Wednesday Recap

[Warning: Bar recap means long entry. But like I've always said, part of the reason I'm recording it is for myself. Here's the quick summary: no sleep, mostly asleep through the first half of morning & afternoon sessions, guessed on over half the questions because of lack of time, 100 degrees outside and test location is not much cooler, travel to NJ for the exam and end up lost in the pouring rain with no cell phone, bummed over the fact that the MBE sucked.]

Wednesday was not a good day. Perhaps I should have tried to be extra cautious once I had a lot of trouble getting a taxi, but I don't know that it would have made much difference, seeing as how the MBE was already printed. But flowing seamlessly from Tuesday, here was my Wednesday. (Note: All times are approximate.)

2:20 am
Bolted up awake in bed. No idea why. Had trouble getting back to sleep. Tossed and turned all night. Two nights in a row that I can't sleep through the night! I wonder if it's the bed. Finally get back to sleep, but toss and turn until the alarms go off.

6:00 am
Alarms go off. Drag self out of bed, bleary eyed and foggy mind. Much more tired than yesterday and feel like I'm going to fall back asleep the entire time I'm getting ready. Eat my footlong Subway sandwich, and try to force my eyes to stay open. This is not a good sign - my eyes are closing and I just woke up!

Extremely mad at myself for not taking a sleeping pill the night before and not being able to sleep, because I just screwed myself over for being alert during the MBE. ARGH! Should have taken a sleeping pill!

7:45 am
Leave the apartment and head over to Madison to get a cab, just like yesterday. Only this time, instead of getting a cab within a minute, it took over 10 minutes and I had to cross three blocks just to get someone to notice me. I had started getting worried - what if I was standing out there for 20 minutes and there were still no cabs? I knew it was still early, but I didn't want to be running into the bar exam at the last second, all rushed and not focused.

8:15 am
Finally get to the Pier. My cab driver was really nice, even though we were racing all over the west 50s because we were stuck in traffic. At one point on 55th & 11th, we looked over to the other side of 11th Avenue and saw an entire block stopped full of taxis. We went around, because obviously everyone else trying to get to the bar exam was still waiting. His way ended up being better than getting stuck on 55th, but the cab ride cost $2 more than yesterday (42nd seems to be the best way to go).

My driver (who had already made 2 trips to the Pier that morning) asked me, "What's going on at the pier? Is there some sort of fashion show?" I explained to him about the bar exam, but it was pretty amusing to me, because I don't know what those other people were wearing, but me, in my gray t-shirt and gym shorts - I was definitely not dressed for a fashion show.

And there was no way, once I arrived still in my green wristband, that I was going to wait on the 30 person line for the bathroom! Bathroom lines are seriously one of the worst parts of the bar exam.

8:30 am
I passed through security (which was really just checking for green wristbands, nothing more, no scrutiny of your plastic bags), and lucked out, because even though I had gone past security later than a lot of people, I was part of the group that they ushered toward the front of the line to alleviate some of the congestion. That put me right in the first group to enter the room! (which was sometime around 8:30, but I really don't know when exactly)

What was good about that... is that first into the room, is first to run to the bathroom. And not having to wait on line for the bathroom makes all the rushing through the room worth it.

Got back to my seat and the taped instructions started repeating. Today's instructions were even more annoying than yesterday's, because they were longer and had all the stuff about how the MBE was a protected test, blah blah blah, don't repeat it to anyone, blah blah blah, fill in the circles, blah blah blah. After the 3rd time it went around, I wanted to break the machine.

I was also falling asleep with my head down on my arms. Not a good sign.

9:00 am
Test begins! This doesn't seem so bad.

9:07 am
Crap. Question 6 sucks. 1-5 weren't bad though! Skip it, move on to 7. Or 8. Or 9. Or 10. Or 11... and crap, I cannot stay awake!

