I'm Living a Fricking COPS Episode!

I can't even comprehend what happened here last night. I don't want to post details in case this ends up in court someday, and I wouldn't want anything compromised, but this was scary! Oh my gosh! Let me just put it this way, if the person gets caught, they could serve up to 9 years in prison for what they did!

(If you know me, ask me about this in person and I'll tell you......)

Whew!

I survived the videotaped session of oral arguments for Moot Court without passing out, throwing up or otherwise embarrassing myself. Actually, I wasn't afraid of any of that. I was more afraid of having the professor/judge ask me questions and not having answers. Luckily, every question he asked me I had a ready answer for. I did not sound as smooth as I would have liked on the section where I was basically talking from my outline (not on direct questioning), mostly because my partner and I have been focused on getting our paper done. I turned that in before 1pm today, had class 1:30-4:30pm, which left little time to actually practice delivering my comments. The good thing is the competition is July 11-13, so in 2 weeks I should be pretty smooth.

I have finished all the reading for my Prof. Resp. class, so all I really need to do in there is construct some sort of an outline and study for the July 17th final. My Family Law Mediation class has its last meeting tomorrow from 8:30-12:30. I already wrote the paper I'm turning in for that, and I suppose I should review what I'm going to present to the class about that. Amazing what a more comprehensive presentation does to your attitude about little ones. I don't really even care about this one, much less have any apprehension about it.

I feel a huge sense of relief to have this paper done, turned in, and finished the videotaping. I'm actually not doing anything tonight and I will probably take the afternoon off tomorrow to run some errands and just plain relax. If I didn't have class tomorrow, I'd like to sleep in till about noon....

Unhelpful Clerks

I made my way over to Office Max tonight to buy some light blue paper for the covers of the appellate brief that is due on Thursday. I wanted to buy 15 sheets of 8.5 x 11" paper. No big deal right? Ugh. I made my way to the back of the store where the print center is. No employees anywhere in sight. I did spot the box that held the paper I needed.....back behind the counter, against the back wall.

Another customer came along, also looking for help. I looked around for a bell or something, and nothing. Finally, I saw an employee with a headset (who didn't seem to be happy to see me). I asked him if I could get some help. He inquired to the headset which told him the person for the print center was at lunch and would be back in 25 minutes. I told him I just needed to buy some paper.

He then left to assist the other customer who said he had been there 4 times to try to pick up his order. Since he wasn't going to bother to help me, and claimed he didn't have authority to go behind the counter, I told him I wasn't going to wait 25 minutes for 15 pieces of paper and I would just go get it myself.

I walked behind their counter, went to the box, counted out 15 sheets and took them to the register up front where they promptly charged me 65 cents for my purchase and I was on my way.

Why do people insist on making things so difficult?

Failing Or Just Staying Sane?

Our brief is coming along. I may do some additional revising- depends on how ambitious I am in the next day or so. I did finish my PR reading for next week as well as finish my paper for Family Law Mediation. I haven't prepared for Thursday's videotaped oral arguments. I feel quite confident at this point that I will suck. Yeah, nothing like having confidence in yourself.

The summer school work may be beginning to wind down, but I'm not feeling much less stress. Most of that is from non-school reasons, but I'm still affected. Once my finals for summer school are over, I'm going to be working at the DA full-time, studying for the MPRE, and starting to prepare for my trial in September in federal court. (Oh, and let's not forget starting to read for the fall classes, as those assignments will be available shortly after summer school ends!)

Of course, if I want to do a law review comment, I should be working on that during the same time. Right now, I feel so overwhelmed, I just can't imagine how I would ever get it done in time, since they expect graduating students to have it basically completed mid August when we register for fall. As I said, I'm going to be working full time and doing those other things. I don't see how I could try to tackle a major research project in there as well.

Part of me feels like I'll be a failure if I don't do Law Review. Another part of me thinks it is better to know my limits. Guess which part is winning right now?

Just Breathe and Keep Going

As if all my summer school classes, including the appellate brief and oral arguments for Moot Court, my internship, and having my home for sale weren't enough, now I have health issues in my family. To be protective, I don't want to reveal specifics. But I don't know how much more I can handle.

To remain sane, I keep telling myself I can do this (law school) in 4 years, instead of 3, if I have to. We're staying in town, so it doesn't really matter now if I finish in 2008 or in 2009. I thought summers were for relaxing, but I can't even remember ever having such an awful, stressful summer. It only gets worse when I think that I won't really get a break until August 2008 (that is, if I do end up finishing next year). But right now, I don't even want to think that far ahead.

Let's just get through today.....finish reading for Family Law Mediation and write that paper. One little step at a time...

