Wigs

Interesting talk about Wigs in the comments section of Pupillage and How to Get it.
Reminds me of the Bar Society meeting I went to at my university slightly.
The people running it, couldn't help themselves but slag off solicitor advocates, and say how they are "stealing" criminal cases from baby barristers, and thus are making baby barristers lives harder!

Not sure what my opinion on this is, I did make a comment, however I don't know too much about SGs just that a lot of people don't like them. One friend commented to me "Oh so you can't make it to the bar and get a pupillage so do an advocacy course instead and voila!"

Oh and I have also just received my first ever comment how exciting! (I really was quite excited - makes me feel special!) Thanks Law Minx :)

Gossip and the End of Term

Gossip:
The semi-decent university that I attend on a fairly regular basis hosted an external moot with a recently benched Judge. It was due to start at 6pm however due to the mooting administrative team lacking the understanding that the hosting team has to prepare all the bundles, the moot didn't even happen. 50 minutes later, the bundle for the opposition came in and they wanted to highlight it and what not so the Judge could have her attention drawn to the specific paragraph etc. The tutor in charge of mooting, made a few short speeches apologising for the delay etc, and then went it came to about 7pm she graciously decided that the hosting university should concede due to the bundle problem.

Not really the hosting mooters fault they thought everything was being taken care of by the moot masters. They seemed somewhat furious. As they should be, I can't imagine the amount of preparation that goes into an external moot especially as it was an OUP national moot. Very disappointing really, and it also made our university look crap.

So after the moot that never happened there was a short reception, whilst I plucked up the courage to ask HHR for some marshalling work experience. So as I asked a lecturer what I should do and he said go for it, I strolled up to the judge who was speaking to a the tutor responsible for mooting and said "excuse me, my name is Lost London Law Student, and I am wondering whether or not you are able to offer marshaling work experience?"

I think I caught her honour off guard, as if I had trespassed onto her very soul, she didn't really know what to say. A series of unintelligible words came out of my mouth, such as "I hear you do criminal law?" Big mistake, never say to a judge "you do criminal law" because as she politely replied " I do not DO criminal law" What I meant to ask is that "I hear you judge criminal cases".
My tutor who I think was annoyed or perhaps was trying to help me out (could have been both) said I should let the judge settle into her new found profession and perhaps write to her with a copy of my CV after christmas. I said "thank you very much for your time"

Nerve wrecking really, I had to have two glasses of wine before I could even attempt to do it. At least I hoped to get some form of card (do judges have cards?) I wasn't impolite just very nervous, I decided to bite the bullet and ask, as I knew that I wouldn't get another chance to ask. Ah well at least I tried and I shall be writing to her honour in the new year.

The end of term:
Next Friday I finish law for christmas, back in January. If I am to reflect on how well I have done this year as opposed to last, I would have said that I have done pretty well, only missing a small number of classes (in comparison to last year) and at least have a half decent grasp of the topics we have been through. Though I am probably more annoyed that I will have to spend the whole of the christmas holidays making sure I know everything and this will probably entail rereading lots of texts books which isn't really what I want to do however will probably be essential to me getting a 2:1 . I have even asked for two new text books as xmas presents, that's quite sad really isn't it.

Pretty sure no one reads this blog still, but for all of you that do, have a nice seasonal time, and try not to get to pissed and bring up embarrassing stories over xmas diner.

Good/Bad week

I was having really really good week.
I had been to everything, was getting up about 8 am everyday. Going to Uni about 9 coming back around 4-5 every day, prepared for all my seminars etc, until I got really drunk on Thursday and didnt wake up till about 12pm on Friday.

Bit annoyed really as that meant I had missed two lectures and a seminar!! Which normally would be quite usual for me to miss in a week, however I have changed now I hope because I want to do this law degree! I really do! I want to go to the bar, do criminal law, or maybe tort, or maybe medical negligence and just get going!!!

So this week I shall hopefully do everything, and seeming as I have no seminars this week, it means that I can do lots of work for my seminars next week :) yay!

Note to self

Stop going for naps that last 12 hours
Take more pro plus
Stop worrying that everyone in law is SO much better than you, and instead just do all the work you can.

I accidently fell asleep well I had planned to have a 2 hour nap from 5-7 and then continue on to do my EU essay and prepare for tort, however I woke up an hour ago, and realised that I had a brief conversation with my mother on the phone, and that someone had rung me from an anymous number and I just put the phone down on them.

