A Good Day

As I start to write this post, it is 11:40 PM CST. In another 20 minutes, it will be August 25, and I will be 34 years old. Today has been the busiest day by far, but I think that I am finally getting a handle on how to approach my assignments. I am also getting used to a schedule that allows very little time for personal reflection and too much time devoted to studying. My efforts to do my work as I wish to (reading and rereading everything and doing outside reading to boot) has not materialized as I had hoped because of several moving-related errands that needed to be run immediately following classes. At least now, I can spend the time from the end of classes until 7 or 8 pm at the law school library getting some work done. I intend to take Saturday mornings and Sunday afternoons off (at least during the NFL season), so I really need to put in the extra time during the weekdays.

I have already found someone who I think will be a very good friend. Justin is from Cincinnati (yes, he was following Huggins firing this week) and is in the same IP writing section as I am. We have the same outlook on school and the approaches, and I think that we will form the foundation of a study group. This morning was a little tricky as the Con Law professor was handing out seating charts for the semester, meaning that if you didn’t show up early enough to claim a seat, you might be relegated to a bad seat. People (myself included) were piling in as early as possible to insure their spots, and the hallways were jammed. I was able to get seat 25 (my spot in all the classes) with no problem. 25 is 2 rows back from the podium and on a side aisle that leads directly to a door. I like seat 25. Con Law was interesting again today. We studied the limits of the Federal Judiciary in deciding cases. I was surprised to find that, if a case is before the Supreme Court and Congress passes a law that alters the original charge of the case, the new law supersedes the old law. This mostly comes into play with things like writs. Except for one incident, I was pretty happy. What was the incident? The professor asked for the literal translation of the phrase Habeas corpus. I raised my hand and answered “you have the body”. The professor corrected this and said that it meant “bring forth the body”. Keep in mind that I had 5 years of Latin prose and poetry classes in high school and did well on the AP Latin examine. I kind of shook my head in disbelief. Who is going to look the fool? The Professor! This will happen when students look up the phrase on their own. As soon as I came home, I consulted my Black’s Legal Dictionary to look up the literal meaning…Booo-ya! I was right. I was worried that I was losing my Latin, but I find that it’s all coming back to me in law school.

The afternoon class was Civil Procedure. The Professor here is a relatively nice guy unless he is asking the students questions. He tends to be more on the sarcastic side, but I think that he is just trying to give us thick skins. We will definitely need them in the real world. Today, we were covering what is necessary in pleadings. I had no idea that bringing a civil suit against someone required not only the requisite forms and documents but that the appearance of the complaint must follow the rules of civil procedure. If this is a federal court, there is only one book on Civil Procedure. It was a very interesting class.

After school, I had a training session with David. I was a little anxious, as the stress of the move and the beginning of law school found me catching a cold. I hadn’t worked out in almost a week, and I knew that David would be merciless. Instead of pain, however, I was happy to find that I have made some significant strides in a short amount of time. It was a very good workout, and it reiterated to me the importance of keeping up my physical fitness while in law school. I got home by 7:40, ate a quick meal, and then it was off to the study for 3 hours of Civil Procedure. Tomorrow I have Legal Writing and Civil Procedure. Hopefully, I can get a lot of reading done in school .