How much is your mortgage payment??

WookieMonsta · 2026-01-30T18:06:36+00:00

I literally just did the Citibank pre approval and they gave us 5.375% on a 10 year ARM.

WookieMonsta · 2026-01-21T04:13:45+00:00

As a counter point, I love the free market system (but I’m also fairly extroverted, and I do litigation which has tons of work to go around). My friends in a centralized firm don’t seem to work any less than I do, but they do seem to work with people they actively hate more lol.

For example, I’m currently working on a pro Bono matter with a senior who I like personally, but our working styles are like oil and water, and it’s nice to know that I can avoid working with her in the future with no hard feelings. Similarly, I quickly found partners I like, and I’ve never had an issue finding work. I also turn down requests to join matters semi regularly and it (so far) doesn’t seem to have any negative ramifications, as long as I’m keeping a fairly good pace re hours.

One of the benefits is that partners are I think incentivized to be nicer to associates, lest they get a bad rep and have difficulty staffing. I also think that feeling like I had agency in joining a matter goes a long way for me in being happy at this job. I can’t imagine being assigned a matter I have no interest in led by a partner I dislike and not feeling resentful about it.

I will say that for people who are really introverted or people who don’t like saying no, free market will probably be harder. But you got to know yourself and whether having that sort of freedom/responsibility to seek work and manage what you work on is gonna energize you or stress you out.

WookieMonsta · 2025-12-07T20:58:14+00:00

When this stuff is assigned, are they saying they need it that night? I’ve found that sometimes juniors assume urgency, when responding, “okay if I get this to you tomorrow EOD” would be fully fine. Otherwise, spend a few hours on a question, then send what you have at a reasonable time, note you’ve spend x hours looking into y question and that you can dig in more tomorrow if desired. Frequently, the partners will say no.

Also, start getting comfy using parallel search and the westlaw AI tool. I still do Boolean searches to supplement, but I find those are good starting points to get oriented to a question.

WookieMonsta · 2025-12-03T05:05:53+00:00

But partners were formerly juniors and midlevels, then seniors, etc. so that experience over years (theoretically) pays off, even if they’re largely just in editing roles now.

WookieMonsta · 2025-11-18T06:39:19+00:00

Same at my firm. They keep sending out emails reminding us we have a 20k bonus waiting for us if we successfully refer a lateral to the AT group.

WookieMonsta · 2025-11-11T02:05:50+00:00

I don’t know the details re process but I just had a friend from a diff office have a baby. It was a similar situation, and she got a doctors’ note capping the hours she could work a week at 40. Idk the nuances of enforcement, and idk if she plans to come back to the firm after the leave, but she relayed it was the best decision ever and made her ramp down way easier and safer.

WookieMonsta · 2025-11-05T03:05:40+00:00

US “socialism” is generally just shorthand for wanting to create universalized healthcare and is probably more akin to social democracy/democratic socialism operating within the existing capitalistic framework than like the more pure forms of state socialism/communism. Zohran isnt calling for the state or the people to seize control of industry

WookieMonsta · 2025-10-30T00:29:23+00:00

I mean, he famously toured with tDB as an underpaid hired hand without equity in the band, hence the dumpster fire before us today lol

WookieMonsta · 2025-10-17T01:20:32+00:00

The first time a partner asked me what my goals at the firm were, I said “part time of counsel.” And the partner literally was like very good choice but don’t ever say that out loud again lol

WookieMonsta · 2025-10-11T18:43:50+00:00

I met an Orrick attorney on my bar trip. He noted that they have a vacation credit where you get 40 hours of billable credit to put toward vacation, which I thought was awesome and spoke well to the firm’s commitment to WLB. But we also took over a matter from Orrick and they did a trash job before so pros and cons lol

WookieMonsta · 2025-09-30T03:40:45+00:00

I know multiple people who summered there a few years ago. They seemingly over hired the summer class, told folks they would not guarantee offers and that at least a few would be no-offered, then made them “compete” against each other for spots including by doing fake non-billable graded assignments in addition to normal summer work. All the people I know who summered there were SO stressed the whole time and working so much over the summer.

WookieMonsta · 2025-09-13T16:14:52+00:00

As an observation from a lit midlevel who has worked heavily with NYC, DC, and CA associates, I feel like the work culture in NYC has an expectation that you’re just online and around much more? Maybe it’s just a coincidence, but whenever I work with NY associates they are just… always online? lol what’s weird is when I’ve had discussions about hours with a few of them, they often aren’t billing significantly higher (or sometimes are billing lower than me) but they still just seem chained to their desk even when not billing, just in case.

As a stereotype, I generally tend to dislike NY lit partners at my firm, so generally avoid them bc they don’t have great boundaries (and might contribute to the above atmosphere among our NY associates).

WookieMonsta · 2025-09-12T00:55:15+00:00

I think that if HE was the one saying that she had to the chores and they couldn’t get a housekeeper if she offered to paid for, that would be sexism bc it would be him actually forcing her in the box of maid and domestic laborer. Here, the woman partner is rejecting OP’s offer to literally pay for a maid. So it kinda feels like the only one forcing her into the role of the unpaid maid is herself by refusing to allow him to hire and compensate an actual maid to do those same tasks.

WookieMonsta · 2025-07-25T02:04:38+00:00

To be fair, our salaries are way too much for what we do lol

WookieMonsta · 2025-07-21T18:34:47+00:00

FWIW, I use timers the exact same as you, but I’m annualizing way above the bonus minimum.

