The double edged sword

Sometimes the curve goes your way, sometimes it does not.

Today was the last day of my lawyering class (well for the semester, anyway). And while we were sitting there basking in the glow of not have to worry about Neumann (our book, which is appropriately named. We look at that book with the same amount of distain Jerry would have towards his overweight mailman. We even refer to it in the same tone. Note to readers: this is a Seinfeld reference, feel free to skip it if you don’t watch the show). Back to my story. As we are sitting there our professor tells us how much she’s enjoyed us, we’ve been a lot of fun, etc. Then she starts to talk about the memo. That’s right, the dreaded memo. The one his and I have been ranting about on this blog. She tells us that this is the best batch of memos she has ever read. Sounds great, right? Nope. The class is graded on a curve, so an A paper last year might easily end up a C- paper this year. I guess I got assigned to the wrong class.

Example of the curve not being such a bad thing: My property class. We have the zaniest property class. While all the other property classes were reviewing this week we STARTED the most confusing and difficult section of our class: The Rule Against Perpetuities, which will be hereinafter referred to as “blasted RAP.” Other classes had weeks to learn this; we had 2 days. That’s fair. Anyway, “blasted RAP” basically states that a conveyance (deed/ will) must be vested, if at all within 21 years of the life in being. Sounds straight forward but with items such as fee simple subject to partial divestment, springing executory interests, contingent remainder subject to partial divestment , the dreaded Rule of Conveniences (which 1) is not in our book, 2) Is not in any of the outside supplements one can buy for the class and 3) NO OTHER CLASS IS LEARNING), precocious toddlers, fertile octogenarians and unborn widows make “blasted RAP” the most mind numbing, curl up in a fetal possession, cold sweat inducing topic that we’ve covered to date. But thanks to the magic of the curve I could get a 5% on the final ( a very real possibility) and still walk away with a C.

In summation:

Curve in lawyering =bad

Curve in property =the only thing that may keep me in law school