Living within our means: How I solved the budget (Spending Cuts, part I)

As I mentioned last post, the New York Times has a neat budget puzzle game on their website. This time we'll examine the spending cuts my phantom administration would have enacted (or, depending on the vicissitudes of fate, the cuts my future administration will enact). I will review the options in the same sections found in the NYT puzzle. Today we look at Domestic Programs and Foreign Aid. Please note that financial figures are set in the following format (savings in 2015/savings in 2030).

Domestic Programs and Foreign Aid

Cuts:

Cut pay of civilian federal workers by 5% (14b/17b): It's not that I hate government employees, far from it. But the federal workforce is huge and, although nobody gets rich in the civil service, the benefits and job security are competitive with or superior to that in the private sector. So I figured that while it is a bit of a hardship, ultimately this was one cut that could be endured.

Reduce the federal workforce by 10% (12b/15b): Reducing the size of the federal government is more of a polemic than anything else these days, as people don't seem to realize that shrinking the workforce will not affect how much the government does, just the speed at which it manages to accomplish it. A slower, slightly less responsive government is the cost of a smaller workforce, but ultimately I feel it is an acceptable loss.

Cut 250,000 government contractors (17b/17b): Government contractors provide a range of services, sometimes with lower cost to the tax payer, but often times at the same or even higher rates. Where the contracted work is of a particular and specialized nature with either a limited duration or fairly infrequent application, it makes sense to obtain contractors. But as a supplement or replacement for ordinary federal employees, contractors seem like a bad deal. They get the axe.

Retained:

Foreign Aid (17b/17b): I elected not to cut Foreign Aid by 50%. Foreign Aid is a popular whipping boy, especially among teabaggers and the conservative press, but it is really some of our best spent money. As any basic textbook on diplomacy can tell you, power comes in two different kinds; hard and soft. Foreign Aid represents a particularly useful form of softer hard power. It is a way to reward friends, punish enemies (by its absence), induce or promote change, and remedy the effects of disasters, wars, and inhumane conditions. For a relatively minuscule portion of the federal budget, we basically purchase a stake, and there for a say, in the fate of other nations. To say nothing of providing humanitarian assistance to those in need. Especially in a post-Iraq War, where the limits of military power have been clearly demonstrated, Foreign Aid offers a cheap and persistent form of influence.

Earmarks (14b/14b): I decided to keep Earmarks, even though I believe their projected cost is inaccurate, as it fails to take into account the likely fact that they will probably cost more in 2015 and 2030 than they do now. That being said, Earmarks are another kind of federal spending that has received a lot of ill-informed criticism. While many Earmarks are poorly conceived, unnecessary, or the product of simple old fashioned corruption, painting them all with that brush is unfair. In many cases individual members of Congress are aware of a particular need in his or her district, and the Earmark represents a relatively easy method (within the context of the legislative process) to address the issue. Furthermore, Earmarks are one form of federal spending that genuinely does help stimulate local economies, and in that regard they are one of the more effective stimulus methods available to the federal government (remember that even once we are out of this period of general economic hardship, there will always be areas and regions with slower growth). While Earmarks should probably be subject to great scrutiny, and the outright boondoggles should be prevented, as a whole I find them an acceptable, and even at times useful, evil.

Eliminate Farm Subsidies (14b/14b): This was a hard cut not to make, as the majority of Farm Subsidies go to big corporations and stymie free trade by keeping US agricultural prices artificially low. With that being said, cutting the subsidies are likely to cause food prices to rise somewhat, and the burden of that increase will fall disproportionately on the poor. Thus, even though the money goes to the rich, cutting it hurts the people we are trying to protect. Additionally, while the majority of the subsidies flow to huge agricultural conglomerates, small and family farms also benefit.

Other cuts to the federal government (30b/30b): This miscellaneous option proposed cutting funding for smaller agencies, educational and research expenditures, and other ancillary government endeavors. I elected to keep them because federal funding for research, development, and education are already woefully inadequate. Reducing the money available for national parks or the Smithsonian, which are already a tiny fraction of the federal budget, will reduce the quality of services available to the public.

Cut aid to states by 5% (29b/42b): Currently many of the states are in dire fiscal straits. My home state of California usually seems to be the one making headlines in this regard, but we are hardly alone. While there is truth in the claim that the individual states did it to themselves, that is neither of much comfort, nor particularly helpful. Aid to states primarily helps fund social programs. Cutting it would disproportionately impact the poor without solving the structural issues that put the states into the red in the first place. That's punishing Peter to scold Paul.

