ingenious, a swiss freaking watch

With only eight days standing between me and my last round of finals, ever, I’ve devised a plan of attack for insuring the best possible grades with the least amount of effort. The plan? I will go to Sugar Brown’s.

You: That's great, but you haven't explained how that's going to work.

Me: Give me a bottomless cup, chop chop.

milk drinkers are turning to powder

Years ago, when I wanted a career in a field held in high regard for its professional standards, I naïvely thought I might try out journalism. As part of that immature and ill-informed phase I participated in University Interscholastic League competitions in headline writing. Nerdery, yes, but those competitions began my lifelong love affair with well-written headlines, and a pet-peeve bordering on obsession with sorry ones.

Contemplate for a moment the following journalistic slice, seen late last evening:

NYC's celebrity hawks shunned by stork

My caffeiene-addled brain seized up at the sight of that. Have paparazzi couples suddenly become barren? Have professional skateboarders been disinvited to feathered weddings? I had to know what was going on, so I clicked the link.

As it turns out, last winter the Audubon Society took up the cause of two urban-dwelling red hawks. Two red hawks that haven't reproduced as yet. So the headline makes sense, but only in a roundabout, moronic sort of way.

It got my attention.

today's zack morris stop the world moment

Are we sure that The Beatles really broke up in April, 1970?

I woke up this morning in my usual fashion. When I say fashion, what I really mean is routine. A routine that only gets broken if the house is on fire or a meteor is headed toward my face.

For the third phase of the morning routine today, I checked my email to the sweet melodies of www.beatlesarama.com. Just like every day. But this morning, something happened that made me question the Beatles Fan-Quotient of my personality. When you take the whole of all the information in my brain and divide by the amount of Beatles knowledge, you get a number somewhere on the order of 1.

So when a song came on that I'd never heard before, I could actually hear the dismay bubbing up somewhere in the temporal lobe. Please refrain from analyzing the science and/or logical reasoning behind that statement.

I have dedicated my day to applying my reserve of Beatles knowledge and experience to narrow down where the song came from in order to deduce its name. Clues do exist: Paul McCartney led the vocals. Whatever band played it did so in a solely acoustic fashion. And the lyrics definitely had a post-1966 feel.

I really don't think it was a Wings song, but I could be wrong.

Okay, roll camera.

and one more ivory back scratcher

Her Honor called yesterday as The Hoov and I were in the middle of one of our increasingly common trips to Rosa’s. The call confirmed that I do indeed love my mother, as evidenced by my willingness to hit the green button, thereby interrupting my Taco Tuesday fieldtrip.

Apparently she and MJW have concluded, somehow, that the July 2005 Edition of the Texas Bar Exam has a bearing of sorts on my future as a litigator. This conclusion manifested itself in their agreement to furnish monetary support to me for the next few months, the idea being that my bar studies will take a front seat to my consternation over how to pay for the trips to Rosa’s.

The generous offer comes despite my advanced age and the fact that in two weeks I’ll be the holder of something akin to a genuine, bona-fide doctorate. I suppose that Her Honor recalled her own scholastic travels, spanning at least two states and the better part of two decades, when making her ruling. Or maybe the Parentals simply took under empathetic advisement the truism that each of them also sat for the Texas Bar Exam.

What Her Honor wanted today on the phone, though, made me shiver just a little. She wanted to know what my expenditures look like each month, so she can plan for what I’ll need. Right. Here’s a rudimentary list of the things I can’t live without this summer.

1) Rosa’s + Chimy’s

My body has grown so accustomed to the Rosa’s taco and the Chimy’s nacho for lunch that I suffer something like the alcoholic shivers if I don’t get one of the two for lunch every day.

2) Sugar Brown’s Coffee

Speaking of addiction, the bottomless cup of coffee at Sugar Brown’s, my carrel away from, uh, carrel, costs $2.17. Plus, Justin and Marla might be two more free ice waters away from charging me rent.

3) ChapStick

My lips hurt real bad.

4) Dog Food

A dog like Ike you gotta feed every day.

Seriously though, thanks Mom and Dad.

i guess we all wasted our time finding nemo

SYDNEY (AFP) - A tiny reef fish which survives for up to 59 days has the shortest lifespan of any vertebrate animal, according to researchers in Australia.

