Posted by TDot on Aug 25, 2010 in
Fail That’s the excuse I’m using for today: Twitter is affecting my speech patterns 
One of my jobs as the Treasurer of NCCU Law‘s Student Bar Association is to spearhead our appropriations process, where we distribute roughly $100K each semester to the various student organizations at the law school.
And one component of spearheading that process is running an annual “Student Leaders Meeting and Budget Workshop” attended by the President and Treasurer of each of those organizations. During my campaign I got several complaints over how the process ran last year (noted in my candidate speech), so I did a pretty extensive revamp for this one.
Expected (and publicized) duration: 90 minutes
Actual duration: 45 minutes 
I was 15 minutes late due to technical problems on my end (things like the mic not working in our cavernous Great Hall) before finally deciding to just yell really loud most of the time… and yet we still somehow finished 30 minutes ahead of schedule. 
The agonizing part is that I can’t figure out if I really am just getting better at brevity, or if the more likely scenario that I forgot to mention a bunch of stuff — 45 minutes is a huge chunk of time that was supposed to be filled with something. But I couldn’t think of anything else to say 
I guess we’ll find out which of the two it was when appropriations requests start coming in? ::fingers crossed::
Tags: #fml, 2L, NCCU Law, SBA
Posted by TDot on Aug 7, 2010 in
Fail Among the various other things I’ve not been doing during my “too hot”-or-”too cold” summer: regular cardio exercise.
I didn’t pay attention to the effects of my slothfulness until my last day in court for the ADR Clinic… when I noticed my slacks were a bit more snug than usual 
So with the weekend here and most preparations for school already done, I decided to hit the American Tobacco Trail for a 2-mile run tonight.
How’d it go, you ask? Let’s just say it’s evident I haven’t run in months
Not only have I regressed way back to before even my failed USMC PFT run, I was panting like a dog and sweating worse than a politician under oath. And my muscles hhhuuuuurrrrrrtttt 
Lesson learned. Calisthenics tomorrow, then more running on Monday…
Until then, have a great night y’all! 
Tags: #fml, ADR, USMC
Posted by TDot on Jul 20, 2010 in
Fail Even though I can’t seem to get mail from the NC DMV, one thing I’ve noticed over the past few days is a string of letters from the federal government about my student loans.
I got all of these today, and that’s on top of 4-5 I got last week.
8 separate letters... saying the same thing
Did they say anything interesting? Billing notices maybe? The semi-annual notices on how much interest has accrued, perhaps?
Of course not
Each letter just noted that one particular student loan or another had been deferred since I’m still in school. ”But TDot,” you ask, “do you really have 12 different student loan accounts with the federal government?” No I don’t… most of the letters were duplicates of each other. In the stack in this photo, these are all deferment notices for just two accounts, with only the date stamps being different between them.
I wasn’t a fan of the Three Stooges deciding to nationalize the student loan industry, but I was willing to accept it because the corporate welfare model that was in place before nationalization wasn’t exactly working either.
But can anyone explain to me how, while the bank financing my pre-nationalization student loans can send me a consolidated statement listing all of my deferred accounts in a single letter, the federal government feels compelled to send me individualized letters in quadruplicate? 
I’d switch to totally online statements, but given my less-than-stellar experiences with the federal government I prefer having physical documentation on file. Still, it can’t cost that much to upgrade a database compared to the cost of printing / folding / stuffing / mailing to millions of students receiving nationalized student loans millions upon millions of letters notifying them those loans have been deferred…
Sorry for the rant, just getting really irritated at government these past few days 
Hope to have something law-related to write about soon 
Until then, have a great night!
Tags: "Real" world rants...
Posted by TDot on Jul 18, 2010 in
Fail Having all-but-decided to go down the criminal prosecution path after I graduate from NCCU Law, you can imagine my surprise when I found out last week that I’ve apparently been a criminal myself for the past 4-5 months 
First, three items of background:
(1) Back in undergrad at N.C. State I had a PO Box that I used for all of my mail, so nothing got lost while I changed residence halls over the last four years. Then in August when I moved to Durham I got a new license with my new address, and submitted a forwarding order to the postal service to forward my mail. The USPS has done so without incident since I moved.
(2) I have no criminal record at all, and my driving record is almost spotless. My last motor vehicle infraction was five years ago, when (during a 3am McDonald’s run while studying for a Calculus III exam) I ran a stop sign at a 3-way intersection that had been installed only moments before.