Things are not going so well. I have a very limited time to prepare for my tort seminar as I fell asleep, I have an EU essay to do which I only have a vague idea about, and I have Equity and Trusts to prepare for which isnt exactly fun. Ohh I also plan to go out tomorrow, to a trendy London club, I actually havent been out for a drink in aboutt 3 weeks so that should be fun, and NOTHING is going to stop me from going out. :)

Time for a cup of tea I think.

Misunderstanding

Apparently there is some misunderstanding in my post "Money and Work"
Just to clarify.

I am complaining about those people who scam the system, get a loan and grant, when they aren't supposed to. Or appear to have a lot of wealth back home but get full grant and loan anyway.

I am not complaining about people who receive the full grant and loan that actually need it!

Work

So whilst I spent last week mostly on mooting, and the week before was reading week, I have done no work my other subjects.

I stayed in bed for most of reading week because I could not be bothered to move and had no money to go out, what else is one supposed to do on reading week. I could have gone home however each day I was determined that when I woke up I would go and do some work however the temptations of my bed were too much.

Last week I spent a 24 hour stint on mooting and then the next day frantically trying to get it all organised and done with into a semi formal speech relying on my points, so that was about 28 hours on mooting. Only to have it fall flat on my face within the first minute, I decided to take Friday off and do nothing apart from go to a Criminology lecture which was sort of interesting I was more pissed off that I thought it was about police powers but it turned out that I had missed that lecture the week before.

So I am currrently stuck with an EU essay to do, obviously the most boring of a subject, so glad we only have it till december, I wouldn't touch EU law with a massive dildo professionally. Unforunately it seems that the topic its is on a topic I actually havent read about. Reasons for this being not out of lazyness but because I was under the naive impression that EU law like the REST of my subjects was every two weeks, however it turned out to be every week, so whilst I missed one due to my lack of organisation skills ( see any Moot post to prove this) I also missed another because I was ill - or was that just "ill" in the sense that I was hungover?

So I thoroughly have no idea what the EU essay is on, and it pains me to even look at the two choices we have for the paper due in on Thursday. Unfortunately I also have all my seminars this week, Tort, Criminology, Eu and the subject that the devil would find most confusing Equity&Trusts.

Now seeming as we are supposed to spend 20 hours of preparation for each seminar how many hours do I now need the week extended to so I can fit in all my seminar preparation and do my Eu Law essay? I'm not a mathematican, so I cannot be bothered out of fear mainly to work it out.

With work normally what happens with students is everything is done the night before in a panic, the sort of panic that goes "AHHH why didn't I do this earlier?" "why can't i motivate myself to work harder during the day"

One of my very first lectures in my first year we had a lecturer that said "we want you to work 9-5 mon-fri and then you can have the evenings and weekends off" if only I had really listened then.

Money and Work

Note: The rant about bursaries is about people who SCAM the system, or people who have a lot of money, but seem to get more anyway.


My room smells of smoke, because I am a dirty smoker, my flat mate is an ex smoker so really hates the smell, and I also really hate the smell when I walk into my room coming back from somewhere and the room just utterly stinks of fags, but I love smoking too much to give it up, althought I will have to because I have currently no money. I have reached the end of my overdraft and I am too afraid to ask Parents Bank Plc to give me money after I recently went through my online statements and have found out that they gave me enough money to last till mid december but somehow I have spent it all!!

How people manage to actually pay of their student debt I will never understand. I have a friend who works 40 hours a week ontop of the same law degree I do, how he managed to cope I will never know, but the fact that students get a loan and then have to work really shows that there is something very wrong with the system.

For example I have another friend who gets a full loan (no grant) which in London is £1500 for the September - December period. Now they have to pay rent, now in London even in the east where I live in matchbox houses and more often than not crack dens, rent is around £100 a week. £100 x 3 months of living = no loan. So students are literally forced to go into debt because the student finances twats will not give us more money.

What is more annoying is bursaries and grants, there are a fair number of people out there who receive both, yet back home have more luxury than I do ( I do not receive a grant or bursary )
the trick apparently is to put down one parents salary and not the others, so if you have one high income breadwinner, you just lie and say that you come from a single parent family or the other parent is retired, seems to be the way.

