Tactical Considerations

In light of how much time is left, its time to start making tactical decisions about what subjects/sections to push to the back burner and which ones to focus on. After today, I’m going to stop doing multiple-choice practice questions. I didn’t touch my PMBR books during the last two weeks of July, and more or less figure I'll stick with about the only thing that worked last time.

In the end, I feel that I’m going to sink or swim with essays. It was my poorest section (although getting a 50 on the second PT sure as hell didn’t help), so I’m going to spend the bulk of my time outlining/writing essays and memorizing (or re-memorizing, in my case) as much of the law as possible. I’m going to try to do at least one full length cross-over question a day, and may, depending on how I feel do one more PT (but will probably just outline it).

Sakai's Essay Predictions

From a reliable source....

More Likely

• Property (apparently he predicted easements, conveyancing, or cross over with torts)
• Professional Responsibility (so obvious you can hardly call it a prediction).
• Community Property (of course he was extremely certain on this one last time)
• Remedies

Likely

• Crim/Pro
• Con Law
• Civ Pro
• Evidence
  

Less Likely

• Contracts (remedies cross-over perhaps?)
• Torts
• Corporations
• Wills and Trusts

I wouldn't exactly bet the farm on these. Although, I did run across someone the other day who swore that she was going to spend the last week only studying whatever he predicted. Maybe I'll call the psychic friends network and see what they have to say...

UPDATE: Studied Ignorance has the predictions from Barpassers

What I'm doing now

Lately I've reduced the number of MBE practice questions I've been doing, haven't been doing as well on them lately (probably over thinking them) so I decided that I could probably use a break from them. I'm planning on outlining 2-3 more PTs between now and the Bar, but am spending the majority of my time on the essays.

I'm trying to write out 2-3 per day under timed conditions, and spend the rest of the time outlining essays and writing out the rules to strengthen my issue spotting skills. One thing I've found particularly useful is to test myself with my flashcards by typing out the answer as if I were writing the rule for the actual essay exam. I've found this to be very useful both for making sure that I learn the rules, but more importantly to ensure that when it comes to exam time I'm not sitting there trying to figure out how to translate the million elements for a particular rule into a succinct and coherent statement of the law.

Two weeks and counting

Had a breakthrough this weekend and have been studying my ass off. Still hate this more than anything. I can't wait for this to be over, but at the same time, I wish I had two more weeks to prepare. At any rate, I'm just glad this is almost done.

Notes from the Doldrums

Still massively burned out. Tried to do some Con Law multiple choice (my best subject, until today) and must have gotten less than 40% right. I'm tired, and no matter how many times I read a question, diagram the question, keep my eyes open with toothpicks, etc., I can barely focus on whatever it is I'm supposed to be doing. I'm sick of this, and now, more than anything just want it to be over.

Burned Out

No matter how hard I try, I'm starting to feel seriously burned out. I'm sick of studying, sick of thinking about the bar all the time, and especially sick of the material. I fucking hate contracts, and loathe even thinking about opening my conviser outline or doing some multiple choice questions.

I think I'm stuck in a phase where the test still seems a little too remote for me to start panicking and really hit the books hard. I'm putting in about 8-9 hours a day, of which only about 75% is actually productive. Hopefully, I'll get my ass in gear over the next couple of days and do more than I'm currently doing.

Progress Report

Had computer problems which prevented me from posting. Hopefully they've been ironed out so that I won't have to deal with a computer melt-down on exam day. More or less finished reviewing the substantive subjects and am planning on spending the next 3+ weeks focusing on practice essays, which played a decisive role in my failing score. Took a practice MBE and did well enough that I'm going to put the multiple choice on the back burner for a while. I figure that 25-30 MBEs per day should be enough to keep me in the ballgame. Need to do some PTs, but keep procrastinating. I don't think there is anything more boring than the PT.