Akhmed Al-Fayyed's Indulgent Rantings

Moved to a new blog

2007-06-02T14:53:41Z

worldtastesbetter.blogspot.com, co-written with my fiancée.

Genital Update

2007-02-23T22:18:04Z

I have nothing really to say about the use of the word "scrotum" in a Newberry Award-winning book. I'm still pissed that nobody told me that some Judy Blume books had sex in them so I didn't have to sneak off and read romance novels or James Bond.

For more serious news on scrotums, let's all laugh at this man's predicament:

The sole question posed to the jury after a trial was "did Dr. Kezis perform a scalpel biopsy of Mr. Cerilli's scrotum over Mr. Cerilli's express objection?"

One would think the answer would be obvious, one way or the other.

Finally, for the three people who haven't heard about this yet, I am never watching porn with the volume on again.

Everybody have fun tonight! Everybody Huang Chung tonight!

2007-02-16T02:10:45Z

Because, you see, I'm now midway through volume two of Romance of the Three Kingdoms. What I've learned so far:

Liu Bei is overrated. His talents are being well-liked, fair in a fight, and listening to advice. On his own, he just loses battles.
Guan Yu is also overrated.
Zhang Fei kicks much ass. My favorite part is where one of Sun Ch'uan's men thinks he's snuck up on Zhang Fei drinking, sticks him with a spear, and it turns out to be a straw dummy of Zhang Fei. Most likely with the Chinese character for "pwned" written on it.
Chao Yun is seriously underrated. He's saves Liu Bei's infant son at least twice, once by turning his breastplate into a baby carrier and fighting his way through Cao Cao's men. He also saves pretty much anyone else in trouble.
Huang Chung gets props for being seventy and yet still being cooler than most of the other people in the Romance.

In other news, how do you hurt yourself to the tune of $200,000 by getting your hand stuck in an Easy-Bake™ oven? Does the child no longer have a hand?

Elsewhere in the universe, I'd just like to say that I am more than willing to be one of John Edwards's campaign bloggers.

The Stuff I Post When I Read My NYSBA Magazine

2007-02-11T19:14:51Z

Reading the New York State Bar Association magazine, I've learned something very important:

DO NOT TRY ANYTHING CUTE TO SKIP OUT ON JURY DUTY IN NEW YORK.

For example, in In re Pringle, 6 Misc. 3d 1025(A), 800 N.Y.S.2d 355 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2005) (N.Y. Co.), James Pringle just sort of left jury duty after most of the jurors were picked, on the assumption that he wasn't going to get picked and he had job and school to attend.

Sadly for Mr. Pringle, he was picked, and he basically tried to fight it all the way. He got sentenced to thirty days of jail for contempt.

Compared to Mr. Pringle, Stephen Caruso got off lucky with a $1,000 fine. In Caruso v. Wetzel, 33 A.D.3d 161, 818 N.Y.S.2d 506 (N.Y. App. Div. 2006) (1st Dep't), Mr. Caruso clearly didn't want to serve on a criminal jury, and the following colloquy took place between him and the court:

"[petitioner]: I'm not going to be fair and impartial in this case. I have been held up three times at gunpoint. One time almost identical, sir, to this.
"the court: You would judge the case on what happened to you even if you were satisfied he was not guilty, you would vote on what happened to you, right?
"[petitioner]: I am already looking at him, I think he is a 'scumbag.'
"the court: First of all, that is an insult not only to him, . . . to me, and the other people in the room. What do you do [for] a living?
"[petitioner]: What does that matter?

It wasn't just the "scumbag" that did it, though, Caruso doubled his contempt pleasure by not leaving the courtroom when asked.

Another Magnet

2007-02-08T00:59:45Z

Got another magnet from the Washington Post. The contest, back in early January, was to come up with bills using the names of freshman Congressmen. The won that got the honorable mention was:

"The Boyda-Whitehouse-Fallin Act regarding the lost dignity of the Executive Branch."

Can't go wrong playing anti-administration to the Post, I guess.

The entries I wrote, didn't win, but liked better were:

Lampson-Hirono-Hall Act, reminding children everywhere that electricity is not free and the switch should be flipped when they leave a room.
Bachmann-Tester "Overdrive" Act for those who have not seen anything yet.
Brown-Johnson-Smith-Wilson Amendment to mock the name of the Klobuchar-Sestak-Loebsack Act.
Murphy-Murphy-Cohen Act prohibiting ethnic bias in "duck-duck-goose"

The contest results, in full, here.

Clickthrough Madness

2007-01-10T17:29:04Z

To see if a call was a sales call, I entered the following into Google:

"the myer group" DC

Google's sidebar sponsored link led to this site.

I found their their answer to the question "why impregnate?" somewhat unconvincing.

Just had to post this...

