raison

Not that things haven't tickled/enraged me in the past few...what's it been, months? (Although I do seem to have the rage under control for the most part. Now I'm amused by most things, in a cynical, snickering sort of way.) So I entered law school; that's going well so far. It's not scary, contrary to all the horror stories I heard from veterans in the past few months, but the assignments are quite time-consuming. I'll try to write more about that later. For now, I'll just focus on the reason I'm writing this post: the 3% of the American population that has no opinion on the way things are going in this country, according to a recent CNN poll result.* What the hell's wrong with you people? I can't imagine what sort of passive, Zen-practicing souls would be so detached from or unaffected by world events as to not give a sh-t. Sure, the survey question provided no middle ground for people who may have been concerned but not angry, but still!!! It's not normal to be opinion-less in times like these. Heck, I even have opinions about people not having opinions. Maybe that's not healthy either.

Findings of this kind amaze me. An argument could be made that to the extent that this poll result reflects this 3%'s susceptibility to persuasion either way in matters other than questions of national import, they might make a perfect jury b/c they're essentially blank slates. To be frank, though, I've had serious concerns about the place of juries in our legal system for a while. I don't trust "the people," and I sure as hell don't believe you can make a "reasonable person" by putting 12 random people in a room. The fact remains, however, that no one has been able to come up with a better alternative so far, so, perhaps much like democracy, the jury system is the worst system except for every other system.

* The question posed to those polled was: "Would you say you are generally content with the way things are going in the country today, or is there something you would say you are angry about?" 76 percent of the sample (1,004 adults) said they were "angry about something," while 21 percent said they were "generally content." Three percent had no opinion. See WaPo blog for more.

Two former prosecutors get busted for drug possession in Minnesota and the judge is so sympathetic he feels their humiliation constitutes adequate punishment. Oh you poor rich white things!! You don't deserve to do time or to have this show up on your record later--you ain't from the ghetto, and you ain't no amigo, if you catch my drift.
Read full story.

That same day, the U.S. Supreme Court renders a decision in a drug case which further strips 4th Amendment rights. Scalia, who wrote the majority opinion, is too worried about "the guilty defendants who go free when otherwise valid evidence is thrown out of court. He concluded that that 'social cost' is too high in relation to whatever additional privacy protection homeowners get from the 'knock and announce' rule."

What makes this coincidence so ironic (for me at least)? The judge in the Minnesota case "had thrown out the case in May 2005, saying that the information police had from an informant, an eight-time felon facing numerous potential felony charges, was insufficient to support the search warrant that uncovered evidence of cocaine use" in the defendants' home. (Oh, sure, when it comes to good middle-class people we care about the 4th Amendment and the exclusionary rule.) I know I'm comparing a local decision with a U.S. Supreme Court one, but humor me as I quote Scalia: "Resort to the massive remedy of suppression of evidence of guilt is unjustified."

No wonder the rest of the Western democratic world thinks we're a little nuts every time they look at our justice system.

So what's with the Iranians renaming Danish pastries BUT STILL EATING THEM!!! I was gonna write a lengthy post about how pissed I am over Muslims' violent and ridiculous reactions to the cartoons, but seeing there's little therapeutic value in that I'll let this suffice:

Danish pastry from a bakery in Tehran: 9,347 Iranian rials. Hating the Danes but acknowledging the infidels make irresistible confections: priceless.

I just bought books for next semester. Two hundred and eighty-nine frickin' dollars for 5 textbooks of average length. I could cry right now.

One of these books comes in a "package," which includes the hardcover textbook and an electronic response pad to be used in class for surveys and mini-quizzes, etc. I have a question for my professor: If you love technology so much, why don't you marry it? Don't get me wrong: I'm all for technology in the classroom, but it still hurts to pay for something that:

a) will be used 14 or fewer times;
b) can't be returned for more than 1/3 of its value at the U bookstore;
c) can't be returned anywhere but at the U bookstore.

I ran into a friend who works at the bookstore. She said there was someone there earlier today who spent $750 on books and school supplies. That was her Christmas present from her parents. Why don't I have parents like that?

Actually, I shouldn't say that. My mom has offered to pay for what I can't cover, but I feel bad asking her for money. I've paid my way through school for the past five years without incurring loans or accepting any monetary assistance from my family (I do live with them without paying rent, though). I'd hate to be like "Hey, give me some money" during my last semester.

I'm gonna return my books in two weeks—by then these same books would have arrived via ebay at more reasonable prices. But I still have to pay tuition by February 15. Don't know how that's gonna happen.

Why is it so darned expensive to get an education these days? What am I supposed to do, sell a kidney or something?

On a slightly happier note, I turned 20 on Monday. My extended family had a bit of a blow-up when they started discussing my culinary skills (or the lack thereof). My grandmother came to my defense and asked my mom and aunts if they knew how to cook at 20. Bad move. My mom was like, "I would like a minute for rebuttal." It was funny that they were getting so worked up about it since I'm not the least bit ashamed of my ineptness in that area. OK maybe a little bit.

