Frauds

Incompetence doesn't just hurt you, it hurts those around you. Remember that when you get your degree, find a career, and call yourself a professional. Remember it when you've got a big office, a big salary, and a big ego. Or if you don't. Know matter where you end up, try not to be an incompetent, arrogant moron, because you'll just be making good people suffer.

For instance, the incompetence of the person who prepared my parents' taxes almost led them to commit tax fraud, and almost forced me into a position to have to commit tax fraud just to fill my taxes out correctly. You see, I was all up on getting my homestead credit and a cool $800 extra this year, until my dad told me he and mom were claiming me as a dependent. I was like "Nigga what?" Apparently since they paid the final portion of my tuition last year, their tax person told them they could claim me as a dependent and get a credit back on that money and more. All of which would disqualify me for receiving the homestead exemption.

It didn't sound right to me, but my tax grade was laughable, so I didn't question the wisdom of their tax lady. However, a hot tip from Kristin the Queen of Taxery said that bitch was trippin', and there was no way my parents could claim me as a dependent. So we hit up the Tax Code, and she was right - out of four conditions to be a "qualifying child," I missed on two. I called my dad, told him the tax lady was wrong, and she had better check herself before my parents get indicted for tax fraud.

Dad called her, she told him that as long as I was a full-time student, I could be claimed as a dependent. Hmm. Well, that's not what the statute says, but she's a professional, right? She's done this plenty of times before, right? She must know what she's doing. Maybe she knows an exception to the rule that we, lowly law students with our "statutes" don't know about.

So I got her number, and I called her. Naturally, she was a bit cranky, so I played as polite as I could. I explained my concerns, and pointed out the statute I was looking at. Turns out she was going off the same statute. Okay...so I read her the conditions I didn't meet. First, I didn't live in my parents' residence for at least half the year. She said as long as I'm a full time student, that doesn't matter. Okay...doesn't really say that anywhere, but oh well. Next, I must not have turned 24 by the end of the calendar year. I explained that I turned 24 in October. If I'm not mistaken, October is part of the calendar year. She never really gave me much explanation for that, just confirmed the fact that I was wrong. On the other hand, Kristin, who had heard the conversation, confirmed that this woman was full of shit. So there I was.

I told my dad, he said he'd probably just go with what they filed, and trust that she knew what she was doing. Which, according to the statute, is encouraging people to commit tax fraud. But then, I wanted my $800. Now, if my parents put that I was a dependent, on for my homestead thing, I checked that no one claimed me as a dependent, I would also be committing tax fraud because I knew otherwise. Even if I was the only one actually following the goddamn laws.

Luckily, my dad contacted a CPA friend, who told him that the tax lady was 100% wrong. So they have to amend, and I can do my thang.

Moral of the story: This is what happens when you "know what you're doing," and don't listen to reason.

And in case you were wondering, as applied to the tax lady, the Hand Formula for this would be "suck my balls, you incompetent biznatch."

Snack Court

Today, as part of my requirements at LDP, I went to observe Drug Court proceedings. For those of you not familiar, Drug Court is for (usually) first-time drug offenders that, rather than getting sentenced to jail time or a fine, go through a program to get clean. It's all very positive and encouraging, everyone's talking about the progress the offender has made, and what they have to do to stay clean, and the benefits of overcoming addition, etc.

My question is, do they have anything similar for snack addicts? I know snacking is bad for me; I know I snack when I'm nervous, or bored, or breathing. I snack constantly. I try to limit myself to less unhealthy snacks (hence my struggles with animal crackers instead of, say, deep fried, cream filled donuts), or non-chocolate candy, but it doesn't make much difference -- I end up eating such a large quantity that it negates any health differential.

So where the hell is my support group?

Fuck it. I'll be right back, I'ma get me some Skittles.

Infiltration

Is it weird that Lord of the Rings characters seem to be popping up in my everyday life? On my way home from work today, I spotted Saruman standing on the sidewalk on Gorham street. His hair was still shock white, and there was some graying in his beard; it looked like he had cut it a little in back, but it was definitely him. He was looking a little worse for the wear; gone were the stately white robes, replaced by the quasi-homeless army green jacket and brown pants. But I imagine that after getting kicked outta Dodge by the Ents and no longer being funded by Sarun & co., his financial prospects might not be looking so hot.

I guess it's not that strange to see him; after all, I've been learning sentencing from Gollum for the past 5 weeks. Good to see he didn't let the fires of Mt. Doom keep him down.

Guilty

Sorry about the lack of posts lately. I've been busy with a lot of things going on, but none of them seemed particularly post-worthy. There was one event that made me think.

So lately I've been working at LDP. Defense is obviously a change for me; I've never had to deal with clients, never had to deal with real people and their problems. Even working as a clerk for a guy who does a lot of defense work - he deals with the clients, I get the legal issues. A lot of the clients seem pretty shady, so its a relief to forget their role in the process and just deal with what the law is (and occasionally attempt to fabricate the law on their behalf).

LDP is different. Forget, for the moment, intake at the jails - not a pleasant experience, but there's nothing overly shattering going on. I speak to the inmates, ask them the most basic questions, and move on to the next. Though the scene isn't pretty, you never really have to engage with anything.

