It's that time again - UGH

But at the end of the semester, I get this beautiful masterpiece. Yay?

Unlike many law students, I don't start my outline at the end of the semester as an exam review. Instead, I start the semester with the table of contents in outline form and add to it each week with my in class and reading notes. I also color code it as I go. Black is from the book, blue is from the professor's lecture, red is anything regarding the exam and brown is anything I added from a supplement. Yes, it sounds over-attentive and nitpicky but it works for me. Plus, if only I had a dollar for every time a classmate asked me, "So I have "this" in my notes (from class) but the book is saying "that." What do you have?" It's very helpful to know when the professor disagrees with the book!

The only downside of my note taking? It has to start before class begins and even before you crack open the book. My first semester, I typed it all by hand and Holy Batman did that take a long time. Finally, I figured out that many publishers post the table of contents online so I could just copy and paste and then put it into outline form. Even with my new and approved method, it still takes me a few hours for each class.

So that is what I have been doing ALL night long. It's currently 5 am and I have one and a half outlines started. Since I have six classes, this should scare me but I think only three need an outline. I'm taking Evidence (needs an outline), Advanced legal research, Estate Planning (needs an outline), Remedies (needs an outline), Interviewing and Counseling, and Cuban Legal System. I only have three traditional law school exams because Advanced legal research has a end of the semester project, interviewing and counseling has an in person exam and the Cuba class has a paper at the end of the semester after our Cuba trip.

As soon as this is done, I can start reading for next week.

Oh joy.