Well, that's it. Tune in tomorrow (or whenever) for Part II of my spending cuts.

Budget Czar for the Day

The New York Times has a really interesting feature on their website right now. Called the Budget Puzzle, it puts you in the position of determining exactly how, through a mix of spending cuts and tax raises, to balance the federal budget out to the years 2015 and 2030. Although the model is no doubt incredibly simplified, it puts into stark terms our national financial realities. It is also, though this may be more an indication of a personal psychosis than anything else, sort of fun.

You can see my plan here. Tomorrow (or when I get around to it) I'll post an explanation as to why I made the spending cuts I did, leaving tax hikes for a third post. I'm sure you're waiting with baited breath.

Santa's late delivery

There was a package waiting for me today at my office. Now, given my inordinate (and, what with my generally pleasant personality, inexplicable) number of enemies, I was naturally suspicious. However, it turned out to be a belated holiday gift.

Wrapped in about twelve pounds of excess shipping material were three cans of chocolate-coated potato chips. Apparently every holiday season Needless Markup produces them in a particularly cholesteric example of the conspicuous consumption to which NM serves as a kind of temple.

Although you won't find these things on the approved list of foods for any kind of reasonable diet, they sure are tasty!

You'll shoot your eye out!

While the loss of an ocular organ seems unlikely, given the nature of the gifts I received, one should never discount human ingenuity.

Anyway, here's what I got from various friends, family, and other assorted well-wishers:

Some clothes
Some money
Return to Cookie Mountain by TV on the Radio
A biographical work on Thomas More, statesman, philosopher, and Catholic bigot
A book on the Somme and another on Ancient Rome
A nice pen
Gift cards
A Star Wars lego tie fighter (the one Vader flies in Star Wars)

Pointless Factoid XXIX

The California State Bar establishes Continuing Legal Education (CLE) requirements for practicing attorneys. Failure to complete the requisite amount of CLE can result in disciplinary action.

In other and completely unrelated news, I have about two weeks to finish some twenty hours of legal study...

More than meets the ire

Last night I saw Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Now, when you go into a movie like that you're not exactly expecting a masterpiece. You understand that the limitations of the genre and, more crippling, the target audience combine to guarantee a mediocre viewing experience. But you hope that cool fight scenes and an interesting character or two shroud the essential shallowness of the film. This time? Not so much.

Transformers was not, at least, an unmitigated failure. The acting is tolerably done, which on the scale of action flicks, is practically Oscar worthy. I am not the biggest fan of Shia LeBeouf, but this movie plays to his strengths, and he is able to carry much of the film. The redoubtable Peter Cullen is a treat to longtime Transformers fans and recent converts alike as Optimus Prime. But the best performance is put in by Sam's parents (Kevin Dunn and Julie White), especially Ms. White as the mother.

That is, however, part of the problem. Transformers seems to suffer from an identity crisis. The film has a strong comedic foundation, with both amusing scenes and witty one-liners. But these flashes of mirth seem, sandwiched as they are between meaningless metallic mayhem and overblown dramatics, stolen from another movie. Micheal Bay seems to believe he can transform his movie between action, comedy, and drama at will, but the transitions are stilted and ultimately detract from those parts of the film that work.

Fight scenes are supposed to be the highlight of an action film, but it seems that the modern trend illustrates a direct correlation between the amount of CG and the degree of dullness. It can be at times difficult to distinguish the silver Decepticons from each other (poor characterization of the villians is a general theme among the two Bey Transformers movies), and even when you can tell, you don't care to make the effort because it doesn't matter who just shrugged off the latest atom bomb.

I don't want to give away what, in an impressive illustration of ambition, aspires to be the plot, but it does such a good job of hiding that I feel compelled to mention that if you don't at least look for it, you might not find it (though I doubt you'll miss it). The portrayal of Megatron as a loyal and conspicuously obedient servant (and the continuing failure to cast Frank Welker, the original voice actor) would infuriate any true fan of the 80's cartoon. Soundwave is finally in this movie, but he's a freaking satellite, when they could have easily made him a CD player, and he doesn't sound like he used to either.

Sadly, even with all our technology and the ability to merge CG robots seemlessly with the real world, we've yet to make a Transformers movie superior to that from 1986. Perhaps even worse, this is also true of the soundtrack. However dated and (even at the time) annoying the mid 80's power ballads may be, at least the animated film had more than one song. Revenge of the Fallen pushes that new Linkin Park tune so aggressively you expect an advertisement for concert dates is coming next.

