Moving on

Today was my last day at chambers. I've been pupil then tenant for seven years now but I am leaving for pastures new. A new set, though, not a new career.

Personal effects

The offer of a new tenancy was made Friday. On Monday some key people weren't in chambers so I waited until Tuesday to tell my head of chambers first, then the main members of my team. It was hard, and I am genuinely sorry to be leaving. I am excited to be moving on, though.

I called The Master to ask his advice. He is a QC now and left chambers several years ago. He has been difficult to track down, though, and I've finished in court too late the last two days to be able to catch up. I still hope for some sage words of wisdom in starting out at a new set.

My barrister colleagues all took the news well, expressing sorrow that I was leaving but congratulating me on the move. Initially I thought the clerks were going to be difficult. The news had spread faster than my legs could carry me and they heard on the grapevine rather than directly from me in person, which I regret. That was yesterday, though, and today, my last day, all seems well. I have been through my diary to work out what work should stay and what I should take with me and I have sorted my papers into three piles: comes with me, return to solicitor, money outstanding.

My abiding memory will be my final farewell this evening. I stayed late to organise my effects for collection tomorrow and delete my computer files. As I left, one of the original senior clerks was on the telephone to a solicitor in an otherwise empty clerks room. It is a scene with which I am very familiar. I gave him a wave and a smile, as I frequently but not invariably did, and he paused to mouth 'good luck'.

I promise you, there were tears in my eyes as I descended the stairs for the final time, just as there are now as I type this.

Silk Party

It was The Master's silk party this evening and I am on my way home, my appetite unsated by three amuse bouche, several glasses of champagne and Pimms and a great deal of awkward small talk. How things have changed since the last time I logged in! I can write this on a mobile phone on a bus. The Master left chambers several years ago. The Blawgosphere has grown hugely. Geeklawyer has been disbarred. Charon QC and Nearly Legal live on, thankfully. I have a busy practice, a professional blog getting 2,000 hits per day and two children. What happened? The Master certainly deserved Silk and it couldn't have happened to a better pupilmaster.

Postscript

I was chatting to The Master (this one) yesterday about a high profile case he has been working on. As I was leaving his room, he said, as if as an afterthought, 'You must show me the blog some time.'

'Which?' I said, wearing what I suspect was an expression resembling that of a myxomatosis-riddled bunny in headlights. One that was quite dopey to start with. Even by rabbit standards.

Whoops.

OK, OK...

Geeklawyer persuaded me at the 'small but perfectly formed' bloggers drinks last week that to keep readers hanging on was one thing but actually not letting them know was just cruel. I have been meaning to post since then and have finally been goaded into it by the most recent comment.

I was offered (and have accepted) tenancy, I did open the bottle of champagne and I have tried to be nice to the pupils, although this is rendered difficult by being out at court rather a lot.

Chambers hit me with a rent bill immediately, so I've gone overnight from receiving a pupillage award to paying chambers to work here. I've also sorted out my insurance with Bar Mutual, which is actually free until March for those starting after 1 October and taking the minimum level of insurance.

I'm far more relaxed now I have some security, the early signs for my practice look good and all is essentially well in the world of the ex-blogger formerly known as Pupilblogger.

Thanks for reading!

Last Post

As I sit here at home an hour, now, after the tenancy decision meeting was due to start, I feel nauseous. I have felt this way all afternoon. As I drifted around chambers during the day, no-one would meet my eyes. I sit here and wonder whether this was an early sign of my impending rejection, or just simple paranoia. Perhaps no-one used to meet my eyes, but I wasn't looking.

I am also thinking about the alternative endings to this blog, this record of the prolonged hazing process that has been my pupillage.