Tired, But Surviving

I finished my arguments yesterday afternoon, all 11.5 pages of them. I'm sure I'll have to trim, but decided not to until I hear the page length limit for the whole brief. The final brief is due one week from today. Doesn't seem unachievable now, but I'm just so tired. I should be preparing for the oral practice video session we are doing that night, but I'm just trying to get everything done right now.

Tomorrow I need to write the short (3 page) paper that is due next Friday for Family Law Mediation. I need to read a 20 page law review article and comment on it. Should be a no-brainer, but will take a couple hours. I also need to finish next week's Prof. Resp. reading.

Oh yeah, and since the house is now listed, I'm having to deal with arranging for showings, keeping it clean all the time, and all that kind of fun.

I'm so tired. I'm only sleeping 4-5 hours a night. But at least I've lost another pound......

Chugging Along

I've been working on the arguments section of my appellate brief for Moot Court and I'm almost done. It's at 11 pages right now (using the correct and HUGE font size- courier new, 12), so I know I will need to refine it some. The arguments are due tomorrow, which won't be an issue. The whole thing is due a week from tomorrow. We will need to revise our table of authorities, put together a table of contents, and statements of the issues and jurisdiction, and a conclusion. That will just take time but not really be that hard. I suppose this makes me feel a little less stressed now because since it is well on its way, it doesn't seem so totally overwhelming.

Right now I'm taking a break for a few hours to run down to the federal courthouse for pretrial motions for the trial I'm doing in September. Since I'm not officially on staff in the US Attorney's office yet, I'm just going to be watching, but I think I'll get to meet some of the other people involved in the case while I'm there. Should be interesting.

Stress- A Good Diet

I weighed myself yesterday morning (which is not a daily habit of mine, unless I'm in an obsessive weight stage, which right now I am not) and found I had lost 5 pounds since summer school started 2 weeks ago. At least there is some benefit to being so stressed!

My Moot Court partner and I completed our "Statement of the Facts" and "Statement of the Case" yesterday. I also did my outline for the arguments of my issue. I then tried to organize the cases I would be using under each point. Now I have the pleasure of reading these cases and deciding which ones I really want to use, and then disecting them in order to write my full arguments. Fun.

I haven't been sleeping well. I seem to wake up between 5:30 and 6am every day, regardless of what time I have my alarm set, or even when it isn't set, like today. I'm actually surprised that I haven't gotten sick. I know it's a function of the stress, but right now, I just wonder why I'm doing this to myself.

Dear Readers.....

No, I have not died from stress overload (yet). I am just still busier than ever and expect to be until at least the 28th when I turn in my brief for Moot Court. I do feel guilty for not posting more, so I suppose you have that as a consolation.

xxxooo

It's Really Not That Bad

That's what I keep trying to tell myself. Heck, it's not really 6 weeks of extreme stress. It's really only 2.5 weeks! Once I get to June 28 and turn in my brief, it will be downhill from there. Well, not really counting the actual Moot Court experience itself, but the rest of summer school.

I honestly have not felt as stressed as I do now since I started law school. I literally have not enough time to get everything done. I have the 3 classes and I have to read for them. I'm taking the MPRE in August, so I have to learn this stuff. Skipping it is not an option.

Of course, when you have lots of "musts", it seems like the "shoulds" and "wants" get set aside. I SHOULD be spending more time researching, and I WANT to read the rest of the optional book on oral advocacy. I'm just extremely frustrated because I'm not getting everything done that I want to.

I had thought, briefly, that maybe I was stupid for doing the DA internship this summer. After all, I'll get more than enough hours at the US Attorney's office during the school year for my needed clinical hours. Why was I putting myself through the extra stress of trying to work all these hours over the summer too? Because, I realized, it's not just about the hours. It's getting in the door there, meeting people, beginning to form a reputation with people there. All that stuff. Plus, having been an intern there now will give me a opportunity to work there (paid) as a law clerk after I take the bar but before I hear if I passed or not.

I can survive 17 more days of stress, can't I?

BUSY!

Due to the 3 summer school classes, one of which involves doing a LOT of research in order to write a 25+ page appellate brief, working at my internship, and trying to get our house listed for sale (and then mundane things like sleeping once in a while), I haven't posted lately. Probably won't post much until I feel like I have a handle on the research. I figure most of my readers are as busy as I am, so check back in a few days~

Ranking

Oh yeah, so I've been so busy the last few days I forgot to mention my new ranking. I'm happy to report that I moved up a notch! : )

The Moot Court problem was finally posted this morning. Of course, I was at work at the time and didn't get to see it until I met my partner at school and he gave me a copy he had printed out. I'm glad I had Con Law this past year, as the issues are constitutional ones. I had hoped for something a little different, but I think it will be very interesting. It is a case of warrantless searches of communications for terrorist act prevention and a newspaper that wants to expose the government's secret agency that deals with this.

