Two Notes on Music During Study/Exam Period

I. I absolutely *adore* Songza. My current playlist is literally just anything and everything by Sun Kil Moon. It's folksy indie music that's all relatively quiet & subdued, so it can block out background noise without distracting me. Particular favorites: Carry Me Ohio, Exit Does Not Exist, and Trucker's Atlas.

II. Earlier this week I had one of the most traumatic experiences ever in the YLS library. I went into the Foreign & International Law Reading Room (Room 0008) on L1 - one of my favorite places to get work done, because it's normally isolated/quiet/doesn't involve the distraction of ten thousand people walking by (as you can tell by now, I am very easily distracted when I should be working - I have ZERO self-discipline without a hypothetical gun to my head). In a rare moment of promise, I came prepared with headphones, since I wanted to listen to some peaceful tunes while revising a handful of final papers for the class that I'm TAing for this semester.

Scene: I come in, sit down at one of two big wooden tables; the other is occupied by another 1L girl who I know mostly through my roommate [for the purpose of the rest of the story, it should be noted that while this girl is really nice, she is also really intense]. We nod hello, and she gets back to work. I plug in my MacBook, plug in my headphones, turn on my music and get to work. I'm being uber-productive, editing page after page [aside: these kids have another thing coming if they think this counts as fluent, well-reasoned scientific argument...]. After about 20 minutes, I go to adjust the volume on my music and realize that MY HEADPHONES HAVEN'T BEEN PLUGGED IN - or, they've been plugged in, but not into the correct jack...so the other girl has been exposed to my music (quiet, yes, but still...the whole purpose of headphones is to keep your music yours) and hasn't said anything about it.

Immediately, I say, "Oh my gosh, I'm SO sorry - I had no idea my headphones weren't plugged in!" Which, of course, sounds totally stupid, as they're hanging from my head...she says: "Oh, no problem, it's like, not a big deal at all." But kind of in that voice that lets me know that it totally WAS a big deal. Eek! I feel bad, because I'm relatively stress-free at the moment (at least academically), but I know others are freaking out about exams and papers and (at the time, earlier this week) finding out whether they passed the first stage of the Journal-joining competition.

In any case, I feel a little less awful when I come back later, after a few meetings. I sit down and double-check to make sure my headphones are correctly plugged in this time - yes. And then, the same girl comes back. And sits at the same table as me. So I guess she doesn't hate me? Then, another guy (an LLM, I think) comes and sits at the other table. Plugs in his headphones. Turns on his music REALLY LOUD. The girl can hear his music, too, and her head snaps to face him: "Could you, like turn that down??"

Him, realizing he's being spoken to, but not sure why: "Oh! Do you want me to turn it down?"

Her, visibly agitated: "Yeah, could you turn it down? Yeahthanks." She turns back to her work, scouring a book and frantically typing things on her computer.

Me, thinking to myself: Phew. Glad that wasn't me.

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