Client work is different. For instance, I had a client with final pre-trial on Wednesday. Obviously, I can't go much into details; suffice it to say, I thought it was a pretty clear cut case, and she would have to plead (the offer was pretty decent, all things considered). Then we found out she was currently homeless, either living with friends or in her car, and 5 mos. pregnant, and was about to lose her job based on a faulty drug test result. Plus she's got a heart condition, and had a pacemaker installed about a year ago. All at the tender age of 18. This makes me think about how lucky I've had it, and how as a DA, I'd be able to skip all of this unnecessary real life stuff. I get the file with its boilerplate information on a nameless defendant and a standard offense, and make an objective decision.

Just like life - I can go through every day in my cushy life without having to see the problems other people face. I've always had this public servant attitude in me, this vague notion of wanting to do great things so I could help people; actually helping real people has been something different. And I start to think maybe I'm not as good of a person as people generally assume. I don't know.

On the other hand, all apologies to Mr. Utah, but I do give money to homeless people on occasion. Not so much to the panhandlers, but I also get a lot that come up to me directly and ask for a dollar or two. They've always got some story why they need it, and I'm not sure I ever really believe them. But I think either way, they've got it worse off than me, and dropping a couple dollars won't hurt me. Maybe they can sense I'm a softie. Maybe they can just see it.

So when we spoke to the DA and got her to offer a much better deal, I felt pretty good. And when I called some shelters for this girl to stay at, I felt better. Speaking to people has never been my strong suit; when we spoke to this girl at the courthouse, my supervising attorney did most of the talking, so I just got to hear the sad story. But now, it was my turn to speak. So I called her, informed her of the places she could go to stay, places she could get hot meals. And when, in tears, she thanked me for all of my help, I felt.....

Guilty.

Restorative Justice

Never again. I'm reading an article for Sentencing with The Dick and Smithy about 'restorative justice,' and my eyes are starting to bleed from the stench of ganja wafting off the pages. The author describes restorative justice as "healing rather than hurting, moral learning, community participation and community caring, respectful dialogue, forgiveness, responsibility, apology, and making amends." Weird. I thought "restorative justice" referred to when criminals injure innocent people, and we "restore" that feeling of pain and victimization back to the offender through a series of vicious headbutts.

(And don't go thinking I'm some electric chair pimping reactionary jackass who just wants to lock people up. I recognize the difference between someone who commits a crime and a criminal, the type of offender who has suffered through hard circumstances and made poor choices, and the type that victimizes people without remorse. When I say "dangerous people," I mean actually dangerous people.)

I've gotta say, this class is majorly disappointing. I knew from the get-go there would be problems with the hippies in this class (including the soccer mom/social worker/huge pain in the ass lady, the "No person of color has ever done anything wrong, and police should not be able to stop a person of color unless that person subjectively wanted to be stopped" guy, and a chorus of "Punishing criminals is wrong" bleeding-heart nutjobs), but the reading material has been surprisingly bad. Dense psychology, naive philosophy, and now this schlock. Remington Almighty.

Apparently I'm going to have to make sure I'm at class from now on. I remember when Mr. Utah got laughed at in Prosser's Hippie Love Fest/Crim Pro class for recommending a sentence of 5 years in prison for a drug dealer who shot at a car because the passengers stole his drugs and took off without paying. Well, time to return the favor. From now on, they want to start talking about flower power and making amends to justify letting a dangerous person go free, they can expect to get laughed out of the room. Time to restore some real justice to the classroom.

Pan's Crapyrinth

Huh. Well, that sure sucked some balls. I’m referring, of course, to the subject of 2007's first movie review –

Pan’s Labyrinth.

Billed as a fairy tale/horror story, I can say with confidence that it was pretty damn horrific. Set in Spain after the rise of Generalissimo Francisco Franco and Facism, Pan’s Labrynth tells the story of a young girl (Ofelia) who goes with her pregnant mother to live with her adoptive father, the father of her baby brother, a powerful Captain in Franco’s army. The girl gets drawn into a labyrinth by a fairy and taken down into some otherworldly location, where she speaks to some grotesque-looking faun. He tells her she’s some reincarnated princess for this land below, and she can return if she completes three tasks. Meanwhile, the Spanish army people are fighting off resistance fighters, the Captain is a sadistic asshole, and having the baby may kill Ofelia’s mom.

Warning: Spoilers follow. Seriously, if you want to watch the movie, don’t read.

So what’s the problem? First, there appears to be gore for the sake of gore, which I really don’t care for. I complained about the second episode of Heroes for the same reason – it seemed like they were mutilating corpses willy nilly for the sake of shock value, like “Ooh, this villain is so scary/badass, he somehow nails people horizontally to a wall, or freezes them and rips the upper portion of their body off, for no apparent reason.” If there’s a purpose behind the gore, that’s one thing. If there’s symbolism, that’s another. But if it’s just gore, I’ll pass. Maybe the symbolism was that this girl is experiencing horrors, real horrors, absolutely terrible things, and the only way to portray them adequately was to make them as disgusting as possible. Fine. But then the Captain bashes some guy’s face in with a bottle. Okay. Then some chick sticks a knife into his mouth (?) and slashes out the side of his face. Ew. Not only ew, but stupid. If you’ve got that much leeway in slashing him, why not cut his throat and be done with him? No, she sticks the knife in his mouth and cuts his face, allowing him to survive, then come after her. Retard. Then, at the end, the resistance fighter shoots him through the cheek. What the fuck? Are we to assume his aim was bad, or just that he honestly thinks shooting people through the cheek is a good way to finish them off?

Then there’s the “fairy tale” portion. Absolute crap. The frog in the tree – I’m assuming that was symbolic for something. Maybe the Nazis/Facists getting fat and rich off the people, and stifling growth. Fine. But that’s not exactly a bold statement, since the Nazi’s don’t have much of a fanbase these days.