So whilst I have no money (though I do not pay rent so shouldnt really be complaining) others have lots who really shouldnt and should be in the same situation as me!!!

Now I do not want to seem snobby, I am well off enough that my parents can help me and I have friends whose parents cannot afford to keep them whilst they are at university. I am nagging about those people who apply for grants and bursaries, and seem to get them, when they are not eligbile to do so but get them anyway!!

Perhaps I should say that I have four kids living with me in my ex council house oh sorry it's called "ex local authority" then I would get an extra grand that I wouldn't have to pay back!

Moot Complaint

In the end I moaned enough to my friend about how poorly we did in the moot that one of my friends suggested that I complain about it.

Now what actually happened was that the appellants sent us a moot skeleton only citing 4 cases, then turned up to the moot with 8 cases. So I emailed the moot master saying how unfair and unreasonable it was to surprise us with four new cases and that we couldnt comment on half of the appellants arguement, nor answer judicial questions that referred to the other teams cases.

Even though we did shit anyway - as will probably be confirmed by the moot judges, it was still unfair for them to use 4 new cases.


UPDATE....
The moot master has responded that he will let everyone know that they have cite all their cases in their skeleton.. but said nothing else, which probably means that the Judge was insistent on the fact that even if we had read their cases then we still would have been soo shit as to not allow us through.

Maybe I should complain some more.. I want another go where both teams actually KNOW each others cases.

Grrr

Something that turns my stomach

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7096814.stm
"

According to the Arab News newspaper, the 19-year-old woman, who is from Saudi Arabia's Shia minority, was gang-raped 14 times in an attack in the eastern province a year-and-a-half ago.

Seven men from the majority Sunni community were found guilty of the rape and sentenced to prison terms ranging from just under a year to five years.

But the victim was also punished for violating Saudi Arabia's laws on segregation that forbid unrelated men and women from associating with each other. She was initially sentenced to 90 lashes for being in the car of a strange man.

On appeal, the Arab News reported that the punishment was not reduced but increased to 200 lashes and a six-month prison sentence.

The rapists also had their prison terms doubled. But the sentences are still low considering they could have faced the death penalty.

The Arab News quoted an official as saying the judges had decided to punish the girl for trying to aggravate and influence the judiciary through the media.

The victim's lawyer was suspended from the case, has had his licence to work confiscated, and faces a disciplinary session. "

This is sick.
Because this 19 yr old has violated the segration of the sexes she is to be punished MORE than the defendants.
Ok - on appeal they have had their prison terms doubled, by why isnt it the rapists getting lashed?

Though I despair sometimes at some of the House of Lords decisions I read - namely
R v Brown and that twat Lord Templeman ( i am quite glad the boy is now in a heterosexual relationship) I am so MORE in despair for legal systems that want to enforce the separation of men and women!!!!

Perhaps a controversial topic, that is their culture etc, however it ISN'T what the media reports is distinclty false (perhaps even applying to this case)

For example I have an iranian friend who:
Drinks alcohol in Iran
and has access to illegal substances.

Even though BOTH are OUTLAWED. From my understanding it is not my friend just doing it but everyone! Additionally a lot of the youth are gay, and women like to sleep around!!!


Lost London Law Student
Despairing about controversial issues such as the Islamic Revolution of Iran, and Saudi Arabian laws that punish the victim.

Mooting - the verdict

Not that anyone actually reads this blog but I feel compelled to tell my non readers that today's moot was the most HORRIBLE experience of my life.

The Judges (looked like just graduated or in the stages of training pupilledge who then told us after the moot that they had mooted nationally and internationally) acted like REAL judges. They were not nice. They interupted me at every point.(suppose thats what judges do)

Whilst making my very first submission they asked me to give the elements of promissory estoppel ( I thought to myself FUCK, they want me to give a brief definition right here and now of my WHOLE moot) So from the first minute I had basically fucked it up.

Although the 2nd Judge who seemed a lot nicer did say at the end, that I got a raw deal, and that he would have never asked me to give the elements of promissory estoppel, but instead that I should have refered him to the cases I had used. I didnt know that though! I wasn't inventive enough! The other judge had asked for them and I didnt know what the fuck to do!

I conceded to everything the judges said, I gave up, whilst I did OK at mooting last year getting to the third round, I have never experienced being question before I had made my first submission.