9:07 am - 10:30 am
Skipped around all over the 100 questions. I could not stay awake!! I know it's my own fault because I got no sleep, but this is ridiculous. These long fact patterns, I'm reading every sentence 4 times. I'm reading shorter questions and hearing in my head certain phrases in the question on the first reading that aren't there when I look back at the question. (For example, I thought one question had the words "on the internet" in it. It didn't. This happened way too often.)

I tried everything and anything to stay awake: pinched myself, rotated my ankles, tried to stay in motion as much as possible without disrupting the people around me, drank water, tried to stay awake by eating, had gummy bears, had Sweet Tarts, ate chocolate. NOTHING WORKED. I was getting so frustrated, because I kept trying to stay awake, and I kept feeling my head doing the drop and jerk upwards... and no matter what I did, nothing would stop it.

Time kept ticking by... and I kept falling asleep.

Since I was getting lost in the longer questions, I just picked any question that could hold my attention (meaning I only had to read it 3 or 4 times, instead of 10) and any short questions. The words were still blurry and going all over the page, but I picked some answers. By 10:30, I had maybe 30 answers filled in out of 100?

Oh goodness. 30% finished and halfway through the time period? This is never going to work. I had glanced at most of the fact patterns in the first third of the test, but after that, I just kept skipping the long ones without even knowing what they were about. No idea how I'm going to finish. And I finished the Barbri and PMBR tests both with at least half an hour to spare in each session. This can't be happening!

10:30 am - Noon
Flew through all the remaining questions, as the adrenaline seems to have kicked in from pure fear of not finishing. I knew I had the ability to do it, because I finished Barbri and PMBR's tests so quickly, and I just felt so dumb for not being able to stay awake while everyone else was diligently doing their questions and for not being able to do the test to the best of my ability. I answered the questions the best I could, but that was under impaired circumstances.

Thing is, unlike the way I normally did MBE questions, there wasn't much thought involved. With barely over a minute per question, my answering process basically went: read question - read answer choices - pick one. There was no thinking about rules, no analyzing the call of the question, no analyzing answer choices, no looking for clues in the question to tip me off to the answer. Frankly, there was no time to even try to do that. I tried it for some questions, but for the most part, it was just guessing.

It was all about, "what sounds like the best answer?" Which is a totally bad way to do the MBE, but when you're that short on time, it's hard to do anything else. When the session ended, all I could think was, "I really, really hope I have good instincts." Because that's basically how most of the session went - guessing on what my instincts thought was the right answer. (And having never taken con law except 1st Amendment, I have no con law instincts.) This is not at all how I imagined the MBE would go. One week before the exam, I was comfortable (but not complacent) about the MBE, and terrified of the essays. Who would have known it would be flip in a week's time?

Noon - 1:30 pm
Lunch break at the Pier. There was a food cart outside selling hot dogs, but I walked down to the neighboring pier to see if there were any carts with food other than hot dogs - maybe falafel or chicken pitas or something. Nope. Ended up getting a hot dog, because I wasn't really hungry enough to walk all the way to Subway again. And the temperature was in the high 90s, so I really didn't want to leave the air conditioned lobby of the Pier. Somehow the bathroom lines were long throughout the whole lunch period too. Ridiculous.

There were people studying during lunch again. I just don't get it. It's one thing if you have a hotel room nearby (although there aren't really any that close to the Pier) and you go back there for lunch and just to scan over some notes. But to figure out some way to get notes during lunch, from your car or hiding them somewhere in the lobby, so you can study over the hour lunch break? Is it really worth it? At that point, still really tired, I couldn't imagine seeing anything in my notes that would help me in the afternoon. What I really needed was to stay awake!

1:00 pm
Allowed back into the room, the whole run to the bathroom thing again, repeating of the instructions, this whole thing is becoming kind of routine.

I wasn't overly full, since all I had was a hot dog, and I always feel a little more refreshed in the afternoon, so I had much higher hopes about my performance in the afternoon. I tried to get myself ready for the task at hand: "you have got to do better than the morning! You guessed on over half the questions in the morning! Concentrate and just get this done!" I felt ready to take it on.