Then the feast and the monster with eyes in his hands. First of all, why, when the monster has eyes in his hands, does he have to hold his hands up by his head, where most creatures’ eyes are? Doesn’t that kill the advantage of having eyes on your hands – that you can look all sorts of different places, that you can look around corners, that you’ve got an expanded field of vision? No, let’s hold them up by our head to look ridiculous. I mean, come on. Is he intended to be scary? Bizarre, certainly. Mentally challenged, clearly. But scary? Eh. Then, the idiot girl who eats the grapes, after being warned repeatedly not to eat the food. The faun told her straight out, it was a matter of life and death. Eat the fruit, you’re likely to die. So she goes in there, gets what she needs, starts to leave. Looks at the feast, and thinks “Hey, let’s have a grape, even though everyone and they momma said not to.” The fairies fly in, warn her off, she swats them away, and starts eating grapes. Her excuse afterward? “I didn’t think anyone would notice.” Dumbass! What about the “life or death” concept? Forget the monster sitting dormant at the end of the table; didn’t it even cross your mind the food might be poisoned? And Kristin pointed this out - - it’s not like there was any real compulsion. She wasn’t starving. There was no enchantment on the food drawing her to it. She was just a retard. “I didn’t think anyone would notice.” Gah. I wish the monster would have killed you.

Then there’s the two-dimensional Captain, who is always either a) an imperious soldier, committed to his own supremacy, the idea of honor and duty, and dying like a soldier, or b) bat-shit crazy and sadistic, killing and torturing at will, generally an asshole to those around him. A villain should have some sort of depth, something that makes understand and sympathize with what they’re doing. The Captain, much like this movie, had no redeeming qualities.

And the fairy tale ending? The girl died, spilling her own blood, thus completing her final task. Then she was rewarded in her kingdom. But the fairy tale clearly didn’t exist in the real world, because the faun wasn’t there when the Captain found Ofelia in the Labyrinth, and then she died. Lovely.

Okay, so maybe there was more to the movie. It’s gotten rave reviews, and everyone who I know that’s seen it seemed to enjoy it. I can see how someone would appreciate the story, find it moving, find it heartbreaking, find it mystifying. To me, it was just depressing. That’s not the kind of movie I want to watch.

So from what I can tell, the moral of the story was life sucks, then you die, and if you endured enough pain and suffering in life while still doing good deeds, you will be rewarded in the afterlife. Which, for an alleged fairy tale, is pretty fucking dark.

At least the movie ended. So, I guess, in a way, the theme came true – we suffered through a disgusting, depressing, thoroughly disappointing movie, and the only reward we got came once it was over.

My grade: D
Recommendation: Only if you hate yourself, and either want to subject yourself to a terrible movie, or you want your life to seem better by comparison.

On Mediums

I might be alone on this one, but I think there's some value to watching a movie of a story before reading the book that the movie was based on. Now, I agree that most book versions are significantly better than the movie, for several reasons - the story is more developed, both plot and character-wise, books let you imagine what things look like for yourself, and they don't have to aim for sensationalism in order to sell, like movies do. Thus story isn't sacrficed for explosions. (Not that there's anything wrong with explosions, mind you. Personally, I found it awesome in XXX 2: State of the Union when random vehicles and buildings started exploding just because Ice Cube looked at them or walked past them. He's that badass.) And I can also see the distincting between sitting down for two hours and watching a movie that you already know what happens versus committing yourself to spending 10 or more hours reading a book when you already know what happens (for those of us who aren't speed readers, KH.)

But for my money, I like to be entertained both ways. This way, when I go to see movies like The Da Vinci Code, I can enjoy the movie for what it is, not complain about what it's lacking. I may have been the only person I know of who thought that movie was okay, primarily because I didn't have a superior version to compare it to. Now, if I wanted to, I could read the book, find out all the ways that the book is far superior, and be entertained by that too. Or Harry Potter, for example. I didn't catch on when the books first came out, but I did watch the movies. They weren't bad (except the second one), but the story didn't really excite me that much. Then Goblet of Fire came out, and that was awesome, even to people who'd read the books. So after much coaxing, I went back and read them. Sure enough, the books were generally better (except the second one, which was still craptastic), and provided a lot more depth and explanation to what I'd seen in the movies. And this should pretty much hold true to any series I try, because the books are almost always much better.

On the other hand, some movies could scare me off of the books completely. Take The Lost World for example. The first Jurassic Park movie was pretty cool, but the second one blew some serious goats. Thankfully I had already read the book, which I thought was excellent. But if I had seen the movie first, I never would have ventured into the words on paper version.

Other times, who knows. I saw Children of Men in the movies first, and I thought that was a stunning movie, pretty much incredible. I heard that the book was almost completely different. Like instead of becoming a desperate, violent society like in the movie, the world had become peaceful because humans realized that no one was being born to replace the dead, and humanity would soon reach the brink of extinction. Now maybe the movie picked a bleak, violent future because that would provide more action and tension. Or maybe the producers and director thought that would be more realistic. I'm not too sure I don't agree. The despair in the movie may have made it too dark of a picture for some, but I thought it was awesome. In fact, one moment in the movie actually reduced me to tears, which is not something that happens at the theater much anymore. (Not to give too much away for those who haven't seen it, but when everything stopped and the soldiers put down their weapons, if only for a second - - to me, that was moving.) So I don't know if I would have liked the book more, because it sounds like it would have been lacking some of what I found so compelling in the movie. Who knows.