Do you think that fish flush each other down the toilet when they die?

can i write you a check?

The saying goes that you can’t take it with you. I won’t dispute that. Yet despite my current longing to be rid of this place, Lubbock has some things I’ll be missing soon. In no particular order, a few of the things I’ve learned to love about the South Plains in the last three years:

1) The 9:30 Service/Challenge

I will always associate Lubbock with the life-changing experiences I’ve had at 9:30 and the friends I made in Challenge.

2) Law Review Shenanigans

“The Third Floor is a working environment.” Yeah, right. I hope Beatty gets my carrel next year.

2) Chimy’s

I’ll take Chimy’s fish tacos over a meal at the Mansion on Turtle Creek any day. And I still have a crush on Molly the waitress.

3) Bob at Varsity Bookstore

Despite the fact that I’ve probably put at least one of his kids through college with the amount of books and study aids purchased over the last six semesters, he always knew what I needed for any given class, and wouldn’t sell me anything I didn’t.

4) The Rawls Course

To whomever had the guts to spend millions putting a professional quality, links-style golf course in the middle of the West Texas wasteland: Thanks.

There’s probably others, but I’ve got to get back to studying. Something I won’t miss.

am i supposed to smell like him too?

Ike has a pretty sweet gig going these days. Although purportedly from hunting stock, he has found new employment outside the Vizsla Family business. His new job, according to Yahoo!, is relationship doctor.

Not that I'm looking for relationship advice. He hasn't placed an ad in the paper or anything like that. I only found out about his new line of work because I stubbornly continue to set my browser hompage to Yahoo!, where the following article caught my eye: Dating Advice from Man's Best Friend.

Over the course of Ike's 4 1/2 years under my stewarship, I've found him to be eminently trainable, bright, and happy. Such are the hallmarks of the vizsla breed. He's also an extremely friendly, fun, sweet, expressive and spontaneous dog. Good-looking, too. So I figure that were he actually a human dude, the ladies would be all over him. Assuming he could lose the dog smell.

Still, I don't think he's cut out for his new line of work. Here's just a few pearls of wisdom:

The Irish Setter-man is very sociable and good-natured; perhaps that's why he can be often found at the pub with his buddies. On your first date, suggest an Irish pub that serves authentic dishes such as shepherd’s pie, fish and chips and beef stew. If you get serious with Mr. Irish Setter man, you can expect him to be loyal, affectionate and a family man.

What about Mr. Irish Setter man's propensity to chew on your shoes, hmm?

Mr. Rottweiler can't help but become overly protective when he senses his loved ones are in danger.

That's great. Like to be protected, and also to have slobber on your new Ethan Allen sofa constantly? Then you don't need Mr. Right. You need Mr. Rottweiler.

A Mutt man changes his moods at the drop of a hat, as he possesses the numerous personality traits of his various ancestors!

He's also really smart, but ugly.

Mr. Golden Retriever is not above going through your closets and personal belongings when you're not aware.

Not only that, he'll be prone to hip displaysia. Have your man checked out by a veterinarian before walking down the aisle.

a donation to the human fund has been made in your name

Undoubtedly I deserved that citation for fishing without a license. No, really. I explored every possible legal theory to try and unhook myself from this one. Legal problems aside, though, I got to thinking. Can you think of a bigger waste of $101? Here's a few off the top of my head:

1. Use the cash to light a dried-up Macanudo;
2. Give it to an eight-year old standing outside Gattiland;
3. Exchange it for Roubles;
4. Donate it to Bill Gates;
5. Alternatively, Benny Hinn;
6. Ben Affleck 2012 Campaign;
7. Higher education

That's all I can think of for now. How would you waste it?

is this what you wanted sammy hagar?

I just might freak out, because Nerf Herder has reacquired one of the greatest bassists ever. Or at least one of the funniest. Turn up the volume on thier blog.

I can now go back to buying their lousy records.

i'm right and everybody else is wrong

For those of you who doubt that law school effectively destroys any neurons that remain after the procurement of an undergraduate diploma, what follows should persuade you otherwise. Today on the Third Floor, law students raised their voices at each other over the least decibel-worthy issue ever contrived by attorneydom: Whether "historical" should be preceded by the article "a" or the article "an."