(3) Back in February I had a 4-day lapse in my auto insurance coverage. The catalyst was innocuous enough — amid mailing off about a dozen things, I forgot to put a stamp on the envelope to the Farm Bureau The letter got returned to me, I realized what happened, then called the insurance office and had them do a payment via phone. With the premium paid my insurance was back in effect, but still had a lapse spanning that weekend through the morning following my phone call.
Like most states North Carolina requires drivers to maintain liability insurance in order to operate a motor vehicle. If insurance coverage lapses at any time, the insurance company is obligated to notify the Division of Motor Vehicles. I’ve since learned that the DMV then (purportedly) notifies the driver that a lapse was reported and the driver is required to pay a fine or have their registration revoked.
That notification is where things start to tick me off… because I got none
I had no clue there was even an issue with my vehicle registration until I went online to renew my tags before my mini-vacation to Virginia Beach. After clicking the submit button to renew, I got an error notice that renewal wasn’t possible. But the error had no mention of revoked plates: instead it said I couldn’t renew until my car was re-inspected, part of a law change last year where car inspections now take place the same month as registration renewals.
So I went and got the car inspected the day before I left, enjoyed myself on the break, and came back on Monday. I waited the week to make sure the mechanic had plenty of time to update whatever database the state uses to monitor inspections. Then the following Sunday — a week ago today — I went online to again try and renew my registration.
This time I got a second error notifying me that renewal was not possible, but this time the error noted it was not possible because my plates had been revoked… the very first indication I got that I’d basically been illegally driving around for 4 months on a revoked registration
It particularly frosted my Wheaties because I had just done a boatload of legal research on driving privileges for one of my final exam questions in my Race and the Law class a couple weeks ago. Although driving is a privilege and not a fundamental right, once something like a vehicle registration is conferred it creates a property interest that can’t be taken away without due process. The due process standard is fairly low nationwide but always includes some level of notice prior to the revocation. And here I was being “notified” by an error generated by an automated registration renewal system, with no opportunity to contest the revocation before it happened.
The particular section of the law I had allegedly violated, N.C. Gen. Stat. §20-311, reads as follows:
(a) Action. – When the Division receives evidence, by a notice of termination of a motor vehicle liability policy or otherwise, that the owner of a motor vehicle registered or required to be registered in this State does not have financial responsibility for the operation of the vehicle, the Division shall send the owner a letter. The letter shall notify the owner of the evidence and inform the owner that the owner shall respond to the letter within 10 days of the date on the letter and explain how the owner has met the duty to have continuous financial responsibility for the vehicle. Based on the owner’s response, the Division shall take the appropriate action listed:
(1) Division correction. – If the owner responds within the required time and the response establishes that the owner has not had a lapse in financial responsibility, the Division shall correct its records.
(2) Penalty only. – If the owner responds within the required time and the response establishes all of the following, the Division shall assess the owner a penalty in the amount set in subsection (b) of this section:
a. The owner had a lapse in financial responsibility, but the owner now has financial responsibility.
b. The vehicle was not involved in an accident during the lapse in financial responsibility.
c. The owner did not operate the vehicle during the lapse with knowledge that the owner had no financial responsibility for the vehicle.
(3) Penalty and revocation. – If the owner responds within the required time and the response establishes any of the following, the Division shall assess the owner a penalty in the amount set in subsection (b) of this section and revoke the registration of the owner’s vehicle for the period set in subsection (c) of this section:
a. The owner had a lapse in financial responsibility and still does not have financial responsibility.
b. The owner now has financial responsibility even though the owner had a lapse, but the vehicle was involved in an accident during the lapse, the owner operated the vehicle during the lapse with knowledge that the owner had no financial responsibility for the vehicle, or both.
(4) Revocation pending response. – If the owner does not respond within the required time, the Division shall revoke the registration of the owner’s vehicle for the period set in subsection (c) of this section. When the owner responds, the Division shall take the appropriate action listed in subdivisions (1) through (3) of this subsection as if the response had been timely.
(b) Penalty Amount. [... table outlining penalty amounts ...]
(c) Revocation Period. – The revocation period for a revocation based on a response that establishes that a vehicle owner does not have financial responsibility is indefinite and ends when the owner obtains financial responsibility or transfers the vehicle to an owner who has financial responsibility. The revocation period for a revocation based on a response that establishes the occurrence of an accident during a lapse in financial responsibility or the knowing operation of a vehicle without financial responsibility is 30 days. The revocation period for a revocation based on failure of a vehicle owner to respond is indefinite and ends when the owner responds.