Point is, I think it's time to start reading the Lord of the Rings.

Jailhouse Musings

My first day of intake and arraignment with the Legal Defense Program has come and gone, and it all went relatively smoothly. I wasn't looking forward to intake at the jail, considering a) it's a jail, b) I generally don't think highly of people in jail, and c) I don't like speaking to people. Plus, I had been warned the locals might start flinging feces at me. Not me personally, I suppose, but at people who come to speak with them. The locals are known for occasionally reeking of alcohol, vomit, urine, or feces, and usually at least from bad breath. Some LDP students have had unfortunate run-ins with people (including one girl whose interviewee decided jail was as good a place as any to masturbate, and did so right in front of her), but mine were all relatively decent. No feces flung at me, I can tell you that. My theory is, they start flinging shit, I start flinging shit.

Arraignments were also pretty solid. This marked my first day appearing in front of Dane County courts, and I looked appropriately fly. Nothing worth mentioning really happened, just standard appearances. The DA was extremely reasonable with all of his arguments and conditions, so I really didn't have to argue anything.

What really struck me about the proceedings was how much I would probably be better off in another field of work. As the court commissioner went through giving his orders and stating the conditions, I found myself thinking about how absurd I could make things. He orders the defendant not possess or consume any illegal substances as a bond condition. As defense counsel, I find myself wanting to argue "Your honor, I would ask that we limit that condition to any illegal substances other than cocaine. My client is an avid cocaine user; let's say we keep it to under a kilo. Deal?" I mean really, it's kind of a formality, since no one is allowed to use or possess those anyway. This just provides another opportunity for a bail jumping count, I suppose. But then the next condition - - no possession of any dangerous weapons. "Your honor, that's outrageous. My client has an extensive shoulder-mounted grenade launcher collection, and I really think it unnecessary to restrict his access to these items. How about we limit that to 'no ground-to-air weaponry' and call it a day?" One of the victims in a case was named "Triumph." I hear "I will order that you have no contact with Triumph..." and I'm finishing that sentence as "the Insult Comic Dog from Conan O'Brian." You don't want those two getting together, cahooting about all sorts of criminality. No siree.

Then I think about the other conditions one could throw down. No playing of the game Monopoly unless you are the thimble, and even then, you may not own more than two hotels on any green property. No possession of any fire-breathing squirrels. Refrain from humming any jaunty tunes. You are not to loiter in any area of the city where the mercury level is less than eight cubits. You are not to consume any McFlurrys, unless they are Oreo McFlurrys, and then you must have written authorization from Margaret Thatcher. No bats, vampire or otherwise.

Even still, I can do this job. So does the fact that I'm competent and approach it with a sense of humor mean I'm in the right field or the wrong one?

Mad Props

Okay, so I’ve got to give Erlanger some credit. Yeah, it’s corny, but rocking out on his “paper guitar” to “I’m My Own Grandpa” was hilarious. Someone even snapped a picture. He really tries to make this stuff interesting. Now, I’ve grown a bit jaded and cynical in my old age, especially over all things law school-related. And with how much time I’ve spent working on creating comedy sketches between SNL and Law Revue, it takes something pretty funny to make me laugh. Goddammit Howie, I've gotta give you props on that one.

Go Away, Moosei

It appears that an increased snowfall in Anchorage, Alaska has led many moosei to start wandering around the streets like common transients, bitching because they don't like walking in the snow and that the snow keeps soaking through their brown paper bags, causing their bottles of wine to fall to the ground. As a result, more and more will be getting hit by cars, and starving to death because they can't find food. Meanwhile, others will be pouring in from the mountains, trying to get away from the extreme temperatures, and to take jobs away from hard-working urban moosei.

It's just sickening. Don't get me wrong, I can't stand the snow most of the time either. But I'm going to school, I'm working part-time, and so I spend most of my time indoors. Now, if these lazy-ass vagabond moosei would quit their bitchin' and get themselves some work, they could avoid the harsh weather conditions. Instead, they're probably going to start hanging around laundromats and public parks, assaulting good citizens, and dropping dead in our yards. Apparently, once they die in someone's yard, the body belongs to the citizen, and its their job to dispose of the moose carcass. Just like a transient, imposing themselves on everyone else. I'm already fed up with sweeping out the dead homelii from the lobby of my apartment; no way in hell I'd put up with moose carcass added to the piles.

So to the moose population of Anchorage and surrounding areas, I suggest you shape up and start being productive members of society. For instance, hold gladiator-style fights against one another, and charge a nominal admission. Or at the very least, if you're going to drop dead, do it out in the wilderness, so we don't have to deal with your fat, stinking corpses.

Friends Don't Let Friends...

...Use legalese as a substitute for actual humor. I've been guarding against this since I first came to law school, and the effects still worry me. Sure, it's nice to laugh and be silly, and I'm not one to be all haughty and supercillious about what I'll stoop to laughing at. So the first time I went to A8 China and a fellow law student asked if the wontons were "Wanton and willful," yeah, I laughed. And I'll admit, a well-placed bit of legal jargon can be undeniably funny. But use of legalese and legal puns on a regular basis is unacceptable.

So today when I sent out my response to an assignment for Sentencing class, I really had to check myself. I was describing a cognitive error known as the "Anchoring Effect" in the process of sentencing by way of a personal example -- using my first doctor's diagnosis of my stomach condition as acid reflux and prescribing medications to treat that condition as an "anchor" that prevented him from considering other possible conditions and medications, even when all the acid reflux medications failed miserably to treat my problem. The assignment asked us to suggest a solution, and I indicated that I no longer thought my problem was acid reflux, and instead concluded that, despite all indications to the contrary, it was a tapeworm, and needed to be eliminated by way of a flamethrower.

