Scoplaw

Getting Away From It All

The great thing about living in Miami is that after a kind of stressful week, I can just hop on my bike and be on the beach in a half hour.  Or less if I'm just chilling on the bay.

While stressful, the fireworks happened early in the week - the aformentined two not guilty jury trials on Monday and Tuesday.  The rest of the week was the usual grind, but I was in combat mode as we thought we might have the opportunity to do one more one jury and/or one bench trial.  Turned out that although we were ready, we couldn't get a jury.  Then on Friday corrections simply didn't bring the client who was thinking he might want to go bench.  We'll probably just do a jury with him anyway as he's set off at this point and sitting on another sentence in an unrelated felony case. 

Lest anyone think I am a rockstar and/or am getting a big head, this is a completely relative kind of litigation.  We just have to be better than the opposition in getting our message to the jury and preparing them for the kind of decision making they'll be doing.  This isn't to say my opposite number across the aisle is a slouch - in fact, of all the prosecutors we've seen in there, he's the most tenacious, the most prepared, and thus my least favorite to go to trial with.  Trial is a team effort - and I've been fortunate enough to have stellar trial partners.  And the goddess of case-law still smiles on me. 

Now I'm off to finish my domestic tasks for the week - cooking, washing, cleaning, etc.  I have a lovely chicken, rice, Shiitake  mushroom and assorted veggies soup calling me at the moment. 

**

I'll leave you all with this piece of unfortunateness I noticed while out riding.  Unfortunate because the name of this company blithely uses one of my favorite words.  And then suggests they sell products to paint it with.   There's a thought. 

Supposed to be working late tonight. . .

but an old friend sent me a new song he wrote.  I've played it about 12 times now.   Echoes of everything - but mostly humid nights in Providence.  Which is doubly appropriate as the TLF and I had dinner on the water.  It really did feel like a June night on Wickenden St., except I'm in Miami and it's January. 

Body, following Mind, shuts down. Or is it the other way?

Shutting down.  This sort of thing has happened to me in the past - last week, as soon as I heard my second trial case was not going to go for lack of a jury, I got very very sleepy.  I more or less plodded back to the office while the gray wave was rising, incoherently mumbled my way thought a meeting, staggered home, and fell asleep on the floor for 14 hours.  (It's a very comfy floor and I had a pillow and a blanket which I pulled off my nearby couch.  I woke up a few times and decided I liked it where I was.)

I mention this because I'm fascinated with the mind/body.  So in this case, throughout the day, I knew intellectually that it was unlikely our case would go, given certain factors.  Yet I was in the physical presence of a defendant who might have needed me to be awake and aware and articulate.  And so I was.  Gearing up for trial, I had eaten a fast (but balanced) meal some hours earlier and was drinking coffee.  I should have been (and was) peaking with enough fuel to bring me through everything.  The brain was buzzing merrily along, considering the different possibilities of what we'd see in trial.

However, as soon as I learned that we weren't going forward, apparently my body/mind decided to give me *juuust* enough energy to get home.  And then, literally a few minutes into a place where I could do so, I completely shut myself down - coffee, food, conscious desires of the day notwithstanding.  I know, sure-certain, that had I been mid-trial at that point in time, I'd have been just fine, with energy to spare. 

It appears as though some deeper part of me has assigned priorities in these matters.  I'm amused (and pleased actually) that a client will keep me up and running, even though there's a slim-to-none chance of my being needed, while an office meeting is apparently something I've decided I can publicly drool through (even though the meeting, which provides the majority of my interaction with the office at large, potentially shapes my "career" more than court time does).  I like that my quiet/dream/subconscious self has decided so.  Go self.    

Teddy bears, candy canes, and all that shit.

Tonight I'm just filled, more so than usual, with my own particular helpless rage.  It's the kind of rage that stems from a strong suspicion that something bad is going down and that someone I love is being made a fool of - yet any action, or any undue inaction, on my part might spell disaster.  In this particular situation, information is scant, multi-sourced, and has been processed through the Scoplawic Brain, which guesses well (mostly) and makes some good connections (mostly) and trusts itself.  Hence the problem.  Especially when I'm dealing with a few interlocking "hmm" moments from different sources which nonetheless crystallized into a single elegant, though appalling, explanation.