Various emphases added by me.
With the statutory language in front of me, I called the DMV on Monday as soon as the office opened. The lady I spoke to told me the DMV had sent me notice. Five notices, in fact: she claimed the DMV mailed four separate letters, and a postcard to boot.
When I told her I hadn’t received any of them, she asked for my address which I provided. She then told me the DMV had been sending notices to my old PO Box in Raleigh, and that the confusion was my fault for not updating my mailing address.
The situation and her attitude made me want to reach through the phone and strangle someone. I figured my mailing address would have been updated when I got my new license back in August. But, even assuming the DMV didn’t use my new residence as my new mailing address and it was my fault for not updating them accordingly, that means the USPS would have had to not forward five separate mailings spanning over a month… even though they’ve successfully forwarded all of my other correspondence without a problem.
Even if I thought the USPS was the single most incompetent government enterprise to exist (I don’t), the idea that they selectively didn’t forward material from one particular correspondent on five separate occasions is just preposterous in its implausibility. The far more likely scenario, to my enfeebled mind at least, is that the NC DMV never actually sent the notices or has “Do Not Forward” printed across the front of the envelopes.
Anyhow, trying to contain my total disbelief and figure out how to get my registration renewed, I’m told by the bureaucrat that I’d have to contact my insurance company, have them send a Form FS-1 to the DMV notifying them I had active insurance (bear in mind I’ve been regularly paying my premiums since the 4-day lapse 5 months ago), then call back 2-3 days later to request a hearing on the revocation. I mention the statutory language to her, and she repeats that I need to have the Form FS-1 sent in and call back to demand an administrative hearing.
I contact my insurance agent and the Form FS-1 is faxed to the DMV less than an hour later. I call the DMV back the next morning en route to my Medicaid mediation, talk to a different bureaucrat who verifies the FS-1 has been received, and again mention the plain language of the N.C. General Statutes that my revocation should end and I be allowed to pay my civil penalty and move on with my life. The second bureaucrat asks if I’d like to demand a hearing (I do) and then tells me I’ll receive a notice in 2-3 weeks scheduling a hearing date 2-3 weeks after that. She then tells me that if I need to operate the motor vehicle I should go buy a temporary 30-day tag.
"Dear TDot: You were right. Oops. Sincerely, NCDMV"
Terrified something could happen and I get pulled over in an unlicensed vehicle, I go to the DMV in between the two Medicaid hearings and drop $63 on a 30-day tag as instructed. I then spend the rest of the week waiting for a letter telling me when my hearing will take place.
I got the letter on Saturday, which I took the liberty of scanning in for y’all to read if you’re interested.
Essentially the DMV agrees that the statutory language I pointed out to them was right, and in fact I don’t need a hearing at all. I just have to pay the civil penalty and move on with my life… the exact same thing I was trying to do on the phone with the apparently-less-than-competent DMV personnel.
Now I have no objection at all to being required to pay a civil penalty for the insurance lapse. We live in a society where people get penalized for their carelessness to teach them a lesson; I was careless in not putting a stamp on the envelope, I’m fine being penalized for it, and it won’t happen again.
But I’ve got serious reservations with:
- Not getting an indication about the plate revocation the first time I attempted to renew my plates online, instead only being notified that I needed to get my car inspected. Solely because of the DMV’s negligently-coded website I drove in a vehicle with revoked plates across two separate states spanning five separate days; had I known the plates were revoked, 雅雅 and I could have just taken her car. It’s only by the grace of God that I didn’t get pulled over or in a car accident that would have had far broader repercussions.
- My registration being revoked in the first place without any kind of notice at all whatsoever from the DMV. The notion that the USPS selectively failed to forward 4 separate letters and a postcard spanning several weeks — when they’ve forwarded all of my other bills and other correspondence without an issue — is simply too implausible to be believed.
- The DMV arguing the lack of notice is my own fault for not updating them with my new mailing address… when they got my new mailing address on my new license I obtained in August. If a driver with a mostly-unblemished record hasn’t responded to numerous notices purportedly sent to a (older) mailing address, doesn’t it make sense to send at least one of the notices to the person’s (newer) address on their license?
- Being told by two separate bureaucrats that I’d need to demand a hearing to review the revocation, despite the plain language of the statute I provided to them indicating no such hearing was needed.
