A little complaining

I have signed a lease on an apartment with an August 10^th move-in date, so I think that pretty much commits me to school this year.  Well, that and the $1000 that I sent to the law school for the tuition deposit.

While ultimately I am happy with the apartment choice that I made, it wasn’t without some drama.  Searching for an apartment when you are 3000 miles away is difficult but searching for an apartment when you are 3000 miles away and you have two Siberian Huskies is doubly difficult.  There is one apartment complex that is basically across the street from the law school (I’ll call it Complex A).  It’s very popular with law student because of the convenient location.  Back in December, when I was accepted, I started looking for apartments and Complex A was mentioned.  Their website said that they allowed two dogs per apartment, 50 pounds max each, and if they were over 25 pounds, only in ground floor apartments.  All that sounded reasonable to me, so I called to make sure there were no breed restrictions.  When I talked to Complex A’s manager, she first said that Siberian Huskies were way too big, but I then explained that one of them is 45 pounds and the other is 48, so I didn’t think they would break the rules.  After that, she said it would be no problem.  Because the complex is so popular, they begin accepting applications at midnight on January 1st and start a waitlist for apartments for the next school year.  I submitted my application at 12:08AM and was given a spot of #9 on the waitlist.  I felt like I was in good shape.

When we visited the school in January, we visited multiple apartment complexes, just in case, although I did not really think too much about them since I was so sure that Complex A was going to come through for me.

Fast forward to last week.  I called Complex A to check on how things were going with the waitlist.  The manager told me that she was going to meet with #8 on the waitlist the next day, then they would have 48 hours to pick their apartment, and then I would get to make my selection.  When I spoke with her, we talked about the dogs and she said she would have 5-6 apartments to offer me as choices, depending on what #8 selected.  On Friday, she emailed me that she had one apartment for me, but there was already another dog on the shared hallway, so she didn’t think it would work out for me to live there.  I emailed her back and basically called her out on what I considered to be false information she had been giving me: we had spoken a few times about the dogs, I listed them on my application clearly, and yet, just a few days before, she said there would be 5-6 apartments as options for me and now she is saying only one and it wouldn’t be a good fit.  I asked her to explain what was going on.  She called me the next day and told me that those other apartments were not being offered to me because they had been remodeled and she could not allow dogs in them.  I asked her why she had failed to mention that to me before.  I explained to her that my dogs are always crated when I am not home and they are not destructive and I would even be willing to pay a higher refundable deposit because I was confident they wouldn’t damage the apartment.  Finally she offered me a semi-remodeled apartment that she said she had planned to replace the carpet in, but she wouldn’t replace the carpet and I could have it.  I told her to send me pictures.

The whole thing rubbed me the wrong way.  I completely understand if a property manager does not want dogs in the rental units, so if an apartment says no pets or only pets under 25 pounds or whatever, I respect that and move on.  What I bothered me is that I had been repeatedly told that the dogs would be fine, there had been no previous mention that some apartments would be off-limits, and I felt like she was basically lying to me.  It made me feel really uncomfortable to move into a complex where I didn’t trust the property manager before I even moved in.

So while I was waiting on the pictures from Complex A, I called Complex B, another complex that we had visited in January.  They allow two dogs per apartment, no weight limit and no restrictions on Siberian Huskies.  Complex B is a little under 2 miles from the law school, so not as easy as walking across the street, but not horrible either.  It’s a little more expensive, but the units are recently remodeled, have all wood flooring, washer/dryers, and the best part, fully-fenced, private patios.  It just happened that they had a unit with an August 10^th move-in date.  I expressed interest and had the apartment secured by Monday.  I didn’t want to let go of the other apartment in Complex A until I at least had something else because all of the other complexes that we visited were either much further away from campus or not nearly as nice.

Monday night I emailed Complex A’s manager and told her that because I was completely uncomfortable with how the situation was playing out, I was pulling my application.  I then suggested that she revise her pet policy if she doesn’t actually intend to rent to people who fall within the policy.  I’m sure she ignored everything I said and was glad to not have to deal with me, but it made me feel better to at least mention it.  There is a huge waitlist for Complex A, so she could say No Pets and still fill the complex completely.  It seems like that’s what she should do so others in my situation don’t waste their time on it.

In the long run, Complex B is probably going to be better.  It’s in a residential area, mostly houses and not apartments, with a nice park across the street.  When we were there in January, kids were sledding down the hill in the park.  It will probably be easier to walk the dogs in that type of environment versus the more commercial area where Complex A was located.  Plus with the fenced patio/garden, when the dogs want out in the middle of the night, I can just let them out in that area instead of taking them out on leash.  I’ll still have to walk them a lot, but not in the middle of the night.  I was stuck on Complex A because it would have been like living on-campus and I could have gone home between classes, but ultimately I decided it wasn’t worth it.

Whew!  What a long-winded story.  Thanks for bearing with me.

It’s all about to start

Less than one month until the beginning of application season. I have narrowed my list of schools to 10. Unfortunately it’s going to cost quite a bit to apply to 10 schools, but I’ve selected the list based on the top schools where hubby has a decent chance of also finding a job. About half of those schools release their applications on September 1st, so my plan is to apply as quickly as possible and then hurry up and wait.

Hubby is taking his final in Criminal Law tonight. He has enjoyed his one law school class but has decided to at least take a year break. Working full-time and going to school is just too much for him. His manager also wants him to work a lot of overtime, which is just really hard to do when you have to go to class. He has told me how much he thinks I will like it and how good at it I will be, so that makes me feel good.