On top of everything else, I've fallen in love with Macs and now I want a Powerbook. Or even an iBook. And, of course, I can't afford one right now so that'll have to wait...what, 6-8 months?

Moral of the story: Send some money.

I had the weirdest dream last night. Here goes:

I had become a lawyer and lived with my mother. (Shut up.) For the past couple of days I had been noticing a strange-looking man (I'm talking partly burnt face) hanging around my driveway. It had been making me nervous. One day as I walked into the house he tried to follow me inside. I managed to shut the door in time to lock him outside. As I stood by the door panting, he broke the windows and came in. My mom had come out of an inside room by now. I was scared for both of our lives and fatally shot the guy either in the head or the chest.

Now I faced trial. Apparently I knew only one thing about criminal law: you can use deadly force to defend yourself against an intruder if you're inside your home. I was pretty sure I would be able to use this principle of self-defense to justify the killing. The prosecution, however, tried to make it look like I was a calculating murderer motivated by racial prejudice (the intruder was African American). The notion was ridiculous and an insult to me as a very progressive and egalitarian individual. A long legal battle ensued, where my attorney tried to prove through my impressive record of involvement in social justice activism, particularly on behalf of the African American community, that this was a case of pure self-defense—nothing more. I was very emotional and felt like a victim throughout the trial because, for one, I was being wrongly accused, and secondly, I believed—wrongly, as it turned out—that the jury—and most other people—would subconsciously want to find me guilty because I was a Muslim woman.

I was acquitted. When I returned to work at my big-name law firm, I was let go because even after the acquittal I was a huge PR liability. I cried a river—literally. Then, as I sat in a McDonald's moping and charting a course for the future—mostly moping—a group of 6-10 customers surrounded me. They recognized me because of the extensive media coverage of the trial and were very sympathetic. Their support revitalized me and I decided to make them the pioneers of my grassroots campaign for public office (can't remember what it was).

A rather slapdash mix of ideas from my Criminal Law class and TV shows Boston Legal and Supernatural (I do NOT watch that dumb show—I just happened to catch one episode), this dream was unbelievably cheesy and elaborate. Guess this is a sign I need to wean myself from the dumb machine for a while.

"Since the hotel bombings in Zarqawi's native Jordan, more and more Sunni Iraqis and Arabs have condemned the terrorist leader's nightmarish vision for their societies," writes Fawaz Gerges, a Lebanese-born professor of International Affairs and Middle Eastern Studies at Sarah Lawrence College. "Now that the holy warriors are waging their struggle in the heart of the Muslim community, or ummah -- in shopping centers, residential compounds, hotels and restaurants -- Muslims are getting a closer look at the terrorists' lack of respect for life, and most don't like what they see. Some of the protesters in Amman carried placards asking simply 'Why?' Why would Zarqawi target their country, where so many people had supported his jihad in Iraq? In a survey of more than 1,000 Jordanians conducted for the newspaper al-Ghad, more than 87 percent of the respondents said they now considered al Qaeda a terrorist organization. (In previous surveys in Jordan, al Qaeda had enjoyed approval ratings of upwards of 60 percent.) Other polls in Arab countries confirm this change of opinion."

Gerges characterizes this change of opinion as promising, and perhaps it is, but I can't help but be disgusted by the underlying logic: as long as Zarqawi kills other innocent people, he's a good guy fighting in the way of God, but when he kills "our people" we suddenly realize what he really is. How self-serving is that ideology?

At the workhouse, they had been trying for months to hire a full-time teacher who could help inmates study for their GED. Lord knows we need more than one full-time person for that, but they've finally found someone. It's a woman, probably Caucasian, although I'm not sure about that. They wanted a man, preferably of color, since the inmates (all male and mostly minorities) might have an easier time relating to him. (As it stands, the two existing full-time staff at the learning center are old white ladies, and the two volunteers/interns—myself included—are also women.)

The senior staffer made an announcement about the hire to inmates today. The first question: "Is it a woman?" Yes, we tried to find a male teacher but couldn't. Great, is she young? Excitement, glee.

I don't know what happened to me, but I swear I could've killed the guy with my bare hands in that moment.

You think I'm crazy. I'm not. I guess I've just reached the tipping point where if I hear one more man talk about women as if they were objects—things that existed primarily for their entertainment, I would lose it.

I'm not reading too much into this particular inmate's comments. You know how some men, when they talk to you, just have that look in their eyes. The smirk that conveys so much. The ones who act like they KNOW you like their flirtatious BS and therefore keep spewing it. That is exactly the kind of guy he is.

What is perhaps most nefarious about this is the fact that he's incarcerated and still thinks he can chat up a free woman. (I'll wait till my birthday next month to write about my concern over what I feel is my growing conservatism.) How many times do you need to ask someone if they're single? Why would you ask that in the first place? And over my dead body will I bring you a Qur'an from my home when there's one easily accessible in the jail's library, so stop asking me every time you see me.

I know their comments, questions, and the pieces of paper they hand you with their phone numbers and release dates written on them, mean nothing to them. But to me, it just accentuates the underlying culture that encourages men to see women as "easy" or desirous of their attention.