In one of these endings, I am rejected. I feel bitter. Unavoidably, I think about all of the things, both big and little, that I could have done differently. Top of this list is not wasting my time and energy writing this blog. I wonder what on earth I am going to do now. I think about my old workplace and whether they will take me back. Would I be a failed wannabe barrister who couldn't make it, or would I be seen as courageous for having tried? Perhaps, I think, one of my other tenancy applications will succeed, although I imagine that to be a hopeless prospect at this point in time. Perhaps I grit my teeth and apply for third sixes, looking to endure more of this ridiculousness. My mind then focusses on the immediate issues. Should I go into chambers tomorrow? What, if anything, will people say to me in the morning? How will I bear their sympathy, knowing they probably voted against me? And what happened to The Other Pupil?

In the other ending, I am accepted. I am delighted, of course. I open the bottle of champagne in the fridge and I consider my potentially glorious future at the bar, as a barrister. After my conversation with The Master last week, I simply cannot see both The Other Pupil and I being taken on, and I will have to embarrass us both with the expected platitudes. Looking slightly further ahead, I will have to start paying rent immediately, and my pupillage grant will come to an end. It is time to get to work.

In this second scenario, would I come to think of pupillage as a tough but effective selection process, being as it managed to select me? Like the Whig view of history, everything will have led to this current, blissful state of affairs. Even if some of the contributing events may have seemed nonsensical or even unpleasant at the time, with hindsight I might see them in 'proper' context, as part of the tough but fair process that all us barristers had to endure, the process which fashioned us into the brilliant, ingenious advocates we are today.

Perhaps most poignantly, from the point of view of Pupilblogger, the persona I now cast aside, how will I treat the new pupils? Will I myself become a pupilmaster in the years to come? Watch out for MasterBlog, should this strange turn of events ever come to pass. In the meantime, only occasionally in and around chambers myself to pick up briefs (and occasional cheques), with my own living to make and no responsibility for their welfare, will I simply fail to see them as others failed to see me?

I hope not. I hope that if I do become a tenant, I will remember.

Pangloss

The Master called me last night. My first and original Master, so this was a surprise. It was about ten o'clock, but he always did have a tendency to call out of hours.

I bumped into him last week at the RCJ when we were both appearing before the applications judge in the Family Division on urgent ex parte cases. Mine was a simple matter, but his was a suspected child abduction. I picked up quite a lot of knowledge about this with the next Master I went to (I always suspected this conceit might eventually unravel! - the Austin Powers guy) and was able to make some useful suggestions about disclosure orders.

He suggested on the way back to chambers that I write up something straightforward for general child care family practitioners and include some precedents, so that in urgent situations like his they would have some useful pointers. I'd been thinking of sorting out some precedents for myself anyway, so I was happy to agree. He then suggested, schemer that he is, that he could circulate it around chambers and it might help my chances at the tenancy vote.

I was sceptical about the wisdom of this. Apparently a couple of pupils were rejected three years ago because they were perceived to be too pushy (they were women - I bet men would have been perceived as ambitious and go-get-em). I thought it was all a bit obvious, so I dragged my feet. I bumped into him yesterday and agreed to finish it off, but told him I'd rather he sat on it until after the meeting.

He called to say that he thought it was a really good piece of work and very useful, but that on reflection he agreed with me and that it was not wise to circulate it this close to the meeting. Rather dispiritingly, he then went on in Panglossian style to say that whatever the outcome it would probably be for the best and that he really didn't know what the outcome would be. To cap it, he then said that he would definitely try to be at the meeting and didn't think he had anything else on.

"!" said I.

Then I managed to say, fairly calmly, 'I'd appreciate your vote, Master.'

He's thinking of voting by proxy, he says. He very much supports my application, but if asked during the meeting he would say that he doesn't think that chambers needs another junior at the moment, as we are quite quiet work-wise. Apparently this is very much the view of some of the juniors and he would have to agree with them if asked. So he'd rather not be there, so they can't ask him.

In some ways this is probably worse news for The Other Pupil than for me as I have a bit of my own work, but it still isn't exactly good news, whichever way one looks at it. How strange is it going to look, I wonder, that one of my own pupilmasters hasn't turned up to the meeting?

