Law Review Rumblings

As a few readers may be aware, I'm an associate editor this year with the Hamline Law Review. What does that entail, exactly? Funny you should ask.

One obligation consists of me sitting in a small room for approximately 4.5 hours on Friday evening, editing articles submitted by lawyers all over the country, and painstakingly checking all the cites to make sure they actually say what they say they do. Also, as I learned last week, my task is to try and make incomprehensible gibberish sound like it legitimately came out of the fingers of a qualified legal professional.

My law review denizens and myself quickly learned that after 4 and a half hours of the aforementioned activities, the only rational response once we finally get home is to drink. Preferably heavily.

The second obligation is to write an article, which theoretically will then be considered for publication. Everyone got split into 3 writing groups, corresponding to the 3 issues of the Law Review put out each year. I am in the second writing group, so I'm actually in the midst of researching my topic. For confidentiality reasons, I shouldn't be broadcasting my topic all over the internet, but I can say that it has to do with constitutional questions.

I suppose I'm a bit confused by the writing requirement of this law review gig. It's apparently normal practice to make new associates write articles, but I don't think that makes it any less strange. Not that I'm irritated or angry at it, since it's a fun activity, even if it is a horrendous amount of work. I don't know, maybe I'm just a bit confused. Given the degree of delirium that most people were approaching at the end of the meeting last Friday, maybe a bit of confusion is necessary.

In any event, it's a fairly busy week. It seems like the homework assignments for this week are just a bit weightier than weeks past, compounded by the fact that my Tuesday night is taken up by a ballgame and my Thursday is taken up by swing dancing. I guess it forces me to be more efficient in the morning.

In that vein, I went to Starbucks this morning to read some Corporations in the 3 hour interval between Evidence and Constitutional Law. I can't say I'm on a first name basis with any of the employees there, even given the fact that I seemed to spend my entire winter there last year. Well, I guess I do know Cindy, the middle aged woman cashier. Anyways, I was just a little weirded out this morning when some barista I couldn't recognize at all seemed to know who I was, as well as identify my preferred drink. And then he gave me an extra shot in my latte, seemingly just for the hell of it. Whatever, I didn't complain. I needed the caffeine.