Hateful words of the day: nunc pro tunc. That's right, it's Latin! Latin for "I'm not a very good attorney and I don't want my clients to find out so I'm going to use a bunch of useless Latin phrases to make my clients feel dumb!" Only other attorneys aren't fooled by this stupid tactic and, since the attorneys on the opposing side aren't allowed to talk to the other party except through his/her attorney, laypeople never have a chance to find out about this stupid tactic. (Situation not helped by the fact that criticism from the opposing attorney should be dismissed as a matter of course as self-serving claptrap.)
This calls for something soothing; something less painful but much more satisfying: art.
"In her response, Petitioner asserts that her 18-year-old son is still living at home. Considering she withdrew him from High School in February 2008, ejected him from her home at that time, and he is now incarcerated in County Jail on felony charges, Petitioner's assertion can only be described as a 'lie.' "
Why settle for such a simple little word when a gloriously obfuscating phraseology like "knowing misrepresentation" is available?
;)
Nothing new to report. Currently reading Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (fiction). Just finished Yoga for People Who Can't be Bothered to Do It, by Geoff Dyer (essays).
I learned a piece of trivia today - have you ever looked at the signature line on your personal checks? It appears to be a line of super tiny prose. I wonder what it says. Anyone know? Maybe it's a poem.
A valentine, and then some clever book titles for yet-to-be-written books, for no particular reason. Just something my brain did to kill the time in a CLE class on family law.
Thinking Inside the Box
Three Years in Hades
The Honest But Unfortunate Debtor
Merciless
Time Rich and Money Poor
Inconformability
It's been a long time since I drew any comics. This one's new, and it didn't come easy. It happened like this: my friend Hatchet tells very funny stories about her twins. I told her she could do stand-up. Then she told me I could draw comics. I said "nuh-uh." She said "uh-huh." So I said "I'll draw a comic if you get yourself on video imitating Logan's 'the floor is made of hot lava you must pick me up right now' routine." Not to post it on YouTube or anything, just to see how it feels to be funny on camera.
It was really hard coming up with anything to say in a comic. My brain has turned to putty. Remember the "Angriest Dog In The World" comic? If you do, I'm impressed. It was basically several frames of the same angry dog graphic, with a very simple gag. I think it didn't go anywhere because frankly . . . it didn't have much to say. That's about how I feel right now.
Therefore I shall close with a quote. This is the last sentence of the Author's Note at the front of Life of Pi, by Yann Martel: "If we, citizens, do not support our artists, then we sacrifice our imagination on the altar of crude reality and we end up believing in nothing and having worthless dreams."
What do you think that means?
Guilty secret - I snapped a furtive picture of a poster at a Junior High School. I couldn't resist:
I know it's a terrible picture. I know I'm not supposed to focus on the negative. I know I'm supposed to keep a positive attitude. But seriously: "I will keep your hands and feet to yourself?" "I will celebrate each other's acheivements?" Yikes.
This is what No Child Left Behind has done for us. It should have been called "No Child Left Behind Except Those Children Who Live Where Property Values Are Too Low to Provide Tax Income Sufficient to Hire Actual Professionals As Teachers."
"The world is not out to get you, except in the sense that the world is out to get everyone."
- Manifesto of the Unitarian Jihad
This is so cool: It's a New York Times article on NYC Resistor, referred to variously as "Kingdom of the Geeks," a "Frathouse for Geeks," a "hacker collective," and a "creative community for nerds."
Plus, that's a picture of Devon! Hotness.
Viola! Here are the remaining papers I made this year, using the method I described in my December 6th post.
Aren't they lovely? Also fun to make. :)
What do you think? I thought colorful posts would do better with a nice blank background. (See Inside the White Cube, by Brian O'Doherty.)
It took longer than I'd planned, but a jam session of about 5 hours resulted in a plethora of pleasing papers! Finally getting around to posting them. Here are two, I'll post more later. After coffee. Maybe.
Happy 2009, people.
"It was unwise to read old books; the fury they ignited wasn't old; it was new. If she couldn't get the pompous fart himself, she wanted to search out the descendants of H. Hardless and stab the life out of them. But the child shouldn't be blamed for a father's crime, she tried to reason with herself, then. But should the child therefore also enjoy the father's illicit gain?"
- The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai, chapter 31.
This video is awesome. You must see it! Especially you, Hatchet: Cooking In a Pith: 951 Curry
Ten Years Ago I:
Took my first serious job and began paying back my student debt.
Five Things on Tomorrow's 'To Do' List:
(1) Sleep late; (2) process class evaluations for DateSmart class; (3) pay car insurance bill; (4) research whether a tort action will lie against opposing counsel for fraudulent in-court statements leading to an unfair judgment;(5) go to a caroling party.