After much argument, style manual consultation, and Googling, two heavyweights emerged. In the literary corner, on the side of the English language and sanity, was none other than Mark Twain. In the legal corner, on the side of truth, justice, and verbosity, was the great Judge Benjamin Cardozo.

Twain proffered an argument typical of his own genius, essentially saying, "Get over yourselves and use a historical you self-important nitwits." Cardozo weighed in with his own slice of wisdom, tendering his opinion that "If you don't use an historical you're part of the liberal theology of grammar and you'll end up living in a van down by the river."

The actual rule puts things a little more diplomatically: "Use a before words beginning with consonant sounds, including those spelled with an initial pronounced h. Use an before words that begin with vowel sounds, including those spelled with an initial silent h." My own style manual purports to settle the debate by using a historian as an example.

I'm afraid my style manual gets ahead of itself though with that example, because it doesn't account for regional differences. The debate today took place in West Texas. Lawyers did the debating. If a West Texas lawyer got up in front of a West Texas jury and actually enunciated the h in historical, he'd be laughed out of the courtroom. NASCAR fans hate Jeff Gordon for that very reason.

Not only that, but West Texans as a group hate anything liberal. If they found out they might be part of some liberal theology, even of the grammatical variety, they might run out and join up with the John Birch society just to feel secure in their Tony Lamas. And we don't need that.

Out of respect and an inability to admit when I'm wrong, I'll take Cardozo's side in this debate. Still doubt that law school kills brain cells?

it's not a 1961 250GT California, but...

Disregarding for the moment the fact that as graduation approaches I've lost the motiviation to do anything except play hookey and lip-sync Beatles, nee Isley Brothers hits atop parade floats, the first real sign of summertime has arrived at Thirty Four Fourteen. Revel Blue now rolls sans hardtop and doors for the first time in months.

In case you didn't know, Revel Blue is the most perfect thing to ever come out of Toledo, Ohio: My shiny "Patriot Blue" Jeep Wrangler. Is it possible to covet something I already have?

Either way, rolling topless is sweet. This Jeep is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up.

Life moves by pretty quickly. If you don't stop and look around every once in a while, you could miss it.

could I get some bacon with that lipitor?

Why did Bahama Buck's put whipped cream on my banana protein smoothie today? Sure it's delicious, but after a hot day working out in the sun, i.e., playing golf, I really don't need the empty calories. But what the hey, a lot of things I like don't really make much sense:

1) McDonald's Bacon Ranch Salad
2) Fried chicken with a side of green beans and corn
3) Beanies (or any hat without a brim)
4) Big four wheel drive Jeeps that get used for commuting
5) F-250s that get used for hauling the big bag of dog food
6) Gun dogs that sleep on my bed
7) Swiss Army knives

All either oxymoronic, worthless, or both.

attorneys general & passers by

"The Onion" desktop calendar headline of the day:

William Safire Orders Two Whoppers Junior

Genius.

welcome to d-qwon's dance grooves

Are you ready to get your groove on?

Yes.

a firestorm of controversy

My 2001 model Sony Vaio PCG-R505EL, A.K.A. Amarillo SuperSlim, appears to be coming close to meeting the Great Megabyte in the Sky. Hence the question of the day: Should I replace Slim with another PC, or do I go the Apple route?

A bit of history may be in order at this point.

The first computer I ever did the QWERTY dance with was an Apple IIe. Back in my days on the 90-acre nerd factory known as the Selwyn School, the IIe was the obligatory computer at all institutions educational, and Selwyn was no exception. My computer teacher, a bowtied gem of a science educator with an affection for all things well-crafted, regaled us with tales of Steve Wozniak’s genius on a weekly basis.

Moving that turtle around never got old.

So when Her Honor agreed to bring the Whitten household out of the stone age by purchasing a computer for her sons, we didn’t even consider a PC. We used Macs at school, so we'd use a Mac at home. And thus the Performa 600CD came to occupy a spot at Twenty One Forty-Five, circa Christmas 1992.

