No, seriously

Wanna know who is getting called back where?

Of course you do. Its the law student nature to be obsessed, isn't it?

Its also the law student nature to make a database and put it up on the web. I present to you: SummerAssociate.com

more randoms

Hey Kelly: Philly is furious up at 57th and Georgetown. Those are some strange billboards.....


1wk+ 1 day til the Season Premiere of Battlestar Galactica. The webisodes are sweet, but I'm ready for a full on hour. :o)


Did you ever think that your rejection notes have been lost in the mail? 4 dings so far, but plenty still outstanding. 0 callbacks so far. So, where is the middle ground? Lost in the mail, that's where.

My throat hurts. This is always the foreshadowing of doom. Yes, I'll find some orange juice. Yes, I'll (try and) get to bed early. Still, the sore throat never lies.......

Huh, I never thought of it quite like that

From an interview with Walter Mosley in the Toledo Blade

Walter Mosley was 13 when the 1965 Watts riots jolted Los Angeles. Ask him how America’s attitudes on race have changed since then, and he torpedoes a response.

“Race hasn’t changed. If it had, we wouldn’t be fighting a war against a country that hasn’t done anything to us: Iraq. But we’re fighting it because we think they look like the people we think are our enemies. That’s why the people of the United States have allowed this war to go on. It’d be like if a French terrorist blew up something in America and we declared war on Sweden. Everybody would say ‘Why are we declaring war on Sweden, they’re not French?’”

You know, I never thought of it quite like that. I like the analogy, though.

The whole article is good. We brought Walter Mosley in for the library a few years ago and he was a very wonderful person.

I'm so old

We're listening to "How deep is your love" by the Bee Gee's right this minute in Copyright. Everyone else is laughing and I'm like....."I LOVE this song!" :o) That might not be so much old as geek!

Other randoms:

Navy blue shoe polish saved me a bunch of money. Yay shoe polish!

I think people are getting a little out of hand on Dancin' with the Stars. I'm all for individuality, but give me a break with the cartwheels and the flips and the handstands, okay?

I was up hella early this morning and put in a little time on the treadmill. Its amazing how much better it made me feel.

Good morning, everybody!

Cool

Fantasy football has turned around. I'm 2-1 now. Oh, its not through anything that I've done, it just happened to turn out that way. Sure, I've made a few changes, but, except for one, I can't imagine it did a bit of good. Its better to be lucky, I guess.


On the other hand: not cool to forget that football is a pretty rough and tumble game. It all looks great on tv, or even sitting in the nosebleeds in the stands, but every once in awhile a particular injury brings reality home again. I hope Chris Simms recovers completely and soon. He's such a cute kid.


Someone expressed complete shock that I still brief my cases for class. Well, it goes a little something like this. Briefed classes first year. Got good grades. Stopped briefing 2nd year, got shitty grades. Back to briefing for 3L. And yeah, I brief by hand. With pen. And paper. I don't know why either. It seems easier that way, for some reason.

Really, there isn't anything else going on. Isn't that sad? Fall break is coming up. I was thinking about going......away, but I don't think I have nearly enough vacation time for that with Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up. Plus, I have a baby shower that I'm supposed to be getting together. October 31st is right around the corner, people!

Seriously, the best news I've had all day.

Yeah, I should get out more. Still.......


The Watchman: A Joe Pike Novel

The latest novel in the Elvis Cole series is the book Joe Pike fans have been clamoring for
—a Joe Pike novel.

In The Watchman, RC places Joe Pike square in the cross-hairs as the main character of his new thriller/detective novel.

Larkin Conner Barkley is a federal witness in what appears to be a money laundering case. She also happens to be a spoiled rich girl trying to do the right thing for the first time in her life. But what if the United States Marshals cannot protect her?

What if the best private security money can buy cannot keep her safe? Joe Pike owes a bad man a big favor. And that favor is to protect Larkin Barkley. But when Pike and the girl immediately come under murderous fire, Pike hatches a plan: disappear with the girl into the anonymous underbelly of Los Angeles, turn the tables on the men who want her dead, and do what Joe Pike does best—hunt down the hunters.

With Elvis Cole’s help, Pike uncovers a web of lies and betrayals where nothing and no one is what it seems. But Pike’s biggest threat might be the girl—a lonely soul determined to destroy herself, unless Joe Pike can fill the void in her empty heart.