Five Snacks I Enjoy:
(1) Popcorn; (2) pate de foie gras (sorry); (3) olives; (4) red wine; (5) curry.
Five Things I Would Do If I Were a Millionaire:
(1) Pay off student debt; (2) buy antique building and convert to art studios; (3)-(5) buy coffee for 3 friends with remaining $5.83.
Five Places I Have Lived:
(1) Washington, D.C.;(2) Badlands National Monument, South Dakota; (3) Estes Park, Colorado; (4) Boulder, Colorado (home); (5) Denver, Colorado
Five Jobs I've Had:
(1) Girl Friday for a Private Detective; (2) Office Temp; (3) Night Security Guard; (4) Administrator; (5) Lawyer
Inspired by Killing a Fly with a Ukelele blog.
"I walk slowly, like one who comes from so far away he doesn’t expect to arrive." -Jorge Luis Borge
Take these sunflowers, for example. The hardest part was last summer, when I sketched out the basic forms in blue and goldenrod. Then they languished in my "studio" (ha!) for several months, until they were needed. I finished them in a 20-minute rush session. Hooray!
Presents in wrapping paper sometimes fill me with a sense of dread. Without going much into the ugly, tangled mess that is "the holidays" in my mind, I'll just say: (1) wrapping paper destroys forests and/or (2) wrapping paper guilt requires careful removal and space-consuming storage.
Imagine my excitement when my friend over at Law and Motherhood told me about making her own wrapping paper from paper grocery bags! It's brilliant! Fun to make! Higher quality paper! Covered with original artwork made by someone who loves you! Perfect memorabilia for the sweet and sentimental.
Here's my first foray into grocery-bag birthday wrapping paper, for a certain wizardly barrista I know:
For my next trick I'll use the ol' "stamp made of a sponge" trick to make holiday paper.*
* - Get a flat sponge, a sharpie, a pair of scissors, relatively loose paint, a plate, and a bunch of paper bags. Draw a simple shape on the sponge with a sharpie. Get the sponge a little moist and then cut out the shape. Make a shallow reservoir of paint on the plate. Dip the sponge in the paint just enough to transfer to the paper. Set the sponge, paint side down, on the paper. At this point you can either wait for the paper to absorb the paint or you can apply a little pressure to get the image to transfer. It depends on the denseness of your sponge and the viscosity of your paint. In the alternative: the ol' potato-stamp trick, using a potato and ink instead of sponge and paint. Potatoes tend to result in crisper images if you cut the stamp side flat enough. But be prepared for serious ink stains on your hands.
I've been teaching "Date Smart" for the last couple of weeks, to 8th grade students. Date Smart is intended to teach the students how to recognize abusive relationships, and what to do about it. Really rewarding and fun, but this particular school segregates the kids. I miss having the co-ed mix in the classroom (especially for the "skits") but I notice the students are more open with their input and questions without the opposite sex nearby.
Except this week. Why? Because this week I have the "Mean Girls" in my class. That's right, capital M capital G. It's incredibly challenging! Nobody talks. All eyes look to the Mean Girl section to see how they should respond to . . . pretty much anything. To help me cope I watched Mean Girls (the movie) last night. It's a classic. I wish I could share it with the class but I don't want to give them new ideas for cruelty and manipulation. I might share this small tidbit from the movie: "girls, if you insist on calling each other sluts and whores, you're giving the boys permission to call you that, too." Maybe girls don't care about that anymore but I think they're faking a callousness they don't feel. The ultimate commitment in junior high school, after all, is 'appearing cool.' Maybe it's cool to be called a whore. (Mind boggles. Eyes spin around. Blood pressure rises.)
Today we define the word "coerce." It'll be fun. I promised them it would be!
"Carrying a majority of the popular vote, Obama did especially well among women and young voters, who polls showed were particularly sensitive to the current climate of everything being fucked. [ . . .] Citizens with eyes, ears, and the ability to wake up and realize what truly matters in the end are also believed to have played a crucial role in Tuesday's election."
-The Onion, November 5, 2008
I was a poll-watcher in this election. I watched a huge number of first-time voters, young and old, elect Barack Obama. I spoke Spanish with a little old lady who told me "es mi primera vez" - it was her first time. I so wanted to believe we could elect a Democrat, finally. After 2000 and 2004 I had grown cynical. I reserved judgment. I closed down my assigned polling place and went home to spend about two hours obsessively clicking "reload" on the New York Times election results page. When the press started calling it for Obama I said "ha - they called it in 2000 and they were wrong." When McCain made his concession speech my husband kissed me on the head and went to bed. I'm so proud tonight. Proud, relieved, and exhausted. It's like a big black eye in the face of American cynicism.
Here's a fusion recording of Martin Luther King's "I have a Dream" speech, accompanied by the band Moodfood. (If this link doesn't work, you can find it on You Tube.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjXqft31-O8