1:30 pm
Test starts, and I think my reaction to Q1 was "what the heck is this?"

And then I started falling asleep again.

1:30 pm - 3 pm
Just like the first session, I spent the first half basically asleep. It wasn't only because I was so sleepy from the night before, not having gotten any real rest, but it was so damn hot in the Pier. I was already in a short sleeved shirt and shorts, and I was sticking to the table worse than the day before and started to feel like I was dripping with sweat. Totally unpleasant.

The Pier has walls of windows. It was 100 degrees outside. There was no ventilation. There was barely any air conditioning. Taking a test in those conditions is inhumane.

The problem with taking a multiple choice test (as opposed to essays where it's more active) in a hot room is that you get lazy, you get sluggish, you read more slowly, you start to fall asleep (especially in the post-lunch hours!). Add to the heat and the post-lunch hours not sleeping all night and you have a recipe for disaster.

Ended up doing the same thing as the morning, skipping through and only doing the questions I could handle at the moment based on length and subject matter. But it was worse. Instead of steadily working through page by page doing the ones I knew, I completely skipped around. Just opened the booklet to random pages and did what I could. I felt so disjointed because I was skipping around, but even that didn't hold my attention.

3 pm
I've done even less questions than the morning, and I'm in even worse shape.

Repeat the morning's procedure for the last 90 minutes, but for more questions - read, read answer choices, pick an answer. No reasoning involved, just pick what sounds the best!

This is not at all how the MBE would go. I didn't take PMBR and Barbri so that I would fly through the MBE questions without any thought involved. Time was never an issue, so I wasn't used to dealing with the time pressure the way I did here. They called 15 minutes, and I still had plenty more questions to go. I finished just in time.

4:30 pm
The NY Bar Exam is over! It's really over. And it ended on such a downer.

I don't talk to people about questions when the exam ends, but I don't block out the conversations of those around me. Some people seemed to think it wasn't that hard, some people discussed some con law questions that I couldn't even remember being on the test, a lot of people lit cigarettes as soon as they got outside, and a fair number of people were talking about the next day's Jersey exam. I just felt so numb that even if I were in private and wanted to cry, I don't think I could. But it felt that horrible walking out of the Pier into the humid 100 degree heat.

The entire walk to the subway station... 11th Ave, 10th Ave, 9th Ave, 8th Ave... all I could think about was how I really genuinely felt like I was going to have to sign up for the Feb exam. People who know me know that I usually take a pessimistic view of how I've done on an exam because I don't want to get my hopes up, but this wasn't an exaggeration. I mean, I guessed on over half the questions! And when this section is worth the same amount on the exam as the state essays... well, it's a little worrisome. I tried the entire time never to let the test get the best of me, but I just felt so defeated. I tried valiantly during my awake periods to do the best that I could, but I just felt so stupid and so down.

I couldn't wait to rip my green wristband off in an attempt to purge the exam from my memory, but I knew that I couldn't get it off and it wasn't going to erase the bad memories of the MBE. (Someone did tear it off though, as I saw one on the sidewalk on 50th.) I figured, if people could just stay awake for the 6 hours, they already had an edge over me! There was no way I could eke out a decent performance under the time constraints I ended up facing. Disastrous. And now, in the midst of my resignedness, I had to gear up for the Jersey test. What fun.

Oh, and PMBR and Barbri? Your practice tests felt easier than the real thing, even though you claim that the real thing should be easier. I am aware that part of this may be due to the fact that we knew those were practice tests, but I really think it's about the questions. They were harder and less straight-forward. So, don't tell that fib anymore.

5:00 pm
E train arrives at Port Authority. I've never taken NJ Transit buses before, and as much as I usually like the Amazing Race-ness of figuring out public transportation, I wasn't feeling very into it at the moment. Finally got onto a bus to Secaucus, got a seat, took a pen to my wristband as we headed for the tunnel and finally freed myself (temporarily, at least) from the NY Bar Exam.