I'm trying to gather my different notes from class that deal with the relevant topics and get a bit of research in this evening after a family birthday party. Tomorrow I have class in the afternoon and evening, and then all day Friday, so it looks like I won't really get much done until the weekend.

I should get moving on this, but wanted to add, I LOVE MY INTERNSHIP! : )

The Latest Word

from school is that the Moot Court problem will be posted tomorrow (Wednesday) morning. Ugh. I'm working in the morning and won't be able to even look at it until after I get home from registration.

For those not in law school, Moot Court involves writing an appellate brief and arguing it in front of a mock 3 judge panel. The whole thing is based on a fact pattern given to you. This fact pattern is the problem I've been talking about. Once you have that, you have to research the relevant areas of the law- both statutes and case law, to know what the arguments are on both sides of the issues. Each problem has 2 issues, and each student pairs up with another to form a team. Each student tackles one of the 2 issues, writing and arguing the brief as a team.

The "in court" arguments are in the form of a competition in July, with the top 8 students going to a semi-finals round, and the final day with the top 4 students competing in the finals. I attended last year, so I wouldn't be clueless about what I was getting myself into for this year. At the time, it struck a deep fear in me, but I must say that after having taken Crim Trial Practice, I'm not quite as nervous. Sure, being questioned by a merciless judge is a little different (and worse) than just putting on a trial, but I don't really feel nervous about the speaking in front of people now. It's more a matter of will I embarrass myself by not thinking quickly enough on my feet?

What the Heck?!?!?!

The Moot Court problem STILL isn't online! I thought they were bad last year when they finally put it up a week before summer school started. Well, registration is tomorrow so maybe they are just going to pass it out on class on Thursday. This frustrates me to no end because I like being prepared AHEAD OF TIME, and I had thought I'd at least have a week or so to do research before classes started.

Tomorrow I'm working in the morning and then registering. Thursday I have classes in the afternoon and evening, and all day long on Friday. I guess that means I'll spend my entire weekend researching. I'm trying to get as much of the reading for my other classes done now, but I'm sure I'll have some of that left to try to squeeze into the weekend as well. Fun....

At least I didn't accept the internship at the Attorney General's office. They wanted me to work 32 hours a week during summer school. There was no way that was going to happen. Anyway, I am loving it at the DA's office. I don't feel like I should post about exactly what I'm doing there, but I am enjoying it immensely. It was definitely the right choice for my summer internship!

Just Weird

I happened to be over near school today (which rarely happens when we are not in session), so I stopped by to look up my rankings in each of my subjects. (My overall class ranking will be available on Monday should I choose to drive all the over there.) As far as rankings are concerned, I did the best in the classes I hated the most! I was ranked 6th in Bus. Org. and fricking 3rd in Con. Law!?!? Now, to be fair, my Con. Law class only had 17 people in it, but still, I find it amazing to have done so well despite my disdain for the topic. Quite telling was that 8 of the 17 people in that class had grades in the 60s, with 65 being the lowest grade given. I'm guessing that means I wasn't the only one who didn't care for that class!

My daughter and I killed a few hours by looking at some open houses today. We drove out to a new development north and east of the school and I was very impressed! It is just sooo far out there- you're nearly to the foothills! I'm always amazed when I drive around in these new areas because I can't believe how many new neighborhoods there are. It's like it's not even the same city any more!

Well, I guess since I don't have any research to be doing right now, I should at least do some reading....did all the Prof. Responsibility stuff and now working on the Family Law Mediation stuff. It's way too touchy feely for me, so I can feel my eyes rolling as I read it, but whatever. It counts for a unit.

I'm Not Sure Whether to Be Mad or Happy

The school failed to post the Moot Court problem online today. I emailed someone at the school and the last report is that it will probably be online on Monday. Of course, this leaves me with a weekend with no researching to do, but then I also am not going to have nearly the time I had hoped in preparing the brief for that class.

I will admit that I'm pretty much exhausted from this week and wasn't really looking forward to having to work on that. I am definitely not used to have to work all day, come home and read for hours (not fun stuff either) and all along continue to do normal household stuff (ie., like the 6 loads of laundry I did Tuesday night!). I have a new appreciation for those of you who do that all the time. I am glad I don't have to!

This next week I'm only going to work 7 hours, which will help me get a bunch of reading and researching (should that problem ever find its way to the web site) done. I don't have my first class until Thursday, and of course, I have the all day class on Friday, but at least I'll have some time at the beginning of the week to get some things done.

Right now I'm just so tired. I would love to sleep in until 9 or 10 (yeah right!), but my son has his SAT test tomorrow morning at 8am, so I need to get up and make sure he leaves by 7:30am. Sigh. Maybe I can take a nap next August (after the bar).