No Courtroom Drama

I’m no lawyer. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned from Perry Mason, LA Law, Boston Legal and Edgar Snyder commercials, it’s that lawyers love going to court. That’s where they ply their trade. That’s where the excitement is and reputations are made. Where all those years of research and studying and practicing will manifest themselves in brilliant oratory and reasoned argument that sways the hearts, minds and opinions of judge and jury in headline-grabbing triumph.

Except, apparently, most of the “corporate lawyers” I’ve had to deal with in my career.

No, unfortunately these folks will do anything humanly possible to avoid ever seeing the inside of a courtroom. I’m not sure what they think happens there, but it can’t be good. Maybe they think courtrooms are filled with large bears and swiftly rotating knives. Maybe they saw The Execution of Private Slovic and they think that’s what’ll happen to them if they lose a case. I don’t know. All I know is that they never want any part of a trial. Ever.

They may be great people. I wouldn’t know. I haven’t met any of these banes of my existence in person. It’s always through some intermediary bearing tidings of great disappointment in the form of the phrase, “We can’t say that.”

I know why. But I always ask anyway.

“Why?”

“Someone might take us to court.”

Yeah. Yeah, they might. AND THEN YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BEAT THEM. Isn’t that what lawyers went to law school for? To WIN cases? Didn’t they do dozens of practice trials at school? What happens? Do corporations only get the students that lost?

It would be like a guy going through football practice day after day, lifting weights, doing agility drills, studying film and then flat out refusing to play a game.

“Jackson! You’re in!”

“Whoa! I’m not going in there! There could be giant bears and swiftly rotating knives!”

Awhile back, we had a great tagline for a product. I mean, it was perfect. It was beautiful. It was only two words yet it captured the very essence of the brand and the psyche of the target audience. This baby was a rallying cry and unlike anything the category had ever seen. Then it went to the lawyers. Turns out there’s a wee little company, probably 1/1000 the size of our client, whose name uses variations of the two words in our tagline. Only in reverse order. And one is spelled wrong. And the one that’s spelled wrong is a noun. In our tagline, it was a verb. And spelled correctly. Combined, the words in their company name and our tagline meant completely different things. And believe me, whoever was buying from the little company was NOT in the market for what our client was selling. They’d have probably been brought to tears by it.

And of course, the lawyer agreed with all of the above. It made perfect sense.

“But you can’t use it.”

“Why?”

“They might take us to court.”

Uh huh. Uh huh. You’re right. They might just do that. AND THEN YOUR JOB IS TO BEAT THEM.

No. Apparently, their job is to run that white flag up the pole so fast that the rope smolders from the friction of their panicked yanking before any threatening move of any kind is made by any party anywhere.

I can just see that guy flopping, exhausted, in his extraordinarily expensive leather chair after work that night while his wife hands him a scotch and soda.

“I dodged a bullet today, Millie.”

Yeah. You did. It’s called VICTORY.

Mmm, Mmm, Carp.

Last week, the Pittsburgh Tribune Review reported:

"Recreational fishers can safely eat carp from the Monongahela and Ohio rivers once a month, according to the state Department of Environmental Protection."

The good news is that our rivers are getting cleaner by the day. The bad news is that this announcement indicates that someone actually pulled a carp out of the Mon and said, “Hey, can I eat this?”

Um… What?!?

I don’t care if this thing tested negative for every toxin known to man, the answer should have been an emphatic, “NO.” First of all, it’s the Mon. Second of all, that’s a CARP. In case you’ve never seen a carp in the wild, head on down to the Mon and look for a pile of floating cigarette butts. That’s generally where carp congregate.

Over at the entrance to the Gateway Clipper Fleet, there’s a swarm of carp staring up at the bridge to the dock, the mouths on their grotesque faces flapping up and down mooching crumbs, just like giant aquatic pigeons. If you’re having trouble sticking to your New Year’s weight-loss resolution, just picture that sickening lump of living dreck on a plate.

