Laying Down the Law

Being a lawyer is kind of awesome, at times. The last week has been sort of insanely busy and hectic and stressful and I have to admit, I am very glad it's over. But I also learned a lot this week and got to work on a pretty interesting case and be a valuable member of a team. So it's not all bad.

When I was in law school, I always thought it would be hard to have really good opposing counsel. It turns out, that's the EASIEST possible scenario. When opposing counsel is good--which is to say, prepared, knowledgeable, and, you know, at least a little smart--it makes my life a LOT easier. It's when opposing counsel are, as my mentor says, "jokers," that things get complicated.

I work in a relatively specialized area of the law, but one that general practice lawyers are always convinced they can give a shot. When I'm having to go back to square negative-one to explain to the court WHAT THE LAW ACTUALLY SAYS because these jokers are just talking around in circles, or asking for things the COURT CANNOT ACTUALLY DO, or even saying things that are JUST STRAIGHT UP LIES, it wastes a lot of time I could actually be arguing the issues. Which is something I hadn't thought about until I actually had to do it.

It's also interesting reading press coverage of cases I'm actually working on, which has now happened a couple of times. Like the opposing counsel jokers, it turns out journalists often just don't get what the law actually says, but at least they seem to care about the fact that they don't know rather than just going with whatever they think makes the most sense. It is kind of cool to see people care about the stuff that I do, regardless.

Also on my mind: how is seriously everyone getting preggers? I am not ready to be of an age where my friends all have kids. Unsolicited uterus update: still blissfully empty.