talbotlucas.org: a word to the wise is sufficient

audio balm

Soothing the savage studying beast tonight (and compensating for the racket my neighbors are making):

++ Arlo Guthrie, City of New Orleans
++ Johnny Rivers, Memphis, Tennessee. My favorite version of this Chuck Berry tune, by far. Chuck Berry may have written it, it may be in the Elvis canon, but Rivers' version is my all-time, turn-up-the-car-radio version.
++ Scissor Sisters, Comfortably Numb remix. Terrence--being more familiar with Pink Floyd than I am--finds this pulsing electro-falsetto version too creepy to listen to.
++ Damien Rice, tracks from O. Lots of folk music is creeping into my iTunes these days, see below. Rice got a lot of airplay with The Blower's Daughter, one of the tracks on the O album.
++ The BBC Philharmonic's performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Available now for download on the BBC3 web site.
++ Arlo Guthrie, Alice's Restaurant. Terrence asked if I knew this song/story and I didn't. Out came the LP, he fired up the turntable, and we listened to all 18+ minutes of it last night after dinner. Coincidentally, the movie version is airing tomorrow (isn't the DirecTV/TiVo guide a beautiful thing?) and so I'm going to be fully Arlo-ed out soon. I'm also listening to Arlo's Motorcycle Song. Is this the source of Bob Collins' affection for saying "motorsickle"?

For those of you not from Chicago, Bob Collins was a WGN radio host and amateur pilot who died while piloting a plane a few years ago. Crashed right into the roof of a building, if I remember. He was not my favorite WGN personality, but r.i.p...Can I even get WGN radio on the web? What I'm really interested in is the morning agribiz report. One's morning eggs taste better accompanied by news of winter wheat futures. I don't know if porkbellies were part of the agribiz report, but if not they preceded or immediately followed it, and hearing about porkbellies just seems like an important breakfast component. Maybe not for you, but my weekday breakfast hasn't been the same without it. KTLA is amusing and all, but...and what about Larry Shriner? Is he still on? Are they still letting him do the same from-the-street crime reports? Slouching in his sports car while the bullets are zinging overhead? I miss Larry and the agribiz report more than I can say. Really.

who the hell are these idiots?

Really? Who the hell are the idiots who leave dozens of trackback pings for things like "Texas hold-em," online casinos, and other such sites. Please go away. I'm getting tired of deleting your pain-in-the-ass pings every night. Go away. Now. Thank you.

seizing private property

Thanks to Mr. Doody for sending me the link to this in the wake of the Court's recent Kelo decision. What I found most amusing was the response from the town's zoning code enforcement officer, sort of a let-the-chips-fall-where-they-may attitude. You'd hope, of course, that a member of the Court wouldn't vote differently if their own interests were at stake, but losing one's home is a pretty big deal.

If this is of any interest...the Kelo slip opinion is on the Court's site, as is Justice Stevens' peculiar (IMHO) dissent in the Swedenburg/Heald cases (Stevens' dissent begins on the 36th page of the .pdf version to which I've linked). For a flavor of the commentary/head-scratching about Stevens' Heald dissent, this post from The Volokh Conspiracy reflects the general "huh?" response that followed the decision.

Back to bar exam prep: Community Property is tomorrow's hot topic...and in anticipation I'm downloading Beethoven's Eighth Symphony from the BBC's site. Not that the Eighth Symphony has some sort of relationship with the subject of Community Property although...stranger connections have been made, I'm sure.

picking the sunniest spot

Wallace often settles down on the marble fireplace hearth or the marble floor in the bathroom because even on a warm day those spots are cooler than the nearby carpet, or than the upholstered furniture.

But then there are times, usually in the afternoon, when he likes to soak up the sun. Like today. He's once again positioned himself so that his face is in the middle of the only patch of strong sunlight in the bathroom. His eyes are almost closed (probably a good thing with the sun shining right in them, right?) and his breathing is calm. No huffing, and his ears aren't doing the I'm-constantly-on-alert sonar pivot. He doesn't seem to mind when Terrence and I need to occupy the bathroom, or that we actually close the door and have to step over him. He's just happy to have his spot in the sun.

on a lighter note

Thanks to zippyweb for the alert to this sweet piece about Angus, a corgi in Montana--also known as "The Mayor"--who's slowing down a bit. I love the story about Angus's carrying a flashlight in his mouth when out for his nightly walks.

who are these people?

