger, Contemporary Political Historian, and Popcorn Aficionado, Paco Torres.

Please join me in congratulating Daniel Rojas ('12) on his major victory--his election as Stanford Law School's representative to the Graduate Student Council.

Daniel was born in Harbor City, California. Having excelled at San Pedro High School, he attended the University of California at Santa Barbara, where he served with particular distinction as a residential assistant at the famed "Francisco Torres" ('11) dormitory. A bright young boy, he had always harbored dreams of being an elected student representative for a graduate school at a major research university.

That hope has manifested itself into reality. Last Thursday, James Freedman ('12) initiated a grass roots campaign to elect Daniel to a position that no one before him had bothered to actually run for. In all likelihood, this is an office that few SLS students knew existed in the first place. But James had the savant-like instinct to see the potential for greatness within Daniel's quiet grace and thoughtful leadership.

Other students took the baton from James. Matthew Cagle ('12) began an innovative website to spread the word about Daniel's campaign. Joel Cazares ('12) took to the Information Super Highway and began imploring students to vote for Daniel on listservs near and far. The campaign transformed into a phenomenon. Inspired by Daniel's cutting-edge and progressive positions--against water-boarding but for water-slides; both for and against the ROTC returning to Stanford--word of the campaign spread throughout every corner of SLS. A paragon of modesty, Daniel did not encourage the efforts of his supporters, wishing to remain distant from the electioneering process.

The students' was successful. Daniel won a unanimous victory, garnering more votes than the combined candidates for representatives from the Business, Education, and Medical schools. Astoundingly, he won more support than the famed "Free Weezy" slate for ASSU Junior Class Presidents.

Daniel has yet to decide whether or not he will wear the purple, don a wreath of laurels, and represent Stanford Law School at that famed deliberating body--the Graduate Student Council. We hope that, like General Washington, he will choose to leave the comfort of his Carson, California farm and answer the people's call to public service. [Editor's Note: Mr. Rojas officially accepted the people's call to service on April 12, 2011 via Facebook Post, reprinted below.]

Daniel provided absolutely no supervision for the students' work. As always, invaluable and capable clerical and campaign assistance was provided by Greg Nolan ('12), Ethan Forrest ('12) and Colin McDonell ('12).

Congratulations to all, especially our new dictator, Daniel B. Rojas, on reaching at the pinnacle of student power here at Stanford Law School.

----
~ Official Acceptance ~



Dear SLS,


Thank you for the outpouring of unsolicited support for my unwilling candidacy for GSC Representative. I'm writing to confirm that I accepted the position yesterday. . . [Y]ou can all change your profile pictures back to normal now. It's creepy to keep seeing my face everywhere.


Sincerely,
Daniel B. Rojas
GSC Representative

What would I give for a few legally capable minions...

1L via G-chat [T-minus 5 days til the final Federal Litigation brief deadline]:


I hate that I have brilliant arguments that a) have to be written down, and b) need to be presented in a way that lawyers will appreciate

¡Sí, Se Puede!

SLSLOL Officially Endorses Daniel Rojas for ASSU Law School representative!





What do Dan's supporters say about him?
"Dan has shown great leadership and is a wonderful person, so we should all get out the vote to support him!"
"I would assume I'm not alone in believing that the graduate community as a whole would benefit from [Dan's] quiet grace and thoughtful leadership."

Write-in "Daniel Rojas" under "ASSU Grad Student Council School of Law District".
You can vote at: http://ballot.stanford.edu/ballot/vote

Suspension of Disbelief

Classroom exchange:


Student, after positing a potential argument: 
I'm not saying [that legal argument] would work.


Prof: 
Well, no lawyers never say it could work...but let's put that aside.

Professional Jealousy

1L outside munger:

I just can't handle all the work. . . I wish I were in B-School!


[...oh, to spend your days "networking" instead of casebriefing...]

Scalia better start uping his game...

According to Slate: "Chief Justice John Roberts is hilarious." 

An excerpt:  The chief spent the better part of the hour poking fun at AT&T's claim that the adjective personal means the same thing as the noun person, such that the statute's treatment of corporations as "persons" means that corporations are also somehow capable of getting "personal." As he explained at argument, that claim makes no sense. "I tried to sit down and come up with other examples where the adjective was very different from the root noun," he observed at the time. "It turns out it is not hard at all. You have craft and crafty. Totally different. Crafty doesn't have much to do with craft. Squirrel, squirrely. Right? I mean, pastor—you have a pastor and pastoral. Same root, totally different."


Today's majority opinion continues this same jolly monologue, musing—with copious citations to Webster's that "[t]he noun crab refers variously to a crustacean and a type of apple, while the related adjective crabbed can refer to handwriting that is 'difficult to read,' " and goes on to observe that "corny can mean 'using familiar and stereotyped formulas believed to appeal to the unsophisticated,' which has little to do with corn, ('the seeds of any of the cereal grasses used for food')."

Black Death and Tunnels of Love

Welcome to the first of what I hope will be many guest bloggers! Today, the Honorable Learned Knee Cap shares a bit of his wisdom and dispels a few or the more significant worries we face at SLS.