The blog, in a sense, is the wake my life - after the fact eddies that suggest what has already passed by. 
My actual life involves looking ahead.  I balance and guess and anticipate and try to shape things as they come.  But this situation is outside me, and thus I'm acutely torn between doing something and being yet another (because I'm sure there are many) passive bystander waiting for more information.   But I hesitate because I'm not 100% sure I'm right about some things, *nor* am I sure that even if I am right, any action I'm potentially contemplating would be beneficial.  I'm just outraged at the possibility that what I'm guessing might *actually be.*   I so wish I'm wrong. 

Lawer-talkin (schweetness the second)

I got an iPhone for a holiday gift. 

And then I talked my way out of my Verizon contract and its termination fee. 

Yep.  It can be done.  (Pause for applause)  I'd like to thank Gary Peller and his first year class "Bargain, Exchange and Liability."  Also, the many law students who bitched about phone company contracts in the context of that class.  I wouldn't be here without you. 

The iPhone, by the way, is worth the hype, at least for me.  I can take pictures, listen to music, organize my contacts, call and text easily, surf the web (including Westlaw in the courtroom - how very very sweet!), and check my mail while on the go. 

But the truly great thing about this device is that it makes it all so easy and intuitive.  There are a lot of things that I simply want to be able to do without excessive set up or fooling around with, things I don't need 12 options for, or a tree of menus.  The iPhone isn't perfect, but it goes a long way toward reducing unneeded options.  It won't do everything, but it does what it does fast, well-enough, and reliably.

And the small touches to a surprisingly long way.  I love the fact that when I check my voicemail, I can go directly to whatever message I want to listen to.  No more wading through messages, or (worse) listening to a pathetically slow recorded voice tell me I have messages.  I know I have damn messages - that's why I'm checking them!

**

This also means I have a new phone number.  Email me if you need it and have not yet gotten it.

Various and Sundry

Well, time for another long rambling missive of self-memorialization, because, honestly, the lack of sleep does strange things to long term memory formation and sequencing. Hopefully it will be at least a passingly entertaining read, as I have a couple of Rodneys on the line. (Click on the link to vote.) 

Should we begin with the tapas bar in the gas station? I think we shall. Yes, and there you have it – I have been to a wine cellar and tapas bar which is in the back of a completely ordinary citgoesque gas station. This post could probably end right here.

But, for more detail, after a particularly bad motion-day, I went there with TLF, the Sexicans, and ((dear readers please help moniker this guy – I read his poetry MS when I was in grad school and gave him the thumbs up vote; and yet so much time had passed I had forgotten everything about this when I met him, randomly, in Miami and we discovered our shared connection.)) Obviously, way too long to use as a moniker, so for the moment I will call him, “Jose.”

But back to the tapas bar, hidden in the dim recesses of the gas station. It was like being trapped inside one of those bubblegum card holograms. Turn your head slightly to one side and you view a gas station, indistinguishable from any other in So. FL; the lazy-susan rack s of sunglasses, small pillar ATM, cig dispenser over the cash register counter which boasts the usual assortment of nailcippers and plastic roses. Turn your head slightly the other way and you’re in a tapas bar, surrounded by wine racks of well priced and interesting wines.  Except the tapas are monstrously huge, although priced the same as they are in most cities. I don’t really know what to say about this; it’s fantastic juxtaposition should be, well, delightfully obvious. And I can tell you in the hour and a half I was there, it didn’t get old. Close one eye – fluorescent lit gas station. Switch eyes – candle lit tapas bar.  Repeat for amusement.  But then I’m easily amused. And the sangria probably helped.

