Time out:

I’m taking some.

Alright yes I know I suck at this.

The problem is I don’t know if this is a diary or whether it’s some other bizarre creature that involves me producing entertaining material for other people suffering law degrees. So I’m trying to keep vaguely up to speed with what I’m up to but most of the time I sit down, realise I’m boring myself and close the browser window! I’m writing an inordinate number of applications at the moment and it all involves rather alot of talking about myself. Doubling up on here makes me feel a bit like Floyd Mayweather.

MOOTS

Three Moots I have done Minxy. BVC internal, Jessup international, Lincoln’s Inn Gluckstein prize (which is a sort of pseudo moot)… Four if you count me brief foray into the inter-provider Moot for Lincoln’s. The great thing about Mooting at this level is that most of the time you end up against Brick Court/Blackstone’s/3 Ray/Garden Court pupils. Which although naturally results in a hammering on an epic scale, gives you great access to the folks who will be running the show in 15 years’ time. I was completely annihilated in all but two of these. Jessup the team managed to scrape it into the semis off the back of two days of memorial writing (not the requisite 4 months) and I wriggled my way into the Gluckstein finals. None of my performances were particularly special but it’s pretty unhealthy to nitpick over 20 odd minutes of conversation. I don’t think I’m mooting’s greatest admirer, at least if we’re talking about separating men from boys/boosting CV points. Good practice for missing sitters and getting used to word salad though.

I’m sure the lawyers reading this will be doing similar stuff. I just hope none of you take it too seriously. The aforementioned prestidigitateurs were all pretty lazy about the whole thing. There’s no need to sound like ‘counsel’, or even to work like counsel for most comps. Oxford in our Semis for the Jessup were a pretty good example of why being a bit of a nerd doesn’t always play out the way you want it to. Case, facts, principles, application, alternatives. Rigidly and rapidly applied to every situation and question. Sounded aggressive and didn’t always tackle what the judges were looking for. Sometimes just being likeable goes a long way.

SPURS

My Bro very kindly bought us two seats at the ‘Lane to watch Spurs v Boro. Best game of football ever, last time I visited the pitch looked like a marsh and we lost to Blackburn after a Shearer penalty. I lost my phone. Karma exists people, and we know that the football tariff is one nokia for four goals. Ignore this if you are an Arseanal supporter.

BAND

We’ve just redesigned our Myspace and are finally releasing last year’s Japanese EP in the UK. Reviews have been grand so far but I can’t help feeling that the music bus. is over for a few years in this country. No bands are making money, the big boys of metal all have bios that read along the following lines: ‘together 8 years, played all the toiletest of venues the UK and Europe has to offer, now self releasing our last album’. All a bit rubbish really.

Far too many people starting bands, means there’s no audience any more. It also means that success is only guaranteed by a big contract at some point in a group’s career. This means that you’re going nowhere without a major behind you at some point in your career. It also means that the world considers Fightstar to be edgy.

PS: I just discovered Tecktonik dancing. I love how camp the french are! It’s basically vogueing very quickly. Middle class suburbian Paris tries to produce something street and ends up producing a youth well-equipped to choreograph for the Vengaboys.

Mootie Mootie

Many folks can’t be bothered with it. Spend a few hours doing extra work, only to convert it into a few minutes of reasonably tense conversation with someone that knows far too much. Well I’ve just spent three odd weeks doing just that. I’ll post something more substantial when my brain is in gear…

T-Shirts.

Last night I went and spent a few hours dining in the Grand Hall at Lincoln’s Inn. It is, and the name does spoil the surprise somewhat, quite big, and quite opulent. There is a bloody terrible 20ft fresco at one end and the space between said end and its opposite is interrupted only by vaulted ceilings, elaborate woodwork, and paintings of chaps wearing other people’s/horses’ hair. I quite like it actually. Maybe not a great surprise from someone who smoked a pipe for five years, and those five were 18-23. But I can appreciate that there are some pretty tasteless aspects to the set-up.

This man has the right idea.

Further to this I suspect the dubious taste underpinning the decision to slap up a poorly-painted allegorical fresco (not as bad as Saddam’s, but at least he had naked girls and motorbikes for the subject matter) has an effect on diners. Who in turn infect all of chambers. Which in turn has an effect on junior barristers. Which in turn has an effect on my tattered three piece suit and pocket watch.

I like the watch, no, I love the watch. It makes me feel like I am disconnected from my mobile phone … and back in an era when bowing was acceptable and people had hats to doff and gloves to remove prior to shaking hands … Plus my dad gave it too me. However, it seems the world has given up on such ephemera. For example: I had a couple of glasses of port with a guy I spent a mini-pupillage under, and we had a really awesome time, so awesome in fact that it warrants republication:

The Big Man: Lose the chain
Me: erm….what?
Lose the chain, does it actually have a watch on the end of it?
Yep, yes it does … I’m sorry why am I losing it again?
Is it an heirloom?
No, no. I like it, as do the ladies, and my dad gave it to me for xmas.
Lose the chain
I just don’t think I want to Big Man, what’s wrong with having a watch in your pocket?
*at this point someone points out that he is in fact wearing his watch on his right wrist*
If you have to ask, you don’t deserve to know the answer

I’m still working that one out, but there we have it: waistcoat + pocket watch = no job. A lovely student chap I was sitting next to became rather flustered and stuttery at this point and inquired as to the appropriate sartorial protocol for a cold day.

Wear a T-Shirt underneath your usual shirt, yours is too big by the way.

Everything that is said at dining is of critical CRITICAL importance.

In other news I’m looking into joining my brother in the world of spreadbetting just as soon as I’m out of the red. More on this in a couple of years.

Mate- Bevvies!!!!!

It’s 6 a.m. I’ve been up all night trying to string together a coherent memorial for an international law moot. Normally these cheeky gentlemen take between 3 and 4 months to complete, but I decided to do mine in two days.

…You guessed it, it very much was NOT me in the deciding seat. In fact, the big boss forgot it was happening, so we all found out on Friday. It’s me and 4 other noticeably more impressive BVCers, and I will put money on the fact that none of them are using the sleep-deprivation technique. Some of them may even be using the ‘do work instead of look at your dying bamboo plant’ technique.

This is proof that if it’s late, you write crap. Which in turn is proof that the Daily Mail is written by breakfast TV prestidigitateurs/ices.

Morning all.