This is a silly post, but every now and then these sorts of things get under my skin. So I'll ask the question:

Who are the people whose votes via the Discovery Channel and AOL resulted in this list of the "greatest Americans"? I know these types of lists are essentially popularity contests and not meaningful indicators of anything, really, but if this list reflects the general knowledge of American history--and I won't be surprised if it does--then...whew. Here are a few highlights (or doozies, depending on whether you want to be amused or distressed):

Dr. Phil (psychologist, "life strategist," and talk show host) came in 61st; Dr. Jonas Salk (developed the polio vaccine) came in 81st. But hey, Tom Cruise came in 21st, perhaps because he's not just an actor and producer but also a self-professed expert in the sciences, or pseudo-sciences (depending on what view you want to take about psychology and psychiatry).

Rush Limbaugh (talk radio personality) came in 55th; Johnny Carson came in 13th. But Edward R. Murrow didn't make the list of the top 100. Nor did Walter Cronkite. Or even Jack Paar. Or Ed Sullivan. I miss Johnny, too, but...

Bret Favre (quarterback for the Green Bay Packers) came in 31st, beating out Henry Ford, who came in 32nd. No, Henry Ford did not throw any touchdown passes in a Super Bowl. All he did was introduce the assembly line as a means of American automobile production. I'm quite sure Bret Favre is very talented. I sure as hell couldn't throw a football half as far or with anywhere near the accuracy that he does. And from what admittedly little I've seen, he seems like a pretty good-natured guy. A good athletic role model, given what's on the field these days. And yet...he beats Henry Ford?

Even Matt Lauer, who is hosting (or has already hosted) the Discovery Channel countdown, seemed disgusted with the results when he was interviewed by Jon Stewart on a recent episode of The Daily Show. Mr. Lauer was shocked that Michael Jackson made the list, but Thurgood Marshall did not. Well, yeah.

What about Watson and Crick--you know, the two who made a few breakthroughs regarding DNA? Or any other leaders in the fields of science and medicine? Carl Sagan (and Jonas Salk) appear to be the only ones who made the cut.

Any artists on the list? Um, no. Musicians (aside from Madonna and Frank Sinatra)? No.

Jurists? Nada. Perhaps John Edwards is supposed to represent the lawyers.

Philosophers? Nope. If I mentioned John Rawls I suspect most of the participants would look at me curiously, and explain that it was Lou Rawls who sang "Lady Love." Silly me, suffocating under a veil of ignorance.

Architects? What? Don't be silly.

Writers? Wait, Maya Angelou made the list. Maybe Carl Sagan counts here, too. But no sign of Faulkner or Twain. Or Saul Bellow. Or even, to follow the Oprah route, Toni Morrison. (Henry Miller's not going to get enough votes, no how, no way, so I'm noting a few names that came immediately to mind.)

John Edwards (yes, the politician/2004 vice-presidential candidate) came in 28th. Why is he even on the list? Really? I don't get it.

Perhaps the Americans who helped compile this list are the same Americans who believe that Bill O'Reilly is a journalist. Or perhaps the definition of journalist has changed dramatically in the last few decades. Or perhaps very few people distinguish any more between commentators and journalists. Or...

maybe it's time to get back to the law of wills and trusts before my head explodes. Perhaps I've vented enough.

The more people I meet, and the more of these polls I read...the more I like my dog.

julie/julia publication on the horizon

The revised and expanded version of the Julie/Julia blog (which we loved) will be published this fall, possibly in September, as Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen. It's now available for preorder on amazon.com. Little, Brown (now part of the Time Warner group) is the publisher, and is supposedly also bringing out the book in audiobook and eBook formats.