While debating the future of SCOTUS with one of my tapas companions, I had a moment of inspiration. Our next democratic president should replace whomever comes off the bench (Stevens, sadly, most likely) with the entire 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals. They’d only get one vote – but it would be the entire circuit. I think it’s a great idea.  Perhaps even better than Scott’s plan to clone Scalia, but force the younger one to wear an enormous sombrero to distinguish the two.

**

Socializing in a Quasi-American City

One of the mental pitfalls I can’t seem to avoid is to assume my peers have similar experiences. It’s made me increasingly laconic “in public” but even more rambly with old friends.  And I’m not even talking about the risqué or the obscure. Case in point – I just had lunch with people who had never eaten oysters.  Shocking.

While this might seem a minor point (and it is, come to think of it), I’ve always been more of a fox than a hedgehog, even though I often seem to come off as the latter when you first meet me.  (And while we're at it, could this division have only been thought up by a distressed hedgehog?)  Regardless, I’m just fascinated by stuff, by people. I can’t help it. So my mixed experiences are nice in that I can slot myself into a lot of oddball communities and activities. It’s also amusing that there’s always that sort of friction there – a roughness caused by two seeming contraries passing each other by. And let me tell you, there’s usually no pattern to which little group takes offense at which other little group, beyond seem to have a gift for finding them.

One of my very old friend’s moms was actually pretty keen on this – whenever I stopped by in suit ‘n tie mode and she had friends over, she’d go out of her way ask me about whatever “fringe” things she could – sketchy living situations, crazy artist/musician friends and companions, whatever anecdotes are generally best not floated in front of the grandparents, poetry, radical politics, and so forth. And of course whenever I showed up in combat boots, my beaten up leather jacket, and colored hair, she’d turn the conversation toward (purely for theatrical reasons, I’m sure) classical literature, “certain kinds” of poetry, and the drier and more technical areas of all the other things I love. See folks, it may look like it doesn’t bathe, but it can still preform moderately complicated tricks.)

I usually don’t like these kinds of little games, but now I find I’m missing them somewhat.  Here I have to resort to wearing a dinner jacket with my chacos. Unfortunately instead of straddling lines, it just means I look like a German tourist.

At the very least, to avoid being pigeonholed, I'll have to try to avoid the whole “And what do you do?” conversation with the just-mets. While I honestly do think that educating people about the realities of the American legal system is part of my responsibility, I’m starting to loathe that particular 10 minutes of cocktail conversation. Auden, when faced with identifying himself as a poet claimed to be a Medieval historian – he described this as the response that most withered curiosity. Along those same lines I’m seriously thinking about becoming an IRS auditor – “So nice to meet you - how do you spell your name?” 

How’s that for a twisty bit of associative typing?

Moving Quickly, Moving Slowly

Friends will be glad to note I have actually adhered to being on vacation - yesterday I did a pick-up century (112 miles) up, down, a bit past, and around Key Largo.  I took Card Sound Road instead of Route One.  Compared to Route One, Card Sound Road is cleaner, has less traffic, better sight lines, and is still a fucking death-trap.  I got clipped by a van (minor van-rash on elbow now), and deliberately buzzed by another (horn pressed down).  The trouble with Card Sound as opposed to One is that there is NO shoulder. I mean none - you have to actually ride in one single 55mph lane with traffic.   

Anyone thinking of cycling the Keys should just take a bus down to Largo and go from there.  North Largo is completely beautiful and fun to ride though. 

On the whole the trip went very well, apart from the assholes on the road.  In the last 10 miles my right knee (same knee that gave me trouble on my parking deck climbing jaunt) tweaked out, so I had to let it go slack and use my left leg.  All's well that end's well. 

Today I'm moving a bit slowly - although the legs seem completely fine now. 

**

In other news, I got me some extra furniture: a couch and a couple of extra tables.

**

Tonight - "Rabbit Proof Fence" and/or "A Very Long Engagement."  Or I could just have a few martinis and watch Battlestar or Firefly again.  I like my sci-fi kinda beaten down.  I think that's just the Irish in me talking.   

