Miscellaneous

Shitting Myself ... Adventures Before the Ninth Circuit

With the Supremes' latest term at a close, it should come as little surprise that, yet again, the Ninth Circuit was reversed like a mother fucker. The Supremes absolutely loathe the crazy and wacky decisions that come out of the country's biggest appellate circuit and, this term, eight of the ten Ninth Circuit cases that came before the Big Court were reversed. Interestingly, it's not always (stricly) about political lines, as Judge Pamela Rymer had the distinction of being overturned twice this term, despite being a conservative Bush Sr. appointee.

This story serves as the perfect way to make a little confession. See, I'm a pretty even-keeled guy. Little makes me truly nervous or really gets under my skin. But I recently learned that it looks like I'm going to get to argue a pro bono case before the Ninth Circuit in just over a month and I'm not afraid to admit that, while I'm excited as hell about it, it also kind of scares the shit out of me. I've argued before federal and state trial courts countless times, and while I get a little of the excited-nerves sometimes, I'm never truly jittery. Just last month, I basically got my ass handed to me for a half-hour by a Magistrate judge, and it was kinda fun more than nerve-wracking or anything else.

But this. I'm doing everything I can to keep my bowels from fucking exploding, man. I know the case and the facts as well as one can. But I think what scares me most is that there's a ton of relevant case law, and I have a piss-poor fucking memory. And I know that I need to cram as much of this shit into my head as possible, so that I can pull out whatever I need during the oral argument if I have a particularly "hot" bench (that is, one that asks lots of questions).

I'll try to blog more about the experience over the coming month (or, at least, after the fact), although as busy as I am at work in addition to having to prepare for this oral argument, I'm not sure how much time I'll have for that. Not to mention all the pairs of drawers I'm going to have to clean.

Full post as published by Quiz Law on July 01, 2008 (boomark / email).