- Being given a series of hoops to jump through before I could even demand the hearing I didn’t need.
- Having to spend $60+ on a 30-day temporary tag that I only had to buy because the NC DMV apparently doesn’t know the laws it operates under. Had I gotten a notification in the mail before the revocation, or a notice on the website when I attempted to renew my registration on July 1, or an acknowledgement that the revocation was temporary when I talked to a live bureaucrat on July 12, or even gotten the letter they sent on or before July 15, I would have had enough time to renew my registration without the wasted money and time spent buying the temporary tag.
Unfortunately the N.C. General Assembly has already adjourned for the year, because otherwise I’d be in downtown Raleigh raising hell that this level of pervasive, multi-faceted incompetence is allowed to take place in a government agency. This isn’t like a private marketplace where I can switch vendors if the one I’m using turns out to be incompetent — I have no choice but to register my vehicle with the NC DMV if I want to live and drive in North Carolina. So I expect better of a monopolistic enterprise funded by my tax dollars.
With service like this, it’s no wonder so many North Carolinians end up in court…
Do better, N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles. Do better.
Tags: "Real" world rants..., #fml, CrimLaw, 雅雅, NC State, NCCU Law
Posted by TDot on Jun 14, 2010 in
Fail Decided to take some time on Sunday afternoon to enjoy my apartment complex’s swimming pool. Not expecting to be out more than 45 minutes or so, I neglected to put on sunblock.
And now my shoulders+neck+ears are redder than a lobster dipped in ketchup
I don’t think the ability to get sunburnt is what my textbook meant when it talked about my “white privilege”…
Tags: #fml
Posted by TDot on Apr 22, 2010 in
Fail A tidbit of advice: read directions closely
Several of my 1L classmates at the N.C. Central University School of Law knew I had been having an absolute dog of a time writing our semester-ending memorandum in Legal Research & Persuasion. Essentially, all of the miscellaneous assignments we worked on throughout the semester got synthesized into a legal memo to a fictitious court, supporting a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss a fictitious lawsuit.
We got the assignment about a month ago, and when I read through the instructions I could have sworn they said the memo had to be single-spaced. So I worked on a single-spaced memo over the ensuing weeks.
I ended up hitting a wall after 4.5 pages. With the case law we were required to use, I just couldn’t figure out what else to add without being needlessly loquacious and redundant. But that was actually fine with me: those same instructions said there was no page minimum (the page max was 10) so 4.5 should have been fine.
Then I talked with some of my colleagues who had met with Professor LRP, who apparently told each of them they wouldn’t be able to thoroughly discuss all points of law without using nearly all 10 pages. I had no clue what I was missing… so I spent the past few days staring at this memo at every opportunity, adding a paragraph here, a new argument there, some additional authority I found somewhere else, etc.
Finally, around 4am or so this morning, I got to 10 pages. I print out the memo, read through it, ensure all the BlueBook citations are accurate, staple it, then go print out the grade checklist we have to turn in with the memo…
…which I notice very clearly says only subheadings are to be single-spaced
I figure I’m hallucinating. ”It’s 4am, I’m cracked out on caffeine. There’s no @#$%ing way this is supposed to be double-spaced.” So I go back to the instructions… and sure enough they say the same thing as the checklist. Where I had paused at 4.5 pages — which would have been around 9 double-spaced and could have been turned in on time — I ended up with a 19-page memo that I had to somehow pare back to the 10-page max.
Long story short, I finally turned in a less-than-stellar memo around 7am this morning at the price of not sleeping at all for the past couple days. All because I misread directions a couple weeks ago.
Just thought I’d share in case any of you can learn a lesson from my illiteracy Have a great night everybody!
Tags: #fml, 1L, ::headdesk::, LRP
Posted by TDot on Apr 3, 2010 in
Fail That make-or-break PFT I mentioned ended up more on the “break” side of the spectrum
Before I can head to Officer Candidate School for the Marine Corps, I need a passing score among pullups, crunches and a 3 mile run. Each section is worth a max of 100 points apiece (max of 20 pullups, 100 crunches, 18min on the run) and a passing score is 240 of 300.
And for the however-many-th time, I continue to be thwarted by the 3mi run :mad: It took me an embarrassing 32:02: netting me -0- points, and meaning no OCS for me this summer.