With classes for next quarter to be chosen, finals rolling closer and summer job hunts still on-going, I thought it might be nice to eliminate a couple of worries I had heard voiced this week in our class. A few less worries always makes it easier to focus on matters at hand. So let me put your mind at ease in regard to two matters - the danger of bubonic plague from campus squirrels and the need to avoid salamanders when driving down Junipero Serra Blvd.

If you all are like me, you might have found something off-putting about the fearless squirrels all over campus, squirrels that seem to perversely enjoy a good game of chicken with bikers. But aside from a few near-crashes, I hadn't worried too much about the danger from our rodent neighbors until this week when I was told that interaction with them carried the peril of the Black Death (interesting what comes up in Con Law review sessions).

Now, likely nothing inhibits studying like a case of the Bubonic Plaque. So, with finals coming, I was a bit worried about the prospect of living out my childhood games of Ring Around the Rosy. But an in-depth exploration of available literature and consultation with campus authorities has confirmed that though plaque was found in a squirrel in Los Angeles County this summer, likely sparking rumors about our own whiskered co-tenants here at Stanford, no plaque squirrels have ever been detected on our campus, even among those menacing-looking black squirrels.

So next time someone tells you that a die-off of one-quarter to one-third of campus is imminent from a squirrel-initiated outbreak, you tell them that that is only true for campuses in Los Angeles County and southward.

For those of you working down in SoCal this summer, may God have mercy of your souls.

As for the danger of salamanders on Junipero Serra Blvd, I had long heard rumors that the much of campus development west of Lake Lagunita had been determined/restricted by an unseen, but nevertheless precious, amphibian called the California Tiger salamander. That is apparently completely true.

These endangered/vulnerable salamanders were thought to be extinct in this area until a 1994 summer rainstorm prompted hundreds of them to rise Lazarus-like from the squirrel burrows where they hibernate in dry times and head for the mud of Lake Lagunita to lay their eggs. Apparently, this summer resurrection developed into a salamander tragedy as the amphibians attempted to crawl from the foothills beneath the Dish to Lake Lagunita, transecting (often quite unsuccessfully) Junipero Serra Blvd. The massacre only came to an end with a rush of Stanford volunteers who lovingly carried each salamander across the road to safety and to the enjoyable process of combating extinction.

But before you rush to change your summer plans, as I was tempted to do, so you might aid in the salamander crossing, you should rest assured that this brand of civic activism is no longer needed. The great minds of Stanford University, when faced with such a compelling problem, overcame the challenge with what might be known as tunnels of love for the little Tigers. Several tunnels now pass beneath (and salamander-size rises restrict the direct route across) Junipero Serra and if you ever are headed towards the Dish for a run, you might enjoy pausing for a moment to see what has been accomplished to further Homo sapien-Ambystoma californiense understanding.

Nevertheless, if you are coming back from the Dish and you see a salamander on the road, don't be afraid to do your part - at SLS we apparently brake for salamanders. 

So there you have it, two less things to worry about. Now on to finals!

---Hon. Learned Knee Cap

Audition for the Musical Firm of Awesome, Fun & Kickass LLP

Seriously, how many law schools provide this kind of awesomeness!!?!
Come try out!!!!

Kramerisms

On Chickens:


I once worked in a chicken house. Nasty little creatures! They deserve everything they get. . . . I believe in Animal Rights--just not for chickens.

Kramerisms

Amusedly referring to SCOTUS:


"I wouldn't take the job, even if they offered it to me!"

Criminal Civility

Lunchtime speaker:


"After doing criminal law, I did civil practice for a while. The stories aren't very good, but the pay sure is... Of course, there really isn't a lot of civility in civil practice."

Citation Salutation

For those who are not avid Above the Law readers (ok, let's be honest, if you have stumbled upon this little corner of the blogosphere, ATL is probably already part of your daily routine 100 times over)... but, just in case you missed this, it seems worthy of highlight:

Quote of the Day: Judge Posner Benchslaps the Bluebook

By DAVID LAT[N]eedless to say, I have not read the nineteenth edition. I have dipped into it, much as one might dip one’s toes in a pail of freezing water. I am put in mind of Mr. Kurtz’s dying words in Heart of Darkness — ‘The horror! The horror!’ — and am tempted to end there.

— Judge Richard Posner, in a scathing Yale Law Journal review of The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation (19th ed.).

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery...

Overheard in the hallways munger:

"Wait, I have to wear a cardigan to bar review tonight; I want to look like Lorenzo."

-Contributed by JM...thanks!

E-I-E-I-O

Student dissecting the Coasean realities of cattle grazing:


"Well, there really isn't any cost effective fence that a cow CAN'T break through...I mean, I grew up on a farm so...yeah. If a cow WANTS to break through a fence, it WILL!"

Stranger than documentary film. . .

Said under breath after british 1L made a comment during a student group meeting:


"I want [British Student] to narrate my life. That would be awesome...
[in voice sounding slightly like a BBC documentary narrator] Now, he's going to the baaathroom."