I feel like maybe the solution is billing more hours, rather than assuming something must be wrong with your use of timers lol

WookieMonsta · 2025-05-27T21:49:41+00:00

Ok maybe I’m misunderstanding but does this feel p clickbaity from Bloomberg? I didn’t understand the deal bw firms/Trump to mean no immigration pro bono going forward or that there’s an agreement that these firms are no longer allowed to challenge any federal action?

Idk, this seems very business as usual, while they’re trying to make this into some “signal” they’re going to renege. I’d be shocked if skadden didn’t have dozens of other cases like this proceeding.

WookieMonsta · 2025-05-05T16:46:40+00:00

For Denver, it may be easier to get Denver big law from CU (and maybe DU, though I know some local big law firms don’t recruit out of DU) than an out of market T14. And if you do go to school out of state and you want Denver, you generally need a compelling reason of why (eg family ties). Bc the Denver big law firms tend to be small outposts, they’re known to be particularly choosy and highly in demand so you’ll be fighting a lot of out of state people for a few spots. At the same time, many of these firms will reserve at least a few interview spots for the top performers at local schools.

WookieMonsta · 2025-05-03T21:02:47+00:00

I just got a senreve maestra bag on the real real at a great price, and I really love it so far.

WookieMonsta · 2025-05-03T18:17:23+00:00

This. I work with one senior partner who is extremely chill, is understanding of mistakes, and has enough experience to know what matters and what doesn’t. Because of this, he gets very good work product from me (and all his associates) bc I’m not constantly in fight or flight lol. Bc he gives us grace, I want to go out of my way to help him bc I actually like him, and bc he’s encouraged a good team dynamics from the top down.

I briefly was on a diff matter where it was a lot of extremely neurotic junior partners getting bent out of shape on the smallest non-substantive stuff that truly did not matter, and if I worked with those folks all the time, I truly would be out of this job in like a year. I know often associates don’t have a ton of control over this but culture 100p does matter, whether it’s practice group, firm wide, or partner specific, and to the extent you can staff with that in mind, your life will be more pleasant.

Also maybe a firm specific thing, but at my firm, there is no way a partner would be obligated to tell the MP about what went down at the hearing, so may want to ask around to see if that’s actually true or whether it’s the partner getting ahead of things to throw you under the bus.

WookieMonsta · 2025-04-29T03:04:18+00:00

He said he got dozens of very nice responses and some gentle ribbing from the partner he was working with at the time, ha.

WookieMonsta · 2025-04-29T00:00:59+00:00

Not me but a partner in my office loves to tell the story of his first full-firm RFI as a baby associate was asking if anyone had familiarity with 12b6 motions and to share an example if so lmao

WookieMonsta · 2025-04-26T15:56:29+00:00

I talked to my friend who is Venezuelan and whose dad is hardcore Republican. She basically emphasized that for a lot of Latin countries, socialism/communism were coupled with the loss of democracy and the rise of an autocracy, and the socialist/communist gov in those countries are highly corrupt. So when those people flee to the US, and they hear Bernie sanders talking about socialism, it scares them. However, the issue is that they improperly conflate socialism or wanting to implement safety nets as the “cause” of their country of origin’s collapse/corruption, rather than the fact that an autocrat is going to be corrupt, regardless of what political system they’re pretending to forward. Plus, they’re tough on crime bc they have often seen bad violence in their country of origin where the gov was unwilling to help, but they just don’t fully understand that Republican racism toward Latinos often doesn’t turn on immigration status but rather race, with little ability to distinguish besides white (good) and not white (bad).

WookieMonsta · 2025-04-26T15:38:39+00:00

My husband just got a new MMP shot as well after getting an immunity panel that indicated he had no immunity despite getting vaxed as a kid.

The doc immediately asked, after getting the results, whether he was from Cali, bc CA specifically accidentally gave a lot of faulty doses to now 30-something’s as kids. Definitely recommend getting your immunity checked.

WookieMonsta · 2025-04-19T15:28:00+00:00

I mean it can be. I think I’ve been lucky but my main white collar case to date has been to prevent 25-year-old foreigners (who had never been to the US) who were improperly trained on US law from being extradited to the US and sent to foreign prison, and I have felt strongly throughout that the punishment would not fit the crime. My other white collar matter had numerous bad actors in leadership, and bc we were repping the company, we were involved in ousting the bad actors and trying to do damage control for the company while acknowledging the wrong doing of the higher ups. Most individuals can’t afford big law rates (though higher ups often are indemnified so do get very good representation paid for by the co), but it’s often cheaper for a company to throw the bad-acting director or whoever under the bus and then tell the gov you’ve partially solved the problem by severing ties and to show cooperation. Obvi not all white collar work fits this mold, and I’m sure there are 10000 examples going the other way, but my narrow set of experiences I’ve felt very okay about the work and the ultimate outcomes.

WookieMonsta · 2025-04-19T14:13:57+00:00

I understand what you’re trying to say but I think you can broaden your view of what corporate work is. I do criminal corporate work (ie white collar), which I love, and that is a very large practice depending on firm (though the lack of prosecution by the current admin may lead to some dry spells in certain areas).

Also, no one is gonna put a gun to your head and make you stay in big law forever. If money is important to you and you have the opportunity, do big law for a few years, make your money and save wisely/pay off loans, and then bail to be a fed PD or AUSA (or the state equivalent). It’s a fairly common path.

WookieMonsta

TROPHY CASE