Bar Exam Bliss

How to celebrate that the bar exam is over? Walk directly from the convention center to a bar two blocks away with other bar exam-blitzed friends, and over mojitos, margaritas and so on, share the secrets we all had to reveal to the state Board of Bar Examiners as part of our character and fitness background check: "Wow, so you got deported from Scotland, and I almost shot my wife's boyfriend in the face--" "WHAT?! Holy shit!" (Full details followed, the entire saga). We're jealous of the people whose job it is to read the deep dark secrets on our bar applications. Thousands of bar applicants each year, spilling their hidden craziness out on paper--we have to tell the truth, whole and nothing but, because if it's later discovered that we lied on our applications, we could be disbarred. You could base a whole screenplay on some of these secrets, and there are people sitting in an air-conditioned office in the state capital, getting paid not only to read them, but, if necessity (or curiosity?) requires, to send follow-up letters requesting more information. Lucky bastards!

And how to celebrate, last night, that it was half over? Spend an hour in a gym (I hadn't set foot in a gym in ten years), working myself over completely to dispel the stress from muscle and bone; then go see a rock concert, because... well, why the hell not. So what if I had to get up at 7:30 the next day and go spend another eight-hour day taking the bar exam--life is short.

Bad Reputation

Song In My Head Right Now: Joan Jett, "Bad Reputation."
Why: I'm reviewing evidence law, in particular character evidence: the defendant's reputation, past arrests, etc.
Song In My Head This Morning: Prince, "Delirious."
Why: I was in a lecture review of family law.

Wait. That latter one sounds like it doesn't make sense. But it does; it makes sense because the man giving the lecture had a particular combination of formal language and bawdiness that would put any rational person in mind of Prince (illustrative lyrics: "Dig, if you will, the picture/of you and I engaged in a kiss..."). This despite the fact that physically today's lecturer was more evocative of Drew Carey twenty years from now. And the song represents the often febrile emotions of our hypothetical couple, Harry and Wanda, whom he trotted out for every possible example. Here is how he explained one aspect of family law:

"Another ground for annulment is if one spouse lied or misled the other about his or her sexual proclivities. For example, say Harry and Wanda are fiances, and though they're remaining virgins until marriage--maybe they feel like they have to, maybe they think there's something kinda sexy about waiting, whatever--they have no reticence in discussing the issue. So Wanda says, 'Tell me, Harry, how do you view the role of sex in marriage?' And Harry says, 'Well, I think it's very important. It's a beautiful metaphor for the intimacy and pleasure of marriage itself. So I would want robust, missionary-position sex as often as possible.' They get married, go on their honeymoon to Hawaii, and in their hotel room Wanda excuses herself to slip into the proverbial 'something a little more comfortable.' When she returns 15 minutes later in her Victoria's Secret negligee, she sees Harry sitting on the bed wearing a pair of Pampers and holding a bottle of Wesson oil. Now... Wanda can leave right there and nullify the marriage, because THAT is grounds for annulment. Or... NOT! Since this is one of the grounds that is waivable by the parties, Wanda, upon seeing Harry with his Pampers and his Wesson oil, could choose to waive it, and just... take things from there!"

Tribute to America for this 4th of July

A few words on war from a great American:
"There has never been a just one, never an honorable one - on the part of the instigator of the war. I can see a million years ahead, and this rule will never change in so many as half a dozen instances. The loud little handful - as usual - will shout for the war. The pulpit will - warily and cautiously - object - at first; the great, big, dull bulk of the nation will rub its sleepy eyes and try to make out why there should be a war, and will say, earnestly and indignantly, "It is unjust and dishonorable, and here is no necessity for it."

Then the handful will shout louder.

A few fair men on the other side will argue and reason against the war with speech and pen, and at first will have a hearing and be applauded; but it will not last long; those others will outshout them, and presently the anti-war audiences will thin out and lose popularity. Before long you willsee this curious thing: the speakers stoned from the platform, and free speech strangled by hordes of furious men who in their secret hearts are still at one with those stoned speakers - as earlier - but do not dare to say so.

And now the whole nation - pulpit and all - will take up the war-cry, and shout itself hoarse, and mob any honest man who ventures to open his mouth; and presently such mouths will cease to open. Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception."
- Mark Twain, Chapter 9, The Mysterious Stranger