Maybe I'm not making any sense. I'm too angry to be articulate, and have been for a long time. Angry about society's expectations of and attitudes towards women. My sister and I went to buy a card for my cousin's 5th birthday, and the first one she picked out had a glittery picture of Cinderella on it. "Awwwwwwww," she said. Seeing the revulsion on my face, she tried to find something else. "It should at least have some glitter on it." What the ....??? I said our family needed to stop getting extremely girly things for her (which she has plenty of anyway—apparently all the family friends think alike too). "But she is a girl." I gave up. We got something pink.

In her 1995 documentary, Blue Eyed, Jane Elliott told a group of women in her study to stop "being cute," not in the physical sense, but in terms of behavior. It was blunt, but she was on to something. If you relied on media depictions alone you'd think every woman in America is a sucker for expensive jewelry and would like nothing better as a holiday present. And what's with giving women teddy bears as a token of affection? We're not kids! (I'm sure some women appreciate stuff like that and I don't mean to imply they're stuck at a low level of mental development. My beef is with the popular notions of all women being equally and unfailingly in love with things like this.)

Of course, we do ascribe agency to women when it comes to sexual norms. Remember how many times Lynndie England was called a slut for having a child out of wedlock? Did anyone refer to this sexual relationship in similar terms when discussing Charles Graner, the child's father? Were the portrayals of the two comparable?

Enough ranting. I may have lumped together several parallel but distinct issues, but I hope to get people to think more critically about the implicit messages that surround all of us like heat in a microwave. (Sorry; trying to be poetic here. Not really my thing.)

"The Month of Kindness is a University-wide event dedicated to spreading kindness throughout the community. The Month of Kindness will promote involvement in the University community by promoting events from a wide range of student and community organizations."

The nature of the events has given rise to two rival camps: those who participate and those who laugh at the people who participate. I am of the latter kind. Here are two examples of the activities they're doing:

November 29
Student-Athlete Date Auction, sponsored by the Student-Athlete Advisory Council
Bid to win a date with your favorite U of M sports stars! All proceeds from the date auction will be donated to the Red Cross to benefit Hurricane Katrina victims.

Apparently the only people more pathetic than the ones who came up with this idea would be those who actually participate in the auction. High school flashbacks!!

December 3
Kindness Protest, sponsored by Students Today, Leaders Forever
Check out the picture.

Seriously, what the hell are they protesting?

The Good

This hilarious case from my criminal law class:

Daniel Fransua and the victim were in a bar in Alburquerque. Fransua had been drinking heavily that day and the previous day. Sometime around 3:00 P.M., after an argument, Fransua told the victim he'd shoot him if he had a gun. The victim got up, walked out of the bar, went to his car, took out a loaded pistol, and went back in the bar. He came up to Fransua, laid the pistol on the bar, and said, "There's the gun. If you want to shoot me, go ahead." Fransua picked up the pistol, put the barrel next to the victim's head, and pulled the trigger, wounding him seriously.

State v. Fransua, 510 P.2d 106 (N.Mex.App. 1973)

How many times can you say "fight" before you start to sound like a broken record? Case in point: Senator Bill Frist on the nomination of Scalito: (each occurrence of the word fight is in boldface for the reader's convenience)

"If the Democrats look for a fight, we'll be there ready to fight," Frist said on the Fox News Channel. He said there would be "plenty of fodder for fights" in Alito's judicial record, "and we'll be ready to fight if we need to."

Frist added, "If it takes a fight on the floor of the United States Senate, people like Chuck Schumer and the Democrats are going to get that. The American people deserve fair up-or-down votes. . . . I hope it doesn't come to a filibuster. It should not; the American people deserve more."

Um... Senator, with all due respect, you must be living in some sort of drug-induced utopia if you think the American people enjoy up-or-down votes more than a good old fashioned fight, preferably with some alcohol and profanity thrown in. (Honestly, who here can bear to watch CSPAN for more than 45 seconds?) I'm all for fights: go at it!

My boss's boss seems to think that since we have a remote work relationship I would be interested in reading every email she writes, receives, or forwards. I'm a frickin' webmaster! Don't copy me on emails about who's ordering stationery featuring our new logo. I don't give a rat's ass! A reasonable reader might say, don't read the emails. It's not that simple. When you receive an email from a coworker, you're justified in making the assumption that you're receiving it because you need to know the information contained therein. Especially if every single one of those emails starts with "FYI." And that's not all. Given the nature of her work, she first sends an email about something that's about to happen. (From here on, these will be referred to as "heads-up" emails, as much as I now hate that term.) Then, when said event has occurred, she sends an email notifying all her poor recipients that--SURPRISE--said event has occurred! Finally, we all get an email about a news story that covered the event. Why, God, WHY???!!!

Anyway. Scooter Libby's indictment makes me feel all warm and gooey inside. It took him 85 days to finally be "comfortable" with waiving his right to confidentiality as a source while a principled journalist vicariously suffered in jail. May he rot in hell.

P.S. If anyone feels the new look of the blog is disgusting/hurts your eyes/you have a better idea, please feel free to share. I'll probably just laugh at you, but feedback is always good, even if for its comical value alone.

