More on Macmillan

Well, after a bit more research I found out here that the Crystal Macmillan prize is "A memorial prize [which] is awarded annually in her name by the society of the Middle Temple to the highest placed woman student in the bar's final examinations".

Who'd have thought it?

Free Pizza

Two-for-one voucher for pizza at pizza express valid until end of February from the Times website.

Japan and languages

Well, I got the Japanese tour so I'm very excited about that. I go in October, which is useful in terms of annual leave.

Decided that seeing as the Japanese are allegedly about as good at foreign languages as the English it would be a good idea to spend the next few months being able to read and speak some Japanese before I go.

Turns out, after a very brief bit of internet research, that having learned Chinese for a year is helpful when it comes to one of the three scripts that they use. More helpfully, Salford University offers evening classes which I think I might take up as they seem reasonably priced and I can (just) get from the office to the classroom by 6.

I have to say, I've missed learning stuff since leaving uni. The job has been quite good in that repsect as most of it is still new, but I like to learn for it's own sake and I think languages could be useful in this regard.

I'm too old to become fluent in another language - though I am encouraging the Boy to get work in Germany if he can because that would be my best bet for a second fluent language - but I think it would be good to have c250-1000 words in say 15-20 languages and a smattering of grammar. Means you can be understood literally anywhere in the world and could usually get around.

So far on that list I probably only have 4 - good German, basic French, very basic Chinese and very very basic Turkish. By very, very basic I mean I can count to ten, ask where stuff is, order various foods and drinks and haggle at a market as well as the various 'polite words' - it's all vocab, no grammar.

In non-Roman scripts, learning how to look a word up in a dictionary can take ages in its own right. Try "我是英国人" without using an online dictionary. And typing into a computer is also a lesson in itself (in this case, I typed the pinyin in making sure it was on Chinese input setting and the computer converted the pinyin into characters)

Moral quote of the day

"Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life."

-Jingo, Terry Pratchett

The Barristers (part 2)

I've just watched the second episode of the Barristers and it made me miss dining quite a lot as I always really enjoyed it (perhaps I'm odd in that regard?). I do like seeing Middle Temple on there though - and I did like that they interviewed the porter (who holds a special place in my heart for letting us park the MDU mini bus there for a weekend instead of paying extortionate London car parking charges. Brick court went BMW, porsche, audi, 25 year old decrepit minibus with chipped paint and no brakes, porsche, mercedes....Well, you get the picture. Raise the tone of the neighbourhood, we did not!)

How on earth did that guy get pupillage (I can't remember his name). Having sat down over the last week with various people and chatted about the programme, we were all sure he wouldn't.

Without wanting to be unkind to all of the candidates, I do hope that the programme doesn't show everyone succeeding as it would somewhat undermine the 'only 1 in 5...beware....BEWARE!!!!!' statistics and would make it inconsolably unrealistic.

Put it all down to insane jealousy.

Thought the post-interview rejection feedback was very interesting, however, and made me realise that perhaps I did make the right decision on the paralegal front. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my job quite a lot (though it's pretty intense at the moment on the piles of work front) but when I was offered this job, the same day, I was offered another, non-legal job paying £8000-£10000 per year more. As anyone would find, it was a difficult decision. Ultimately, I decided that I like the atmosphere of Law Firm better than the other place, but when I get my paycheque though, there is always that little bit of doubt lingering....! Had I enjoyed the atmosphere of the other place (having temped there) I might have found the decision much harder and gone the other way - and then watched the feedback given to the applicant tonight with my heart sinking through the floor!

Oh well, back to watching QI.

Ballet

Went to see Manon the other night at the Palace theatre.

I've not been to the ballet before but was very fortunate to be given tickets by the barrister who I was clerking who was unable to go at the last minute. (The five-year-old girl in my got very excited!)

Persuaded the Boy to go with me (he was a tad apprehensive) and initially sounded like he would prefer to learn how to walk on hot coals than go.

It was excellent and I enjoyed it very much :) .... makes me think that maybe I should check out the opera for once after all. I tend to think that I should try everything once....

Amazon (rant)

As I had recieved money for my bitrhday with the instruction to spend it on books, I decided to poodle along to Amazon as I had a fair idea of what I wanted as was sure it would be cheaper (it was).

When it came to shipping, I typed in my home address figuring that even if I wasn't there, it would be delivered to the Royal Mail depo which is around the corner and I could pick it up later, after work, or at the weekend as the dep it a 5 minute walk from my house with heavy books, as opposed to a 35 minute walk.

Turns out Amazon doesn't use Royal Mail, but a courier company who is based in Warrington. 23 miles from Manchester. The courier company phone me and say they haven't been able to deliver the package (note that this is not a criticism of the couriers - yet) and that they would hold it for 5 days before returning it.