See it, if you have to. But don't expect any more than meets the eye.

Grey skies are gonna clear up

Alright, so it's been a little mopey and pathetic around here, even for me (which is saying something). So I have committed myself to ensure that at least the next few posts are somwhat less dark and miserable. Stay tuned for mirth and other diversions!

The rewards of failure

I am a very talented person. Intelligent, articulate, polite but without pretension, and particular without undue severity. It is true that, at times, these traits lay idle, or are even appropriated in lesser or even dubious causes. Yet even so, I remain a man with vast and disparate capabilities. Up until now, the primary use of my talents has been in the conservation of personal energy. I have honed the art of cutting corners to such an extent that my endeavors are ultimately, and invariably, doughnut shaped.

The reasons for this are several; probably some of it is good old fashioned sloth. To a certain extent, I like the idea that I can succeed with ease where others manage only through the expenditure of great effort and the assumption of much care. Of course, it is difficult to evade the accusation that a fear of failure, or success, or in one of psychologies more interesting and tormenting little vices, both, may lurk about.

At any rate, and for whatever reason, I had yet to encounter any enterprise in which I felt the need or the desire to exhaust every eventuality (how's that for aliteration!). That is no longer true, and if the outcome is in some sense disappointing, the end results have proven unexpectedly encouraging.

It was something of a surprise to find how interested I'd become in a successful resolution, and indeed how quickly the aspiration took hold. But having inspired my ambition, I became dedicated to achieving my goal in a way that I'd never really experienced before. I tried my best. I employed all my talents, pursued every opportunity, and spared no efforts. And in the end I fell on my face.

I mean, I didn't just fail. I blew it by a long shot. If it was a race, my shoe laces were tied together and I never got off the starting blocks. In a different situation, I think the whole experience could have been frustrating or humiliating, or even soul crushing. But as is, I find already I look back on it with a kind of (perhaps morbid) amusement.

For the first time I actually tried my best, and it wasn't anywhere near good enough. And yet, everything was still in place. The sky didn't fall, the sun rose the next day. It is unexpectedly liberating, like when you run as fast as you can for as long as you can. Then when exhaustion forces you to stop, you look back and see how far you managed to go, and you realize that in the future, you might get further yet.

It goes without saying that nobody changes over night. But I count this experience as a positive one. Of course the pessimist in me is not surprised that my first genuine effort would have been expended in a hopeless exercise, but I am not discourged. I may try again sometime, or if not, I might yet employ the same dedication to a new task. After all, now that I've fallen flat on my face, I know it hurts a bit, but it won't kill you.

Pointless Factoid XXIIX

Legal case citation, though subject to an amount of variance, follows a general pattern illustrated by the following example:

Apple v. Banana, 21 Mk Blv 986 (2021).

That means the case involved the parties Apple and Banana, and it can be found in volume 21 of Make Believe, page 986, and that it was decided in 2021.

To use an example from real life:

Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966).

So, Miranda was one, and the State of Arizona was the other. It's in volume 384 of the United States Reporter, page 436, and it was decided in 1966.

Some volumes have multiple series, so you'll see something like Cal App 3rd, which stands for the California Appellate Reporter, third series. In many instances, these indices are not government sponsored, but rather are compiled by third parties. Because these works are not protected by copyright, anyone can print them, and so there are often competing volumes. In such cases, it is customary to site important cases in several or even all of the major reports for the jurisdiction.

Matryoshka

It may be strange to say, on a blog dedicated to excessive self-flagellation and the magnification of ubiquitous trivialities, but there are certain insufficiencies and disappointments of which I have never complained. This is not due so much to any masculine stoicism, nor the eventual resolution brought by the passage of time, but rather because, to put it in simple terms, I was afraid to confront it.

And so this topic may have remained unexamined still, except that I have recently resolved to abandon the comforting crutch of avoidance for the less certain, but ultimately more rewarding (hopefully) promise of personal honesty. That is, honesty to myself about myself.

Probably even a few weeks ago I could never have written this post, or if I had it would have been left forever unpublished, or at best buried through the judicious use of back dating. But with the help of a good and paitent friend, I've learned that what you don't say is far more hurtful than what you do.