Bone Tired But Pleased

Technically I'm on vacation.  That means I came in on vacation day one for a true dogfight of a trial, in which the jury ended up splitting the baby.  I'd say more, but, as is mostly the case, things are not yet done.   It also means that I'm in on Monday to jockey a few trials around. 

Such is life.  But here's the thing that rocks - the "why" of the "why do I do this job?"  Today, while getting together for a critical mass ride, I saw 3 (3!) of my clients, out on the streets, enjoying the sunlight and having a good time.  One of them, a drag queen, blew me a kiss and called me sweetie - she then gave a few big sweeping leg kicks which showed off her legs and her skirt's flair.  The other CM riders were pretty amused. 

But there you have it.  Sunlight.  Air.  Freedom.  Somebody doing essentially what they want to do, unapologetically, no matter what the republican soccer moms of the world might think of it.  And I had something to do with that happening through a high/tightwire argument in court.  Some people might think efforts that manifest themselves in this way are perforce petty.  But as unquantifiable as it may be, I did something to make sure that this very unique and quirky person wasn't in a metal cage. 

And yeah, in my poverty and relative isolation, I think I'm entitled to a small bit of smugness when the long hours pay off - even if that's in the particular form of someone kicking up  their legs in a can-can at passer's by - life, joy, pleasure - it's gloriously inappropriate and perfectly expressive, as it must be.

**

PS - Spot the Scoplaw - not as much fun as Where's Waldo, but perhaps as challenging.  This is from the latest Critical Mass ride.

How to Survive Trial Prep

Actually I love trial prep - it's kind of perverse, I know, yet I confess that I love knocking the ideas about, hunting down leads, bringing strategies together, honing stuff.  But one needs a break sometimes. 

Anyway, it's rare that I actually laugh out loud at the wonders of the Internet.  Usually when that happens it's on Something Awful, of which I'm a longstanding fan (Something Awful has been mocking itself and the internet since 1999, bringing you reviews of the worst movies, video games, and websites to ever exist. If it's something and it's awful, it's probably on Something Awful, where the internet makes you stupid.)  You can certainly kill some time there.

However, the motivation for this post was to pass on a link that a co-worker, in the spirit of both education and distraction, had sent me.  It's a truly brilliant thread, "Charts and Graphs of Rap Song Lyrics".

It contains the following Venn Diagram; certainly the best I've ever seen.  (Yes, even poetry delinquents like the Scoplaw know something about Set Theory - try not to be too shocked.)

And, to keep with the theme. . .the following will explain the above in its own quirky way. I had posted this video before.  It's in that rare category of "things-that-REALLY-probably-shouldn't-work-at-all-but-actually-kinda-do."  (On a more serious note, it says something pretty cool about song-writing, and, dare we say it, essential humanity - once you make this jump you can almost hear the Willie Nelson cover just around the corner):

Semi-unconditional offer of marriage

To any woman who:

a) can give a decent foot-rub

b) can appreciate Northern Exposure in all its glory.  Or more explicitly Marlyn and Maggie as they are perfectly.

Basically it all comes down to and is encompassed by that. I'm serious - respond before Monday if interested.  Oh.  And you must love Billy Bragg.  But I'd assume that goes without saying.

Le Scop

PS - And the Cowboy Junkies.  And my sense of humor, such as it is.  And my cat.  And my tendency to be bespelled by books.  And my odd yet fun biking and breaking down tendencies.  And my bad cornet playing.  And the whole public defender thing.  And my experimental cooking.  And a healthy appreciation (if not love for) Wesley Willis (one can only expect so much.)

PPS - I can see this is going to be more difficult than I thought.

PPPS - And you have to have a more accomplished sister for Tamboli (see comment below).  Yeah, this is what law school does to you, or at least what studying for finals does to you.  I think this was made during the penultimate set of finals(?) and, I must confess, I liked the non-musical version of the accelerated-day-long-studying-with-night-falling-in-the-windows.  (Too bad we couldn't slip into this kind of passage of time during some of Quinn's Jurisprudence lectures.)