After suggesting this, I realized that this alternative would qualify as a different cognitive error we read about -- an "Illusory Correlation." So when I finished my assignment, I originally included a sentence indicating that my alternative would effectively take me away from the Anchoring Effect and into the realm of an Illusory Correlation. I thought this was clever. No, scratch that, the law student in me thought that was clever. The human being in me knew that this was blatantly retarded and corny, and was far beneath my actual humor capacity. So I deleted the line and sent it off.

Apparently I'm not as immune to this problem as I thought, but at least I had the good sense to curb the impulse. But I bet someone reading my response will come up with the same stupid joke I did, and if we end up discussing our responses at class, I half expect someone to utter it. Then, with the appropriate air of self-righteousness, I can look down upon the idiot in question with a mix of derision and pity, and backhand them in the mouth.

Please, friends - - don't be that guy.

Audit This

So not having prepared my own taxes before, I figure that it's cool if you don't report to the IRS when you make very little money. Say, under $1000 a year or so. By extension, once you start making over that amount, you probably still shouldn't claim any income, because the IRS hates inconsistency. Then, once your drug deals and mercenary contracts push you well over the $100,000 a year barrier, you should probably continue to not report it, because...

Goddammit, just let me keep my money.

(Points to genitals)

One Small Step For Mediocrity

You know, I've been rocking the same mediocre GPA for four straight semesters now (seriously - all four were within like 0.5 points), but apparently I can break that. I got my last grade for this fall today, and after averaging these grades against my other semesters, my average grade for this semester was a full 3 points higher than all my other semesters.

Now, if it only made any difference whatsoever...

Tragic

Death has left my life mercifully unscathed up to this point; I've never had to deal with any real sort of tragedy. I still have three of my four grandparents, and the fourth died when I was about eight or nine, and I wasn't nearly as close to him. As a result, the magnitude of what happened didn't really strike me at the time. I still remember my cousin and I playing in the basement of the funeral home while some sort of service was going on. Good friends of mine recently lost their father. I knew him pretty well, and he was a great man. But he had been in pain for so long, his death, while tragic, was somewhat of a blessing. A friend of mine from high school died in Iraq two years ago; I had lost touch with him for years before that. I went to the funeral, and it was quite sad, especially because of how young he was. But still, it wasn't close enough to really hit me.

Yesterday I received news that my ex-girlfriend's younger sister, Candice, was killed in a car accident recently. Now, we were never all that close. A fair portion of the time, I couldn't stand her. Much like my ex, and even moreso, her sister was everything that I was not. She smoked, she drank, she'd done drugs, she was a bit promiscuous, she cared little for school, she was loud and reckless and self-destructive. I thought she was a terrible influence on my ex, who at the time I was dating her, was in the process of turning her life around. Yet, Candice was a nice person. She could be pleasant and caring and fun to be around. As a result, I asked her to participate in the second Saturday Night Live show my friends and I put together. She jumped at the chance, and (unlike my ex) was actually pretty funny. Even after I broke up with my ex, Candice still participated in the taping. I mean, we were never really friends. But...you know how it is. You've got people in your life who piss you off most of the time, but for some reason, you still like knowing them. That was Candice.

News of her death saddened me, not only because of the fact that she died, but also for her family. That situation is beyond tragic. Two parents, five children - all step siblings, all between the ages of 15-20 (when I knew them). Not poor, but not remotely well-off. The oldest child, a boy, was autistic. The girls, all teenagers within two years of each other, were always fighting with each other or their parents, always getting into trouble. It was a depressing environment; as a result, the parents were incredibly pessimistic people. They had already had hard, crappy lives, and now their children were doing the same. Before I met her, my ex got expelled from school for drug use. One of the girls got pregnant when she was 18, and is now raising her child as a single mother; her younger sister got pregnant when she was 16, and I don't know what happened there. Every week there was a new catastrophe; every week the floor fell out from one cataclysm or another.

Perhaps the biggest came when my ex drove her car into the ditch and crashed into a telephone pole. She suffered serious head trauma, and the doctors had to induce a coma so she wouldn't injure her spine. She was in the hospital for forty days; when she got out, nothing was the same. She had been working two jobs, but both were gone. She couldn't concentrate in school, and ended up unable to go back the year she should have graduated. When she did go back, she dropped out after a month. She had been enlisted in the army reserves, and was going to use that to pay for college. After her brain injury, she could no longer serve. She never went to college. She became completely dependent upon me, she started smoking again, and she got depressed. She had been the only one in the family with direction; by about a year after the accident, she had none.

Now this. Candice had been drinking at a local bar, until she had too much to drink and was cut off. She drove home drunk, around the same road as my ex, and lost control on the same curve, flipped into the ditch, struck a tree, and died. The kicker? The bartender that cut her off was her father. He told her to go home. So she did. But she never made it.

The point of all this? Well, in one sense, I'm glad I turned out to be who I am. I'm glad that, as a teenager, I devoted my free time to creative enterprises like SNL rather than getting wasted all the time and messing up my life. But I didn't write this to extol my own choices. And I'm not seeking sympathy. I don't want anyone telling me they're sorry; this isn't my loss. This is just another tragedy for a terminally tragic family that I'm not a part of. I almost have the urge to call her father and express my sympathy, but I doubt it would mean much of anything. Not when his life and the lives of everyone in his family is in constant freefall.