Just to be clear...this is not the same Julie Powell who is a Christian singer/songwriter who "plays guitar in smoky bars." Our Julie Powell is the woman who cooked her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, learned a lot more than she bargained for, and chronicled it all on her blog. Our Julie Powell has won a few James Beard Awards for her magazine writing (two, I think) and is occasionally contributing to The New York Times

BBC3's Beethoven Experience

This is a very nifty offering from the BBC, and one that you might wish to take advantage of. The downloads page is here and the mp3 files will only be available for a brief period of time. There's quite a bit of traffic on the site, so if you don't have a fast connection, you might want to wait 'til a later hour. (The files are not small; e.g., No. 7 is a 37.2 megabyte file; No. 6 was just over 44 MB.) For those using Safari and iTunes, once the file is downloaded it automatically finds its way to the iTunes library. Each file includes brief introductory comments and closing comments, but you're otherwise getting the whole musical performance, uninterrupted.

I missed downloading symphonies 1 through 5, but I grabbed No. 6 last night and very much enjoyed it. No. 7 is now available, and 8 and 9 will be available in the coming days. Even if you're not a huge Beethoven fan, this is a great opportunity to snag some quality recordings and to expand your musical knowledge. (At least that's how I feel; my knowledge of music isn't as broad or deep as I'd like it to be.)

There are other features of the BBC's project that I haven't yet explored, and don't know if I will because I can't justify dawdling when the Bar Exam Countdown is at 28. The homepage for the project is here, for those of you with a little more time (or better time management).

I'd also encourage those of you who are excited about the new Podcasting feature in iTunes to hold off for a few days. The service seems swamped (at least for those feeds that interested me, like several from KCRW, a local NPR afffiliate) and my iPod isn't happy with the supposed update to its software. Then again, my iPod wasn't happy with the shuffle update, either, but that worked itself out after a few tries.

this week's assortment

Here I am, along with the other thousands of former law students dragging themselves toward the California bar exam. Twenty-nine days 'til Day One. In the meantime:

++ Still listening to Arlo Guthrie's "City of New Orleans." It's oddly comforting. I found myself singing it on the way to my Saturday BarBri session. The next UCLALive season will feature a performance by Guthrie, so if the commerce gods are good to us, we might be singing along, in person, with Arlo come November.
++ Also listening to:
1. La Divina, which amounts to a Maria Callas greatest hits album. I've noticed that even the power of La Callas doesn't put a dent in the din that is the BarBri classroom during break time. I guess that fad of teaching children to use their "inside voice" didn't work so well with this group. Yow.
2. The soundtrack from Amelie. No, Yann Tiersen's new album is still not available on the U.S. version of iTunes.
3. In bits and pieces, La Wally (Catalani).
++ I'm finally reading The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby. It's a perfect book for this time because the chapters (his month-by-month reading notes) are short and easy to dip into and enjoy. Just the right thing for a little break, after the U.C.C. or recording statutes have made my head whirl.
++ And when I'm feeling discouraged, a few pages from Paul Arden's It's Not How Good You Are, It's How Good You Want To Be can reset my tone.
++ Wallace is shedding up a furstorm, so vacuuming has been elevated from a regular chore to a hazmat duty. Thank heavens for the Dyson.

an assortment

++ Jon Katz on the possibility that holistic veterinary medicine might have a place alongside traditional treatments.
++ How long does that last? I love these kinds of lists: this one courtesy of Real Simple magazine.
++ Living in our area means that one lives near people who have Variety delivered to their homes or offices. (My dentist gets it delivered daily and always has the last seven issues in a tidy rack in the waiting room, to the exclusion of typical waiting room reading fare. So L.A., no?) Anyway, the point is that this is Variety's centennial year, and NPR had a nice little feature about Variety-speak, which is the vocabulary that makes reading the headlines and articles a little cryptic until you get the hang of it. The list of "slanguage" is available on the Variety web site, for those of you who'd like to pepper your speech with a few words from the Coast.
++ Why is there a "fertile octogenarian" rule in real property? Sure, men can become parents after their seventh decade, but the rule applies equally to women when assessing whether or not a future interest is valid. Perhaps this will be a reality some day, but in the meantime, it's the perfect example of those legal fictions that can make studying the law a counterintuitive process.
++ Among the Bar study additions to the iTunes music library:
1. Arlo Guthrie, "City of New Orleans": Love the way he sings "Kan-ka-kee." I was just telling Terrence about a very clear memory I have of Larry Lujack (WLS, AM 89 in Chicago) playing this repeatedly one morning on the way to school, just to hear the same thing. Uncle Lar' must've played it four times until my mom had enough.
2. Willie Nelson, "Georgia on My Mind": IMHO, to sing this song well, a singer needs to have a voice that reflects life's travels, and Willie Nelson's fits the bill.
3. Israel Kamakawiwo'ole, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow": For me, there's Judy Garland's version, and this one.
4. Yaz: a few tunes from Upstairs at Eric's: Yeah, I know, '80s flashback, but sometimes the music of our youth is a good tonic. This was a big album the summer I went to Greece and Italy, and I remember riding the bus on the way to Delphi, looking out at the craggy hills and olive trees, and this was playing on my Walkman.
5. Billy Squier, "In the Dark": We all have our guilty musical pleasures. This, plus a few Def Leppard songs and "Twilight Zone" by Golden Earring are some of mine. Don't laugh: You have yours, I know you do.