Having been told where they are based, I ask their opening hours. 9-6, Monday through Friday. That's no use to any person who either
(a) works normal hours not in Warrington
(b) doesn't own a car and so can't drive to their depo

They said they would normally leave the package with a neighbour. Unfortunately, I live in a secure block of flats which means people cannot get access without being let through and there wouldn't be a neighbour with whom it could be left, anyway. I ask if they could redirect it to my place of work.

They can only do that with Amazon's permission. I couldn't find any way of contacting Amazon through their website so I can't change that.

Luckily, the Boy's sister and her partner live in the same block of flats and the couriers were nice enough to let me re-direct to them. The package should be delivered today or tomorrow.

Fingers crossed, eh?

Specialisation

Bleugh, just spent the last week watching 1 public debating, debating in another, doing a sponsored legal walk, cleaning the house (which was so bad it was toxic), starting my OLPAS form, finishing my OLPAS form and applying to various other chambers.

Hence the lack of blog posts.

Having substituted dinner (evening meal, not lunch - see what being up North for too long does to my wariness of the casual use of possibly misleading vocab?) for alcohol on 4 days of the seven my figure is loving my but I'm pretty sure my liver is in a sulk. Working on the principle that if I'm happy, my body is happy. My body includes my liver. Wine makes me happy. Somehow, I just dont think it's going to wash...


At the hearing the other day and was in the lawyers room chatting with the barrister I was supporting and another barrister who was in there. We were talking about pupillages and how they used to be very unspecialised and how that had changed - aparently becase of the demand from solicitors for 'experts' in a given area of law. From my point of view, which they agreed with, it seems utterly silly to ask a person who has done between 2-4 years of law which are of law they wish to specialise in until the end of time in 150 words on a pupilage application form. 95% of people won't have a clue - oh, we all knpw there are some areas we really enjoy and others which we hate, but for the in-between bits 'who knows/cares' probably sums it up. For the rare 5% who know whaich area they want to do because they are passionately in love with it, 150 words is hardly enough.

My good luck is mine. My bad luck, yours.

This is a very short, but elegant, article on how we apportion 'luck' in society - especially when it comes to holiday companies and bad harvests.

Sponsorship

Hello!

I'm asking people for sponsorship for a legal walk in Manchester which raises funds for legal advice charities, so I thought, who better to ask than you, my wonderful blog-readers!

If you would like to be a good and wonderful person, please go to: http://www.justgiving.com/fieldfisherwaterhousemanchester to sign up and for more information about the charities which we are supporting.

Thank you lots and lots in advance!

Miss Middle

Life update - very boring, really

Start new job tomorrow - somewhat apprehensive as they appear to have given it to me on the basis that they liked me rather than there actually being work to do. As a consequence, they don't know what the job description or hours are - and only have a rough idea of the pay!

Oh well, they assured me that it'll be at least 2 weeks of work which means I'll have enough to pay for my share of the rent this month.


Going to the theatre on Monday hopefully to see hayfever after a friend recommended it. Haven't been to theatre in aaaaaages - looking forward to it.

Just bought and costructed 2 new bookcases - meaning we now have 9 (and all full) in total in the house. Vive la livre!

Ok, enough personal updates, will try and blog of my interesting topics at some point (the Boy is using the computer to play games os I can't read the news....)

Oh, Ossetia most upsetting. I've thought it would be Abkhazia which caused the problem instead.

ps: hear about whether or not I got the paralegal job, tomorrow. V. nervous.

Top 10 blogs competition

I'll be the first to admit this blog is, on occasion, a tad schizophrenic.

It's not quite sure whether it's a debating blog, a blawg or just about current affair commentary and tends to change depending what is interesting me at the time (note heavy debate coverage during Euros/heavy BVC coverage when a deadline is coming up).

However, I am honoured that 2 people have voted for me on Iain Dale's search for the top UK political bloggers.


And one of those people wasn't me!

Whilst I consider voting for myself the height of immodesty, I have no such qualms about asking any readers to do the same.

Just follow the link above and write your top 10 political blogs in a comment. If you don't read too many political blogs, you can always reference nought.point.zero (regular commentator Al's blog) and Iain Dale's diary itself. I'm sure geeklawyer and Charon could quite probably count given that they touch politcs and current affairs (sometimes!)

Indexed - BVC style

In a homage to indexed


And because I am very much at the point where the 'days' axis is running out of numbers...

'Tis the season

Well, having applied for a job as an admissions officer at Salford, I'd given up hope as I hadn't heard anything.

This morning just got a letter asking me to interview - yay!

Let's hope the spate of 'good luck with jobs' extends to pupillage!

Paralegalling

Well, I bit the bullet and applied to three paralegalling positions yesterday.