Coming in Spring, 2007. Additional information, excerpts, and interviews will appear in the coming months.

Michael Connelly's Echo Park

Its a commercial for/ movie (a mini movie) of the first chapter. A neat idea. But....you have to wonder if they aren't kind of preaching to the choir here. The people who are likely to watch this are people who were already going to read the book.

today is one of those days

When I really, really, really don't feel like going to class.

Really.

I want to go home, and get in my bed. Flip on the tv. Take a nap. Not necessarily in that order.

Of course I'm going to class. Don't be ridiculous. I just don't want to is all.

Miracles of Modern Medicine

Peter Gammons, who had a brain aneurysm earlier this summer (!) is coming back to tv tomorrow night.

Wow.

My arch nemesis

So I'm looking through grammar books this morning and I came across the Blue Book of Grammar. It has 3 holds right now, and has gone out a fair number of times, so I'm behind the curve here. But, I also hate grammar. Yes, that's right. I hate grammar. It was my worst grade in my major in undergrad. And, even though I have two English degrees, I hate grammar.

Detest grammar.


So, I'm looking through this book and I come across the Effect v. Affect page. Here is the rule:

Rule 1: Use effect when you mean bring about or brought about, cause or caused. Example: He effected a commotion in the crowd.

Rule 2: Use effect when you mean result. Example: What effect did that speech have?

Rule 3: Also use effect whenever any of these words precede it: a, an, the, no, any, take, into.
Note: These words may be separated from effect by an adjective.
Example: That book had a long lasting effect on my thinking.
Has the medicine produced any noticeable effects?

Rule 4: If none of the above fit, use affect.


Now, I thought this was an easy way to remember it. Pretty much, use effect unless you don't. But does that tell you anything about the word "affect"? I don't know. Grammarians, is this correct? Have I been making this way too hard all these years? I think I've been using it right..... (ha, but how would I know?)

If you don't understand the difference.......

Honestly. Its time for my weekly rant about book reviews. Some people, however, appear not to know the difference between taking a piece of literature and re-doing it (or dumbing it down) so people can understand it, and writing a book review that you know most people aren't going to get. So, for your people, let me see if I can illustrate the difference:

Taking Shakespeare and translating it into easier language will get you a lot of new readers. Maybe. But, you're also taking away most of what makes Shakespeare worth reading in the first place.

But, writing a book review using words that most people won't know is just ridiculous. I gave the inter alia example a few weeks ago. Today's eye roll comes from the New York times book review. I generally don't bother reading it because half the time I spend more time trying to unravel what the reviewer is saying that I don't care about the actual book being reviewed when I make it to the end. Useless. But, they were doing John Le Carre so I decided to take a look. Exhibit one:

“The Spy Who Came in From the Cold,” to name just one example, is much less an exciting espionage novel than a wholly original cri de coeur about the amorality of governments on both sides of the Iron Curtain and, unexpectedly, about the anti-Semitism that remained endemic to both Soviet socialism and Western capitalism long after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

"cri de coeur"? Is that something I should know? A literary term, perhaps? Or is it just French for the sake of speaking French? If the former, shame on me. If the latter, fuck you. You're a book review. Speak English to me and tell me why you think I should, or shouldn't, care about the damn book.

Honestly. Next we'll have book reviewers using Greek (ancient, not modern) in their reviews just to one up the Latin and the French! All the while, book readers will be saying the hell with reviews......which, I guess, they should be doing anyway. Dear book reviewers: stop taking yourselves so seriously. The book you're reviewing is the important thing, not your review!

Update: I liked the WaPo's review much better.



Of course, there are good reviews as well. I loved this one. The image of "being stoned to death with popcorn" will make me laugh for the rest of the day.

When the same post is still funny the next day

you know its a keeper.

How Star Wars should have ended

first seen on Cynical-C's site. Hilarious!

Last, but not least,

Funny pics I got in the mail today.

This one reminded me of Brian.

This one was wrong, and I know it, but I laughed anyway. (sean, don't try this at home!)

In "you have got to be kidding me" news.....

Whitney and Bobby are finally calling it a marriage, and now a divorce.

