Caricatures – April 15, 2008

I need not reiterate the recurring theme of my life. However, to ensure completeness of the record, I shall do so anyway. Things do not go according to plan.

I have begun to shirk the responsibility of failed plans by placing them upon the law school, but it is not really fair to do so. Instead, I place said responsibility on the shoulders of the caricatures (little people with big heads) that run the institution of failure.

Today, at the stroke of midnight, registration opens for the entire first year class. Hundreds of people submitting course registration numbers on the same system, at the same time, spell intensity and doom. However, I get ahead of myself.

This morning was the big day for appellate advocacy. There are a lot of things at which I am relatively horrible, speaking, however, is not one of them. I am the lone student that people hate. I am the guy who would rather speak in public than die on an airplane. Yeah, I like oral advocacy (the legal kind).

Appellate arguments are a very special skill. Whereas trial lawyers speak in prose, and rarely argue or are attacked, appellate arguments take quite a different turn. There is no jury. Instead, there are judges. These judges can cut an attorney off as they see fit, and constantly attack the stance of the attorney. It is very much like the televised congressional hearings where the person testifying is under a constant barrage of unfriendly attacks. Basically, it is fun.

I loved my ten minutes of argument. Constantly dodging bullets, knowing the record and using statutes and caselaw in argument yields much joy for me. After each pair of attorneys went (M and I versus annoying guy and quiet girl), we received critiques from the judges and our professor. M, who thought she was going to bomb, did wonderfully, and it showed. I was very confident in my performance, so when they gave me my sole piece of criticism, I was shocked. This time, M was shocked right along with me.

The judges and professor said, “You were noticeably nervous.”

What! Noticeably nervous? Not something I hear on a regular basis.

I looked to my right and saw M hurriedly scribbling on her pad of paper, attempting hiding a smirk. Her note read “They obviously do not know you! Perhaps they mistook your intensity for nervousness!”

I will get over it, though.

Annoying Guy was not a person whose abilities could be pinpointed ahead of time. M and I believed that one of two things would occur. Either he would do as we envisioned he would, and bomb the oral argument, or he would surprise us all. Interestingly, our gut instinct was correct; Guy did not do very well. He was caught misquoted the record, and was lambasted for it. He did not handle the tough questioning well, and stumbled around. It was painful to watch.

After the argument I went to meet with Professor B, who had been a roadblock in the way of the founding of the competition organization. She is a keystone to our becoming a recognized organization, but felt what we considered to be (and could only imagine was) territorial, as she is the Head Advisor for the Moot Court Association.

The meeting, as with (seemingly) every meeting at the law school, was very adversarial from the get-go. We walked in calm and collected, with diplomacy on our minds. Our plans quickly disintegrated into an attempt to argue using reason. Reason, in law school, has been proven futile. We went back and forth, and sent volleys at each other until both our battleships were sunk.

Surprisingly, we walked away with a very decent agreement. It is a good thing negotiation is one of the three competitions in which we will field teams. Now we have to go back to the Office of Student Affairs. This is never a fun trip.

Before we left the office, we were surprised with an exchange between C – who, in the future, you will hear quite a bit regarding – me and Professor B. C is the reliable person who was elected Vice Justice (Vice President) of the Legal Fraternity, when I was elected Justice (President). He and I were both under the relatively confirmed assumption that Professor B, with whom we were battling, was our Advisor for the organization.

When we talked to her about our new positions, she was astonished to hear that we thought she was our Advisor. She said she held no such position (even though she is recorded as being such).

C turned to Professor B and proceeded to ask her if, in that case, she would be willing to be our Advisor.

We walked out of the room with a negotiated agreement and a new advisor. Surprise!

As C and I headed to class, we were quite happy with our performance, and sat through the next hour of class content.

As if the day was not long enough, registration required me – and every other student – to remain awake until the (literal) stroke of midnight. As stated previously, hundreds of people would attempt to get classes before anybody else could. Classes had already begun to fill up, and others were completely full.

It would be the first to click the submit button. I had all my classes laid-out and ready to go. I had backups prepared, and I counted down the ticks to midnight.

I had planned the following schedule:

T/Th	2:10-4pm	Criminal Procedure I
T, Th, F	12:10-2pm	Family Law (with Skills)
T/Th	(T) 4:10-6pm, (Th) 4:10-5pm	Constitutional Law I
M/W	(M) 6:10-8pm and (W) 8:10-10pm	Evidence
W	2:10-4pm	Juvenile Justice Seminar

But, I ended up with these classes:

Th	10:10am-12pm	Voting Rights and Election Law
T, Th, F	12:10-2pm	Family Law (with Skills)
T/Th	(T) 4:10-6pm, (Th) 4:10-5pm	Constitutional Law I
M/W	(M) 6:10-8pm and (W) 8:10-10pm	Evidence
T	6:10-9pm	Child, Abuse & Neglect

Obviously, plans failed. Many of the classes I wanted to take, and even some backups, filled up before I had a chance to register. This is just another sign that the caricatures are very out of touch. I do, however, have a decently nice schedule. I really hope I will enjoy taking night classes. Luckily, they get increasingly late as the week progresses. It builds of the impending craziness.

In blocked out form, my schedule looks like this:

	M	T	W	Th
10
11
12
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

This will give me the opportunity to engage in a part time judicial clerkship or just relax on Mondays, Wednesdays and every other Friday.

I had promised to place a follow-up call to the Judge in the prior conversation. After I spoke with my friend’s father (the Judge) I went to sleep. I was so drained from the long, exciting day that I was unconscious within seconds.