I Object.

I have had my first round of moot court here at Baylor Law. Yes, I have been here less than a year and they are already expecting me to know what to say about legal stuff.

Really it feels like I am playing "house" in a law school setting.

Here is what I expected:

The room is hot and sweaty. Everyone has beady little eyes squinting at me. I stand up to speak and swagger to the podium. I give my introduction flawlessly and immediately am pressed with questions from the judges (called barrister's). I shoot each question down with my eloquence of legal principles. Soon all are aghast at what I've done. In fact, the other side bursts into tears. Just then my time for speaking is up and I humbly thank the court for their time and sit down.

In reality:

The room is a classroom. Everyone, including me, is nervous.

My co-counsel whispers, "Go speak."

I whisper back, "Is it time yet?"

He responds, "Yes, they just said you could start".

I didn't hear that.

I get up and give a good introduction and launch into my first point, waiting for a question... and nothing. I talk for 4 minutes straight and finally a question. But I answer it in 10 seconds. I pause to see if they will ask another question but both barristers are looking down at some piece of paper that seems to have hypnotized them.

I talk for the next 6 minutes, and receive one more question. Again, I answer it and wait for another...and nothing.

I've gone through every legal point prepared, still no questions. So I start telling the court what they've said before, in other cases.

(wha-whah, who likes to hear someone repeat what they've said 40 yrs ago???)

Finally my time is up and I get to sit down.

However on the positive, I wrote a great rebuttal for my co-counsel to give, and it won the case for us.