I love her.....I love her not

This is my ongoing relationship with Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake Series. The first 9....... fantastic. Well, the first 6 or 7, fantastic. The next 2 or 3...... very, very good. Then, it happened. Yes, she went stark raving mad. No, that's not what happened. She got divorced, got re-married, whatever. Decided that her main character (who I've never especially liked) was the hottest woman on planet earth and everyone had to sleep with her. At once. Right now. Plot? What do you need that for?

So, when Danse Macabre came in, I did check it out. And it sat on my coffee table for two months. Then I returned it. Unread. I just had no interest in what hastily thrown together threesome she'd concocted and watch the further destruction of two of my favorite characters ever in fiction.

But, like all drug addicts, I couldn't stay away. I downloaded the book from our website, and listening seems to really be helping. I really like the woman who is reading it, and I'm enjoying it more than I imagined that I would. I still can only listen in small doses before I want to stab her through the eyes with red hot pokers for what she's doing to these characters....... but I keep listening..........

My First Foray

into Fantasy Football wasn't exactly a failure....

Exactly....


I see how people spend so much time on it. But, as it isn't for money, I don't see the need to put all the effort into it. I picked people I like, and people I'll see in the ordinary course of me being a football fan. It didn't work out that badly, but I would have preferred to win. I always prefer to win.

Oh yeah, and some of the people that I got through the draft (the ones I didn't pick) I had no idea they were on tv around these parts yesterday. I mean, I knew who was on, but I didn't put that together with who was on my team! LOL.


How's that for being a football fan, eh? I'll do better next week. I hope.

There is an old saying......

You can't cheat an honest man. Now, that may or may not be strictly true, but it does make a certain amount of sense in the broadest terms. Its when people are trying to get something for nothing (or on the cheap) that you can take advantage of them.

Did the dude know his "diploma" was from a diploma mill? Maybe, maybe not.

Did the due know that most places require you to do some level of academic work for a degree? Probably. I don't think I believe, just yet, that we are so technologically advanced that everyone believes you can just log on and get your degree without work.

but....but....he says he DID work! Maybe he did.

But, wouldn't you think, if you wrote a master's thesis there would be some evidence of it? Somewhere? I've written one. It took a lot of time. I may not have a hard copy of it, but I certainly have it on a disc. Hell, I may have a hard copy of it. I just, recently, threw out copies of undergrad papers. Undergrad! Now, I'm not saying that everyone is a packrat like me, but to have nothing?! Not a single, solitary paper? I agree, its fishy.

Do I think it was malicious? I don't. I think he thought it was good enough and then thought nothing more of it. But come on! Is that the type of attitude you want overseeing anything let alone something as big as the juvenile detention center.

uh.....no.

I don't know if "jilted" is the right word

But, otherwise, good for her!

Hey You!

Get your Constitution On.

Bad Sister..........No Biscuit

So, today is my sister's birthday. She's vacationing in the motherland (my motherland, not hers) with my dad. When last I spoke to them, they were on their way out to dinner.

I was reading Employment Law in the car, but don't cry for ME argentina.....

Anyway,

So, its her birthday and I had to deliver the bad news to her that there would be no SugarClooney awards for her and its all my fault. Why, you ask? Because someone (that would be me) waited around to call about tickets and now all the ones for the discounted price are gone. Discounted price being $350 instead of $500 per person.

Now, one of you will probably be wondering: why don't you just pay the extra for her ticket as a birthday present? Well, there is a big mental difference between paying $700 and paying $1000. Logically, it isn't that much, I'll grant you. Well, it is that much, but if you're willing to spend $700, spending $1000 shouldn't be that much of a bigger deal.

But it is. Not to mention that I do enjoying eating on occasion, and wouldn't be doing as much of it if I dropped a grand on an awards show. And I did put the question to her if she would like to buy her own $500 ticket and she said no without even a bit of a hesitation. Yes, to $350 (although she did have to think about that for a few days) and absolutely not to $500. My mental block is genetic, apparently.

So, no Clooney for us this year. Bummer, but the money I'm saving on hotel, airfare, conference registration, Clooney awards.....is about $1700. Do you KNOW what I can do with $1700?!

Heh.


In other news: doesn't it seem kind of ridiculous to drag out all the laptop & accessories for a one hour class? I think about this every Wednesday, but do it anyway every week.

