talbotlucas.org: a word to the wise is sufficient

heading to pasadena

I'll be heading toward Pasadena, the location of my bar exam testing center, in just a little while. Hold a good thought, y'all.

I haven't been typing much here in recent days--too much to do on other fronts--but postings will resume as soon as I've recovered from the next few days. With the help of friends, sunny weather, a few bottles of wine we've been holding, and some cheese wonders from The Cheese Store the recovery process shouldn't take too long.

Results aren't published until November, so no questions until then. And maybe even then.

not so prescient?

I'm sorry; I can't resist this one. From today's "Daily Dish" on the SFGate site:

Troubled pop star Michael Jackson was sued Monday by the Prescient Acquisition Group, after the singer failed to pay them $48 million in fees for recovering his stake in publishing rights for the Beatles' back catalogue....The company claimed it was entitled to an immediate payment of $24.8 million--9 percent of the funds used to pay off the Bank of America debt and a $3.3 million advance to Jackson and his company MJ Publishing.

A typical definition of "prescient" is having knowledge of an event before it occurs...so it's ironic that the Prescient Acquisition Group now has to pursue a bad client. Shouldn't they have known they'd run into trouble on this deal?

Do you think they get these sorts of jokes all the time? Perhaps they do and they're not angry, because they anticipated them. Or not.

This is the kind of thing that strikes me as funny as I review Corporations for the bar exam...

cooking for the wrong reasons

I read the article in Sunday's New York Times about "meth orphans"--those children who are now in the foster care system because their parents were/are addicted to methamphetamine. The article caught my eye for two reasons, really. Terrence was at an out-of-state Target store and noticed that on the shelves, in place of many of the cold medications, there were little tags that you could take to the pharmacist to redeem for the actual product. This is because pseudoephedrine is a key component in methamphetamine manufacture, so many states are restricting the sale of any OTC cold medication that contains it. So my attention was heightened.

The second reason was that I can't fathom why anyone would ingest a drug that may have been cooked on someone's stove and made from a combination of pseudoephedrine and "common fertilizers, solvents, or battery acid." Battery acid? Solvents? Fertilizers? Weren't these all the things my parents used to treat as POISON and keep out of my reach (and the dog's reach) when I was younger? This boggles my mind.

My awareness was also heightened because The New Yorker recently featured an article about meth use among members of the gay community in San Francisco, and its devastating effects. It struck me as a sad state of affairs, even though the article dealt with adults, not children suffering the effects of an adult's poor choices.

But after reading the Times piece another thought struck me. The article describes a scene in which the parents "...cook these chemicals in the kitchen....They're on the couch watching their stuff cook, and the kids are on the floor watching them." Meth use has become a huge problem across many disparate communities. It's one thing, in my mind, if adults choose to use a drug for their own sexual/emotional pleasures, but I was saddened to think that for many parents, it's more desirable to cook up a batch of meth than a square meal for their family.

Cooking used to be something that was part of home life. Part of being a family. Now, for many people, cooking has some sort of elitist aura. Somehow it's become, in their eyes, an expensive hobby, or something snobbish, too difficult, or too time-consuming, or not really important because there are so many other options available for filling the stomach. And yet cooking is so much more, or can be so much more, particularly when family is involved. This is one of the reasons I became so interested in the Slow Food movement, and why I'm so supportive of the work that Alice Waters is doing through her Edible Schoolyard and Delicious Revolution initiatives.

My memories of our Chicago kitchen are the fantastic wood-and-glass cabinets that used to hang on the walls when I was a child, and of the huge white Universal stove that dominated the room; of lasagne and chili and paprika steak with mashed potatoes, or the smell of crepes in the morning. Of pineapple upside-down cake and so many cookies at Christmastime that sometimes we'd lose track of a tin. In many ways, the kitchen table was the center of the house: it was where my father read the paper, where meals (and the occasional sardine-and-fig newton snacks) were served, and where announcements were made. It was also where most arguments took place and l-o-n-g lectures were delivered, but if memory serves it was also where the resulting wounds were healed over cups of coffee and more l-o-n-g conversations.