With this newfound, and yet unsteady dedication, I turn to review in earnest a topic of great personal dissatisfaction. Appropriately enough, for Father's Day, it is my relationship with my own.

I should start out by allowing that my parents were very young when I was born. My dad was 23, my mom 19. The undeniable fact is that, to a certain extent, I ruined their lives, and though I can be assigned little blame, still the realization is actual enough to prompt some degree of guilt. Had they had their first child later, no doubt everyone would have been happier. This is not to say that they didn't adjust, or that they would wish things were different. But it is undeniable that basically I screwed things up for everybody.

The actual problem, however, is that at 23, and with the subsequent demands of family life from such a young age, my dad lacked any of the attributes of responsible parentage aside from a firm sense of responsibility. When I came, and then almost two years later my brother as well, he took a job he hated and worked to provide for us, and I respect that effort. Unfortunately his own displeasure grew, and when combined with his volitile personality, explosive temper, and generally poor disposition, it produced in him a growing discontent that he was unable to properly manage.

While I in no sense wish to imply that my childhood was an unremitting misery, neither would it be accurate to say that it was not miserable. The fact is that the behavior of my father would, by today's standards, be considered physically, mentally, and emotionally abusive. He could be brought into uncontrollable rages by trivial infractions or insignificant accidents. Setting the wrong dinner fork, or using a TV tray that he wanted were among the most absurd triggers, though there were others.

His anger could be a terrible thing to behold, especially to a small child. When enraged he delighted in subjecting us to blistering evaluations and tirades of endless profanity. In those unfortunate situations where emotional wounds seemed in his judgment insufficient, he proved willing to resort to those more readily apparent.

On an absolute metric of physical abuse, probably what we received was fairly mild. We were never punched or kicked, used as footstools or ashtrays. But we were hit, and by which I mean to indicate more than spanking or a little whack aside the head, though such indulgences may also have made occasional appearances.

During my father's rages, my mother would usually stand off to the side. He never, insofar as I know, was physical with her in the least, but whether through fear or agreement, she abstained from intervention, except when it seemed he had finally lost the last semblence of control.

Even with my limited understanding of psychology, I know that such experiences have left deep wounds, which yet are still raw to the touch. In many ways the personal deficiencies that trouble me on so many levels are attributable, either directly or indirectly, to these events. Of course I do not mean to lay all my inadequacies at my father's feet, and at any rate these incidents ended long ago, and it is reasonable to say I should simply get over it.

In a very real way, part of me never actually matured. Or, if it did, it did so in some stunted and twisted sense. There is a piece of my soul that never grew up, but rather learned to grow over itself, with layer after layer of insufficient rationalizations and imperfect defenses. I have lived with the fear that, in the end, I may be nothing more than the little boy who tried to shield his head from his father's anger. And it is an apprehension that still colors everything that I am.

But I realize now that whatever my father's errors, in the end the responsibility is my own. Fear offers only hesitation and discontent, and it is my fault and mine alone if I accept them. I am still broken, I think, and probably will always remain so in at least some fashion.

But I am unwilling to condemn myself to a life of misery, nor through some misguided sense of anger, allow the responsibility for my own contentment to rest with others. For a very long time I was bitter and angry and hateful, but those emotions have wearied me, and provided nothing in recompense. So while I may not be able to completely abandon them, at least no longer will I rely on them.

Interestingly enough, my current relationship with my dad is tolerably pleasent. We have a stable, if somewhat shallow bond based on some mutual interests and a generally pessimistic view of life. I know in my heart I will always hate him, at least in part, but that is no longer the dominant paradigm of our interactions. It may seem like that is not much. But it's more than I had before.

Happy Father's Day.

Literature

Sometimes you read something and it sticks with you for a while. Like one time back in Junior High, when I read The Stand, it freaked me out and I spend the next week sleeping with the lights on. Of course, not every genre is going to affect you the same way, but inevitably there will be a few works from every literary flavor that lingers on the palette.

Earlier this evening, I was treated to a taste of such a work. While the story was somewhat incomplete, it was not only compelling, but it has also inspried me to improve my own similar writings.

Of course, that is a concern for the future. Right now it's almost four in the morning, and I have court in five hours. I shall lie down, and hope sleep comes soon (though I rather doubt it will)!