2007-01-08T20:07:05Z

Boing! Tigger accused of hitting child at Disney

"This is the second time that a Tigger actor has been investigated over allegations of serious misconduct at Disney World. A 13-year-old girl and her mother reported being groped and molested by a British employee dressed as Tigger in the Magic Kingdom's Toontown zone in February 2004."

Whatev.

2007-01-07T22:48:56Z

I spent some time today "friending" people on my law school's alumni network. Mostly so they know I'm still alive.

Not much else to report; bar study progresses apace, so you won't hear from me much until March.

Mail Call

2007-01-04T04:28:13Z

Because I didn't read the Post on Sunday, I didn't realize that I appeared in this contest until I got a magnet in the mail today.

I've got an entry on the first page. It's not my favorite, but I got a free magnet.

Why don't I get these cases?

2006-12-19T18:47:52Z

In London, a man won a huge jury verdict for an injury that he claims turned him into a sex addict.

Gone for the Weekend...

2006-12-19T01:21:58Z

So, I was out of town for the weekend, and the following happened:

1) www.livejournal.com/update.bml now crashes my Firefox.

2) Everyone in DC is chattering about a troop increase in Iraq called a "surge." Why is everyone going along with this stupid name? Why must there be so many stupid catchphrases in the "war on terror," including that one?

3) How did I miss the brawl at Madison Square Garden? That must have been awesome, in a train crash kinda way.

In the Post Today

2006-12-13T01:12:16Z

In the second article in "Findings," the Washington Post tells us that some scientists say a regional nuclear war could reverse this global warming trend. They don't say it as such, but hey, if the ice caps' melting imperils NYC, it sounds like an easier option than reducing emissions today. We could even nuke somewhere no one lives, like North Dakota or Canada.

Mail Call

2006-12-12T01:36:21Z

Today's mail, other than credit card and student loan consolidation solicitations:

My monthly Association of Trial Lawyers of America magazine and law reporter;
a Godiva catalogue;
a travel brochure for West Virginia's historic Route 60, also known as the "Midland Trail"

Pretty good, today.

According to my ATLA Law Reporter, Board of Supervisors of Louisiana St. Univ. v. Smack Apparel Co., 438 F. Supp. 2d 653 (E.D. La. 2006) is one of those decisions that gets me all Lawrence Lessig. Apparently, college sports logos are "unregistered trademarks," allowing the university to sue so that it gets a monopoly on its licensed merchandise.

I know, I know, that's what the law says, but I so dislike this extension of it. University sports are already a greedhog exercise, and the avarice shouldn't be encouraged.

Also interesting is Williams v. Bitner, 455 F.3d 186 (3d Cir. 2006)</a>, which would say that it's a First Amendment violation to force Muslim inmates to cook pork products in the prison kitchen when they refuse, but is really a technical discussion about qualified immunity because the state admitted that a First Amendment violation occurred. Obviously, we're all more interested in the latter question.

For my legal pals.

2006-12-08T01:26:52Z

A writing contest. For those who are interested in such things.

Nothing Useful to Say

2006-12-07T01:25:47Z

So, since I'm too busy to blog well, I have to relate the tales of a partner in crime, who's reading old issues of Marvel's "Dazzler."

Evidently, before she joined the X-Men as "that mutant whose power is like a neutered Jubilee," (her power, for those who don't know, is to turn sound into light - not lasers, not destructive energy, just plain old visual spectrum light) Dazzler had her own, fantastically bad comic. She was one of those superheroes who profess no interest in using their lame powers, but when Dr. Doom shows up, instead of calling the cops like normal people, she "reluctantly" uses her powers to fight evil.

Also, she allegedly gave up law to become a pop singer. Since her teenage years were spent in roller derby, it's like saying I gave up medicine to be a lawyer - when I was eight.

Anyway, I was trying to think of ways to make Dazzler cooler, and the best way I could think of was to replace her sidekick, her talent agent Harry Wright, with Spiderman villain Harry Osborn. Having a very, very lame power doesn't matter when you've got the Hobgoblin bombs, skiff, and other paraphenalia.

Ah, well

2006-12-03T17:51:32Z

I should not be so proud of myself for making an anime porn joke while watching Horatio Hornblower.

Even though it was funny.

Coincidence?

2006-11-14T01:19:34Z

Why does the guy calling for money for the ACLU sound just like the guy who wanted me to give money to LaRouche because the "Synarchists" were behind 9/11 and the Madrid bombings?

Bumperstickers

2006-11-10T23:02:00Z

Okay, as I said before, election's over. Bumperstickers off now. You're just being redundant.

Politics

2006-11-10T18:01:39Z

This has been stewing with me for about two days, and I have to say it:

Regarding the election of Senator James Webb - I am a Virginia voter, and I voted for Webb both in the Democratic primary and the general election.

However, my vote should not be taken as a repudiation of President Bush or the Republicans. While I don't agree with them all the time, I agree with the Republicans these days more often than the Democrats.