The Next Generation

A new generation of pupils started in chambers yesterday. There was no fanfare or announcement, nor even an email. I did not know their names, and only came to know of their existence because I heard one's Master introducing her to a passer-by in the corridor. Pretty much everyone in chambers will be in the same state of ignorance as myself.

I arranged for myself, The Other Pupil and one of last year's pupils to take them both out for a quick drink after work. In the event the other pupil from last year and one of the other junior tenants came along as well, which was good. I thought it would at least give them an opportunity to talk to each other, and a useful platform for talking to others as well. Although how much longer I'll be here is still an open question. I feel like I'm on a less terminal version of Death Row, with a Supreme Court reprieve vaguely pending.

When I started I certainly had no welcome to chambers and had no idea what to make of the whole thing. It was why I started this blog. Although I suspect that my reasons for starting this blog are proliferating faster than the main weapons used by the Spanish Inquisition, or a politician's top priorities. See my first post for what I then thought my reasons were. Anyway, I didn't want their first days to be as spectacularly anti-climatic as my own, after all those years of waiting and wanting.

I was positive and upbeat at the pub. There seemed little purpose in deflating any remaining enthusiasm after their first day. I hate the sound of a crest falling.

At the moment I am trying to think of useful advice. So far, it amounts to:

1. Be outgoing and friendly. Make lots of tea for other people. Do not hide away in your Master's room, as I persistently have.

2. Offer to do paperwork for other barristers. They won't see it as a hamfisted bid for their vote, they'll just appreciate it. As long as you don't screw it up, anyway.

3. Try to get on well with the other pupil or pupils. It'll look good for neither of you if there are obvious problems, as well as no doubt being bloody stressful.

4. Get a laptop. It's hard to get much serious work done without one. And don't leave it in sight where some little con can grab it after a con. I doubt you're reading this you little bastard.

5. Don't keep a blog.

Interview

I find myself thinking that it must be over two years ago now since I first sat in these chairs in the reception area of these chambers. About nine months ago I sat in them again, just before I started this blog, waiting for several hours for someone to come and do something about this bloke who had arrived claiming to be the new pupil.

One of the junior clerks walks past and, surprised to see me sitting in the waiting area reading a book, nods and smiles in my direction. The faces of the more seasoned passers-by morph with impressive speed from the same expression of puzzlement to one of affected disinterest. Eye contact is avoided.

The interivew goes well. At least, I think it does. I have prepared some thoughts on why I want to be a barrister, why I want to specialise in this particular area of law, what I have to offer these chambers and why I want to practice from these chambers. This last point has provoked some soul searching, and I find myself wondering who I am trying to convince. This preparation turns out to be redundant, and I am pleasantly surprised not to be patronised by such questions. The three relatively junior members of chambers conducting the interview seem to be willing to assume that I know what I am doing in making this application for tenancy, which is a relief.

I am asked instead about high points and low points. I have to think quickly. There are plenty of low points, but most of these are best avoided. I talk about a case that I felt should have succeeded that has been gnawing away at me since. This was hardly the most heart-rending case with which I've dealt, but for some reason it has become one of several cases that I think about in quiet moments.

The high point that jumps to mind is not a moment in court, in fact. It is the conference I attended with The Master, the head of chambers and a prominent solicitor for the House of Lords case. It was not something I had dwelt on, and I'm not sure what suddenly brought it to the front of my mind at that moment. I said it was the fast flow of ideas and the fact that I was able to contribute something useful, but I suspect it was also the excitement and the warm sense of welcome inferiority that enveloped me as the conference progressed.

At one point at the very end I mention that I have not applied for tenancy elsewhere. As soon as I say it, I realise that this is not a sensible strategy. I don't mean the answer, I mean that I really should have applied elsewhere. I am genuinely ambivalent about whether I want to practice here and now is the time to be applying to other sets.

I can't really remember the rest of it. I've always found that to be the case with my big interviews. The moment I stepped out of my future tutor's room at Oxford I could remember nothing at all about what had just happened.