First, he tells the Washington Post:

"Leave the developing world aside; I think we are better than all of them. Bring the developed world and let us compare Pakistan's record, under me, a uniformed man, with many of the developed countries. I challenge that we will be better off."

Delusional. Then, when speaking of the Mukhtaran Mai case, he said:

"You must understand the environment in Pakistan. This has become a moneymaking concern. A lot of people say if you want to go abroad and get a visa for Canada or citizenship and be a millionaire, get yourself raped."

Very, very stupid. I think when he says "a lot of people" he's referring to himself. Protests ensued, both in Pakistan and abroad. Musharraf recanted:

"Let me say with total sincerity that I never said that and it has been misquoted," Musharraf said while addressing a gathering of women in New York.

"These are not my words and I would go to the extent of saying I am not so silly and stupid to make comments of this sort," he said in remarks to the forum recorded by private Pakistani television channel Geo.

As it turns out, he is so silly and stupid to make comments of this sort. Washington Post proved this using a tape recording of his interview. They even got a little vengeful and disclosed some more damaging parts of the interview not initially reported:

In the interview, Musharraf said that he is "on the side of women" but that Pakistan is being unfairly "singled out when this curse is happening everywhere in the world." Speaking of another high-profile rape case, he said that he had arranged for a visa and for $50,000 to be given to Shazia Khalid -- a Pakistani medical doctor who was raped by a masked intruder, allegedly an army officer -- so she could leave the country. Khalid has applied for asylum in Canada.

Then, as the reporters prepared to move to the next question, Musharraf interjected the comments about rape as a moneymaking concern, saying it was the "popular term" in Islamabad.

"It is the easiest way of doing it," he continued. "Every second person now wants to come up and get all the [pause] because there is so much of finances. Dr. Shazia, I don't know. But maybe she's a case of money, that she wants to make money. She is again talking all against Pakistan, against whatever we've done. But I know what the realities are."

Is the guy sick? A woman would get herself raped/gang-raped—in Pakistan, of all places—so she can move to Canada? WTF!? And then he talks about trying to protect Pakistan's global image. Son of a #$?@%! Hang the f*ing bastard!

What a bad idea (when combined with a full-time class load). I have enough coffee in me right now that, were it alcohol, my BAC would be somewhere around .20. Tomorrow: another day at the jail trying in vain to convince the few residents of the women's unit to attend a rehab class instead of watching some guy expose his beer belly on Jerry Springer. I went to Barnes and Noble to look for a book called The Ex-Offender's Job-Hunting Guide so I could prepare a somewhat need-specific curriculum for the resume class. They didn't have it, and the customer service rep looked at me funny when I asked him. Oh well.

In Bush's speech tonigh, at one point he said:

Four years after the frightening experience of September the 11th, Americans have every right to expect a more effective response in a time of emergency.

When the federal government fails to meet such an obligation, I as president am responsible for the problem and for the solution. So I have ordered...

WHOA, whoa...STOP!! I can't believe what just happened! The president actually took responsibility for something! Wow. Katrina make him crazy.¹


1. Jon Stewart of the Daily Show first used the words, "Tsunami make him crazy," when Bush, in the aftermath of last year's tsunami, said something about solidarity with the rest of the world or something.

Wow man, being a 5th-year senior sucks. Back in high school when I was picked on as the new immigrant kid (Bully-type kid: "Hey, do you know that hats are not allowed on school premises. School policy." Me: (out loud) "Yes." (inaudible) It's a headscarf, not a hat, dumbass.), I used to hope that someday a) some of these kids end up in prison, and b) I get to do some bullying of my own, God willing. But now, seeing the new breed of freshmen and sophomores studying campus maps and looking helpless and prepubescent evokes every goddamn motherly instinct in me. Come, little ones, let me show you around campus and introduce you to the mass cults of college life (namely, the facebook and The Da Vinci Code).

I like my internship at the jail. I'll be teaching a resume-writing class every week and working on some other projects, doing caseworker-type things. Many of the inmates are surprisingly upbeat. The sad part is that the proverbial revolving door is a reality for many of these people. When you have a guy who can't spell the name of his apartment building or street and has an eight-page record of driving offenses and fines which anyone can tell he won't be able to pay, something tells me simply incarcerating him is not going to solve the problem. Seeing the human face of the problem up close has gotten me all riled up again. Granted, I have what some would consider an extremely liberal stance on crime in general, but we seriously need to start addressing the root causes of crime instead of exacerbating them by putting people behind bars. At the very least we need to rethink our categorization of crimes and the penalties we currently use. Is growing marijuana for personal use a serious enough reason to put someone in prison for more than a decade and strip them of their voting rights after they've served time? Social contract my ass.

I would still be delighted to run into one of those high school bully kids at the Ramsey County workhouse, though. It's not prison, but it'll do.