I know death will strike closer someday. That's inevitable. I love my grandparents dearly, and their health is deteriorating more and more each year. Of course, tragedy could strike anywhere, anytime. I have no idea who I may lose, and I don't know how I'll handle it.

But for now, every day I thank God for everyone in my life, and for everything I've been given.

I Still Don't Care

Thanks, Professor Smith, for that stunning display in redundancy. First, he sent us an email Friday for the Sentencing Seminary with him and the Dick, detailing what we'll be doing for our first class. Blah.

Then, another email? Well, the exact same one. Okay.

Then, another email. Almost the exact same one, except he didn't leave his signature. Ooh, sneaky, Mike. We know it's you.

Then today, another email, saying that apparently the email about the first class didn't make it around, so here is what that email said, word for word. Huh, yeah I must have missed that one. Perhaps the email would get around more if he stopped sending it to me so often and decided to spread the wealth.

The internets are a confusing and dangerous place, Mikey. Find yourself an Idiot's Guide, and leave me the hell alone.

Robot Rights? My Ass!

The British government is apparently worried that robots might one day become so advanced through artificial intelligence that they will demand rights. They may demand to be treated as citizens, and may one day sue to be provided with full social benefits including housing, income support, and robo-health care. The state-sponsored study indicated, although this is probably at least 20 years away, that a "monumental shift" could occur if robots advanced to the point where they could reproduce or think for themselves.

Like hell, says I.

Listen up, you goddamn hippie-ass crackpots. The moment a man-made piece of metal demands to be treated like a citizen, those of us who are not bird-shit crazy will take a sledgehammer and fuck it up, Office Space-style. And don't even get me started on robo-humping.

Apparently the U.K. Office of Science and Innovation's Horizon Scanning Center thinks it's cool to just completely make shit up, then speculate about it like this is actual scientific discussion. Here's a thought - - let's not make robots advanced enough that we have to sit and debate whether robots have souls or feelings. I've seen Galactica, I've seen the Matrix, I've seen I, Robot. It never ends well. Take a few too many steps into the "playing God" zone, and you've got a full-on robo-revolution on your hands.

Nah. Robots wanna give me sass, I'll kick them squah in the nuts.

No News is Gay News

Sorry the news of my return to the DA's office has been so few and far between, but truth be told, not a goddamn thing has happening worth mentioning. They've been down two attornies lately, and reports of their backlog reached 1200 uncharged cases at one point. Which means, no court for me. I've gotten the pleasure of sitting and dictating domestic complaints non-stop, as well as charging out the occasional stack of traffic. Whoopee.

I did get one venture into court for a preliminary hearing for a child abuse case, which was a barely-mitigated disaster. It seems the investigating police officers decided to entirely skip the "investigation" phase and stick with mere allegations, which made getting any details out of the two witnesses (both 13 year old girls, one of whom recanted and said nothing happened at all) like pulling teeth. From a pissed off alligator. Who has no teeth. The only mitigating factor is we got in the bare minimum of facts for a bind-over on both counts, barely avoiding dismissal. I just want to give a shout out to police incompetence, since they made me look like an idiot when it really wasn't my fault. Thanks, assholes. At least I looked fly in my new suit.

It's not all bad though. I'm a lot more comfortable with domestics now. They gave me an office this time - the old office of the guy who just got elected DA. I still enjoy all the people here, and the only two who I didn't really care that much for are the ones that left. No real permanent job prospects here, though, since they've got to fill their openings pretty much ASAP. Still, good experience, and hopefully good money for me. Kinda shot my winter break as far as rest and relaxation, but honestly, I catch up enough on those during the semester. This should be a busier semester for me, between work, class, and LDP, but as far as I'm concerned, break starts when school starts.

Back home for the weekend. Hopefully I'll have more to report by then.

Vigilance and Travesty

I woke up this morning, looked outside, and saw that all was still right with the world, at least for the moment. Democracy still stands, GW still holds the office, and the Taliban have not set up camps in my front lawn. Yet. Despite these comforting signs, I know that vigilance is required to continue my happy American way of life.

Which is why the decision of Democratic representative from Minnesota, Keith Ellison, to be sworn into office using Thomas Jefferson's copy of the Koran is troubling to no end. The man calls himself a public servant, an American leader, and yet he takes his oath with one hand on terrorism's handbook? This goes beyond unethical, beyond unacceptable. This is downright dangerous.

First, it shows that our rock of American democracy, the US House of Representatives, has been infiltrated by muslims ("terrorists.") This is how it starts; first Minnesota elects a muslim in the House, then Iowa elects an Iraqi to the Senate, and pretty soon Kentucky's sending Mr. Kim-Jong II to the US Supreme Court. Not on my watch, Mr. Ellison. Not on my watch.

Second, as Roy Moore so succinctly stated, our country was founded on the freedom of religion without the interference of government. This means that the government may not interfere with its citizens' practice of Christianity. By swearing an oath on the Koran, Ellison is attempting to impose muslimocity on a nation of freedom-loving Christians. The US Constitution compels Congress to step in and prevent Ellison from taking office, unless he's willing to re-swear his oath on the US Bible. Otherwise, Congress will have been complicit in the greatest trampling of the civil rights of American Christians since Woodstock.

Third, Ellison's use of the Koran to take his oath undermines American civilization. This point is self-evident, and requires no further explanation or support.