They called me the next morning to say that I would be recommended 'as someone suitable for Chambers to consider' for tenancy. I get the impression that getting through this screening process is not much of a first step.

Later that day, I fax two tenancy applications to other sets, hoping it isn't too late.

This is it...

...except it isn't, really. I'd be very surprised if The Other Pupil and I don't both get recommended to chambers. And if we do, well, we're both good and we're not really directly in competition as we work in different areas of law. We could both be taken on. With the way the work looks at the moment, I'm probably in a slightly better position, but that's no reflection on her (or me) at all, it's just luck. The most recent tenant did eighteen months of pupillage here and was taken on only six months ago. There is undoubtedly a question about how much junior family work there is in chambers. But I don't do much family work at all, I specialise in other areas, and I've been fairly busy.

I've heard that many family sets are simply not recruiting at the moment. Apparently Coram Chambers, for example, have turned around to their three pupils (paid £20,000 each) and said to them that they are not recruiting this year. I've heard that our chambers are interviewing twelve candidates for third sixes, which suggests there are a lot of 'floaters' out there.

There are a lot of nervous junior family law barristers out there, waiting to see how the legal aid reforms work out.

Am I kidding myself? Trying to convince myself that there's no race here? Ask me again in a month.

If one or both of us are recommended, it goes to a vote. It is a simply majority vote here, but in many chambers there is a two-thirds requirement.

Battlestations!

Late last week The Other Pupil and I were emailed in (more or less) the following terms:

'If you want to apply for tenancy or a third six, send us a CV, covering letter and any references by yesterday. Interviews next week.'

We were both rather taken by surprise. So, I've cobbled together a covering letter over the weekend, re-written it a million times in various styles, ranging from cowering and unworthy to arrogant and overbearing. I finally settled on an unendearing and rather schitzophrenic combination of both these qualities.

I also spent quite a lot of time getting together some solicitor references saying (a) Pupilblogger is the best thing to hit the Bar since alco-pops, (b) I have instructed Pupilblogger a LOT since the Bar was graced with his presence and (c) you would be lucky to have him, and if you do I'll send both you and he LOADS of work.

I now owe a lot of solicitors a lot of beer, and could teach a thing or two to Colin 'The Forger' Blythe from The Great Escape.

I have also very belatedly decided, after a conversation with The Other Pupil's first pupilmaster and the annoyance of the stupidly short notice for making the application here, that it is time to apply for tenancy elsewhere. I'm setting up a meeting with someone at one set and will fax a couple of applications off tomorrow.

The interview is Friday. If I were to get through this, I would be recommended by the tenancy committee to a full AGM of chambers, where a vote would be taken.

Scraps

August and even this first week of September are a VERY quiet time in the legal world, it seems. I am suspicious that there are no fewer problems occurring in the real world. Indeed, with children making nuisances of themselves at home and down at the local shopping mall, rather than being tucked away safely at school, I would have thought we lawyers might be busier than normal.

Not so. The judges and barristers have migrated to warmer climes. I'm not so sure about the solicitors. I think they might all be in Skegness, Blackpool or somewhere similar.

Yet the world has not ended and, despite the efforts of the screws' union, normal folk are going about... normally. Lawyers are leeches and parasites, create work for themselves and are unnecessary? No, surely not!

It's been a good time for The Other Pupil and I, though. While we have on the whole been kicking around chambers an awful lot, we've also picked up all sorts of interesting scraps from other barristers both in chambers and out. I had my first contested non-molestation order in front of magistrates, for example, which was useful experience.

Pupils are recommended not to go away in August and I can see why. There are benefits to being here when others are not.

The diary watchers

In the quiet hours in chambers, particularly around mid-morning when only pupils, clerks and un-instructed barristers pace the corridors, one can sometimes hear the eerie clicking of the Diarywatch Beetle. The sound is similar to that of a computer mouse button being pressed repeatedly, but with added almost inaudible winces and dark mutterings.

