Notes and queries:
Jan. 4th, 2009 03:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
raven1. The definition of a valuable consideration, from Curie v Misa (1875), is: "either a right, interest, benefit or profit accruing to one party; or a forebearance, detriment, loss or responsibiity given, suffered or undertaken by the other."
No, shut up, I do not care that you thought that was boring, because I have spent the last two days of my life committing it to memory. It and a whole lot of other things, of course, but it remains the most impressive thing that I actually know.
The whole galaxy of things, however, that I do not know, remains a major source of gravity. As I keep telling people at great and aggrieved length, I took Oxford Finals six months ago, there is something deeply unfair in a universe that has me doing exams again six months later. And yes, I know these are not the same, but Finals remain a sterling example of the principle that you can work your body and mind into half-insanity for three months and still fuck it up. Which inclines me to the new and equally general principle that whatever you do, academic life sucks, and in its yet more general formulation, woman is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards.
(Seriously, why am I doing postgrad? I'm congenitally lazy (c.f a life-long passion for baths, and writing stories about other people's characters so I never have to do my own worldbuilding) and intellectually sharp as a rubber band. I love law, but I'm continuously wondering, these days, why I persist in the unnatural delusion that "love" and "am any good at" are somehow co-referential.)
Part of this mood of sweetness and light is perhaps brought on by the fact I am right in the middle of 2009's first bout of insomnia. I'm not sure why, either. I just sort of levitate over a pillow and hate the night. I think I ought to use the time to try and sit and remember cases - for example, Pinnel's Case [1602] - in which one may not suggest to one's creditor that one will pay less than owed unless one offers something to support the promise, be it a "horse, a hawk or a robe" - but thinking about cases leads to thinking about writing about cases which leads to thinking about writing cases in exams which leads to difficulty breathing through one's nose.
It isn't even the productive kind of insomnia, either; not the kind where I beaver away cheerfully and wait for the dawn. This is more the stalking-the-Serengeti type, prowling around the house irritably looking for lions, or something, anyway, all wound up with nervous energy until it snaps into unconsciousness at some unearthly hour of the morning. At which point I dream, about death, usually, and wake up in a bright and obnoxious mood in the middle of the afternoon. I also wonder, at this stage, if my whatever-it-is sleep disorder could actually be diagnosed (after twenty-two years, it may be time to convince my mother than no, I'm not going to grow out of it): I mean, it consists of occasional insomnia, occasional hypersomnia, bruxism, very infrequent sleepwalking, violent nightmares and once asleep, being almost impossible to wake. In short, I never quite got the whole sleeping-through-the-night thing that most people have nailed by the age of six months or so. I have no conclusion to draw, really. Maybe I should enlist a loved one with a frying pan.
...there was supposed to be a second point, wasn't there? Here it is.
2. I have decided, therefore, that I now wish to write romance novels for a living. So there.
No, shut up, I do not care that you thought that was boring, because I have spent the last two days of my life committing it to memory. It and a whole lot of other things, of course, but it remains the most impressive thing that I actually know.
The whole galaxy of things, however, that I do not know, remains a major source of gravity. As I keep telling people at great and aggrieved length, I took Oxford Finals six months ago, there is something deeply unfair in a universe that has me doing exams again six months later. And yes, I know these are not the same, but Finals remain a sterling example of the principle that you can work your body and mind into half-insanity for three months and still fuck it up. Which inclines me to the new and equally general principle that whatever you do, academic life sucks, and in its yet more general formulation, woman is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards.
(Seriously, why am I doing postgrad? I'm congenitally lazy (c.f a life-long passion for baths, and writing stories about other people's characters so I never have to do my own worldbuilding) and intellectually sharp as a rubber band. I love law, but I'm continuously wondering, these days, why I persist in the unnatural delusion that "love" and "am any good at" are somehow co-referential.)