Land of Opportunity

Having my own office is somewhat exciting, and I rather like just following my own rules. I know that, in the long run, I'd never really be satisfied working for another person anyway. That being said, at this point in my life, and especially with the economy the way it is, I'd much rather have a steady paycheck. The thing is, my chosen field is small and, sadly, one where the government is the single largest employer. With counties all over the state in the grip of cutbacks, I have thus far been unable to secure full-time employment in Criminal Defense work.

Accordingly, I have today started to apply to such jobs out of state where the absence of local bar admission is not a total prohibition to employment, provided the candidate agrees to secure a license as soon as possible. Thus far I have limited my applications to the western states, such as Nevada. I don't really care to leave California, but if I do, I'd rather go to Arizona or Washington than say Montana. Unfortunately, though somewhat predictably, most of these kinds of jobs are in the dismal states.

Pointless Factoid XXVII

Inter-Uterine Devices (IUDs) are the world's most popular form of reversable contraception. Interestingly, the non-hormonal IUD used in the US is essentially just a T-shaped piece of plastic with a copper wire wrapped around it. Strings extend from the uterus into the vaginal cavity.

IUDs work because the presence of a foriegn object in the uterus prompts the endometrium to produce compounds hostile to sperm and egg alike. The devices have strings so that the wearer (if indeed that is the proper term) can determine that it still remains properly emplaced, and to aid in the IUD's eventual removal. Apparently these strings may be noticeable during sexual intercourse which, I would think, would be a little odd.

A hill of beans, and other cinematic legume references

As it seems this blog, taken alone, may have provided some of my associates with an inaccurate depiction of my varying qualities and insufficiencies, I have decided to take this opportunity to respond to a few claims levelled at me in recent weeks.

Problems: In an absolute objective sense, I don't really have any. I'm not going to starve. There isn't a rebel army looking to chop me to pieces for being the wrong tribe. I've got all my limbs, most of my mental faculties, and a standard of living the envy of millions. Such difficulties as I may encounter are first world problems; I'm not fabulously rich. The girl I like doesn't like me. I wish I was a little bit taller. I wish I was a baller (try identifying that song without recourse to the internet!).

A friend of mine recently claimed that I make spilled milk sound like the Noahchian deluge (though not in those terms, which probably goes some way to proving the point). And, I suppose it is a charge with some degree of validity. I concede that the literary style I have affected is burdened by, among other imperfections, an unnecessary recourse to the dramatic. We tend to see formality as an inevitable indication of importance. When it is employed to catalogue personal disappointments, there may seem to be Byronic pretensions.

To the extent that they exist, they're unintended, and really in life I am closer to Charlie Chaplin than Charlton Heston. My problems seem important to me because they are mine, but I do not flatter myself that they are either particularly unique, or unusally oppressive.

Depression: On occasion blogging seems to be, at least for me, nothing other than a litany of literary self-flagellation. This charge, like the other, has a hint of truth to it, but such validity as it may claim is due more to selection bias than simple disatisfaction.

I use my blog as a forum where I can engage my issues on my own terms. It isn't really even meant for public consumption, and while insofar as any reader may derive amusement from my endeavors they are welcome to do so, I write (for the most part) for a solitary, introspective audience.

Accordingly, if I've had an awesome day, or struck some unusual fortune, rarely do I feel the need, or even the interest, to describe it. Like most people, I assimilate success easily. It's only failure that necessitates discussion.

Inhibition: A friend recently accused me of having "taboo" subjects which, I think, is not particularly damning (as we all have our own little limitations), but he meant it to encompass even such topics as should be commonly suitable for discussion. Again I must concede some accuracy in the accusation, but I actually think it misses the mark.

The reality is that I believe I display a remarkable willingness to describe my own limitations and express my frustrations. Admittedly, such volition is restricted primarily to the printed word, but it is at least in a venue of universal exposure.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being (29, that is)

I hate my birthday.

Now, when I say I "hate" it, I do not speak in the simple chronological sense, and the increasing nearness of inevitable mortality. Nor do I express insincere protestations in the hopes of garnering attention, gifts, or social events of dubious value (such as "surprise" parties). Rather, I hate my birthday because it is the one day when my insecurities and inadequacies grow beyond the respectful bounds of colorful idiosyncracies, instead assuming a troubling primacy over my psyche.

For the other 364 days the disparate slivers that forms what passes for my personality maintain, more or less, a kind of workable cohesion. Even when I am unhappy or distressed, these things are in me in the adjectival sense, as in I feel unhappy. But today these terms take on the trappings of nouns, and as a consequence I am unhappy.

