I just finished my fourth week of work. This upcoming Monday, I will change practice groups from Labor and Employment to Environmental.  I'm excited to do something different, but also a little anxious all over again.  I've spent the last three weeks getting to know the attorneys I've worked with, learning their preferences and styles and basically just trying not to screw anything up.  Now I get to start the process all over again!  I'm excited though because it will be an entirely new area of the law, with different assignments and different issues.  Also, I've met a lot of the attorneys in the group who are all really nice.

 This week was a little less hectic than last week, but I still had some pretty interesting experiences.  On Wednesday, Mayor Slay of St. Louis came to speak with the firm about the city and the issues going on within the community.  It was great to shake his hand and meet him, but I was at kind of a loss as to what to talk with him about.  Luckily, we all sat down after a few minutes and Mayor Slay spoke with us about the various programs and initiatives within St. Louis.  In particular, Mayor Slay spoke about the homelessness problem in St. Louis and the steps the City is taking to rectify the situation.  Also, he talked about everything affecting St. Louis from ballpark village to updating the mass transit system.  I already live in downtown St. Louis and plan on staying here after law school graduation, so I was pretty interested in hearing what the Mayor had to say about improving the area for current and future residents. 

 On Thursday, we had our first client service group focus meeting.  The firm tries to get someone from each practice group throughout the summer to come in and speak with us about what the group does.  This week, Greg Willard from bankruptcy came and spoke with us.  We had two hours slated for the meeting, which I thought was a little odd.  As it turned out, he spent about fifteen minutes speaking with us about the group and the remainder of the time sharing his direct involvement in planning President Ford's state funeral.  It was amazing to hear him speak about not only his interaction with the President as a White House staff assistant and personal friend, but also about the three years of work that went into planning the funeral.  It's kind of funny because a state funeral for a former president is a pretty rare event, and even in the few that have occurred recently for both President Reagan and President Ford, I never really thought about the amount of planning that would be required.  Everything from security measures to small details like the song selections are handled in secret, and the event requires coordination and notification of every major official on both levels of government.  It was great to hear about this unique experience first-hand, especially regarding the traditions our nation has for state funerals and other personal attributes that made President Ford's funeral unique.  It's just really amazing to hear about some of the things people at the firm have accomplished, especially the things that I never would have occured to me upon meeting them.

 Socially, I played my first game of softball on Wednesday.  I'm far from the most athletic person in the world, but I had a lot of fun.  A lot of younger attorneys play every week, so it was nice to meet a new mix of people.  I played in the outfield for most of the game and didn't let any balls roll past me, which was kind of my goal for the night.  Last night, a number of summer associates went to Fairmount Park over in Illinois to watch the horse races.  It sounded like a lot of fun, but the weather had been rainy all day and truth be told, I fell asleep at around 9:30pm last night!  The whole experience this summer has been great but definitely exhausting.  I use my weekends to kind of catch up on personal stuff, and it's also the first time I usually get around to checking my personal e-mail.

 I also had to schedule my mid-summer review this week.  Fortunately, it is with two attorneys I am already familiar with, so hopefully they will go easy on me!  So far, I've had fourteen projects this summer, so at the very least it's kept me busy.  Either way, I'm excited to see how my next rotation goes!