When I left my last company to move up here and work, I was really sad and torn about the decision. I cried every time I thought about it, including at work the day I left, which was very embarrassing. I do have to say that I don’t have those same feelings about leaving the current company and going to school, even though it’s going to be a huge change for us, going from two incomes to one and potentially living in different locations. I’m excited about it. I also think it might be easier for me because I’ll take the dogs with me wherever I go and hubby will just have the evil cat.

Results

I received my LSAT score via email on Thursday.  I was jumping up and down as I read it.  Well, first, when I saw the LSAC email in my inbox, I started shaking, but then when I read the email, I started jumping up and down.  The dogs were staring at me like I was insane.  I got a 170!  That’s so much better than I expected.  I took 15 practice tests and I got a 171 once and a 170 once, but all of my other scores were between 164-169, mostly 167-ish.  I’m super excited though because I was afraid that I would not perform well on the real test because of burnout.

Despite the fact that I’m really excited about my score, it has made things more complicated.  Now I have a whole new realm of potential schools.  I never thought I had chance at a top 10 school, but now I might.  It’s hard to know what to do because it’s not just me to consider anymore.  I’m married, we own a house, and we have pets.  It’s a lot harder for me to pack up and move across the country to school, yet should I really stay local if I can get into a better school and potentially have more opportunities after school?  Also, since we don’t really want to live here forever, maybe it would be better to get into a more national reaching school.  Lots to think about.

LSAT Dreamin’

I had a dream over the weekend that I got a 168 on my LSAT.  I guess it was a really vivid dream because I woke up in the night so excited about my score.  I was ready to work on finalizing my list of school to send my applications and finishing up my application materials.  Then I realized that it was just a dream.  Ugh!  I need to stop thinking about the LSAT score.  Only six more days until I know for sure and hopefully I will know sooner.  My October score came in a few days early, so maybe I’ll know by the end of the week.

I’m also waiting for an estimate on our backyard landscaping.  It should be coming in the next couple days as well.  My guess is that it’s going to be $5000 for the grading of the yard, soil prep and new sod.  Hubby guessed $2000.  While I would love for him to be right, I think I’m going to win this one.  We’re toying with doing a new fence at the same time. We have three different neighbors to deal with for replacing the bad fence on two sides of our yard.  I think one of the neighbors will be more than willing to pay for half of the fence between us, but I expect that the other two neighbors will not be interested.  One of them has a dog, so maybe that will work in our favor, but judging from the rest of their yard and house, I’m not sure they care very much about the look of their fence.  Hopefully I’m just jumping to conclusions.

In other home improvement news, I spent the weekend painting.  Since the time we moved into our house, the paint in the hall and stairs has bugged me.  The walls in the hall looked dirty and since it was a flat paint, no amount of scrubbing helped make it cleaner.  The stairs looked like the walls were painted with a flat paint and then touch-up painting was done with a semi-gloss.  It was patchy looking and it bugged me every time I went upstairs (which, in reality, isn’t much).  Now it’s freshly painted, very light beige.  I’m not quite done with the stairs.  I ran out of paint so I have one wall of the stairs that needs a second coat.  I also need to finish the top edge, but I’ll need hubby to move the ladder for me.  We have a huge contraption of a ladder and it’s so heavy that I have to drag it around.  There’s no way I could get it up and down the stairs.  I might buy a new light for the entryway tonight when I go back to Lowe’s for more paint.  I will post some pictures when I’m totally done.

Hello world!

I’ve decided to blog my thoughts on the process of getting into law school and hopefully while in law school.  I’m not sure there will be anything exciting or newsworthy about the entire process, but we’ll see how it goes, I guess.  Law school seems to be all I can think about lately, so maybe it will help to write about it.

Here’s where I am today:

I work full-time and I have been out of undergrad for six years.  I originally planned to be starting law school this summer, in a part-time program.  I took the LSAT, got accepted into the local program, and then decided I didn’t want to be a part-time student.  If I’m going to do this whole thing, I want to have the entire experience.  I don’t want to half-ass it because I have to work 40 hours per week and then go to school every night and just basically get by.  I want the whole experience and I guess I’ve accepted that tens of thousands of dollars of student loan debt is part of the whole experience.  I’m lucky that I have a husband who’s willing to let me quit my job in a year (which in this economy is probably stupid) and who will pay the bills for three years while I try to figure out what I want to do when I grow up.

I took the LSAT over again a week ago.  Last time I took it, I got a 160, which isn’t horrible, but I didn’t prepare or anything.  I have a really good GPA, so I knew that if I could just get a decent score on the LSAT, I could get into the PT program.  Now that I’m looking at full-time, I decided to actually spend two months studying two hours every night after work and see what I can do, in hopes of getting a scholarship to help with tuition.  My goal is a 165 for the June LSAT.  I took about 15 practice tests and my scores ranged from 164 to 171.  I was so nervous during the real LSAT, so I honestly don’t know what to think about how I did.  My hands were shaking as I filled out my name and all the header stuff for the answer sheet.  I calmed down a bit for the real test, but I was really shocked at my nerves as I am normally a good test taker and don’t get nervous.

My plan is to send in my applications as soon as they are available this fall.  One of my LOR writers is done and is waiting on me to give her a final list of schools and my other LOR writer is pretty much in the same place.  As soon as the LSAT scores come out, that’s when I’ll make my final list.  Over the summer I’m planning to write a completely new personal statement, touch up my resume, and hopefully put together great application materials.

Two weeks left of waiting for LSAT scores.  Join me for the ride.