Miscellaneous

I'm not sure how to categorize

Posted on May 04, 2008
I'm not sure how to categorize this. Don't read it if your laughing will disturb anyone.

When I saw this picture on the

Posted on May 02, 2008
When I saw this picture on the front page of the NYTimes Arts section today I knew I was lost. The trailer was great, but great trailers for comic book movies don't always mean that I'm there for the opening night-- sometimes I want to share the experience with my daughters, sometimes I'm traveling and my faithless family sees the movie without me-- what I'm saying is, circumstances can intervene, but for "Iron Man" I was going to be there...

I should get back to writing something

Posted on April 29, 2008
I should get back to writing something about the Law sometime. Would it count if I complained about the single-spaced papers I got the other day? What about if I added that the author of these papers turns out to be one of those people who put things between quotation marks for emphasis? Don't you "hate" that? On top of that, this character is one of those people who never learned the rule about "its"...

Dylan's Greenwich Village time

Posted on April 28, 2008
Dylan's Greenwich Village time is probably the most over-documented phase of his career, but I'm interested to read what Suze Rotolo has to say about it. She has kept her silence well, and if she wants to write about Dylan now, some fifty years on, well it hardly seems as though she is taking advantage of a long-ago lover

To access this complete feed in the blog feed reader login or register for free.

Although I haven't made a dedicated

Posted on April 23, 2008
Although I haven't made a dedicated point of it the way Buffalo Pundit once did, I find that I have directed my share of snark at Buffalo News columnist Mary Kunz Goldman. The other day Pundit reported that she is now blogging, and that her site is "well written and funny, and well worth the addition to the blogroll"...

The smart money for the over-under

Posted on April 23, 2008
The smart money for the over-under at Lawyers, Guns & Money was 8 percentage points. I was in the car when the polls closed in Pennsylvania, and when I heard that the turnout favored women, I was glad I hadn't followed my gut and taken the under. HRC attracts a motivated group, there's just no getting around it...

And speaking of the music biz,

Posted on April 13, 2008
And speaking of the music biz, it is early days yet, but a contender for my Personal Hit Single of the summer is Duffy's "Mercy". (There's a fun video here.) This is the kind of thing, it seems to me, that it takes a label to break, and I'm fine with that...

Interesting article on the changed

Posted on April 12, 2008
Interesting article on the changed business model for popular music. Older acts are the big concert attractions, and touring is where the money is. This has probably been true for jazz musicians for a couple of generations, of course, and is probably more true than ever for jazz, but it's a reality for rock too, and it's the "heritage acts" that are cashing in...

Chief Judge Judith Kaye and her

Posted on April 11, 2008
Chief Judge Judith Kaye and her judge pals are suing the State of New York over judicial salaries. You know what? Nobody puts a gun to your head and makes you become a judge. In fact, it goes the other way: when someone wants to become a judge, that person goes around to all of his or her friends and asks them for money...

I've been liberal in my praise

Posted on April 10, 2008
I've been liberal in my praise of Ron Rosenbaum in the past, and I was sorry when he and the New York Observer parted ways. He is a versatile journalist, and a spellbinding Dylanologist, and the every-other-week format of his Observer column, "The Edgy Enthusiast" was perfect for him, and if he occasionally lapsed into a piece about his cat, well, it happens to everyone, I suppose...

Since I have just been informed

Posted on April 08, 2008
Since I have just been informed that I came in dead last in the NCAA Pool I was in (picks and analysis here), I am pleased that my abilities as a prognosticator have been somewhat validated by the announcement that Bob Dylan has been honored with a Pulitzer Prize.

The hilarious part about a McCain-Rice

Posted on April 07, 2008
The hilarious part about a McCain-Rice ticket is that it would make sense in terms of their policy goals. Those policies are demonstrably disastrous, and unpopular to boot, but that really wouldn't be the point, would it? It seems to me that the notion that this tandem would have cross-over racial appeal is off the mark, although I suppose if HRC somehow got the nomination she'd really only have one option to fill out her ticket...

What does it tell us that the presumptive

Posted on April 06, 2008
What does it tell us that the presumptive Republican nominee for President graduated at the bottom of his class? I mean, I suppose it all has something to do with normal bell distributions, maybe, although it seems to me that fifth from the bottom is pretty far down the curve...

In 1892 Cincinnati Reds pitcher

Posted on April 05, 2008
In 1892 Cincinnati Reds pitcher Bumpus Jones threw a no-hitter in his major league debut. (I'd be willing to bet that contemporary accounts would have said he "twirled" it). I just mention it because Bumpus Jones is such a great name.

I'm in the process of finalizing

Posted on April 04, 2008
I'm in the process of finalizing papers in a case that has been unusually contentious. This may be because I'm a jerk, but I think actually that it is because my adversary is a sociopath. We'd had something together about ten years ago, but my partner had done most of the work on the thing and I didn't really get the full brunt of his personality...