Was pleasantly surprised when the firm I liked the most got back within the hour and offered me an interview for next Monday. They're a respectable sized city firm with a Manchester office. My only problem is that the advert said 'PRG paralegal'. If anyone has ANY idea what PRG stands for, I would be grateful!

My only thought as to why I got the interview was because I've done two vac schemes with solicitors firms in Manchester - maybe that helped?

Or it was simply my sparkly personality!

Fingers crossed, eh?

The interview - Preston

Well, I had the interview with 15 Winckley Square yesterday and I enjoyed it more than I thought I might!

Turns out they are interviewing 8 people for one pupillage - so we'll see how it goes!

They spent the first third of the interview asking me about debating. I realise a question like 'so, you say you're the 71st best speaker in the world - how is that measured?' may have sounded odd in many contexts, but for me it was the perfect opening as it meant I could just go onto 'auto debating explanation' :)

They went through my application form in a lot of detail, luckily I didn't make any of it up or I would have been in trouble! I'd photocopied my results transcript as well, so when they started asking for details about my marks, I handed it over which seemed to save them some effort!

I'm a bit worried that they thought I didn't want to do crime at all. I had to explain that whilst I have a greater interest in civil, I don't loathe crime. I think they were amused when I said that the reason I was put off somewhat by crime was because of the clients!

After they'd gone though the OLPAS form and academics, they moved onto three problem questions involving professional conduct - one of each of their practice areas. I had to be prompted to take further action sometimes (like forgetting to negotiate - oooops!) and got bogged down on side issues on others. I hope they figured that it was just nerves!

The final part focussed on 'HR' questions. Luckily, I'd played the dinner party guests games with friends a while ago (Stephen Fry, Oscar Wilde, Jane Austin, JS Mill and Mary Wollstonecroft, in case you were wondering! I reject Jesus as although He would be interesting and the water to wine is useful, I fear I would have to be on best behaviour all the time!). They also asked a couple of other reasonably odd ball questions - nothing too bad though and all perfectly reasonable.

A friend who was interviewed after me found their contradicting her somewhat disconcerting, I guess debating is fairly handy for being taught just to go 'no, I really do think I'm right and here's why' in a polite manner but unmovable manner.

I tend to become one of two things when nervous: self deprecating or verbally aggressive. They appeared to be laughing at a lot of my answers (Q:"do you get scared when speaking in front of large numbers of people?"A: not really. 1 person and 100 people are all the same to me, it depends who the people are. For example, I'm more scared of a 5 member pupillage committee than I am of 500 students....) OK, so not too funny but hey!

They also asked me my favourite film. I blurted out Princess Bride without thinking and then realised I should probably have said somewhting far more intellectual! What's worse, I then said out loud that I should have chosen something more intellectual.

Given I wasn't sure what to think of the set before the interview (there isn't much information out there) but that I now really like them (quicky, in a good way :)) I really hope to get this one.

Fingers crossed, eh?


(Whilst I came out feeling somewhat positive about how I ha performed, the more I think back, the more errors and mistakes I realise I made. Wish I could stop the mental dissection!)

Wii-fit

The Boy came back with a wii-fit yesterday.


It's even more fun than I had expected! Whilst on the BVC, I used to walk the journey to and from uni about 50% of the time and its about a 2. 5 mile walk. Now, I spend all day in front a computer convincing myself that reading blogs and playing Civ IV counts as career research and jobs applications and all the typing I'm doing *must* have compensated for the complete lack of leaving the house and walking.


Hmmm, the bathroom scales begged to differ so lets see if the wii-fit can do better!

BVC results

Well, just picked up my results today, less than an hour after getting off the plane!

Overall I'm a solid very competent, which is nice.

Very surprisingly, I did significantly better in Employment than I expected. Had I been given the two options marks without their labels, I would have thought I would have scored far better in PI.

Even more suprisingly, I have a certificate stating that I scored the highest mark in professional conduct out of the entire year having got 98%. I'm in one of those odd moods where I wonder where those missing 2% went as they would have been nice to have - but hey, who's complaining! It boosts the average wonderfully.

The only marks I am disappointed with are my advocacy marks. Whilst the scores for A2 and A3 were still VCs, I wish they were higher.

All in all, VC (Very Content).

EUDC 2008: The Book

Ok,

My bid for the ENL final is: KCL A, Oxford A, UCD Law A and UCC Law A.

My bid for the ESL final is: Leiden A, Tilbury for sure. I'm afraid I don't know about the others so I'll run with their breaking position and take BBU A and Tel Aviv A.

What nationality are BBU, by the way?



Any bets?

Lack of posts...

Sorry about the lack of updates recently, by the way. I've got re-obsessed with the West Wing.