‘So-and-so instructed by That Firm? They used to send me their best cases…’

‘How did she get briefed in a juicy case like that?’

And so forth. The clicking often marks the passing of another perhaps once promising legal career.

I recently covered a very juicy case for The Master. It was a high court inter partes (meaning both parties are supposed to show up) application for some disclosure orders, but with the other side very unlikely to show as they had bunked off to another country with the kids. The Master has been very busy of late, and was trying to combine a Court of Appeal hearing with another case he’d been working on for a long time. Nine years, in fact. I read the transcript of his cross examination of the witnesses in that case as preparation for the hearing he wanted me to handle.

He returned another couple of briefs, some of which probably then left chambers. He cleared my one with the solicitors and then went to speak to the clerks.

‘Ooo, the diary watchers aren’t going to like that, sir.’

He put it down in my diary as a legal aid risk, which was true as I had knocked out an advice for public funding the solicitors wanted in case public funding was refused. The Legal Services Commission had been flooded, apparently, and weren’t answering calls. Although how this differs from their normal ‘service’, I’m not sure.

He returned to his room, told me about the exchange and warned me against diary watching myself. Our computer system allows everyone to look at one another’s diaries, although thankfully not the fees attached to cases. There are some in chambers, he told me, who take an unhealthy interest in the diaries of others.

Of course, the first thing I did as soon as he was out of the room was have a look at the Other Pupil’s diary, then those of last year’s pupils. I’ve had idle looks before, but not for some time. I’ve been busy, it hasn’t crossed my mind for a while.

I bumped into one of last years’ pupils half an hour later in a moment of serendipity. ‘How’s things? From you’re diary you’ve been busy,’ she said. Her tone was pleasant, though. Her diary has quietened down over the summer, as have most people’s, but she seems to be getting enough work, as do the others.

Tenancy II

I went for a couple of pints with The Master last night. There is some sort of infestation of mini and micro pupils around chambers at the moment, and I suggested we go for a mid-afternoon coffee so we could catch up. A couple of hours later, we headed to the pub for something non alcoholic. An hour later, we left after a couple of pints and a useful, very pleasant, occasionally hilarious chat.

He thinks I stand a very good chance of getting tenancy as I’m a strong candidate, but need to show my face more around chambers. This is pretty much my own analysis of my situation as well, but it was very helpful to hear it from someone else. One member of chambers I know only in passing and with whom The Master was out for a drink with the other night doesn’t know much about me, and this is apparently a common complaint at tenancy votes. I’m not naturally gregarious, so The Master has decided to start touting me around based on his very specialist practice: ‘Do you mind if Pupilblogger sits in your room for a week to get some public/private/ancillary relief experience?’ type thing. I don’t like this idea one little bit, but I can see it is nevertheless a Good Idea.

Factors in my favour now include:

• I think I get on pretty well with the people with whom I do naturally have contact in chambers through rooms and work, and I think both editions of The Master will be recommending me very strongly. I imagine most pupilmasters put in a good word for their pupils out of loyalty, but I know this hasn’t always been the case in these chambers.
• The Master reports that the clerks are pleased with my willingness to take on work. This surprises me as I haven’t been going out of my way to do so and am still nervously holding off on offering myself for family work, the main work of chambers.
• The inscrutable head of chambers is (probably) pleased with me as I’ve done quite a bit of work on a House of Lords case in which he and The Master are instructed, and a lot of my first draft of the Petition has made its way into the final version.
• I’m doing fairly well at attracting half-decent work. With The Master’s help I worked out how to interrogate the chambers computer system. He held the server down while I administered a good kicking, then we broke it (morally) by getting a mop bucket and threatening water-boarding. Luckily, the fees clerk walked in at this point and seemed to know quite a lot about it. I think this lent us some much-needed credibility and professionalism in the victim’s eye, which I understand is quite useful in a torture situation. To my considerable surprise I earned, on paper, over £6500 in a period of two months. I’ve actually been PAID about £250 in that time, but it still bodes well.
• The clerks took a relatively straightforward bail case from me yesterday to give me something more complicated instead on the same day, and gave the bail case to a tenant of several years' call instead. I would actually have rather kept the bail case, which was for a firm I'd like to do more work for, but nevermind.
• I’ve had a couple of people I vaguely know at another set of chambers separately suggest I apply to them, which gives me options should it go pear-shaped here and also injects a certain amount of confidence. Hopefully not tragically misplaced.

