Take the July '07 Ca Bar Exam? Oh, HELL No!

I spend an inordinate amount of time pondering what I am going to do if I fail the bar again. And what I am going to do if I pass the bar. I have thought, maybe if I fail, I will become a rock star and then when Rolling Stone magazine interviews me, I can tell them that I have a law degree but abandoned a law career to pursue my one true love: music. I have thought, maybe if I pass, I am going to be discovered as the great legal mind that I really am and argue some heart-wrenching case that will end up being the next Palsgraf. But really, if I pass, I am going to sit my ass in my chair and do some more paralegal work till I can strong-arm my company into hiring me as a lawyer. And if I fail, I am going to cry and drink. A lot. But I can tell you for sure what I am NOT going to do if I fail to bar again. I am not taking the July 2007 California Bar Exam.

The brain waves over there at the State Bar are going to be adding 3 subjects to the bar exam this July. California Evidence, California Civil Procedure and Business Associations are the new subjects. Not only do you need to know these new subjects, you need to know with specificity the difference between California Evidence and Federal Evidence, California Civil Procedure and Federal Civil Procedure and for Business Associations, you need to add Agency and Partnerships to Corporations. What-the-fuck-ever. The bar announced these fun and exciting new additions in October of 2002. Yep, almost a full FIVE YEARS before they will debut on the exam.

That is a colossal five year mind fuck, right there. Legal scholars and the mental giants that teach any and all bar review classes have been ramping up to this climactic crescendo for FIVE YEARS.

I paid thousands of dollars more than once to hear bar review professors pontificate on what subjects they think will be tested on the next bar. All of them, and I mean all of them, even the ones I didn't take, predicted incorrectly. I can't tell you how many blogs and articles I have read on-line discussing this very subject. Will the new subjects be on the exam in July or will they wait? Maybe only SOME of the new subjects will be on the July bar? They just tested Corporations twice in a row...does that make it more or less likely for them to test it in July? I can tell you that ever single person I spoke to prior to the February exam was convinced that Civil Procedure was going to be on the exam. Jackass himself told me that "without a doubt" it was going to show up on the test, and that he would "totally bet me." We call him Jackass for a reason; it was not on the exam.

This whole subject of what is going to be on the next bar makes me shake and makes me want to drink till I pass out. In my experience, July bars are more tense, emotionally charged and stressful than February bars. Maybe the sheer numbers present in July account for that, but you can count me out. There is no fucking way I am going near that bar exam. The farther away I get from the February bar, the more I realize what a stressed out, psychotic bitch I was. It is a miracle I am still married.

And it's not too late for beauty school.