With all that in my memory bank, it's sad to think that for some people, the outstanding memory of their childhood kitchen will be that it was the place where the drugs were cooked.

No great insight here, just my observations.

another eco zinger

One of the books that is on my to purchase/to read list after the Bar exam is Umberto Eco's latest, The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana. It's not something I can get into now, before the exam, but in the meantime I can be amused by some of the reviews on the blogs I read, such as this one from Crescat Sententia.

The best line: "[Eco] came to speak in D.C. recently and somebody complained that his books were very difficult. His reply: 'Yes, but I write for masochists.'"

Ah...well, yes. Hmm.

migraine research

New reports indicate there may be a link between certain types of sinus/nasal conditions and migraine. The BBC features a summary of the news.

zabar media alert

Wallace may live a corgi-trot away from Hollywood, but his half-brother, Zabar, is the star of the family. We were proud to note Zabar's appearance on The Today Show last year, and now he's been featured (along with his owner, Daphna) in Sports Illustrated along with his AKC friends (canine and human). He's one handsome corgi--his smile lights up the photo.

eighteen days...

Do I need more incentive?

eighteen days until the start of the bar exam,
which covers fourteen subjects
addressed over three days, broken out into:
six one-hour essays;
two three-hour performance tests; and
two hundred multistate questions over six hours.

Back to torts...

penguins at the box office

Ha! We here at talbotlucas.org feel vindicated. It's a lovely feeling. And it's not often that my preferences are reflected in box office data.

Then this: The box office champ was March of the Penguins, at least from one point of view. According to an article in today's Los Angeles Times (free registration required*), "[o]n a per-screen basis, ticket sales for "March of the Penguins" were far more than for any other movie, $26,269, compared with $19,719 for the overall box-office champ, "War of the Worlds." Tee hee hee. After all the media attention about one of the stars of one of the aforementioned movies, I would like to think that this is a small sign that at least some of the moviegoing public has made a choice...and chose penguins.

Don't get me wrong: I'm under no delusions that the penguins are going to top the nationwide box office, or that the movie is really pulling people out of the queue for War of the Worlds. But the numbers are nice, yes? And maybe there are a few other people out there, like me, who would rather watch the annual trek of penguins to their breeding ground than watch aliens emerging from the bowels of the earth to annihilate the human race.

And if my recent moviegoing experience is any indication, the volume on these action movies is WAY out of proportion. Either that or everyone else is becoming hard of hearing and so the volume needs to be that high for most of the audience. I just can't bear going to a movie theatre and feeling the sound in my bones. Literally. This happened to be not long ago. I could feel the sound in my ribs, and it was not pleasant. But that's a topic for another post. Right now, I'm going to be happy about the penguins.

* If you're already registered on the Chicago Tribune site, the same name/password works for the Los Angeles Times. Same ownership, same registration system.

nan kempner, r.i.p.

One of the so-called "social x-rays" and one of the most ardent supporters (and wearers) of haute couture, Nan Kempner died on Sunday.

A devotee of Yves Saint Laurent and a woman who seemed to have achieved the goal of always being camera-ready, Nan Kempner was singled out by Diana Vreeland as the one exception to Vreeland's view that there was no such thing as a chic American woman. This snippet (from a salon.com piece on YSL) reflects Kempner's enthusiastic admiration for YSL and the craftsmanship of haute couture, and her joie de vivre:

The most famous story about Saint Laurent's trousers and the stir they caused is the one about the evening sometime in the late '60s when socialite Nan Kempner (who has been a vocally enthusiastic Saint Laurent client for nearly all the 40 years of his career) stepped into a tony Manhattan restaurant [supposedly La Cote Basque - L.] wearing one of Saint Laurent's remarkable trouser suits, only to be told that women in trousers (I'll bet anything the hostess actually used the word "slacks") were not allowed. Kempner stepped out of the pants and strode into the restaurant wearing only the jacket. [Kempner supposedly took her seat and dined with her husband, with her only concession being an extra napkin on her lap. -L.] Many years later, giving a lecture on couture at New York University, Kempner wanted to make sure people understood the degree of workmanship that went into a completely handmade couture garment (which can take hundreds of hours to make, and tens of thousands of dollars to buy): She slipped out of her Saint Laurent skirt and jacket and passed them around the room. (Her Saint Laurent blouse stayed on.)