Fourth, this incident exposes Thomas Jefferson for what he really was: a terrorist-lovin' terrorist. Sure, he wrote the Declaration of Independence; but few know the truth - - that Mr. Mohammed al-Jefferson originally intended to be a declaration of independece from liberty and the American way. Only after extensive editing by Paul Bunyan and one Mr. Charles Norris did this document come to be known as what it is today. But now that the truth is out, Congress must take several steps:

(1) Destroy all nickels. Nobody likes nickels. Nobody uses nickels. Nickels are small, puny, and frankly un-American. Nickels should all be tossed in a giant vat and melted down, and the molten metal should be shaped into a gigantic machete, with one purpose in mind:
(2) Removing Jefferson's face from Mount Rushmore. Surely the face of a more worthy patriot belongs on one of our nation's greatest treasures. Maybe not W yet, (YET), but certainly Ronald Reagan, or Jerry Falwell.
(3) Torch the Jefferson Memorial. That place is ass anyway. Rather than a massive, lithosphere-touching phallus like the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial is vaguely dome-shaped, like some sort of...jihad...or something. Burn it down, and salt the earth. And -
(4) Replace all references to "Jefferson" across the country (street names, building names, people's names) with the word "Libertarydom." I know, it's not an actual word, but it sounds damn American.

Only after taking these steps can we ensure that this latest sideswipe by the terrorists will fail utterly and completely.

My parting words for Mr. Ellison and those (traitors) who support him: Freedom isn't free. Think about that when you're inevitably picked up in your cave and left to rot in Guantanamo.

Hey JB, this Statute is Facially Unconstitutional, and Coincidentally, So is Your Face

Word on the street is that Vice is taking on the Attorney General. That's right, working as a clerk on a case involving criminal defamation, Vice has laid down the gauntlet, challening the criminal defamation statute as both facially unconstitutional, and unconstitutional as applied to his client. Take that, AG-elect Van Hollen!

(In my best Outkast falsetto) "I - am - for - reeeeeal!" Any time you challenge a state statute as unconstitutional, as a courtesy, you have to send a copy of the motion to the AG's office, and they can decide whether or not they want to step in on the litigation. My boss got a call from the DA on the case yesterday, saying the AG's office wants in. Apparently, this is the first time in 20 years they've intervened in a misdemeanor case. Someone there read my brief, and told the DA that there were considerable issues raised worth addressing.

In all honesty, the statute as written is probably unconstitutional. It fails to provide some necessary exceptions to statements made about public figures and public affairs, which is an area that can't be subject to much limitation without infringing on free speech, since the ability of all citizens to criticize public officials and their affairs is fundamental to a liberal democracy. So unless the courts decide to (a) judicially narrow the statute to comport with the first amendment, which they really shouldn't do, or (b) read in the required components into some vague statutory language which would directly contradict what the statute says, then the statute should fall. And it's pretty damn exciting to me. My boss even offered to let me do the oral arguments. Which, legally I can't, and that would be downright frightening. Still, the thought of standing up there, going Walter Dickey-style on the court....goddamn!

Of course, the DA could decide to dismiss the defamation charge, and put our guy away on all the other charges they've got him nailed on. But for now, the charges stand, and the AG's office requested an oral arguments schedule and 45 days to respond to my motion. It's probably going to take months for anything to happen on this, so hopefully I'll still be working here when the dust settles. 'Til then.....put 'em up, JB. I've got your unconstitutional motion right here.

Fun With Floridiots

Let me tell you, it's nice to be back in the land of the literate. Four days in Florida, while a good time overall, was enough to make this ninja consider a quick bout of genocide. (For those of you who might quibble with my use of "genocide," believe me, Floridiots are an entirely different race, if not species, of idiots.) Here's the lowdown:

Sunday, Dec 31 - Spent the morning driving to Midway, and took a AirTran flight (I assume they were an offshot of AirTron Airlines, the official airline of the Transformers) to Orlando. Overall, smooth sailing. Took only carry-ons, no checked luggage, which meant we got to bypass all the long lines. Only glitch occurred when Miss Hays attempted to sneak her morningstar through the metal detectors. But that problem quickly resolved itself when roughly fifteen to twenty airport security guards suddenly died of myterious morningstar-related injuries.

Got to Orlando, where a shuttle took us to our hotel (a Howard Johnson) in Kissimmee. Well, not our hotel, actually. A different Howard Johnson. The shuttle lady asked for the address, explaining that there were multple HoJos in Kissimmee. So we gave her the address. The correct address. It was on a long, popular highway stretching from Kissimmee to Disney World, and apparently it was all officially called "West 192." However, another highway crossed it about halfway down, and those sneaky (read: retarded) Floridiots took to calling one half the west part of 192, and the other the east half. And our hotel, which was technically on West 192, was on the eastern half of West 192. So the shuttle driver takes us to a Howard Johnson on the western half of West 192, disregarding the actual address of the hotel, and disregarding the actual name of the hotel ("Howard Johnson Enchanted Land," as opposed to a regular HoJo). Then we point out we're at the wrong one. Oh, damn - somebody screwed up. So he has to take us all the way back down this godforsaken highway, which takes forever. If we had just gone to the correct hotel in the first place, it would have cut out about45 minutes of driving.

Rest of the evening was kind of quiet, since we didn't have transportation to get downtown by the bars, unless we wanted to shell out $100 round-trip to a cab. We ate at a Smokeybones restaurant nearby, which was essentially Famous Daves by another name. I.e. amazing. I had to seriously restrain myself from chugging a bottle of their barbeque sauce. We noted the Packers game was on tv, and they were currently whupping the Bears, so we decided to make an emergency "Cake Day" declaration, pick up a cake and some champagne, and go back to watch the game. However, the grocery store had closed just moments before, dashing our dreams of ridiculous chocolate cake. At least the Packers continued to stomp the hapless Bears. That was pretty funny.