When I travailed to college and accordingly got stupid in a real hurry, I went the PC route. To this day there's an "Intel Inside" sticker on my computer. And to this day, I miss my Apple. My covetous desire for one the fine machines only magnifies when I consider the storge love I have for my iPod and my daily interactions with The Hoov and his iBook/PowerMac one-two punch.

Alas, while an Apple a day might keep the computer doctor away, it certainly won’t do much for keeping any extra change in my pocket. The suckers are expensive.

Which of course leads back to the query posed earlier. I could go in circles on this one, but who has the time for that when I need to reboot Slim every five minutes?

the small game theory of economics

You don't have to have kids to learn that they cost money.

In lieu of final exam preparation or other classroom study, today's weather mandated a trip to Buffalo Springs Lake. "Lake," in this case, is a term that is used with the same cavalier attitude toward the truth as Michael Corleone's use of the term "family." Yet despite its claim to water that appears to have been stagnent since the Carter Administration, the lake appears to contain some fish.

My plan in trekking out to this muck-ridden sinkhole was not to fish. Rather, some law school friends of mine have been planning an entire weekend of barbecue, dominoes, and general revelry out at the lake for what seems like the last two years, and the weekend has finally arrived. Not long after I arrived this afternoon, though, one of said law student's 10-year old offspring wanted to do some fishing.

So what did I do? I took the kid fishing. I showed him how to string up his open-line reel, how to set up a Carolina rig, how to tie a proper fisherman's knot, and how to cast one out there. And I did this well.

So of course something had to go wrong amid this little slice of Good Old American Fun. Not twenty minutes after we put out the first cast, a representative of Texas Parks & Wildlife pulled up.

Up to this point, my barbecue and softball-filled Saturday had cost me exactly the $3.00 lake admission fee and, more importantly, the opportunity cost of lost study time. Stated another way, this trip cost very little. At least until Warden showed up.

And what's the thanks I get for teaching a little kid to fish in 2005 America? I don't know yet, but you can bet the ticket for fishing without a license will cost more than $3.00.

I didn't stay at the lake. The opportunity cost of fishing versus studying rose to more than I can afford, so it's back to the books.

never fear change

Love y'all...Challenge 2005

its easy to grin

When your ship comes in,
And you've got the stock market beat.
But the man worthwhile,
Is the man who can smile,
When his shorts are too tight in the seat.

If I'm going to be a federal judge someday, I'll need one of these. For graduation.

every once in a while

Sometimes its hard to see the forest for the trees, but yesterday evening's task of preparing for a deposition later this morning led to one of those wonderful but rare experiences in which I remembered why I chose to be a lawyer: I like to argue people into corners.

Now, the question of whether I have a slight mean streak in me probably isn't a topic worthy of debate. I do. And I strive to keep it from manifesting itself in personal relationships. You know, the greatest of the commandments, and all.

The legal business, on the other hand, sometimes calls for a little meanness.

Not that a lawyer should try to be pugilisitic for the sake of pugilism. The very best lawyers I know, MJW and Matlock included, use the "kill em with tact and kindness" method far more often. I do the same.

We'll see which method I use later today.

worry

In today's news, the Texas Rangers look like a pretty sorry baseball team, and I don't like what I'm seeing so far.

Updates to follow on the 10, 30 and 50.

off to a running start

Due to equal parts nagging back injury and nagging attitude of laziness, I haven't been able to run regularly for many months now. Yet the runner mentality remains ingrained, except for the fact that I have begun committing the cardinal sin in the sport of running: I wear my running shoes as my daily footwear now. Shocker, I know, but otherwise the ol' custom-orthotic fitted nb587 duo will gather dust.

And of course people now think I'm a poser. I always was, really, but at least I wasn't flaunting it before.

That said, today marks the first twenty-four hour period in which nobody can call me a poser ever again, at least not in the most important race I'm running. A mere 13 years after getting saved, and a mere 29 days after getting baptised at Huntington Beach, I officially became a member of First Baptist Church yesterday.

So I'm lacing up and heading out the door. It's the one race I can't lose...

the greatest golfer of all time?

Tiger's in the lead through 12 on Sunday. Chris DiMarco's one shot back. History in the making right now.