Part of this mood of sweetness and light is perhaps brought on by the fact I am right in the middle of 2009's first bout of insomnia. I'm not sure why, either. I just sort of levitate over a pillow and hate the night. I think I ought to use the time to try and sit and remember cases - for example, Pinnel's Case [1602] - in which one may not suggest to one's creditor that one will pay less than owed unless one offers something to support the promise, be it a "horse, a hawk or a robe" - but thinking about cases leads to thinking about writing about cases which leads to thinking about writing cases in exams which leads to difficulty breathing through one's nose.
It isn't even the productive kind of insomnia, either; not the kind where I beaver away cheerfully and wait for the dawn. This is more the stalking-the-Serengeti type, prowling around the house irritably looking for lions, or something, anyway, all wound up with nervous energy until it snaps into unconsciousness at some unearthly hour of the morning. At which point I dream, about death, usually, and wake up in a bright and obnoxious mood in the middle of the afternoon. I also wonder, at this stage, if my whatever-it-is sleep disorder could actually be diagnosed (after twenty-two years, it may be time to convince my mother than no, I'm not going to grow out of it): I mean, it consists of occasional insomnia, occasional hypersomnia, bruxism, very infrequent sleepwalking, violent nightmares and once asleep, being almost impossible to wake. In short, I never quite got the whole sleeping-through-the-night thing that most people have nailed by the age of six months or so. I have no conclusion to draw, really. Maybe I should enlist a loved one with a frying pan.
...there was supposed to be a second point, wasn't there? Here it is.
2. I have decided, therefore, that I now wish to write romance novels for a living. So there.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
on 2009-01-04 05:12 am (UTC)However, and this may be a singularly unhelpful comment, and you may delete or mock at will, but. . . clearly I can't say a thing about whether you're any good at law, since all I have to go on is how you talk about how you feel about your own abilities. Cue unreliable narrator. I suppose you may be rubbish at it.
But if you love it, does it matter? You already said you wouldn't make money at it. :P And I'd vote for a bad lawyer who loves the law over a clever lawyer who wishes to take advantage of the law any day.
However, I don't expect you're bad at it at all. After all, law and exams about law aren't very closely related. I expect if you can muddle through the school part of it things will be better?
And one of my friends has slammed her head into the wall hard enough to knock herself unconscious, so I suppose you could discipline yourself to use the frying pan on yourself, but wandering around to the GP who helped you get off your prior medications and seeing what they have to say might be a step to take first?
no subject
on 2009-01-05 10:00 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-01-04 11:48 am (UTC)Go ask nicely for a sleep study, perhaps?
no subject
on 2009-01-05 09:59 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-01-04 12:32 pm (UTC)There must be someone somewhere in oxford that will wire you up to electrodes and see why you can't sleep, although they may find that its due to being wired to electrodes.
Whatever you write is great, i suspect you'd make a brilliant columnist and also write the sort of romance novels that people who don't like romance novels would read...
*bruxism
no subject
on 2009-01-05 10:01 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-01-04 06:22 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-01-05 09:56 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-01-04 09:56 pm (UTC)I have invariably found that forcing huge amounts of info into my brain leads to insominia, it's a sort of mental indigestion.
Painful as it is, it's better to do all the exams at a gallop than space them out - I'll always remember the first summer I was actually free to enjoy with no exams in it (I was 24...)
Good luck!
Sx
no subject
on 2009-01-05 09:58 pm (UTC)(ps. new undergarments? I like that.)
no subject
on 2009-01-05 12:49 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-01-05 09:57 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-01-06 09:49 am (UTC)(what i was trying to say, although i'm sure it was clear, is that i am at a point right now where the 'love' and 'am good at' line is becoming painfully clear. i love psychology, yes, but i do not think i am any good at it. i'm not smart enough for that, and am thus seeking other employment. hmph.)
no subject
on 2009-01-06 05:21 pm (UTC)Obviously I can't speak for how good you are at law, I have no idea; but given your general way with words and ideas and huge, enormous, Godzilla-sized capacity brain, you are probably good at it. Regardless, if you like it, then that's good, and keep on doing it. Liking it is more important than being good at it, finances allowing. (And while finances do allow, milk it, and something will always come along. Because you are Great.)
Also, exams, urgh. I sympathise, though I have none until summer, as usual. I am, however, trying to write my project, and bouts of morbid depression aren't helping any.