Now none of this was particularly surprising — I mentioned to you back in January that I might have to push back a year — but it’s incredibly frustrating. Just about everything I’ve tried to do in life has used GPA or some similar criteria as the bar to admission. This is the first time I’m trying to do something and it’s my physical condition stopping me
I’m trying to take solace in the fact I shaved 4.5 minutes off my time from my last PFT. But even at the peak of my physical fitness in high school, where playing basketball was a bigger part of my life than doing homework, a 10-minute mile was a miracle — no clue howtf I’m going to do 3 of them back-to-back in 8min apiece or less
For at least the next few weeks though I get to push it out of my mind. Need to focus on studying for finals, wrapping up the UNCASG presidency, and finding a job.
If you happen to be hiring any slightly overweight, modestly balding 1Ls with an affinity for technology and a slow 3mi runtime, let me know
Tags: #fml
Posted by TDot on Mar 8, 2010 in
Fail i•ro•ny – n., a state of affairs or an event that seems deliberately contrary to what one expects: After successfully preserving his health during midterms, TDot noted the irony in abruptly falling ill at the start of Spring Break.
Posted by TDot on Jan 5, 2010 in
Fail I see why folks told me to be grateful after reading my complaints about not yet having grades back. The CivPro final exams got returned about an hour ago, I got mine soon thereafter…
…and I nearly failed
This is the same class where I can quote you nearly every case we’ve studied by name, along with the relevant points of law. The only class where I actually felt comfortable with the material. The class I professed my love for after riding the curve to an A on the midterm.
The final wasn’t nearly as kind.
I rocked out the multiples (16 out of 20) but got eaten alive on both essays (14.5 of 20 on the first, 20 of 35 on the second, 2 of 5 for writing style). That leaves me with a 65%, on the test that makes up 80% of my grade.
Part of me feels bad for thinking it, but I’m hoping history repeats itself and all of us did sufficiently bad that there’s a tremendously huge curve. Fingers are firmly crossed…
Posted by TDot on Nov 5, 2009 in
Fail I’ve been enjoying law school so far, and realized around Fall Break that I was griping more than experience warranted. But every now and then things just don’t work out the way I intended. Like today.
As absurd as it probably sounds to y’all, I’m convinced that I’m allergic to the cold. It’s not a bona fide “allergy” per se, but for years now any time the temperature around me drops below 70 or so I end up with the symptoms folks would have for the flu: stuffy nose, sore throat, burning eyes, etc. It makes for a pretty miserable fall/winter (and even summer — when QuietStorm and I lived together and she insisted on having the AC set to “arctic” 24/7 ). I compensate by staying warm, to the point where 雅雅 once teased me that being in my apartment during the summer reminded her of being in Shanghai.
I must not have set the thermostat high enough before going to bed last night, because I woke up at 5am feeling thoroughly wretched. I pulled the covers over my head and went back to sleep, just to wake up again an hour later. I got out of the bed, made some breakfast, read the news, and decided I felt bad enough I was just going to skip Contracts class and go back to sleep. Then around 7:45 or so I woke up, felt guilty for skipping, once again crawled out of bed and headed for the law school.
Professor Ks is more laid back than the other professors, and let’s folks show up late to class — provided that if you walk in late, you’re “on deck” for all of the questions for the day. I get to the law school about 5 minutes before class is scheduled to start, and skip going to my locker to get my notebook so I can make sure I’m on time. We were starting a new section on the syllabus anyhow (Principles of Interpretation) so I figured I wouldn’t need my old notes for class.
By 8:28am I’m at the classroom… and Professor Ks has already started.
“@#$%.”
Instead of going back to get my notebook, I figure “what the hell, I’ve read everything we’re going over today and understand it. let’s go.” and walk in. Professor Ks greets me with his predictable you’re-going-to-get-grilled-and-better-be-ready smile, and starts to ask me questions about… the Statute of Frauds.
We were starting with a review of the previous section. The section that was in my notes… in my notebook… in my locker… that I skipped getting to be on time and avoid getting grilled.
I couldn’t even bluff my way through because I felt like shit and hadn’t reviewed the SOF material since Tuesday. Professor Ks called on someone else to bail me out on the review, but then instead of coming back to me for the new stuff and giving me a chance to recover (since I knew it backwards and forwards) he picked a few other folks and I was left to sit there in silence.
It was a decidedly not-fun experience, and successfully earned me a “see me after class” admonition from the professor. And I’m pretty sure I’ll be called on next week due to the poor performance…
w00t
Tags: #fml, About TDot, 雅雅
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