Monday, Jan 1 - The real game day. We decided to rent a car, and took that downtown to the stadium. We had our Badger reds on, but apparently the Razorbacks were also red, so all the fans were in red, except the morons who showed up to support the Gators. Anyway, the game was awesome. We were in the thick of the student section, the absolute place to be. I got me some nice inflatable boom sticks, and rocked the shit out of those for most of the game. We were at ground zero for all the chants and waves, as well as the crude yet often hilarious chants at the Arkansas fans expense. (My favs: "We won the war," "NASCAR sucks," and "You can't read!") Badgers jumped out to a 17-7 lead at halftime, thanks to some nifty Jonathon Roderick Stocco action, then held on for dear life in the second half. Other than the Bager's subpar second-half performance, the whole thing was pretty awesome.

Then, some more useless Florida driving. We wanted to find a couple of books, but we forgot that no one in Florida is literate, thus rendering bookstores hard to come by. We drove and drove, found a WalMart, and checked around. It had some books, but not what we wanted. On the way out, we decided to ask a WalMart employee whether there were any bookstores nearby. Naturally, the woman had no earthly idea what the words "book" and "store" meant. She had a vague notion when we mentioned the word "mall," but that was the extent of her expertise in the realm of words and knowing things. Needless to say, we never found a bookstore. However, we did get lost on 192 on the way back, since whoever designed the layout and labels for the highway were undoubtedly several filthy hippies short of a filthy hippie commune.

Then we decided to get lobster. 192 was littered with places advertising lobster feasts, so we settled on one with a coupon for cash off on our drinks (clearly in need of drinks at this point). For $35, this place offered all you can eat lobster, crab legs, sushi, other seafood, bacon-wrapped filet mignon, salad, desert, etc. So we went for it. Now, the lobster was tasty, don't get me wrong. It was also kinda gross to get at the lobster. They just handed us a whole lobster, eyes and all, plus a few claws. Prying the lobster apart was frickin' disgusting. It had some sort of brownish-green substance inside. The meat was really only located in one section, plus the claws (which turned out to be the best part). One Kristin's lobsters had a bunch of red dots all over the inside, which happened to be eggs. Eugh. The rest of the meal, while not fantastic, was pretty good. My margarita was phenomenal. The crab was excellent, and much less gross. Plus chocolate cake, key lime pie, and cheesecake afterward.

All of which led to way too much food ingested. And afterward, my increasingly-apparent inability to digest tequila caused me to recapitulate most of the food at about 1am. Not fun for anyone.

Tuesday, Jan 2 - Disney day. Hadn't been to Disney World or any of its theme parks for over 12 years, and not to the Magic Kingdom for even longer. It was cloudy that morning, seemed like the rain might hold off though. For most of the morning, it did. We hit up the Small World, Peter Pan, Snow White, (Gay) Haunted Mansion, and some other stuff. It was all very cool, and very nostalgic. The FastPass thing works pretty well, and allowed us to cut out about a half hour of waiting for Peter Pan. However, when we attempted to get one for Space Mountain, some sort of malfunctions screwed that up, so we had to skip it and come back later. About lunchtime, the rain started. And it rained, and continued to rain. By now, you either stood somewhere protected from the rain, or stood in the now-ridiculously long lines. People weren't leaving; not with screaming children in the balance. The line for Pirates of the Carribean was about an 80 minute wait. We got a FastPass for some train adventure thing, but that wasn't for another few hours. So we tried to find something relatively dry to do. We went on the Teacups, and that was alright. Then we arrived back at Space Mountain, and decided to camp out. What else could we do? Our shuttle wouldn't return until 6, and it was only like 2 by this point. So we stood there and stood there, and got poured on. Probably 40 minutes of pouring rain, and we were still 30 minutes from actually going on the ride. Then a worker came out and told us that Space Mountain wasn't working, and we could either stay and wait in line, hoping it would be fixed, or go elsewhere. By now, we were both pretty distraught, and that was the last straw. We called a cab, and got the funk outta there.

Then, illiteracy strikes again. We just wanted to get home, find some dry clothes, and stop shivering. But as the completely incoherent cab driver took us down 192, we realized he was going the wrong goddamn way. We told him the address, we told him the exact name of the hotel. He takes us to the wrong fucking place. He agreed to cap the fare at a certain level, but then it rang up about $12 past that, so he reneged on that deal. I still didn't have to pay the full fare, but needless to say, neither of us were happy. We pretty much slept off the next couple hours to de-hypothermiaize. Fortunately, a damn good pizza hut pizza capped the night, and the knowledge that we would be escaping Florida the next morning calmed the nerves.

Wednesday, Jan 3 - Another Airtran flight back to Chicago, with smooth sailing. We got to Midway, found my car, and proceeded on a horrific drive around the city attempting to find the interstate. Our directions kinda messed us up, and took us deep into the 4th circle of Hell, surrounded by FIB drivers who made me look like frickin' Miss Manners behind the wheel. Cutting each other off left and right, nobody obeys traffic lights, or yields the right of way, or uses turn signals. It's kill or be killed. Despite my reputation, I'm not on that level. We eventually made it out, found an Oasis, ate some Panda Express, and the world corrected itself.

Finally we reached Madison, and hit the first two bookstores that greeted our arrival. That's a hella-nice feeling.