Fomalist

Our first written assignment/graded assignment of law school, the aptly titled "Memo 1" is due this Sunday. 1L's are inevitably spending the weekend doing various levels of work with various levels of stress. This ranges from people who don't know anything and are fine figuring it out on the fly to people who don't know anything and are LOSING THEIR MINDS trying to figure it all out. I definitely fall towards the former category, with an emphasis on not knowing anything. I already know people who plan on holing themselves up in the library all weekend. It sounds awful. This is a 5-6 page paper. Let's all calm down. Just because it must be in a foreign, obtuse format does not mean you need to freak out. Eyes on the prize here.

Yesterday's first class was Torts. It ended with our (conservative) professor explaining a doctrine (really just his interpretation of it) and justifying it by saying that he is a formalist and this is how the law is written, so that is how it should be applied even if is not intuitive (read: even if it doesn't make any sense). As a direct contrast, my last class that day, Civil Procedure, involved my (liberal) professor hammering on a Supreme Court decision, saying it makes no sense and that it was "formalist bullshit." I don't think my professors talk to each other very much. But at least both of them have clear agendas.

I got a free flu shot yesterday at school. It was the most like cattle I've ever felt. There were probably 300 people lined up to get free shots. The flu was selling like hot cakes! We waited in line to get to a table where they gave us a consent form, pen, and clipboard. Then, group of 40 at a time, we sat down, and filled out the form. Then, group of 10 at a time, we get called up to hand in our form and get a flu shot. The herd gradually thinned out until only the prime rib was left. Then we were to be slaughtered and eaten. Good thing that wasn't actually happening. Instead of being dinner, I just won't get the flu. Except that I get a little flu-ish after I get the shot. And that it doesn't stop swine flu, that's a separate shot. Yet somehow it is still important to get a flu shot. Sweet.