All my love to the bus riding hellraisers

A few months ago, I heard about a site online, I can't remember what it's called, like "quiz for people who don't know what to do with themselves" or something. So of course I went there. It asks a bunch of questions about what kind of place you want to live in (fuck no, cold is not OK by me, I don't care about nightlife and there had better be some trees and stuff around) and it gives you places that match up. My number one place, even after changing a couple of maybes, was in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Now, I have never been to Louisiana. I tried to volunteer twice to go down to do free legal work after Hurricane Katrina but the organization couldn't get their shit together enough to find me a placement at all the second time, or the first time until 2 weeks before school started, which I'd give them a break for but the organization wasn't based in Louisana and should have had it together a little more. All I asked for was a building to sleep in once I got there, was that really asking for so much?
At any rate, I had an open mind about Louisiana pretty much until I started reading about this crap going on in Jena. What the fuck year is this? Nooses in a tree? White kids getting away with beating up and terrorizing black kids, but black kids being charged with attempted murder when they fight back? I am completely serious when I ask: What the FUCK?

What disturbs me almost as much as the behavior is that the law is signing off on it. The law is a very powerful tool and to quote Spiderman, (it's been a long time since I was an English major, give me a break) "with great power comes great responsibility." We're not just talking about swinging around on webs here, folks, we're talking about the power to ruin people's lives. I guess I'm still an idealistic student, but I think that those of us with the law in our hands are just plan morally required to do the right thing, even if some of us are prejudiced assholes.

Our school sent buses and I feel pretty crappy about not riding down to the protest. I was trying to arrange things so I could go when I realized that the school had an attorney on call and my semi redneck ass very well might get pissed off and arrested, which is not something I need to explain to the bar, since, as we've already discussed, I have my misspent youth and 20s and half of my misspent 30's (I learn slow) to explain already. Really though, that's no excuse and I still feel like a bum. However, here's to you thousands of people who did go down there and raise some hell on behalf of doing the right thing. People heard you and even if you didn't change much, at least you let those fuckers know what the rest of us think of them. Thanks.


---------To learn more about the events in Louisana, go to: http://www.colorofchange.org/

Sniff*

So I went to a dinner party at my oldest and dearest friend's house this weekend. Her boyfriend came out with a long stemmed rose and a ring and got one one knee and proposed. He even waited until after dinner so nobody cried in their raspberry tarts. Sniff! What a great guy. His teenage kids came out with him carrying roses too, which I thought was the act of a good father. It was totally cool.

It isn't just that she's getting married, though. It's that I've known her for 20 years and haven't approved of a single one of the bumbling idiots she's dated in all this time until him. Now granted, this guy actually mentioned burps and farts in his proposal, but I have to hand it to him, he pulled it off and still had almost every girl there sniffing. He also beats out all of her ex boyfriends, for starters, because he's employed and self supporting. That's a good thing in a mate, says the broke ass law student whose girlfriend has to buy the groceries. But I am cute. I don't think I could pull off talking about burps and farts in a proposal though, so my hat's off to Phil.

Now one of the things that is interesting is that all the girls there were sniffing except my girlfriend. "Sigh, I'm not a girl" she said when we talked about it later. It's funny because everyone thinks I'm 'the guy', I guess because I like to work on cars and am almost never seen in a skirt. Some lesbians are that simple. Neither of us are, though. She wears skirts and won't cry at a wedding proposal. I get lost and dreamy in the Sears tools department and am totally excited about shopping for a cool maid of honor dress, since my friend said I can wear what I want and I am going to look absolutely fabulous in something emerald green and not TOO slinky. I change clothes four times before I go out and wear lacy underwear but still show up in hiking shoes and a t shirt. My girlfriend has long hair and pretty eyes but bless her heart, she's got the decorating sense of a 14 year old boy. Umm, the list goes on.

It works, though. The question is, if we are going to have a committment ceremony - (since we're not allowed to get married, a legal contract any drunk 'ho and coke dealer can make at a moment's notice in Las Vegas then dissolve when the drugs run out), who will propose? And would she know to show up with a long-handled ratchet and a ring with inset stones so I won't knock them off in an exhaust manifold? Would I be pissed if she says "yeah, sure" and doesn't cry? (You're damn right I would!) Would I be able to find a fabulous dress and make her wear one too, when I'm sure she doesn't really want to? Could we get Phil to be ordained online at the Holy Drive through Jesus Barn of Apostolic Lambs and do the ceremony and work in 'burp' and 'fart'? So many questions, so much time since we'd be doing it for the hell of it anyway (fuck you, Republicans!) but at least one thing I do know, my pal found a good one, and I couldn't be happier. Three cheers for love, folks, and for things that make your chick friends cry.

The Wizard of Bar

I saw this movie once, "Clean and Sober" with Michael Keaton, who is probably neither, but that's beside the point. He plays this alcoholic guy who is getting his life together and there is a set of scenes where he's arduously writing down all of his past wrongs and, running out of breath, reading the extensive list to his sponsor. Filling out your bar application is like this. They want everything down to the spitball incident in third grade. There are all these cloaked suggestions that they will find out about the spitball incident and every other wrong thing you've ever done and you'd better have written it down, too.

And now, to completely mix metaphors and movies, having written down all of your wrongs and read them out Michael Keaton style - who, dammit, was NOT a good Batman!! - the whole application process starts to look like going to see the wizard. Switch channels with me, folks. We're all kicking around our dirt farms in Kansas or Wilmington or whatever and got swept up in this idea of going to law school and next thing we knew, were following what seemed to be the yellow brick road of law school, reading cases about the guy with no heart and defending the scared lion in a mock trial, assuming the yellow bricks were gold which we'd pick up with these phat jobs at the end of the road, meanwhile sweaty and exhausted and living off of corn chips with the wicked witches of exams harassing us. But then, at the end, haha! You have to go before what seem to be these cloaked figures with mind reading powers who can mine all of your secrets and imply they will find out absolutely everything because they are the wizards and are secretly hooked up with the FBI. Whoa! Where is my dirt farm? Well, either you get a pass and then get to sit for the bar, a mental obstacle course fraught with swamps of reason then go wherever you can get a job writing memos in a corner 80 hours per week, or (b) you get dragged before a hearing, which means you have to ask your friends to come vouch for you, but that you have to let your friends listen to you defend all the stupid, embarrassing things you've ever done, which means they'd beter be true friends, then either (a) or (b), you get kicked back to the dirt farm with an expensive degree unable to practice law because the wizard says you smell.

This, my dear fans, is called taking the bar. Look out, sports fans! (We've changed channels again, keep up!) Will she be able to jump the bar or fall on her ass? Only the wizard knows for sure! Now, those of you who haven't applied to law school yet, well, now you know. So take a close look at that dirt farm, man, because it might not be so bad.