Four out of five ain't bad

So I got all the classes that I wanted, but did not get the professor I wanted for criminal procedure. So I suppose it is more like 4.5/5. So next year I'll be taking:

- Adv. Constitutional Law Teaching Fellowship (3 credits) - (see the Marshall-Brennan program described below)
- National Security Law in the Age of Terrorism (3 credits) - Patriot Act, NSA surveillance, enemy combatants, etc.
- Criminal Procedure (3 credits)
- Lobbying/Legislative Process (2 credits)
- Legal History (3 credits)
= 14 credits

The "standard load" here is 14 credits. We are required to take at least 12, but cannot take more than 16 without special permission. I was actually really torn between IP law (the substantive class that will make me $$, but is offered every semester) and National Security Law in the Age of Terrorism (which may never be offered again, but has little practical value).

Yeah, no contest. ;-)

Oh, and I'm now almost to Weathertop. I've come 232 miles since I started keeping track back in January, averaging about 2.4 miles/day. Not what I had planned, but not bad. All I have to do is walk about 9 miles/day every day for the rest of the semester and I'll make it to Rivendell before the semester is over.

Right, and I'm going to update my blog consistently and frequently.

Oh the drama!

Ok, so I'm not actually dead, just have been insanely busy of late ("of late" being the last six weeks or so). The trials and tribulations that I have endured since spring break are more or less summarized below. And yes, there are pictures.

As for right now, I'm sitting in the library (yeah, I know, big surprise), waiting to register for classes, and obsessive-compulsively updating the current-enrollment figures for the classes that I want to take. In particular, I'm fretting about Criminal Procedure, which is the one class that I am required to take next semester. Legend has it that Professor Davis is far and away the best criminal procedure teacher in the school, and consequently, enrollment in the five sections (with a max of 95/section) is currently: 93, 11, 8, 15, 8. Guess which section Davis teaches... yeah, two spots left.

Not getting into Davis' class would be inconvenient, but not devastating. My second-choice is one of the 8s, so I suspect there will be adequate room for me when my turn rolls around.

Oh wait, I haven't explained how the registration process here works have I? Well, each graduating class is divided up into 10 groups by the last digit of their student ID numbers and then put into a lottery for time slots. My slot starts at 5:00 this afternoon and so at 5:00.01, the 45 or so students whose ID numbers end in 7 will frantically vie for position in the registration queue. The issue is probably moot for the other four classes I want to take, but it would sure be nice to have one of those two magic spots in Davis' crim pro class. We shall see.

**Update: The last two spots in Davis' class are gone. So much for the drama.

Ok, milage. Bloody hell. It's been three weeks and I've walked to school damn near every day except *furrows brow, counts on fingers* four... but I've also walked to the store three times and taken the long road to the Metro at least four times... hmm... ok, we're going to err on the side of caution and call it 57 miles. Yikes. Nearly to the foot of the Weather Hills. Hey! I'm almost half way to Rivendell! Total distance: 227 miles.

The Giant Post of Doom!

Ok, this is going to take a while to write, so please be patient. As a demonstration of just how far I have fallen and been consumed by law school, I present you with an outline of this post (hey, at least it's not highlighted):

I. The T-Shirt
II. The Oral Argument *maniacal laughter*
III. The Appellate Brief *horrifying screams*
IV. The Event
V. The Marshall-Brennan Program
VI. More on the campaign trail
VII. A promising development

Yeah, ok, I don't have the inclination or the energy to write proper posts, so you'll have to make do with these massively summarized accounts.

I. The T-Shirt

So all of us first-year students get organized into sections according to our position in the alphabet. Section 4, my section, consists of letters R-Z, with one "L" thrown in for flavor. Anyway, we decided that since we spend pretty much all of our time with one another, we should make a section shirt. This is my submission:

RES IPSA LOQUITUR

Yeah, it's an inside joke, but I'm really proud of how their expressions turned out so I thought I would share. Yeah, I drew those myself, and yeah, photoshop helped cover up the eraser marks and clean up the smudges. ;-)


II. The Oral Argument *maniacal laughter*
Yeah, so in addition to submitting our Appellate Brief *horrifying screams*, we also have to argue the case in front of a panel of "judges" (two prof's and a TA). Not surprisingly, this went a good deal better than the brief itself, as I am rather more articulate with verbal communication than I am with written.

III. The Appellate Brief *horrifying screams*
Yeah, I really got nothin t' say about this. It was a beast, it consumed a few weeks of my life, it is done.

IV. The Event
So I got to meet Jim Hightower at a fundraiser. I also got to serve lemonade.



V. The Marshall-Brennan Program
I'm gonna teach constitutional law to a class of high school students next year. I'll be teaching with Julie and it will be OUR class, meaning we're not filling in for some teacher or giving guest presentations, we're teaching a proper class to a room full of highschoolers.

Should be a breeze.

VI. More on the campaign trail
I honestly don't remember what I was going to write here, so in lieu of a post, here's a disturbingly accurate commentary on the nature of law, by one of my favorite philosophers.


And here's a really funny, and yet disturbingly insightful, picture of Bush:



VII. An interesting development
Oh, and as a side note, I'm kinda dating some girl. More on this as it develops. :-)

Spring Break and Pictures!

LOOK AT THE SHINY PICTURES! SEE THEM! AREN'T THEY SHINY?


New Orleans is still in rough shape. See that dark line running through the center of the doors? That's the high water mark and you can still see it on buildings all over town.


Here's a fun picture. Can you tell where the high water line was?
Sheesh, and I thought the water in Africa was bad.


This is the neighborhood where we stayed in New Orleans. The piles of rubble represent houses where people have returned and are rebuilding. However, I'd guess that less than 20% of the houses in the 5 or 6 block neighborhood around where we stayed had even started rebuilding, most people still had not returned.