Mr. Doody had pronounced the CD collection that Terrence and I have as uncategorizable. Or was that uncharacterizable? Or maybe he could categorize some of it, but the rest was too much for him (and that's saying something). We'll see what he says about my iTunes library on his next visit...in the meantime, back to Real Property and Con Law, this afternoon's subjects for review. Break over!

returning to chicago

I have no quibble with people who are happy about moving to Chicago--bless 'em!--but I thought this tidbit in the Chicago Tribune's article about the actor Vince Vaughn was too much:

Even though he was raised in Buffalo Grove and Lake Forest, Vaughn's parents didn't shield him from city living. They would visit museums, go to Bears games, and when Vaughn expressed an interest in boxing as a teenager, his dad found him a gym in Portage Park.

future technogeek content

will probably look more like this: the Stanford U. commencement address by Steve Jobs. (No, this doesn't mean to suggest that my posts will sound like Steve Jobs' commencement speech, only that they'll probably be links to things of this sort, rather than things like this, which I can barely fathom.)

the quasi-marital blog

Terrence has started posting to the talblog, his own blog devoted to code, design, and Los Angeles. It's not really a sister-blog (or brother-blog) to talbotlucas.org--I think it would be a little peculiar to use sibling references even in this context. It's more like...a quasi-marital blog. I'm thinking of our blogs as the blogging equivalent of a shared bathroom vanity with two sinks.

Terrence and his partner-in-code, Dan Wood, have also sprung the hatch on Sandvox, their latest (very nifty) application that will be available to the masses in the coming months. Not all has been revealed, but check out the available information at the Karelia Software site.

bar review with...pete seeger and arlo guthrie

I've chosen my theme for bar exam review: "Garden Song" by Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie, specifically the version that's on the live album Precious Friend. Arlo Guthrie has this great audience participation exercise in which everyone learns the lyrics to the song. I can't do justice to Guthrie's style or voice (or teaching style)--you'll have to listen to this version for yourself. But I was struck by the fact that the idea applies to gardening as well as to preparation of bar subject flash cards. The refrain's official lyrics are:

Inch by inch
row by row
gonna make this garden grow
gonna mulch it deep and low
gonna make it fertile ground.

Inch by inch
row by row
please bless these seeds I sow
please keep them safe below
til the rain comes tumb'lin down

Rule by rule
card by card
gonna make this much less hard
gonna cram this in my brain
gotta take the bar exam.

Rule by rule
card by card
don't let my brain grow hard
and please keep it free of lard
'til the test is over and done.

penguins!

The little girl who loved all the animal articles in National Geographic, especially those about aquatic creatures, is alive and well, and has already watched this trailer multiple times since discovering it earlier this evening. I know there are many movies in our viewing queue (luckily some have been TiVoed [TiVo'd? TiVod?] from pay-per-view and can wait a while) but March of the Penguins should get to jump the line. Even Terrence, who is not a fan of birds, thinks penguins are worth watching.

I hope what I've heard about bad voice-overs and a not-so-great soundtrack aren't true of the U.S. release, but I'll risk it and see it anyway. I'm a sucker for this kind of film. I may even have to get popcorn, and extra napkins to dry all the salty tears I'll cry watching the penguins trudge across the Antarctic.