'I have more questions than you have answers.'

I answered questions for about 30 minutes in class the other day. The professor for civil procedure is probably the toughest on the students and the class has more of an 'academic boot camp' feel to it than the others. I handled the questions pretty well. At one point the professor attempted to create a hypothetical to elicit a certain response from me. I answered all his questions correctly. He just didn't ask the question the right way to get the answer he wanted. He finally laughed, phrased the question correctly and as I was thinking about the answer he said 'See, I have more questions than you have answers.'

I laughed because it was painfully true as my mind raced to find an appropriate answer.

After rephrases and the scribbled out drawings on the board about who lived where during whatever time period and what state the parties all lived in I got a little confused and fumbled on the last answer. I did my best to work through it and I think I did alright.

Next weekend is Halloween. For whatever reason California Western students take this holiday really, really seriously. They treat it like a Catholic treats Fat Tuesday before lent. I guess there is a parallel (admittedly not the best analog, but I like it so shut up) there in that after Halloween everyone gives up their freedom to go out and starts putting in 8-12 hours a day, every day, until finals.

Some students haven't caught on quite yet to how hard this work load is. You can get away with not reading or not briefing once or twice but its painful to catch back up. If you don't read or brief for a class and do nothing to learn the material otherwise you have effectively put it off for another day. It takes about 50-60 hours per week of going to class and studying outside of class to learn and know the material cold. To learn it well enough to answer any kind of questions you could get away with 40. So lets just say 50 hours/ week. If you only put in 30 hours for a week you've backlogged 20 hours of learning for yourself. If you do that two weeks in a row you have a 40 hour backlog.

Thats not to say it isn't irrecoverable. Its just going to be an excruciating experience.

I played soccer all through high school pretty competitively. Our coach, who we not so affectionately called, 'the soccer Nazi', would make us run 60-50-40s. You have 60 seconds to run a lap around the field and without stopping you have 50 seconds to run the next lap and without stopping you have 40 seconds to run the last lap which leaves you breathless, dead tired and wondering why you ever thought soccer was fun.

The fall semester feels about the same. The beginning is 40 hours/week, the middle is 50 hours/week and the end is 60 hours/week to the finish. I think the school recommends 70 hours/ week for the whole semester or something ungodly like that but that would probably leave you with the social and networking skills of a turnip.

My outlines are looking good. My tutors like them and have given me their input. I'm going to start taking practice tests this weekend.

One last sprint to the finish.