The only way the state should OK eating carp is if the person making the request meets the following criteria:

1. You’re starving
2. You’re literally moments from death
3. You ran out of skunk

Otherwise, we run the risk of being labeled a bunch of carp-eating psychos. How would that play next time the CVB takes a call about a convention looking into our town?

“Pittsburgh is a beautiful place for a convention. Lots of greenery, lots to do, and lots of friendly, carp-eating residents who… hello? Hello?”

But again, I guess the bigger story is that our rivers are now so clean, so free of industrial waste that you can actually eat the most disgusting creatures that call them home. Maybe that should be our new slogan: “Pittsburgh — so clean, you can eat the carp. You know… if you’re desperate.”

The Great Spending Dilemma of 2011

I’m extremely hesitant to spend money on myself, mainly because I’m the only person in a house full of five people that earns any of it. That and I have always been convinced that five seconds after I pay a lot of money for something, so-and-so will buy the exact same thing for 94% less than I paid. 

But this year, I promised to make two purchases of items I dearly want but don’t really need: a second-generation iPad (fun!) and a Thompson Center .50 caliber Hawken muzzleloader (used but funner!). I say used because for some reason, a new Thompson Center .50 caliber Hawken muzzleloader is surprisingly expensive. Upwards of $750. That may not sound like a lot, but did you ever hear the expression “lock, stock and barrel?” Well, that’s all a Hawken rifle is: a primitive lock mechanism that was designed in the 17^th Century, a stock of wood and a thick iron pipe. It’s the most basic of basic firearms. But for some reason, $8 worth of wood and iron becomes, when assembled, $750 worth of retail flintlock. At least when it’s made in New England. So, I opted to look for a good one used.

I saved up throughout 2010 and came into 2011 excited for my two new toys. But, you know what they say: Life is prone to snapping off a slider when you’re sittin’ heat.

They do say that. I heard them.

Anyhow, that slider comes in the form of Sir Elton John.

On Friday, two colleagues at work emailed me the news that Elton John is coming to Pittsburgh on March 23. (As an aside, that’s two days before his birthday. I wonder if he checked the calendar.) And the problem is, tickets to an Elton John concert are really, really expensive. You’d think that a 63-year old dude who has earned eight bucks shy of half a trillion dollars wouldn’t need to charge $125 for a floor seat. But he does. Because there’s always some idiot out there willing to pay it. Me, for instance.

That wouldn’t be bad if it were just me and the missus. But it won’t be. You might think that three girls aged 11, nine and seven would have no interest whatsoever in going with mommy and daddy to see a 63-year-old Elton John in concert. Well, you’d be wrong. Because daddy plays a lot of Elton John music in his car and occasionally on his piano and his girls love it. (At least in the car.) They even request it. (Again, in the car.)

So now, with parking and the requisite souvenir and concessions, I was looking at a third major purchase in a two-major-purchase budget.

Like a lot of Elton John fans, I was torn between the concert, the iPad and the Hawken rifle. One of them would have to go. It was exactly like Sophie’s Choice. Only harder.

Oh well, I thought. I won’t be able to use the muzzleloader until December anyhow, and I haven’t found a reasonably priced used one in good shape yet, so I’ll put off the Hawken. But later, on the exact same day that my colleagues informed me of the upcoming Elton John concert, I got an email from my brother. A shop in Hollidaysburg had exactly the Hawken I was looking for. And it was less than any used Hawken I’d found online. 

So I went to see it.

It was beautiful.

And now, it’s mine.

So now my splurge budget is down to either an evening listening to a 63-year-old entertainer whose voice irrevocably changed in 1986 or the absolute latest in amazing tablet computer technology.

It’s no contest.

You lose, iPad.

That’s OK. There will be a third generation of iPad, but who knows if my wife and kids and I will ever have the chance to see the great Elton John in concert again. He’s not getting any younger. And besides, with that Hawken rifle, I could get an iPad any time I want. 