My jail internship starts Friday. In an attempt to alleviate my family's vocal concerns about my security there, I gave them some stats on what the most common crimes are for which these people are incarcerated and how long the average inmate stays there (35 days). The first time I was there for an interview, one of the inmates coming back from work even smiled at me. "Maybe they think you're one of them," my mom said. Now, I dress up respectably enough for interviews (despite the fact that my family periodically donates some of my clothes to Lupus Foundation and the Salvation Army behind my back to get me to buy new clothes), although I have been told that some of my blog posts could pass for those a sociopath would write. I would hate to think that that's the kinda first impression I make, though. Hmm..

My new job is going well. My boss seems to think I'm someone else, though. She somehow got the impression that I have a strong work ethic¹ and has offered a bunch of accommodations she says she wouldn't usually make for an employee, especially in her first few weeks. I told her I was considering employment with Kaplan as a weekend/evenings LSAT teacher, and she asked me if more pay and a work-from-home option would change my mind. They're already paying me more than they do their other student employees, so that was kinda surprising. Heck yeah I'll take the offer. Finances are kinda tight right now and less work for more pay sounds like godsend.


1. I don't.

It's my last week at my current job. Come Monday morning, I will no longer have to enter this dark, damp building. Instead, I'll enter a different dark, damp building. The only other difference? I'll have my "Meet and Greet" face on instead of my regular "What the hell do you want now?" one.

...

This post is being continued about a month later. What can I say, I got lazy. Anyway, enough about me. On to more important topics. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Bush (Sr.), Shrub, and Bill Clinton have once again come together to announce a joint fundraising effort (actually, a joint effort by George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Dubya's still got weapons on the mind, saying, "It's as if the entire Gulf Coast were obliterated by the worst kind of weapon you can imagine.") Having demonstrated the same kind of solidarity in the weeks following December's tsunami, the three eminent political figures announced they want to be referred to as the "Awesome Threesome" from now on.

Was that lame? Well, I'm not a comedian. Go read the onion if you want humor. Losers.

Alright this is funny; bear with me. I just saw this Indian movie. There's a schizophrenic woman who has hallucinations about a guy. She's engaged to someone else but falls in love with her imaginary friend. She's an art student so she sketches several great portraits of him, too. Eventually, her condition deteriorates; all her psychiatrists give up. Her fiancé can't bear to see her like that, so he goes to the U.S. for plastic surgery, shows the surgeons the sketches, and, wouldn't you know it, comes back looking, walking and talking exactly like the guy from her hallucinations. (They even show part of the surgery; it's face-off meets zombie.) Everything's cool, they're about to get married when she finds out the truth (because her fiancé is telling her family the whole story in the room next to hers half an hour before the wedding).

She finally realizes that the guy she used to see doesn't exist. Fast forward six months: she's at the All India Medical Convention giving a speech about how she miraculously recovered from schizophrenia because of her fiancé's love. Everyone present immediately turns to look at this hero, and there's her fiancé WITH HIS ORIGINAL FACE!!! He gets a standing ovation. End of story.




Um, I have a question: What the hell just happened?????

Apparently I have no imagination because I can't see how the death of some Harry Potter character can cause intense, widespread mourning. My attempts to make light of the matter have been met with responses such as "His name is not Hogwash!" and "Shut up!" Sorry people, but I like stuff that's at least somewhat grounded in reality. Which is probably the reason why the movie The Day After Tomorrow made little sense to me after a certain point. (Seriously, somebody steps off a chopper and their face freezes instantly, what the hell is that?)

Speaking of realistic movies, raise your hand if you think Office Space is basically your life being played out on screen. That Samir guy with all his profanity, that's me. Oh, and if I had a nickel for every Bill Lumbergh I know, I'd be rich. I guess my abhorrence of my job is plenty clear from past posts, but here's some concrete proof.

This is a from a NY Times story:

In Leeds, England
"Sanjay Dutt and his friends grappled Friday with why their friend Kakey, better known to the world as Shehzad Tanweer, had decided to become a suicide bomber.

'He was sick of it all, all the injustice and the way the world is going about it,' Mr. Dutt, 22, said. 'Why, for example, don't they ever take a moment of silence for all the Iraqi kids who die?'"

Ok, let me get your argument straight: He was sick of injustice and the way the world is going about it, so he decided to make a change for the better by killing and wounding hundreds of innocent people. Yeah, makes perfect sense.

This is exactly the kind of thing people are talking about when they accuse Muslims of condoning terrorism, albeit subtly. Why does it always have to be, "I don't agree with what he/they did, but....."? Why can't people admit it's wrong, whatever the reason? Every time something like this happens, we regurgitate the same message: Islam is a religion of peace. And every time there's widespread mania about writing to newspapers and expressing sympathy with the victims and their nations as quickly as possible, because otherwise our silence would be seen as tacit approval of the perpetrators' actions. But every time a fraction of the Muslim population also tries to make suicide bombers look like victims. I'm sick of it.

No, I don't write letters to the editor anymore to let the world know how sorry I am about what happened. Does that mean I didn't feel outraged? If it does, then 99% of the American, and in fact the world, population didn't feel outraged either because we didn't see written proof of their outrage. I, as a Muslim and as a human being, refuse to make excuses for mass killing, and I refuse to make attempts to exonerate myself from the forced guilf of association.

Warning: If you don't want to hear me bitch about my rough day at work, you may skip the rest of this entry.