Arnie's watching. You should be too.

problem solved...

Looks like the Plainview Lodging Fiasco of 2005 isn't going to happen after all. When informed of the aforementioned predicament regarding the lack of overnight lodging for graduation weekend, Her Honor took things extremely well. Her first reaction upon hearing that she may be lodged up to one hour away from her actual destination? Joy.

You read that right. Her Honor was actually happy that that she could stay that far away, the better to visit her Aunt, she explained. I thought she may react that way. But she also, without having been reminded, recalled the Astro Motel Fiasco of ’89.

Alluded to before, I now feel the need, nay, the calling, to set forth a semi-detailed account of the Astro Motel Fiasco. The better to give Her Honor something to reminisce about with her aunt.

It all started when Older Bro invited the Attorneys down to Waco for Parents’ Weekend at Baylor University, that bastion of southern conservatism, pretty girls, and lackluster football. Older Bro, at this stage of his 18 year-old student athlete life, displayed at times a lack of judgment normally reserved for chimps that have broken into a case of Swizzle Sticks. And I of course looked up to him.

And what did he do that I looked up to on this particular October weekend? He booked us into accommodations of highly questionable quality – the kind of place normally reserved for, ahem, men who don’t like their wives as much as women that cost money, or for folks who like to barter in goods that aren’t sold at the pharmacy the squares shop at.

Normally, foisting this hourly-rate haven off on the Attorneys would have been sort of funny, at least after we left our new digs for the Ramada five minutes after pulling into the parking lot. Which we did. But something happened that Older Bro hadn’t really planned on.

Her Honor had been in Austin or San Antonio or somesuchplace on business earlier in the week, and drove up to Waco to meet us while we drove down from Denton. Unfortunately, she arrived several hours earlier than did MJW, Little Bro, and I. And it just so happens that the Astro, showing blatant contempt for the law, did not see fit to install locking devices of any type on the doors of its rooms. Apparently, the fashionable drug deals went on outside the doors of hotel rooms in ’89. Oh, and have I mentioned that Her Honor is exactly five feet tall?

MJW, needless to say, was not pleased with the situation as he found it. He may actually be bitter about it.

I told you that story to tell you this story: The Attorneys will be staying in Lubbock for my graduation next month. Lubbock Proper. Not in Plainview. Two rooms were procured at the Comfort Inn on I-27, thanks to the foresight of a law school buddy who has booked his parents into even posher digs. The Comfort Inn! Just think about it: Locking doors, ice machines, free local calls, clean sheets, and absolutely zero prostitutes hanging out in the parking lot.

Keeping the Attorneys away from drug deals is the least I can do after 26 years, right?

where'd you go?

We get questions. I. The Royal We, you know, the Editorial. Lately, the one most often asked is a variation on the following:

"I haven't seen you up here [on the Third Floor] lately. Where you been, man?"

For the unacquainted, the Third Floor is law school shorthand for the offices of the Texas Tech Law Review. It's where I've been doing most of my work, writing and editing for the better part of the last two years. Just a few minutes of observation by any outsider confirms what one probably already suspects: The Third Floor is the nexus of nerdery, ground zero for jokes about colons of the grammatical variety.

It's not that I don't love nerd culture. I'm the very person who just two days ago seriously considered flushing $19.99 away for a 4'X6' poster of NCC-1701-A, complete with cutaway artwork of its inner workings. Perhaps a different sort of nerdery than can be witnessed on the Third Floor, but nerdery nonetheless.

The Editorial doesn't know how to respond to the question, really. Certain things have come to light, perhaps. Closer to graduation. Mission Trip. New Lady Friend. All of them excuses. I love my friends and my work, I just haven't had a reason to sit up there and bother everyone lately.

So for the duration of the school year, I have but one, simple request. Nobody ask me where I've been. Unless you're talking about 9:30.

maybe plainview has an upside

I'm in trouble. On May 14, a mere 38 days from today, I'll graduate from law school. It's been roughly 2900 days since I graduated high school. I've had a lot of schooling in those 2900 days, but apparently I was sick on "evils of procrastination" day, because I've managed to create a very real, if not sitcom-worthy, predicament from which hilarity may very well ensue.