The couldn’t-make-it-up anecdote that emerged from the chat with The Master was a real corker. I’ve heard some great ones recently, but need to think of ways to dress them up slightly, if you’ll forgive what you will soon see was dramatic irony. I seek to preserve what I see as the integrity of the anecdote.

More on that in a later post.

Tenancy I

I have started to worry in earnest about tenancy. This has been prompted partly by a potentially disastrous boo-boo on my part recently, which I'm not going to go into as it's a bit of an identity giveaway and I don't have the imagination to cook up a plausible alternative.

I don't think it's fatal, but it certainly wasn't helpful.

If I was planning my path to tenancy with the meticulousness of BabyBarista, I wouldn't be going to quite those lengths but I would be:

1. Diligently doing the loose leaf filing.
2. Making lots of tea, and not just for the people in my room.
3. Asking the clerks to give me family work in far flung places.
4. Socialising with members of chambers.
5. Not being seen in my cycling clothes, even on the way into and out of chambers in the morning and evening as it seems to irritate some people (and I don't even wear lycra).
6. Offering to do paperwork and research for others.
7. Learning everyone's marital status and calling everyone Mr and Mrs Barrister.
8. Turning up early and staying late.

I am doing none of these things. I either can't be bothered or it rankles too much. Or both, more likely. But it is starting to worry me. The Master mentioned the other day how popular the other pupil is around chambers, and I suspect that several members of chambers feel that offering tenancy to both pupils from last year might have been a mistake.

Our chambers makes decisions very late, only after the end of pupillage. As the other pupil pointed out recently, that puts us at a real disadvantage if it comes to applying for third sixes at other sets as other failed pupils will already know by then and have been making applications.

Navel gazing

I'm going to slip this post in before I do a proper one in a few minutes. It's for regular readers, of whom there are still quite a few. I'm very sorry I'm managing to post less often. I'm trying to get one out a week, and I'm trying to keep them on subject, i.e. a record of my experiences of pupillage which I hope might be some use to others either in choosing career paths or in steeling themselves for the whole pupillage experience.

Since I started to cut back a bit once my second six started, I think my posts have gotten longer and they are less well crafted than previously. This is a result of limited time, basically, and as any experienced legal draftsman will know, limited time often ends up meaning longer but less good documents.

Thanks to all those who leave comments and email in. I really enjoy getting both, even though it may not seem it as I'm a bit hopeless at replying to comments. I'll try and do better in future.

Wig and gown

I wore a wig and my gown in combat for the first time today. And the bloody tunic shirt with detachable collars, the wing collar and the bands.

Did I look and feel silly? You bet. I looked no sillier than any other barristers in court, of course, but they are at least used to it by now. I borrowed The Master’s wig, but it turns out that the wearer isn’t magically endowed with his charm and eloquence. I did try lifting it from my head and replacing it several times to check. Had to be worth a try.

On The Master’s advice I got changed into wing collar and bands in chambers to avoid panicking about it later. It took me about twenty minutes to work out which collar stud went where and facing which way. This was despite purchasing them last night from Stanley Ley and getting Nigel there to talk me through it.

By this time I was pretty hot and bothered and I could smell my own rising fear.

The reason for the fear? This wasn’t exactly the first time I’ve appeared in front of a judge. As an advocate, I hasten to point out. I should be used to this. However, it was the first time I’d done a contested hearing in the High Court at the Royal Courts of Justice wearing full regalia.