The Most Important Story of 2010

There's a good chance many Americans aren't familiar with the most important story of 2010. The big-government-friendly media ignored it. The President, clearly, continues to pretend it didn't happen. And science teachers have never heard of it, as evidenced by their continued adherence to alarmist orthodoxy.  

The story is perhaps not only the most important of this passing year, but of this century's first decade. It consists of one resignation letter: that of Harold "Hal" Lewis, Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara. In this letter he exposes "the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud" of his lifetime, and the machinations behind keeping that fraud alive. He also puts the lie to the claim that those who have not fallen for this fraud are know-nothings. Clearly, Hal Lewis knows his science.

Happy New Year.

http://thegwpf.org/ipcc-news/1670-hal-lewis-my-resignation-from-the-american-physical-society.html

Dioramas

Forget computers, books and blackboards. Today’s educational tool of choice, by all appearances, is that three-dimensional quasi-artistic monument to household upheaval called the diorama.

You can't pass a school today without seeing at least a handful of kids carting their creations up to the school doors. In theory, these dioramas gave the kids a greater understanding of and appreciation for a tiny corner of our world. In reality, all they did was give these kids' parents a good idea of what the world would look like if God were a fourth grade surrealist. Rabbits would be the size of Kilimanjaro, grass would be 90 feet high, alligators and polar bears would live in the same trees, the hills would be covered with glitter and Selena Gomez would hover overhead beside the sun. Which is shaped like an eggplant.

Popular though they may be, I have the sneaking suspicion that dioramas are basically useless. Since when do kids have to build dioramas to learn something? Do you think anyone associated with the Apollo Program built dioramas in grade school? How about Einstein? Oppenheimer? Edison? Can you just see young George Patton building a diorama of the Brazilian rainforest? And those fellows did OK for themselves. Yet for some reason, there's always a diorama under construction in our three-schoolgirl home. They're building a habitat for an Aye Aye (a Madagascar lemur that's about as relevant to my kids as SETI is to the skunk in my yard). Building one of the Stations of the Cross. Building a grassland. Building -- as God is my witness -- a Mexican burial altar, complete with a plastic elephant, a picture of Bach, a chocolate-covered pretzel, a Gryffindor badge and a sugar skull.

Yes that's right. A sugar skull. What is a sugar skull? It’s a skull made of sugar. A human skull. With a patch of shiny foil on top. It’s about the size of a plum. And it cost me five damned dollars. I could have bought two five-pound bags of sugar for five damned dollars. Instead, I got one goofy plum-sized freaky-looking sugar skull that could have come from the world's tackiest Satanism superstore. I’m told they’re all the rage in Mexico. That would help to explain something else that's all the rage in Mexico: drug-gang massacres. How about a diorama of that?

Teachers that assign dioramas assume several things:

1. Parents have spare shoeboxes sitting around at all times just waiting to be desecrated
2. We have crap laying around that we wouldn’t mind hot-gluing to a shoebox
3. We have hot glue guns
4. We have children with artistic ability
5. We have spare fabric
6. We budgeted $5 This month for a goofy damned sugar skull

Note to teachers: you're wrong.

“Well,” teachers might say, “kids have fun with them.” Well of course they have fun with them. They’ve basically just been ordered by the primary authority figures in their lives to do something they love more than life itself: make the house look like a Mardi Gras float exploded in it.

In our house, one diorama — just one — completely ransacks three rooms. There’s the den, where the art supplies are kept and which must be thoroughly scattered so as to find the right foam, construction paper, twigs, cotton balls and walnut shells. There’s the dining room, where all that crap has to be meticulously disorganized into 35 individual piles, half of which are on the floor. Then there’s the kitchen, where everything comes together to create a darling display, which as it sits there all finished and shiny and colorful, looks a lot like an FTD Pick-Me-Up Bouquet in the middle of war-torn Baghdad.