You see, like any Parentals that have thrown piles of money into an education for their squid, in hopes that one day said squid will take his elderly Parentals out for a monthly afternoon of fun at Chucky Cheese, MJW and Her Honor want to attend the graduation festivities. This graduation is all the more special because both Parentals also happen to be attorneys. Even more noteworthy is that MJW's presence is now officially required as he will be listed on the program as my "Hooding Attorney." I'm not sure what that means, exactly, but he really wants to give a speech now.

The reason I’m in trouble? I can’t find a hotel room available within 50 miles that weekend. Now, West Texas isn’t exactly a resort destination, but I get the feeling as my fingers do the walking that the Hilton, Marriot, and Super8 families have severely underestimated demand around here. Either that, or perhaps there is a possibility, be it ever so slight, that I may have procrastinated a little on this one by waiting until today to try and book a hotel room for graduation weekend a month from now. Mind you, I’ve done this in a town where 80 percent of the population owes its very existence to a university of roughly 33,000 students. So, yeah, I messed up.

At least this doesn’t measure up to the Astro Motel Fiasco of ’89, in which Older Bro booked the Attorneys into a crack-infested dump with an hourly rate in the seediest part of McLennan County he could find. Hilarity did not ensue.

Options are limited. I did find a Best Western available in Plainview. That’s only 45 minutes away, and MJW just might enjoy the drive.

Outside of that, I do have a fold-out couch in the living room. And Roommate has suggested that Landlords might have a couple extra beds at their place. The plane has crashed into the mountain.

Who’s up for a backyard camping trip?

wouldn't hold out much hope for the creedence

Well, after 26.3 safe and serene years calling Twenty One Forty-Five home, it finally had to happen. MJW’s pickup got broken into last Friday evening.

Not that this was the first instance of crime at the Parental Casa worthy of memory. Circa 1985, unidentified but certainly evil individuals absconded with a certain Kuwahara BMX bike. We’re commanded to forgive, but I wouldn’t blame Older Bro if he still has issues with the fiends that robbed him and his bike of a starring role in “Rad.”

The fact that I happened to be visiting home the weekend of the mysterious F-150 caper made the circumstance all the more unusual, at least in the mind of MJW. Not long after he goateed his way out the door Saturday morning, he called me at the house, presumably while parked in the driveway in his Cowboy Cadillac.

MJW: “Didya git some stuff outta mah pickup last night?”

mjw: “Huh?”

MJW: “Well, mah checkbook’s missin’, and mah CDs, and so’s yer mother’s GPS dealy!”

mjw: “I don’t know, Dad. Maybe Mom has that stuff. It’s hers anyway.”

What MJW had failed to discover in his pre-7-Eleven coffee trip haze was the manner in which the F-150 had failed to escape the dark hours unmolested. No window was broken. No metal was bent. A Messianic prophecy of sorts. Apparently, The Cat had some pretty specialized tools, gaining entry through, of all things, the lock itself.

The main clue to illicit entry? The interior map light had been carefully, even lovingly, deprived of its bulbs, so as not to draw attention to the vehicle during the strangely well-planned episode. The Cat had even placed the bulbs in the cupholder. Oh, and a small piece of the exterior lock had gone AWOL. If it turns out that the Ghost of Alfred Hitchcock has cast the Ghost of Cary Grant in some new reality series, I wouldn’t be surprised.

Meanwhile, as MJW summoned Denton’s Finest, I left the Casa to see The Pilot for the day. So I can only imagine the conversation between MJW and Detective Friday.

Friday: “What’s missing here?”

MJW: “Well, mah checkbook, and mah wife’s Magellan GPS, and some of mah CDs.”

Friday: “Some?”

MJW: “Yeah, they left the Garrison Keillor CDs. Took mah Eagles though.”

Friday: "You're lucky they left the Creedence."

Her Honor called me later that afternoon to apprise me of the situation. Indeed her life had taken a turn for the marginally inconvenient, the Turbocharged and Intercooled Shoebox now being sans GPS unit on a more permanent basis than she had anticipated when she “loaned” the Magellan to MJW. If map-folding prowess is an inherited trait, then Her Honor is going to need an automatic.