This idiot surgeon's secretary is on vacation, and he wanted a student employee to answer phones and open his mail. I didn't have enough staff to send a student to his office for the entire day where there wouldn't be much to do besides staring into outer space. (He's like 80 and doesn't perform many surgeries anymore. The only calls his office gets are probably his distant cousins RSVPing for his pathetic upcoming beach party.) So a student sat in his office for about two hours while he was out.

The next day, the guy goes and showers the head of HR with shit because he had to open his own mail. "There was no one in my office when I returned from clinic." The HR head in turn bitched at me and my manager (who is one of the Administrative Directors, by the way) and hinted that my staff was incompetent/irresponsible. All because some cretinous senile megalomaniac who got an M.D. put after his name in the 1930's thought it was beneath him to pick up his own damn phone instead of sitting on his sorry ass and watching someone else do it.

Moral of the story: I must make sure that I don't ever turn into one of those lawyers whose J.D. stands for Jerkoff, Dickhead.

P.S. If somehow this gets back to the department, I hope it's not just verbally related. If the purpose is to get me in trouble, I hope whoever does it is kind enough to print this out and make him read it. Pictures or even eye-witness accounts of what his face looks like would be highly appreciated.

As it turns out, I'll have to quit my current job in order to make room for the Ramsey County Jail internship in fall. There are other reasons for quitting this job, too, some of them best left unsaid—until my last day, at least. For one, there aren't many opportunities for growth in the foreseeable future. I do love my coworkers, however. Apparently they love me too, as implied by the element of denial in the following conversation:

Me: Did I tell you I'm leaving in August?
Payroll guy: You're full of shit!
Me: Wow, that was unexpected! [Both laugh.]
Payroll guy: Oh, you're serious?

He then proceeded to suggest that I get a bunch of Monopoly "Get out of jail" cards and distribute them to inmates at my internship. Quite a conversation, that.

By the way, the Rocori High School shootings trial ended today. What I read in the Star Tribune this morning pissed me off to no end:

Told by an investigator that he had killed a student at Rocori High School, John Jason McLaughlin smacked his fist on a table, hid his face against a nearby wall, then laid his head down on the table and began to sob.

I watched the video of this emotional "reaction," and although I would normally side with the defense in a juvenile case, all I wanted to do was hurt this kid (if he's sane). I mean, please!!! You want us to believe you took a loaded gun, chased a kid through the school, shot him in the FOREHEAD, and all you meant to do was injure him. Here's a newsflash: Guns kill people. And no, 15 is not too young an age to know this. I'm surprised his lawyer is even pursuing this diastrous line of defense. I don't know enough about the case yet to render an opinion on the mental illness issue.

I live by a simple philosophy: Don't sweat the small stuff. This is especially true when there are bigger, more important issues to worry about. With that in mind, people who were crying because NY can't host the Olympics in 2012, you're a bunch of losers. Ditto for Paris. People who shed actual tears of joy when London was picked as host, you too need lives.

In other news, MPR reports on the shutdown:

A judge ordered the state to pay for core services relating to the life, health and safety of Minnesotans. That includes nursing homes, health care for the poor and road construction.

...and the zoo! Why do y'all keep forgetting the zoo?!

Apparently we've also made a new record by keeping the state under lockdown for more than 3 days. I say we should not neglect to mention the other record we can be proud of, that of having the most boneheaded governor and legislative leaders imaginable in office at the same time.

To add to all the merriment, here's a letter from the Strib:

An Iowan's lament

As someone who travels through your state several times during the year, I must say Minnesota is not showing its best to visitors right now. Closing all rest areas over a three-day holiday weekend was just plain stupid -- a black mark on your tourism and hospitality.

Although I don't live in Minnesota, I do like visiting. I hope those who do live in this fine state let their lawmakers know how childishly they're acting.

Jeff Binstock, Mason City, Iowa.

Gee, you know we haven't really thought about it that much. Well, thanks for bringing this to our attention, we'll see what we can do. We always appreciate it when people from other states rub it in.

Wow, I can't believe I'm so bitter :)

All Minnesotans blaming the Governor and legislators for the shutdown, please shut up. These people really do have our best interests in mind and are working hard to keep the most critical of services, like zoos and parks. Not convinced? Answer this: Where do you go after you lose your job because of a government shutdown? A ZOO!!! It's a no-brainer. Nothing says "We care" like keeping state parks and zoos open while rest areas and libraries are shut down or at least have their funding delayed. Governor Tim Pawlenty and Minnesota state legislators: Thank you thank you thank you! We love you!