5:30 pm
Bus arrives in Secaucus at the stop where I was supposed to get off to go to the hotel. I am lost. I'm outside the Home Depot where I'm supposed to be, but the hotel looks quite far away.

I go into Home Depot, and they tell me that the hotel is over the bridge and a really long walk, if it's even walk-able. And the sky looked like it was about to open up and pour. Great. Since the bar examiners don't let you carry in a cell phone, I am stranded at Home Depot and have no idea how to get to the hotel. Luckily, Home Depot lets me call my mom, who is at the hotel, and since the hotel claimed Home Depot was so close to the hotel, I asked her if she could pick me up there, thinking that, even with rush hour traffic, it couldn't take more than 10 minutes.

5:50 pm
Okay, it's getting a little late. I am standing on the edge of the Home Depot parking lot, literally watching every car go by to make sure I don't miss my mom. I hate not having a cell phone. And I have already seen hundreds of cars, but not one of the same make and model and color!

6:10 pm
Lots of cars driving through the parking lot have stared at me, probably wondering, "what is that little girl doing, standing at the edge of the parking lot, clutching a plastic bag and staring out at the road?" Yeah... that was me. Hundreds and hundreds of cars whizzing by, and none of them is the one I wanted to see.

Two heavy shower spells, no car, I'm starting to get a little depressed. First, the MBE was horrible. And now, I'm stranded in Home Depot. Of all places, Home Depot! Why?!? Something must be wrong. There's no reason why, if the hotel were so close, I should be standing 40 minutes later in the Home Depot parking lot, just barely sheltered from the pouring rain. No cell phone, no connection to the rest of the world, in the middle of nowhere ... I guess it wasn't so bad that crying coincided with the rain.

6:25 pm
My mom finally shows up. Apparently she's been driving all around Secaucus because the hotel's instructions are worthless. And since I have no cell phone, it was a whole big mess. Had it been 5 minutes later, I would have been begging strangers to use their cell phones to call my mom. We were both frazzled at this point, and it was already getting so late (and my lack of sleep was really catching up to me and I needed to study civil procedure since it wasn't on the NY exam).

Oh, and the hotel was around a curve about 3 buildings away. The Home Depot people were really nice... but totally wrong information. Sigh. Could have saved myself over 40 minutes of stress!

Evening
The rest of the evening was relatively mild, compared to the depressing and tumultuous events of the rest of the day. Scoped out the test site, which I had thought would look more like an arena than an office building. Found the Burger King where I planned to grab my quick lunch during the exam. Found our way around the area and had dinner at the food court. Went to Stop and Shop to pick up TV dinners for breakfast for the next day. Studied civil procedure, but my brain wasn't really focusing. It was more just re-recognition of key words, like "code pleading" and "notice pleading." I mean, I haven't heard those terms since December 2002.

And even though JDJive can make you crazy sometimes, I think I needed it that night (1st time online during the bar experience!) because of my lack of genuine human contact with other bar takers. It was good to hear that other people thought the MBE was hard. It was good to know that there were people who felt as clueless as I did. Not because it made me feel like things had suddenly gone well, but because it made me feel a whole lot less alone, and not as dumb and a failure as I had been feeling. Crazy how a message board like that can actually give you a sense of calm.

I also learned from my mistakes. Before taking a shower, I took allergy medicine that makes you drowsy. It started to work as I was scanning my property notes and watching Lost. I put it all away and headed to bed. I slept through the night. Whether this was due to the beds at the Hilton being about a hundred times more comfortable or the sleeping pill or both, it was much welcomed rest. If only I had that the night before the MBE, things might have gone a little bit better. But what's done is done. All we can do is hope that things aren't as bad as they seemed. Or that I have really, really good instincts.

So that was Wednesday. The day that I thought would be my strength on the bar exam, as opposed to the essays. The day for which I really had the most preparation from the bar courses and the most simulated testing. Just proves that you never really know what's going to happen.

(Entry completed 8/3/05, 12:23 am)