The weekend is over

This weekend marked the end of the formal move-in phase. My roommate Eric is now ensconced downstairs, and we spent much of the weekend getting the place into shape. There is still a lot of work to do, and I feel kind of bad that I left a lot of it for Eric to do. I didn't do it on purpose, but my studying kind of got away from me (more on that later).

There were 2 fun adventures this weekend. The first adventure started at 6:30 on Saturday morning. I was meeting some movers hired by my brother to pick up some furniture for the new place. The furniture was in Oak Park, and the plan was to load up the furniture, drop some of it off at my brother's place, and take the rest of it to my place. Now let me pause here to say that the house where the furniture was located was built in 1880, and many of the pieces were rather large. Can you see where I am going with this? The best part was when the movers and I had to disassemble a large and HEAVY spiral metal staircase to get a sectional sofa out of the top floor. The moving took up most of the day and I was done by 2:30. I was exhausted, but I spent the rst of the afternoon mounting 2 window A/C units. Most of the heat in the house goes to the top floor (duh!), and since the thermostat is also on the top floor, Eric and I were envisioning huge electric bills that neither of us are equipped to pay for. I also set up my bedroom as I wanted it. All in all, it was a productive day. We then met up with some of his friends and relaxed a bit.

Sunday came too soon. Our job today was the basic shopping (Eric had stuff that he needed and I had stuff that I needed). It has been a while since I had a roommate (well, if you don't count the 6 weeks or so that I lived with my brother last year-long story). Getting used to a roommate dynamic hasn't been that hard, however, because we are good friends. So, we went shopping for window blinds, and household cleaning stuff. I hung the blinds and put away my kitchen stuff when I came home. I spent the rest of the afternoon picking up stuff and putting things away. Around 4 PM, the time had come for me to start the long process of studying. I had been dreading this moment, for I was worried that I would get bored. I didn't want my mind to start wandering, and I really did not know what to expect from the legal texts that were staring at me, mocking me with their forbidding thickness....

I have 2 classes tomorrow: Civil Procedure (the hows and whys of courts) and Constitutional Process. I tackled Civil Procedure first. I had 50 pages to read, and I started outlining the chapters as I read. I found this to be extremely helpful and I learned a lot. Surprise, surprise..studying the law was interesting! It wasn't as bad as I had feared. Civil Procedure took me 3 hours, though, and I was dreading how long Constitutional Process would take.

I looked at my assignment for Constitutional Process. I had to read the US Constitution and analyze the legal doctrines discussed from Marbury v. Madison. I set about reading the Constitution, and I was amazed-truly amazed-at how powerful this document is. Our entire Federal Government is in this small document drafted 218 years ago. The way that the government has worked for those many years was framed by our Founding Fathers. I didn't remember getting this excited about the Constitution when I read it in government class in high school. Check it out, and you will see how impressive this document truly is. Marbury v Madison was even more interesting. This was a situation where the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court interpreted the law in such a way that it forever defined the limits and scope of the highest court in the land. Even more amazing was the fact that, in doing so, Chief Justice John Marshall went against his party affiliations. Think about this for a second. A justice putting the Constitution first and his own allegiances second......how often does that happen in this day and age? I was impressed.

After I completed Con Process, I looked up at the clock. Over 4 hours had gone by since I first sat down at my desk!! I am still concerned about whether I can keep up with all of the material, but if the material stays this interesting, there is hope for me!