ambivalent comment

It sounds like you have lots of great reasons for loving it up there, both personally and professionally. From what you've said, it certianly does sound like the ultimate place to start a legal career -- at least a criminal defense career. I haven't heard anything like the great stuff about anywhere else, but I'll admit I haven't heard much about other places at all. I wish there was a way to get an inside look at more jurisdictions so decisions like this would be easier to make. I wonder if there's any resource for that anywhere... Have I mentioned how jealous I am of your experience up there? I'd say we might be in competition for the same jobs a year from now, but I'm still finding it hard to figure out how I could deal w/being so far from family -- both mine and my girlfriend's. Her family is already saying that she'd be insane even to live as far from them as Montana, so Alaska would be like moving to the moon, as far as they're concerned. We'll see. But I guess my main point is this: I've loved working around DC where I worked last summer and will be working again this summer. The attorneys are awesome, the office is laid back, it's only funded ok so resources are a little tight, but not bad. The prosecutors are mostly ok and generally (sort of) seem committed to doing the right thing rather than just nailing ever D to the wall. The attorneys all eat lunch together every day and talk about cases and many of them hang out frequently after work and socialize on weekends occasionally and it's all around a great place to be, both personally and professionally. However, the huge difference is the amount of responsibility and autonomy they give to interns -- it's not even close to what you've had, and therefore it's nowhere near as useful to a law student. We also don't get to go to Talkeetna and see if Denali is out. ;-)