Some people just don't like structure

So, we have a seating chart in class. In most classes, actually, but that's neither here nor there. ANYWAY, we have a seating chart in class but there is one.......person.......who likes to sit in other people's assigned seat.

So, people have signed the seating chart, come in to sit down, and see some idiot sitting there. The first time it happened, I thought it was just a mistake. He sat down in someone else's seat, and when she got there, she just found another place to sit. No big.

TODAY, he's in a different seat. Right in front of me, in fact, where these two people always sit. So, is it just a fun time?

Oh wait! The person on the other side just told him he had to move because he doesn't sit there. Ha! Its like geek street justice.

You know.....this is not a promising start to the day if this is the only amusing thing I can find in the world.

He isn't even wearing flip flops!

Its either right or it isn't. Right?

There is a new book out (soon) that is sort of the anti-Eats, Shoots and Leaves.

The Fight for English: How language pundits are ate, shot and left. The author rags on Lynne Truss' book and goes on and on about how she is a "linguistic fundamentalist".

But, as far as punctuation goes, isn't it either right or wrong? Don't we want to have rules to follow? Isn't that kind of the point of the whole thing? I haven't read Eats, Shoots and Leaves. I had grammar and punctuation. But, I do like the idea of knowing that there is a right way to do it. If I care enough, I'll look up the right way. Possibly.

8 to 80, blind, crippled and crazy

I have never laughed so hard in all my life. Its true, there is a direct association between how funny things are and how late it is (or early it is) in the morning. Things are intensely funny at 2. Still, my silly cousins had me in tears all night.

No, really. They're crazy. This title is a line from one of my cousins on how he likes his women. Its true, he's kind of like a pied piper when it comes to chicks. Some guys are a chick magnet, I don't think the word is invented for what David does to women.

I wish he didn't take the blind, crippeled and crazy part quite so literally........


Anyway, the wedding was beautiful.....and I forgot my camera. I'm so ticked off. What the hell is the point of buying a camera if you forget it at home. Second best line of the day was Tiffany (the bride) saying after the kiss "I got him now." LOL!

They have known each other since pre-school so I suppose it must seem like its been a long time. They weren't high school sweethearts. They weren't college sweethearts. But, isn't it funny how these things turn out? As the best man said "Shaun had to go all the way around the country to come home and find his wife."

Maybe I'll take pictures at the post-festivities cookout. ........

Morning in Middle America

Greetings from Illinois. I'll have to take some pictures from the front steps where I'm typing this.....on stolen Internet service because someone has wireless......so you can see the total suburbia I'm surrounded by. All the houses look the same. There are cars parked in front of houses, or in driveways. The house across the street is a mirror image of our house as far as layout is concerned. Theirs is yellow, ours is green. It used to be yellow. And the bushes in front of our house look kind of sad and pathetic. I don't know what happened to them.

Anyway, its an absolutely GORGEOUS day out, and I think I may pull off the sleeveless dress for the wedding after all. I was a bit worried yesterday, when I got here, because it was cool and dark and gloomy. Today is exactly the opposite. I swear, I don't know if Tiffany placed an order for this weather, but it turned out perfectly.

And I just finished watching my first premiership game of the season. I swear, does a Saturday morning get any better? No, no it doesn't.

Happy September

Fall is my favorite season. Football season starts. Baseball playoffs start. Weather is cooler, sweaters, sweatshirts and jeans season. I LOVE IT.

September is also the month where you can learn more about YOUR U.S. Constitution.

That's right, it belongs to you. And if you're not going to take care of it, we're going to take it away from you. Oh, no wait. That was a puppy I had once.....

Anyway, the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library -- in joint participation with other area institutions -- is partcipating in My Daily Constitution. There will be various events around the city including one I think is VERY cool, a public reading of the Constitution at the Indiana State House on Sunday, Sept. 17th. Bad news is, there is a Home Colts game that day, so get downtown early. Have brunch.

After that, there are several other discussions happening around town on different Constitutional issues: Free speech, citizenship, freedom of religion, eminent domain, war powers, you name it.

it sounds very interesting. I hope you can make some of the events.

Oh yeah, and stop by any library branch to get a free (FREE!) copy of your U.S. Constitution donated by Lexis-Nexis.