Here's a letter from today's Strib:

Here's an open challenge to those who oppose the war in Iraq: Anyone who thinks the war was a mistake should spend the next year-and-a-half in the Middle East explaining why America is wrong to bring freedom and democracy to an area of the world that has never known it. (emphasis mine)

Dave Thul, Chaska

Honestly, if I were him, I would check out a history book or two before giving voice to such a bold challenge. Nothing makes my blood boil like idiots who believe that the United States has perennially played midwife to freedom and independence worldwide. "Oh look, it's a democracy!!! Awwww, it's soooooooooo cuuuuuute. Doesn't it look just like America when it was young?" Ok, maybe that was a little creepy, but let me present just one example, in the interest of time, that proves how ignorant this view is: Iran. Iran was well on its way to a real democracy in the early 50's when the United States organized a coup to overthrow the immensely popular elected leader Mossadegh because we wanted to protect our own interests. We knew full well that Mossadegh was working to represent the best interests of the Iranian people. History is replete with examples such as this. Anyone who believes we're doing what we're doing now just for the love of democracy and the Middle Eastern people is either stupid or delusional.

HOLY SHIT people guess what my LSAT score is!!! 167!!! The score is a bit lower than what I expected BUT MY PERCENTILE RANK IS 96!!!!!!!! I can live with that!!! I just can't get my finger off the exclamation mark key!!!!!!!

As I obsessively check my email every half hour to see if my LSAT score is here, I do some silly things to distract myself.

You Are From Saturn

You're steady, organized, and determined to achieve your dreams. You tend to play it conservative, going by the rules (at least the practical ones). You'll likely reach the top. And when you do, you'll be honorable and responsible. Focus on happiness. Don't let your goals distract you from fun! Don't be too set in your ways, and you'll be more of a success than you ever dreamed of.

I'm trying to get a fall internship at Ramsey County Adult Corrections. Yes, I would enjoy working with people who have committed crimes. So I was talking to this guy who manages all the programs and services provided to inmates, and he was telling me that they offer everything from drug rehabilitation to GED and anger management classes, anything that would help people get their lives back on track. I almost giggled when he said anger management. You know, because of my own anger management problems. God, if only people found out how immature I really am!

Today was one of the few days of the week (two, to be exact) when I'm actually productive at work. Thursdays and Fridays are like "eh," and Mondays...please, get fucking serious. Speaking of which, tomorrow is Thursday. Yayyyyy!!

Now I just need to call Qwest and pose to them this somewhat philosophical question:

In your opinion, if I pay for DSL, is it fair to expect something closely approximating DSL service, as opposed to, oh I don't know, no connection to the Internet for long periods of time? Bitches.

Ok, that list deserves to go on. I couldn't resist.

11. I recommended against writing your name in all lower case. Looks like someone read my blog before applying. They wrote everything but their name in lower case.

12. Don't invent names for the employer; for example, an email ID such as "lmo" could be the person's initials. Don't assume their name is Limo and address them as such, especially when their first and last names are provided with the job posting.


I could feel a few of my brain cells dying while reading some of these.

I know, I know, there's been a hiatus, but I need to be inspired in order to blog, and generally, I find inspiration in stupidity. Here are some (pretty common sense, you'd think) don't's when applying for a job (yes, even if it's a lowly student job) culled from actual applications for a student job we posted recently.

1. Don't put "Job employment" in the subject line.

2. Don't put "About the JOB" in the subject line.

3. Don't put "job interest," "seeking a job" or "very interested in job" either.

4. Don't ask in the cover letter, "So what do I do to get the job?"

5. If you're gonna use a Word resume template or copy-paste a template from the web, for f*ck's sake take a look at the final version before you hit the send button. Otherwise, your killer cover letter and experience won't quite offset an Objective that reads:

(Brackets in original)

6. If you have a boiler plate message/signature like "Soul Committment to God and Christ his son," it's a good idea to take that out when you're emailing a prospective employer, and not just for spelling reasons.

7. If you're not sure what a word means, use a dictionary instead of just winging it. Fancy words won't impress anybody if they make no sense as used in the sentence:

dis·sem·ble (d-smbl)
v. tr.

1. To disguise or conceal behind a false appearance.
   
2. To make a false show of; feign.

In a press conference on May 31, when asked about Amnesty International's "gulag" comment, the President said the allegations by detainees at Guantanamo were not reliable because these are people who hate America, who've been trained to "disassemble".

Huh? Disassemble as in Ikea?

In all fairness, the President helpfully clarified what he meant. Here's the full quote:

"It seemed like to me they based some of their decisions on the word of -- and the allegations -- by people who were held in detention, people who hate America, people that had been trained in some instances to disassemble -- that means not tell the truth."

Aaaahhh, I see. He meant dissemble, as in "The current administration has repeatedly dissembled key information about Guantanamo in the face of mounting criticism of practices at the prison."

Ivy League hangs its head in shame.

By the way, I took the LSAT today. I have a really good feeling about it, which I owe partly to the people who advised me to go in with a winner's attitude. Actually, I went in with more of a "pompous ass" attitude: I looked at each test-taker around me and assured myself, "I am better than you," in order to keep myself calm while we waited for the test to begin. Helped tremendously.

Now that the LSAT is out of the way, I have more time to ... fill out applications and work on my personal statement! Yayyy!! As a coworker of mine said: Life is a bitch and then you die.

It's not that I enjoy ridiculing people; some people just readily lend themselves to public ridicule. The author of the following letter to the editor in the Star Tribune, for example, is just asking for it:

It's my money

I am disgusted with the recent letter writers who are happy to pay their taxes since they see them as an investment in their families via government spending.