I’d received the brief the night before. With some help from a friendly face in chambers I worked out that we were judicially reviewing the wrong decision and had also submitted no evidence to support the application. Well, we’d submitted it, but the evidence we wanted to rely on consisted of confidential family court proceedings and we didn’t have a disclosure order, so no-one was supposed to look at it – including me.

What could possibly go wrong?

In fact, because it was so hopeless, nothing could really go badly wrong. It was an ideal case to be practicing on, with no real pressure involved.

Having been way down the list, we ended up going on first. I had been counting on watching the proper barristers showing me how it worked, particularly at the beginning and end of the hearing when I did my introductions and then made any requests for orders. No such luck.

Being used to tribunal work, I wrote ‘MAY IT PLEASE MY LORDSHIP!’ and ‘’MY LEARNED FRIEND!’ at the top of the page in my notebook to remind myself of the protocols.

It went quite well, considering. We lost, unsurprisingly, but I felt I put up a good fight and the hearing took 40 minutes, so I did give the judge a few things to think about. I think I was really quite good on the law, even if I say so myself, and responded well to the judge’s points but I’ve definitely got work to do on presentation. It didn’t help that after about five minutes I reverted to ‘Sir’ rather than ‘My Lord’ and had to start correcting myself. At the end I was asked whether I had any requests for any orders. I was relieved Treasury Counsel wasn’t pressing for costs, and I thought it was probably a privately funded brief but hadn’t checked. I asked for detailed assessment of legally aided costs. It turned out it was private, but I don’t think this matters.

I was really quite pleased -- although also exhausted -- by the time I got back to chambers.

Then I bumped into the head of the library committee, who told me to get on with the loose leaf filing mountain. She’s emailed my pupilmaster about it.

Back in your box, Pupilblogger!

Client party

It was the chambers b-2-s schmooze-fest last night. It is held every year on the Friday closest to midsummer, and it is quite a big do. There must have been around 300 people there. Hopefully none of them are big fans of blog surfing.

The Other Pupil and I were on name tag duty for the first couple of hours. I'd been out at court until late on and then sorting out some bundles for The Master, so the preparation work had fallen to her. She arranged the names in a complex hierarchy that started with judges and wives, went on to court staff, then solicitors organised by firm and then alphabetically by name and then, finally our chambers barristers and staff.

It took me a while to realise that no other barristers were invited.

The names on the tags were facing away from the two of us, which led to some friendly rivalry as we strove to be the first to find the name of each new arrival. However, there was an additional complication The Other Pupil had not anticipated and which became something of a minefield for us both.

As each arrival walked into the room, we had somehow to ascertain their place in the hierarchy. Judge, wife, court staff or solicitor? In some cases it was really quite easy to guess. Sandals means a solicitor, I learned, and advanced age generally signifies a judge of some seniority. Still, there were a couple of classic moments.

'Sorry to keep you waiting. Which firm are you with?'

'I AM LORD JUSTICE VERY IMPORTANT.'

There was also the problem that not everyone had RSVP-ed, therefore not everyone had a nametag. Some people got quite surprisingly upset about this, and wrote out a number of tags ourselves. One solicitor also made The Other Pupil go back to chambers and print off a new name tag with his OBE included on it.

One of the waitresses took pity on us and secretly fed us canapés, which was helpful, and we were both very moderate with the champagne. We'd be warned about the behaviour of one of the pupils two years ago at the same party, but neither of us has been able to find anyone willing to spill the beans, even after a few drinks.

With the exception of one clanger, I found the party useful, I think. Nearly Legal has just posted on the subject of schmoozing by barristers, and includes a link to a recent article by David Pannick QC on the same subject. I chatted to several solicitors I haven't seen for a while and attempted to strike a delicate balance between sounding legally knowledgeable and not laying it on too thick. At the very least I reminded them that I exist and am available for work. Whether that actually translates into briefs, only time will tell. I saw several junior members of chambers being introduced to solicitors by whom they had been briefed but had never met, so I would have thought that would have been useful to them.