As part of that razor-thin margin that gave the Senate to the Democrats, you should know that throwing out Allen had, for at least me and I bet I'm not alone, a lot more to do with a sincere dislike of the way George Felix Allen handled himself as a senator than with the national Republican policy.

Allen responded to correspondence only if he could score with his base or he felt he had to. Writing to his base, he'd just be jubilant about his hewing to RNC talking points, which were often not my position (I don't write my Congressmen about things I'm sure they'll vote for anyway). When Allen felt pressed to respond, he'd write three sentences and fail to address my concerns. If he couldn't write a form letter, he wouldn't respond at all. Senator Allen seemed to have no original ideas in his head and no willingness to communicate with his constituents.

And all this is before I knew about the welcoming of dark-skinned citizens to America, the disturbing stars n' bars fetish (if your forefathers died at Manassas, OK, but he's Californian), and the inability to understand that it's okay to be Jewish in 2006. In fact, none of the newsworthy events of this campaign surprised me, because I already knew what kind of an intellectually incurious boor Allen was.

So, for me, what tipped this election is that George Allen, regardless of his political beliefs, was an unfit individual to be Senator. If I were voting based on my appreciation of the policies of Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid, Allen would still be in office.

And, while I'm not 100% sure, I think the guy at the Wegman's with the "I'll forgive Jane Fonda when the Jews forgive Hitler" bumpersticker right next to the Webb bumpersticker voted that way for the same reasons.

So, just like in 2004, let's not be too hasty about declaring a mandate for what the people have spoken.

PBR - no J

2006-10-27T02:26:04Z

So, for various reasons today, I found myself humming Country & Western tunes to myself. One of these songs was Tim McGraw's "Live Like You Were Dying," which I will not link to lyrics of because all the pages I found had numerous typos AND spyware.

Anyway, in the song, McGraw sings that he "rode 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Manchu."

As one of the few living country listeners who has also read Sax Rohmer's The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu (it's free on Project Gutenberg!), I can tell you that Fu Manchu is not a good bull name. Riding bulls are named after things that can beat the crap out of you; a good Sinic-inspired bull name is Ghengis Khan.

For a bull to be like Fu Manchu, he'd be some old, skinny bull that when you tried to ride, you'd find that he'd poisoned the inside of your glove, or your saddle was full of vicious flesh-eating beetles, or some Indonesian guy with a knife would jump you before you'd get to the pen. That's Fu Manchu's style. Nothing easy if it could be done in a complicated, unrealistic, and sadistic manner.

Of course, then I thought that Master Blaster wouldn't be such a bad name for a bull, especially if it got the Professional Bull Riding commentators to say things like, "0.8 seconds on Master Blaster! Guess Jack Smith learned who owns Bartertown at the rodeo today!"

Why I am not Commenting on Your LiveJournals

2006-10-19T06:13:52Z

...because I will argue with you, basically, and I'm tedious.

Off to the Notary!

2006-10-14T18:25:24Z

Just FYI: you can, in Virginia on a Saturday, get the following things in five hours:

1) A DMV driving record;
2) Two passport photos;
3) A credit report issued within the last sixty days;
4) Lunch
5) Two $3 off coupons from Staples for recycling printer cartridges;
6) Two new printer cartridges, 250 sheets 32lb. resume paper, 500 sheets 20lb. bright white paper;
7) A watchband fixed;
8) A free trial of software that alters PDF files.

All that's left for my Virginia re-up (as I mentioned to someone in a postcard, like any good Northerner, I'll lick this Virginia thing if I have to sack and burn the state from the Kentucky border to Richmond to do it) is a notarization (available at the UPS store at the mall 3 mi. away; open 'till 5) and $600 in money orders (available at the Post Office, which at Merrifield is open 'till midnight).

Bummers and Such

2006-10-14T00:24:33Z

It would have hurt me more were I not a lawyer elsewhere, but I must strive again to be a Virginia lawyer. My favorite part of the reapplication form is that I must promise, on a form signed in the presence of a notary, that I will study at least ninety hours for the next try.

And there will be a next try. I was pretty close.

Non-Presence

2006-10-11T22:00:10Z

Hey folks - not much to report, especially since I'm probably not going to be blogging in any substantial way for the forseeable future. Need job security, and a less than sixty-hour-a-week job, first.

Triple Sigh.

2006-09-30T16:36:11Z

Okay, for the second time in twenty-four hours, someone called my cell phone, spoke in Spanish for a moment, then asked for someone who isn't here, then asked for someone who speaks Spanish. I understand that, although I don't speak Spanish, the person on the other end doesn't speak enough English to understand that she has called a cell phone and therefore there is no house full of polyglots to aid her in her confusion. But it's darn frustrating all the same, especially since she seems to wait until the beep on the voicemail to hang up.