I post this not because I wanted to prove that if bad news comes my way when the results are in, I'll still have a future doing layouts for a magazine; rather, because it illustrates some difficulty I had over the weekend. Trying to be a diligent student, I took home several books. Unfortunately, they weren't the right one. This, I'm quite sure, is because I was an idiot, and not because it's difficult to keep which book is which straight right off the bat. (Of course, one could have read the directions on the front of one's study schedule, but one wasn't smart enough to do that, regrettably.)

So, for those of you fortunate enough to not be taking the bar and enjoying the summer, here's a quick summary of what these books are.

Starting in the top row, on the left, you have the Ohio outlines. These are massive outlines in subjects not tested on the multistate multichoice questions; but tested on the Ohio essay questions. These are ponderous and fairly dull, but have just about every answer you might need. Maybe.

Middle, top row, Drills & Released Questions. These are actual previous multistate questions, asked of bar examinees in years passed, which questions have now been released. (Hence, the term, released questions.)

On the right, in yellow, Essay Testing. As you may have guessed from the title, this book contains...essays. Past essays from the Ohio bar exam, in fact, at least, those which are still tested. There are several questions not included, where they say, "No Question: Subject No Longer Included." I always wonder how that makes the people that flunked the bar exam on their answers to one of those questions feel.

Second row, far right, below the essays. The Conviser Mini Review. This mini review contains outlines, not to be confused with the Ohio Outlines, of course. Conviser's Mini Review is easier to read, more accessible, full of charts and such, although I dispute that it's "mini" anything.

To its left is the MPT Workbook, not to be confused with the Essay Testing workbook. The MPT Workbook is where you are given a case file with relevant (and irrelevant) law and facts and asked to come up with a legal solution. We haven't even touched the MPT yet.

To its left are the Practice Questions, which are not, in any circumstances, to be confused with the Drills & Released Questions. The practice questions are actually just a precursor to answering the questions in the drills and released questions. (Yes, you read that right: Essentially, you are studying to study for the bar exam.) Surely, no one with a law degree would confuse the two, right? Certainly not! Because it would certainly suck if you were to do that when you were going home for the weekend and take the Practice Questions when you were supposed to take the D&RQ. Could throw off your whole study schedule for the first half of the week, if you were such an idiot.

Believe me.

OK, just below that is the Ohio Lecture Handout book. This book has several charming features: (1) It forces you to go and pay attention to lectures, so you can fill in the blanks and have the answers when you go back to study later. (2) It reminds you just how bad your handwriting can be sometimes, and encourages you to do better before you take a test that will require legibility. Such a confidence booster.

To its right is the Multistate outline book. This is not to be confused with the Ohio outline book, the D&RQ, the MPT or either of the Multistate Workbooks. This is much like the Ohio outline book, insofar as it has more dense outlines, but just on subjects covered by the multistate bar exam. Still confused? That's tough! That's tricky! That's......the multi-state!

Below that are the two PMBR books, each of which contain ungodly numbers of multistate multichoice questions. You're supposed to do fifty questions a night out of there. That is tricky, and that is, most definitely, tough.

So, if you can master these books, what they mean, and what all the abbreviations on your study schedule relate to, you may be ready to start studying for the bar with some higher degree of confidence.

I'll need to get back to you on that one.