Decent deli is an endangered cuisine.

Posted on April 03, 2008
Decent deli is an endangered cuisine. Even in New York there are really only about a half dozen places that do it right. You can't always get to Katz's; the Carnegie is always jammed, and is a bit of a tourist trap (and expensive). Juniors would be great if it was in Buffalo...

I don't necessarily hold with the

Posted on April 02, 2008
I don't necessarily hold with the notion that it is a senator's job to bring home a lot of taxpayer-supported projects-- I'd be fine with senators that voted against stupid, mendacious wars, and worked to make sure we have a quality judiciary and justice system...

I like Jeffrey Steingarten's pizza

Posted on April 01, 2008
I like Jeffrey Steingarten's pizza recipe, but it is a very difficult dough to work with, so I don't make it as often as I'd like. This recipe, while not quite as yeasty, produces a dough that is far less wet, and a lot easier to control, while still yielding an admirably thin crust...

Of the 2000 Presidential election

Posted on March 31, 2008
Of the 2000 Presidential election it has been said that the margin of error exceeded the margin of victory-- an interesting thing, since what it means is that the ability to accurately count the votes cast was too complex for our existing computational methodologies...

Judged a couple of moot court rounds

Posted on March 29, 2008
Judged a couple of moot court rounds this morning, this time the Herbert Wechsler National Criminal Law Moot Court competition. I like the inter-scholastic moot court competitions because the level of advocacy is strong, and because it is interesting to see how other law schools approach it...

I put AI on the Netflix queue because

Posted on March 28, 2008
I put AI on the Netflix queue because LCA and A were going out of town, and I though it would be funny to have a movie about robots arrive so I could listen to them complain. I complain when they get movies that don't have robots, so this would be perfect...

As we pulled in front of our house

Posted on March 27, 2008
As we pulled in front of our house last night we saw Southtowns congressman Brian Higgins drive by in a big ol' SUV. "Now we know what his energy policy is," A. said.

Jonah Keri is doing a series on

Posted on March 26, 2008
Jonah Keri is doing a series on failed dynasties. His piece on the '86 Mets captures exactly what is was like to be in the stands from '83 on, watching as it came together, then watching as it came apart. Those Mets were so good that the pieces that were traded away went on to bring championships for a lot of other clubs: Rick Aguilera, Lenny Dykstra, David Cone (acquired in '87...

The founder of Popeyes, my favorite

Posted on March 25, 2008
The founder of Popeyes, my favorite fast food chain has died. Popeyes red beans and rice are a wonderful thing, and unlike a lot of fast food the portion is exactly right. Come to find out that he named the restaurant for Popeye Doyle, the hero of "The French Connection...

Here's a good example of why John

Posted on March 25, 2008
Here's a good example of why John Kerry is useless. Four years ago it was widely reported that he had reached out to John McCain as a potential running mate. the story appears to be true-- even McCain says he was approached, but he now denies that he was interested...

You know what might be useful?

Posted on March 24, 2008
You know what might be useful? I propose that the media start reporting the total number of casualties in Iraq, not just the number of US military personnel killed. I realize that there are epidemiological issues presented by this, and I certainly realize that the number of US casualties is a horrifying number, but it is well past time for us to be candid about the cost in lives that this obscene war has incurred...

I like the fact that Obama invoked

Posted on March 22, 2008
I like the fact that Obama invoked my favorite fictional lawyer in his speech on race. Gavin Stevens is a complicated man. He's been out of Yoknapatawpha County, and is frequently scorned by its denizens, but he is an honorable cat, dependable, and forthright...

A couple of weeks ago LCA and I

Posted on March 21, 2008
A couple of weeks ago LCA and I scoured the shoe stores of WNY looking for a pair of red Chuck Taylors. I forget when I bought my pair-- it must have been sometime in the late 80's. Even then they were not really sports shoes. You'd cripple yourself playing hoops wearing them...

The morning jock on WFUV said something

Posted on March 19, 2008
The morning jock on WFUV said something inexcusably stupid, so I switched over to WKCR and caught Phil Schaap's "Birdflight". I guess Schaap makes some people crazy, but I think his show is cool-- a good example of the sort of thing public radio used to do, and now really never does...

Slate is marking the 5th Anniversary

Posted on March 17, 2008
Slate is marking the 5th Anniversary of the Iraq War by having columnists write pieces on the theme "How Did I Get It Wrong". Count on it, nobody is going to say, "It was a stupid idea. I'm sorry." Nobody will say, "I now realize that we had no business invading a sovereign nation with no provocation...

Bloggers, promote your law blog by nominating your blog for inclusion in USLaw.com's Law Blog Directory and RSS Reader. Benefits described.