Something Moore

Clay and I celebrated our 2nd anniversary this weekend... or more appropriately I should say we "attempted" to celebrate our anniversary. With us both in school "our" time is hard to come by so we're trying to make the best of things. I decided to work Saturday morning and Sunday so that we could have Saturday evening to celebrate. For Clay's part he took care of the household chores on Saturday and was going to study on Sunday.

Saturday afternoon when I finished studying and Clay finished running errands I noticed his eye was a bit gucky. He washed his face and thought that was the end of it. About an hour later he noticed his eye was bothering him and when he went to investigate he discovered he had pink eye. Now neither of us have had pink eye since we were in elementary so he figures he picked this fun little germ up while shopping at "the evil empire" as our good neighbor Justin calls Wal-Mart.

Now it's about 7pm on a Saturday night and while Clay needs medical care this doesn't exactly constitute an ER visit. So we call up our doctor who has an answering services that pages him. Dr. Layne calls back a few minutes later, laughs at us, and calls in a prescription to a 24 hour pharmacy. I decide I'll go get the meds and Clay can begin creating our wonderfully romantic meal. On the way to the store Clay calls to inform me that the power has gone out at the house. Luckily for us the dinner we had planned was predominantly barbequed.

A long story short... it was a memerable anniversary :)! We did have a great evening together but it just goes to show you that you've got to be flexible!

A funny thing about education; every time you think you're done with a topic it comes back to haunt you. This was true in undergrad when I thought the Euler equation would NEVER be important only to find out it was the basis for EVERY SINGLE CLASS!!! So today in Legal Research and Writing another one of those little ironies of education popped up with a grammar test.

Now, you may be one of those freaks who loved learning all of the "i" before "e" rules and when to use semi-colons and how dependent clauses were to be structured... I was not. In fact I felt grammar was one of the drudgeries of education that you had to "get through" during english class so you could go read a good book. However, that is not the case in law school and today we had a 20 question grammar test. The trick is, if you didn't pass the grammar test, which historically only about 5 people actually pass, you have to take a remedial grammar class on Saturdays. So, as if grammar wasn't bad enough I will more than likely have to take a grammar class on the weekends! Isn't education GREAT!!

It's day 2 of law school and I've already learned something... it's not as scary as everyone makes it out to be. During all of these fun meet-n-greets and open houses a discussion I attended inevitably a discussion about "what to expect in class" would commence and everyone would mention the dreaded "Socratic Method". All the "Socratic Method" means is that teachers are going to call on people in class and actually expect people to have prepared for class so that they can add something intelligent to the class discussion. However, in preparation for law school this discussion tends to lean towards teachers who "eat law school students for lunch" and get a great deal of enjoyment out of watching the children cower in fear. While someday this may be true I am pleased to announce that thus far all of my law professors are actually human! They all seem to be very pleasant and willing to help everyone understand why something is "wrong" or "right" or "more right". So I'm here to tell you I'm surviving quite nicely.

And having said that I'm back to enjoying a wonderful reading on impleader and joinder... I love lawsuits with multiple parties all suing and counter-suing each other :)!

In legal analysis class the other day I got a chuckle out of a quote from the professor. He was critiquing someone's brief and made the following statement...

"You would need only in front of the possibly; maybe."

Proof yet again that highly educated people can create incoherant and ambigous statements just like the rest of us!

Today I had a wonderful reminder to take a moment and smile at the simple things in life. I was driving home from class engrossed in thoughts of the writ of certiorari when I saw the Oscar Meyer weenie mobile driving down the other side of the highway. I can't say that I've ever actually seen the weenie mobile in real life but something about it cruising down the highway at 65mph gave me a good chuckle and made me think how often we forget to take time and laugh at the little things in life.

So, for all of you out in blog reading land, here is your daily reminder to stop and smell the roses... or in my case stop and laugh at the weenie mobile!

Law school started this week and it's been an amazingly hectic experience. The first two days were orientation which was capped off by our swearing in ceremony. The incoming class took the Pledge of Professional Commitment in a formal affair which was a very nice "welcome to the club" type of event.

This first week we are also taking a Legal Analysis class. It's supposed to be an introduction into reading and briefing cases. So far the class has been pretty interesting and very informative. Professor Arrow has been excellent at allowing us to make our mistakes and explaining why they are mistakes instead of just telling us we're stupid or incompetent and moving on. I've appreciated the feedback. This concept of the "issue statement" is quite complex. So far I've been WAY too general and need to work on developing more specific ideas. But like everything else I'm sure my pendulum will swing the other way and I will end up on the other side of the spectrum being far too specific. Such is life!

I've also got to meet a lot of new people. I'm really excited because I've met a couple of girls who are going to be in all of my classes and I think that will be a good study group to begin with. I think I'm going to make it... check back in about 4 months :)!

I'm sitting in my office eating cherries and working out how to brief Marbury v Madison and a memory came I felt I should share. While my mom was here we went to visit an old family friend, Mrs. Stone. Mrs. Stone is my mom's best friend's (since high school) mother. When my sister and I were younger and we would come to OKC to visit family we were often drug from one unkown family member's home to another and honestly I don't remember much about those visits, but I do remember Mrs. Stone.

Mrs. Stone lives in a little old house downtown. Everything about her home is perfectly manicured and decorated with beautiful things. The "music room" had two grand pianos, because Mrs. Stone's husband taught music during his lifetime, and they would often request performances from my sister and I, who were quite good at playing "Mary Had A Little Lamb" and not much else.

Also, each time we visited the Stone's home my sister and I were enthralled by the "tea party". Mrs. Stone is a very proper lady and serves tea or coffee with little cookies everytime you come. This was nothing like our house and I remember thinking how special the tea party was. Even when I introduced my husband to Mrs. Stone I had told him about the tea parties and he still refers to her as the "Tea Party Lady".

Today Mrs. Stone still serves tea. After dinner the other night we went to her home and had a tea party in the music room among all of her beautiful treasures. I know I've been truly blessed to know this special lady.

My mom recently came to visit and it was a lot of fun. Since she lives in Montana and I live in Oklahoma we don't get to see each other very often. We had a lot of fun while she was here. We enjoyed some great food and had a lot of fun golfing and shopping. In fact Clay had his best round of golf ever. He was really excicited.

Now that my vacation time is over it's time to get to work. I've been writing briefs for my legal analysis class which is the first week of school. As I read I case I keep discussing it with Clay. I have decided that once Law School is over Clay is going to have to receive an honorary law degree. When they say "we're going to law school" they really do me "we". Wish us luck... Class starts Sunday!

A friend recently recommended a book to me and now I feel I must pass along the recomendation. The book is "State of Fear" by Michael Chrichton (he brought us "Jurassic Park"). This is an excellent work of fiction with a great deal of research put into it. The story line is fiction but some of the facts and figures presented are based on actual research and sited in the book. I may not agree with everything that's in the book but it does give you reason to stop and think. After you read the book let me know what you think :)!