I had heard that in during the final rounds of the Moot at my Uni that barristers that were invited to judge the competition threw the counsel's bundles and just said it was rubbish, that they interrupted them before making their first submission, I thought that was what happened in the final stages, and I was very wrong.

The appellants were very good, first year mooters who had never before mooted, very clear, did not back down on their arguements (my downfall - can't hack being told repeatedly what I am saying is rubbish so I just agree what im saying is rubbish)

I stumbled my way through my arguement because I felt that all of it was rubbish, I hadn't had any real grasp of the topic, the judges were talking about things of promissory estoppel that I had never heard of before, even though I read two text books on promissory estoppel.

I was shit I hadnt prepared enough, just generall shit and I feel really shit, because of the way the judges talked to me which as i said in my moot" you've completly thrown me off my argument" note - never say that in a real moot. I just despaired, I despair now.

Advocacy is hard really hard.

Points to improve
- Our Bundle was apparentlly shit, the judges didn't like our complicated system of tabbing.
- Fair enough it was complicated however we had been told the year before that our tabbing wasn't complicated enough and that for example if you want to refer the judge to the facts of the case then that should have a tab, and if you want to refer them to a judge's ratio then that also has to be tabbed. - The judges HATED our Bundle, said it was confusing, and preferred the appellants bundle which just had each case clearly separated.

Yeh

So I feel shit, great, currently not thinking "oh I should think about this, note down points and improve" I just want to curl up, watch the new series of The Mighty Boosh, and get mightly pissed.

Halsbury's Laws of England

I have realised that Halsbury's Laws of England is actually my saviour!
It's brilliant!
All I needed to do was type in "promissory estoppel" and I got a shit load of information!
Wonderful!
Absolutely wonderful! :)

Or as other blog posting would say in rather flowering language.

One logged onto LexisNexis and typed into the computer interface, "promissory estoppel" to which one discovered the source of divinity in relation to promissiory estoppel. Spiffing! Absolutely Spiffing!!

Mooting Frenzy

I have a moot on Thursday on promissory estoppel, which when I first saw the moot problem I though I knew little about. I turned to my seminar/lecture notes from last year and it appears that I had decided to give that topic a miss for some particular reason ( was probably out getting wankered - it was my first year)

So now my moot partner and I are frantically trying to prepare our skeleton tomorrow on promissory estoppel and consideration. If only I didnt lend my nutcases on contract law to my partner then I may have actually had a heads up on what I was doing. Some very lovely (hardworking) friends have given me some of their notes which I have breezed through and I have read some of the text book outlining the key principles however I have yet to read a case about it!

I am sometimes stupidly lazy! Though it does seem to pay off as last year I got to the 3rd round of mooting (out of five) with doing all the preparation the night before!! (obviously not a good habbit to have in chambers though)

So I'm off to do some reading in the hope that somehow I may enlighten myself about promissory estoppel and how to make my speech last ten minutes on it. :S
(note last year I actually typed out my entire speech for a moot was approx 2500 words, and I dont thnk that even lasted me ten minutes.. I dare to think what will happen this time)

An Introduction

Hello there,
Let me introduce myself. I am a 19 year old male law student with delusions of perhaps one day practicing at the bar (however without that 1st class degree lets consider that it will be impossible and that im getting into thousands of pounds into debt for nothing)

I currently in my 2nd year Law LLB at a semi-prestigious London university good for Law but not a lot else according to the Guardian and The Times.

What else to write? I have other interests which normally have a higher priority than actually do law work such as going out to clubs and waking up the next morning wondering what I have done and who I have offended.

I hope to start this blog for other law students who feel that they don't quite cut the mustard with all the other bloggers out there, who seem so enthusiatically whimisical with every post that it makes us less presentable people feel a bit crap, and perhaps for all those students who can't seem to be stuck in the library 9-5 Monday to Friday because they can't even get themselves out of bed!

The title of this blog adequatelly describes how I feel, Lost (not the tv series), completly. While I can be hardworking I'm not the type that loves to study law, (perhaps a change in degree is needed) Like most law students I feel apathetic towards a degree that ultimately decides my career. A career in law almost seems like a joke in my current situation, am I an oxbridge graduate? Do I have a 1st? Do I have a 10 page CV full of extra curricular activities? No!
Oh well High Street Solicitor firm for me then.