The reality is that my miseries, to the extent that they even warrant such a term, are no greater on the 29th of May than they were on the 28th. It is my inability to properly internalize them that makes the day so difficult, and hence why I view it with something akin to dread.

But though my problems are no larger today than any other day, they do loom more prominently in the mind. I am plagued by unfulfilled ambitions and affections, which trouble me as incomplete, or unbecoming, or even in some instances both, or neither, or more.

Some of them seem no further than my fingertips; others may as well be on the moon. But either way I lack the capacity to consumate them, and the good sense to divorce them. Strangely, it may seem that those within my grasp would frustrate me more, as there I am my own obstacle, but in an ironic turn I find I press and strain against the impossible, until the effort replaces enthusiasm with exhaustion.

David Hume once wrote that reason could aspire to no other office than to serve passion. In my everyday life I acclaim reason and disdain passion, regarding even its pleasures as deleterious. It may then be fitting that on the 29th of each year I am forced to pay the compounded interest of sentiments deferred the rest of the year.

But even so, I hate my birthday.

Four days in Xanadu

This weekend I was at Kublacon, a gaming convention in Burlingame, near the San Francisco Airport. It's four days of RPGs, CCGs, LARPs, miniatures, board games, and sleep deprivation. To these activities must be added drinking, socializing, and more than one or two hook-ups, as despite the general stereotype assigned to nerds, cons tend to have something of a party atmosphere, and gaming is at its heart a social hobby.

As usual I had a good time, managing to play a wide variety of games and meet up with a number of people I only encounter at these events. Such "con friends" occupy an unusual strata among the layers of social relationships. You see each other infrequently, but that in large blocks over a short timespan, and amongst a sea of like-minded strangers. Even someone ill-disposed to quick attachment would find that con events can help forge instant, though shallow, bonds.

Aside, or simultaneous to hanging out with con buddies, I managed to fit in a lot of gaming. On Friday I helped run my brother's Napoleonic War board game. We had a good mix of new and veteran players, and the game developed an interesting dynamic and ended, appropriately, with an unlikely resolution.

On Saturday I filled a seat in the Game of Thrones tournament, but was solidly defeat by almost all my opponents, including my brother. After that I gave Vampire: Prince of the City a try but didn't really care for it, and watched as a friend playtested his homebrew CCG. The highpoint of the day, and in some ways the con itself, came later that evening when I ran my Serenity game Love in the Time of Compression Coils (apologies to Gabriel Garcia Marquez for the title). Upon finishing that game, I spent all night battling a master strategist for control of the ancient Mediterranean in Pax Romana.

Sunday was a little less busy than Saturday, but I still managed to play several games. I beat my brother in Zombies, almost destroyed the Galactica as a Cylon in the BSG board game, lost to friend and stranger alike in Vampire: The Eternal Struggle, gave Carcassone another try (won, but still don't care for the game), and played Race for the Galaxy and La Havre until Monday morning.

Now exiled once again to the real world, I'm already looking forward to the Labor Day weekend con. If only September weren't so far away.

Northern Sirens

Their album came out on April 28th. R&B isn't exactly anyone's first idea of Swedish music, but these guys are pretty cool.

Stealth Mode

There is something about RSS feeds that I find objectionable. What exactly it is I'm not entirely sure, but I do know that I don't like the idea of being tracked. Therefore I have, insofar as I understand the process, gone into the settings and disabled feeds. Whether or not this will actually do anything I can't really say, but at least for the moment it makes me feel pretty sneaky.

Life Imitates Art

Every so often we have a moment in our own lives that resembles more a scene bound by celluloid than reality. Earlier this evening, I had one such experience. In itself it was a trifling affair of little note, a misunderstanding born of mojitos and poor judgement, that subsequently assumed somewhat epic pretensions.

Maybe another day I'll go into more detail, but for now I'll just note that, without the benefit of laugh tracks or montages, movie scenes aren't always as fun to live through as they are to watch.

Ebb and Flow

It never rains but it pours. When I was in trial, and without time to accept other work, I had to decline a number of potential cases. Now that my trial is done and I have all this free time, there's nothing to do.

All I've done this week is write a contract, revise an NDA, and give a nickel's worth of free advice on landlord-tenant law. Thursday is another volunteer session, this time at the bankruptcy clinic in Oakland, which however good it may be for karma, does little to help the balance book. I did pick up another translation editing assignment. Better than nothing, but not much.

I think I need to marry rich.