Lawl school stories

I've been working various part-time jobs at the Cornell Law School during the last 3.5 years, including library assistant, Interlibrary Book and Copy Service, A/V tech support, and computer lab consultant. I don't think I ever fully knew my way around the corridors and stairways of the law school until this semester. There are so many secret shortcuts you can take through doors and stairs.

One perk of working with the A/V team is filming all-day law school events. Of course, you're stuck in a room for most of the day, but they have free food (usually breakfast and lunch). This weekend and next weekend are the Trial Advocacy finales downtown in the real courtrooms.

The mock trial cases are interesting sometimes. Today's was interesting in particular. In the beginning of the trial, it felt like the objection rulings were always in the defense's favor (despite the numerous objections that the plaintiff's team threw out), but at the end of the trial when the defense called up their last witness to testify as an expert, they were unable to have her admitted as an expert. Three times the defense tried to lay foundation questions for expertise of their witness in a different (but related) field, and three times an objection against the defense was sustained. It must be very frustrating to prepare questions for a witness that you couldn't actually ask because they could not be identified as an expert, but it was impressive how calm the law students were.

I think that watching mock trials for the Trial Advocacy class for 4 semesters has familiarized me with some legal jargon, but if I use legal jargon in my everyday language, I'd be talking about stuff that I know nothing about. I feel more comfortable sticking with cameras and projectors.

Random facts

Here is a list of things (not exhaustive) that I don't care about, in bullet form and in no particular order:

• Luxury
• Class
• Drama
• MAE 4180

Victory Burgers

Today, we went to Glenwood Pines for dinner. On a last-minute whim (and under peer pressure), I decided to go for the Pinesburger Challenge to eat 4 Pinesburgers in under an hour (vegetables are optional). This is what 4 Pinesburgers on 1 plate looks like:

First burger was finished at 7 minutes. Second burger at 15 minutes. Third burger at 28 minutes. Fourth burger at 49 minutes. Thanks to Kevin for keeping time with his iPhone. Here was the aftermath:

(Also included in the aftermath was 1 t-shirt and my picture on the wall)

Happenings around campus

Two (2) Cornell engineering students committed suicide via gorge bridge jump 2 days apart from each other this past week. Also, a month ago another student jumped the bridge, which brings the campus suicide rate to 3 within the past month. As I understand, in the past there is an average suicide rate of n per year here, where n is between 0 and 1.

Why have campus suicides spiked in frequency lately? I wish I knew, but may never know. It's disheartening, for sure, even though I did not know any of these students.

Airports

In the news today was a study of large North American airports and how travelers like them. I found it interesting how Detroit and Denver were listed as the top two airports, because I had the opportunity to travel to both for a job interview earlier this year. They are definitely some of the nicest airports that I've seen, both in appearance and facilities. The blue tunnel at Detroit was spectacular, and the airport train at Denver plays a cool tune every time the train stops and goes.

I also had the opportunity to travel through Philadelphia several times for interviews, and it was a pretty run-down airport compared to the others. Also, the food selection wasn't that great (especially at the C terminal), and moving between terminals isn't very convenient either.