I can't imagine a party being a good way of meeting entirely new solicitors and somehow persuading them to brief me, though.

On a related note, The Master told me of one of his commerical barrister friends who flies a bunch of solicitors out for a weekend in Dublin every summer, which is (a) pretty weird to my ears, (b) just short of offering them money and (c) makes me wonder whether he really needs to do that to get briefs from these corrupt freeloaders and what that means about his legal skills.

Back to the clanger, which I hope wasn't actually too bad. I ended up talking to the sole partner at a firm that has sent me quite a bit of work thinking that he was one of his employees. Somehow – I'm really not sure how – he ended up pulling out his driving licence to prove otherwise. Other than that, I think my evening was gaff free.

Fate decreed that I bumped into an old friend on the way home – the same friend I had witnessed in action at his chambers client party a couple of years ago. Neither of us could face going for a drink at that point, so we just vaguely suggested meeting up soon. An odd coincidence.

Cardiff

Whoops, went to Cardiff today. Wasn't supposed to. Looked at the wrong page in my diary. No serious harm done, though, as I wasn't supposed to be anywhere else anyway.

Mental note to self: do try not to do that again.

Busy is good

I've been Busy. This is Good.

I am, I admit, having a little difficulty with this correlation. Now, I've never been lazy. Ok, ok, I've had days occasionally. But I've always considered myself a hard worker and have often ended up volunteering for additional tasks or jobs, or just getting on and doing something I didn't technically need to do. Yes, I'm basically a bit of a swot.

In my previous jobs, though, this was genuinely voluntary and it was also controllable. I could always just relax and take it easy instead.

Now, I find myself been given stuff to do by the clerks and my contacts, and I've just got to get on with it. It is very much involuntary.

But -- and this is the conceptually difficult bit -- this is a Good Thing. It means that I'm earning money. Well, in theory, at least. More accurately, I'm actually just building up what barristers call an 'aged debt', meaning the wad of cash that a whole bunch of solicitors owe you but haven't paid you yet. The only actual money I've received was a cash payment, but more on that in another post.

One of my friends, who got tenancy in 2002, told me he had an aged debt of £50,000. And also three separate overdrafts of about £10,000 each. At least I think that's what he said, there had been some cold drinks involved.

Still standing

I'm happy to report that all went quite well. The pre-hearing review went smoothly, although the judge must have taken three times as long as was necessary, just through general faffing. The ex parte application also went fairly smoothly.

I was certainly nervous. The Master wasn't around, but had texted me some rough details. There was no papers yet, so I drafted up an order based on this text message, thinking I could amend it once I had the papers. When did I get the papers? On the way to court, of course. It was a bit late for changes by then as we really needed the order signed and sealed that day so that documents could be released to us by the court.

The solicitors sent a work experience student. This was Good because it meant that no-one important was watching me if I messed up, stuttered, slumped forward in a nervous collapse and so on. However, it was Bad because there was no-one there to point me in the right direction if something went wrong.

After some deliberation I decided to write on the form for my name and party that I was 'counsel/pupil' and tell the usher it was my first case in the High Court in the hope she would tell the judge. I decided there was probably more chance of an easy ride that way, as the judge in question was reputed to be OK. I'd checked that in chambers before leaving.

The hearing was over in a flash and I did fine, even if I say so myself. There was very little to say and the order I'd drafted was suitable, with one slight amendment (insertion in the recital of a quick reference to a previous order). The judge and Associate were willing for me to hand write this, as otherwise we'd need to call the solicitors, get them to make the changes then email it to the Associate so that a pristine correct copy could be produced.

All in all, a good first day. I've now got a few hearings appearing in my diary, including some substantive half day cases. I am, however, going through what I hope is simply a nervous phase where I wonder where the work is going to come from in the future. I've got to make a living doing this.