It's not like they're learning a valuable life skill that will help them in their career some day. "Jim, the Mayo Clinic folks are coming in on Wednesday. I'd like you to build a diorama of an operating room that shows our new imaging tool in action. I think it'll seal the deal."

The worst part about dioramas is that after the kids take them to school, they eventually bring them back home again. What the hell am I supposed to do with it now? Yeah, I want to put that Mexican burial altar with its freaking $5 voodoo-shop sugar skull on my mantle. Yet you can't throw it away because, "Oh daddy I like it and I worked so hard on it." No, all you can do is leave it low to the ground and hope that someone breaks it eventually. Then you can pretend it's a darned shame as you carry it out to the garbage laughing quietly to yourself while sipping the iced tea you sweetened with that now-fractured sugar skull.

So please, teachers. No more dioramas. But if you must, here’s the deal: they’re coming to your house to make it. And then you get to keep it.

Enjoy.

Phenomenal Federal Food Drive

This photo was taken on October 21, 2010.

It was taken by a friend who works for a massive government agency. I won’t say which one, since I don’t want to get him in trouble for pointing out this particular absurdity. But trust me. It’s loaded with people.

You’ll note that the date of the food drive was June 1-17, 2010. So you may be asking yourself:

• Why is the donation box still there FOUR MONTHS AFTER THE FOOD DRIVE ENDED?

• How effing cheap are federal government employees that the best they could do was a box of whole grain pasta (which sucks) and a tiny cup of applesauce?

• And what’s with all the hands holding up the planet? It’s the “Capital Area Foodbank” not the “United Nations Foodbank.” I got news for you: if you plan on feeding the world with one box of whole grain pasta (which sucks) and a tiny cup of applesauce, you’d better be Jesus, and you’d better have something better up your sleeve than whatever you pulled out to feed 5,000 people with a couple of fish and a few loaves of bread.

This is the federal government. They can’t even pull off a half-assed food drive, yet they’re convinced they can run the nation’s health care system, power the whole country with windmills and coerce auto manufacturers into building electric cars that appeal to people with testicles.

The world’s longest, least-generous food drive should be predictive of how all of that will turn out. 

Typing with the iPad

So im sitting here with the iPad pt ... Aw crap. Trying to use e keyboard to actually type something of length. This fantastic little device, I just ear, is the... No not ear, i just read is the most quickly adopted piece of electronic equipment ever pcreated. The only problem is its really hard to get used to typing on itl i mean, on it, i can't rest my fingers on the keypad, like i should do thwith a regu lar keypad. Bad things happen. And there aren't characters readi
Y avail... How the hell did I get down here now? Oh. The l is right beside the return key. Anyhow, characters like the apostrophe aren
T on the... Aw son of a bitch. See? Where the apostrophe should be is whe the return key is, i think I type too fart too because some of the letters don
T get typed shit! There
S that dammit!

Qwheee was I?

Oh right, I type too fast sometimes and it just guesses what word I was trying to type. That doesn
T Keats you bastard. That doesn't always work out too well. Where the hell did Keats come from? That was supposed to by "always."

Still, it
S a remarkable piece of technology, except for that cork sucking apostrophe pain in the ass thing I can not get used to. Maybe one of the advantages of that will be that we eliminate contractions from the English language and we shall start sounding rather formal again. But I digress.

What I will likely do, should I buy one of these for myself instead of Bogarting he one from the office, is get thoe wireless keyboard. Provided it isn
T this touch screen you miserable piece of peckerwood.I am on another line again.

Clearly, ,anyone who wants to buy an iPad and use it for writing purposes is going to have to relearn h qwerty keypad and alter their typing technique. It might be worth it. The portability and versatility of the iPad is truly remarkable -- which mite account for sales projections of over 12 million this year. But I can
T help but think that aw the hell with this.