Her father supposedly told her at a young age that "You'll never make it on your face, so you'd better be interesting." Nowadays such a comment would probably engender years of therapy, but Nan Kempner seemed to have taken the advice to heart, to her (and many others') benefit. (Interesting that Diana Vreeland was described as having "the profile of a cigar store Indian" but that never stopped her from putting her best foot forward, and becoming one of the most sought-out guests in circles around the globe. But I digress...)

For more reading, there was a "Day in the Life" piece about Kempner in the SF Chronicle last year. Kempner was also the subject of a profile by Bob Colacello in the April 2005 issue of Vanity Fair.

the fourth of july entry

Here 'tis, again. A few historical details to recall on this Fourth of July holiday. Thanks again to Mr. Miller for the original message.

HuffPost entries of note

The Huffington Post has been a mixed bag for me, but there were three posts of interest:

++ Geoffrey Stone of the University of Chicago Law School has an interesting, concise post regarding the Judith Miller/Matthew Cooper First Amendment hoo-ha. Many reporters and commentators have been addressing this issue as if there's an unqualified privilege for reporters and their sources, and that Miller and Cooper are being put through the legal wringer for no good reason. I think Prof. Stone's piece speaks to this sentiment, and provides a tidy overview of the law on this point.

++ Two posts on migraines--their pain and the pain of getting emergency treatment for them: from the migraineur's perspective, and her husband's perspective. Because of the wise recommendation of a good friend of mine, and in consultation with my own doctor, I've been caffeine-free since October 17, 2004 (yes, I remember the date, and still swoon when I smell a really fresh cup of good coffee). Caffeine is known to contribute to rebound headaches, particularly in combination with headache medications (both prescription and over-the-counter ones), and though I put off the decision as long as possible it just had to go. I've become more aware of hormonal shifts and what dietary changes I need to make when those shifts are approaching or occuring. And I've had great success with Amerge, one of the triptans mentioned in Bree Walker's piece (linked above). To people who find that Imitrex doesn't quite do what it used to, Amerge can be a lifesaver.

the first hispanic justice?

In the wake of Sandra Day O'Connor's announcement of her resignation from the Court, I read this on slate.com about potential nominees:

Other names that float in the ether include the more reliably conservative Emilio Garza of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals and Miguel Estrada, who is currently waiting to hear whether he's won a seat on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. [Correction: Nov. 26, 2002: A shout-out to the fact-checking behemoth that is our Fray, specifically to ShilohGun, first to point out that I was mistaken in parroting the oft-repeated claim that President Bush wants to appoint the "first Hispanic justice" to the high court. There's already been one: Benjamin Nathan Cardozo, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court from 1932-1938. Cardozo--of Portuguese-Jewish descent--may well have been the first Hispanic justice, depending on who you consult; some Hispanic organizations classify Portuguese-Americans as Hispanic, and many others do not.]

I have really, really serious doubts that Benjamin Cardozo would have described himself as "Hispanic." I wonder what percentage of people who would describe themselves as being Sephardic Jews would also describe themselves as Hispanic. I'm going to have to reread portions of Andrew Kaufman's Cardozo biography to gather more info.

I guess the bottom-line question is this: Do we call someone Hispanic (or insert another ethnic or cultural descriptor here) even if the person himself wouldn't have done so?

If you want more amusing tidbits related to O'Connor's departure from the Court, Underneath Their Robes, the Article III Groupie's blog, is a much better source than Slate.

Back to (bar prep) work: I've finished three essays this morning and am doing a practice performance test for three hours this afternoon. And if I want to make my start time, I'd better stop typing and eat lunch...now.