This liberal, collectivist attitude is why more Minnesotans aren't outraged by the immorality of the income tax.

I am nowhere close to being in the highest income tax bracket, but I still lament the amount of federal and state income taxes that I must involuntarily surrender with each paycheck.

I do not view these as necessary investments in the community. Individuals should have the right to spend their entire earnings as they see fit rather than having the government spend some of it.

I am in my 20s and upwardly mobile. It disturbs me that as I become more successful and make more money, the government says it's just fine to take an even greater bite out of wealth generated from a service I provide to my employer.

The left-wing attitude is that I should take my medicine and turn over this money since I can more easily afford it. Liberals and the Minnesota DFL promote this never-ending class envy and enact punitive tax laws for those who are most successful in life.

Wealth is not a four-letter word, and I should have the unfettered right to spend or invest 100 percent of it at my discretion.

Jeremy DeMai, St. Paul


Wow, man, whatever drugs you're on, I'd like to try them. It's pretty clear that it's not just the income tax this gentleman opposes, but all kinds of taxes, because any taxation would mean the government is taking some of your money against your will.

Ok, how do I explain this... See, it's the little things like roads, public education, and not letting people who can't work because of a disability die of starvation that set us apart from earlier generations of people, say, those who liked to live in caves. And these things need to be funded. Hence taxation. But it doesn't end there; taxes also help the government fund important clinical research that would help explain how some people reach their 20's without maturing enough to accept social responsibility along with individual rights.

Assholes piss me off.

In a House committee hearing on the Twins-Hennepin County Stadium bill yesterday, an amendment to hold a referendum on the tax increase in Hennepin was defeated 10-9. Strong opponents of the referendum said things to the effect of:

"Ours is a representative democracy. We can't hold referenda every time we undertake a major project. We're elected officials and so are the Hennepin county board members. The people put us here to get things done. If we hold a referendum, this is never going to pass."

Excusez moi, est-ce que je suis aux les Étas-Unis? J’ai pensé Ok I’ll cut the French, but am I in the wrong country? I thought this was America, home of the Freedom Fries®. With evidence of much controversy and great public concern about a tax increase to fund the stadium, the kind of view expressed above strikes me as a very cute coverup. It's like saying to the voters, "We know you don't want this, so we're not gonna ask lest you say no." See the tautology?

My psych instructor's tendency to oversimplify things has raised its ugly head again. But maybe it's just me. I am, after all, a soc major taking a psych class on individual differences; of course I disagree with many of the quasi-deterministic inferences he draws from the material. We were talking about a study that classified toddlers into three categories of personality: the anti-social kind, the abnormally introverted kind, and the well-adjusted (normal) kind, and tracked their psychological development and life events into their early 20's. At the end of the discussion, he gave us this:

A wise old man at work* came to me today and expressed grave concern about my anger management issues after reading my blog. He tried to give me advice about how when you encounter a pothole in the path of life, you need to fill it up, learn from the experience and move on instead of steaming and blogging about it. I took it literally and said I paid taxes to have others fill up potholes.

He just shook his head in disbelief and walked off.

* I use the term "work" loosely. A couple weeks ago, a coworker (we'll call her Bob to protect her identity) and I blew up marshmallow peeps in the office microwave. On Friday, four of us had a contest solving a puzzle in Highlights for Children magazine for ice cream.

I hate FedEx.* Their customer service number has a voice-activated menu, which sucks for someone like me who has a slight accent. Best part is, they only have about 8 options to choose from, none of which involve talking to a real person, so you have to say one of the things they want you to say.

"I'm sorry, I didn't catch that. Could you repeat that?"
"Yeah, you bitch, 'cuz I have all day to sit here and do this."
Apparently, this is not one of the options.
"I'm sorry, I didn't catch that. Could you repeat that?"
"&*^#$!%"
"I'm sorry, I didn't ...."

And it goes on and on and on.

* The pattern of hatred and anger evident in my posts may lead you to believe I'm a pretty aggressive person. Well, you're right. I took the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire (MPQ) recently and scored slightly above average on aggression.

I got an internship with the Red Cross writing grant proposals for their local disaster relief work. It took two interviews and three references. I really don't see why they needed all that. First, it's not a paid position. Secondly, I didn't demonstrate any astounding qualities at either interview. For all I know, they would've taken anyone who didn't appear to have an anti-social personality disorder or a criminal record, because there just aren't that many applicants for unpaid internships.

Interviews are weird, though. "Describe yourself in three words." Hmm, let's see, Lazy, Opinionated, Lazy. And then there's the question about your weaknesses. All those books that tell you to package a strength as a weakness are out of date. I mean, you really think they'll see "I'm a perfectionist and I get very upset with myself when I can't meet the goals I set for myself" as a weakness? You gotta make it more subtle, like, "I get too many paper cuts." It's work-related, yet it doesn't reflect badly on your qualifications or motivation.

One thing is for sure: if you're me, being yourself is the last thing you wanna do at an interview. Hell, I find it funny to call Burn Surgery "Burrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrn* Surgery" and laugh at people with the first name "Dorcus" because I think it's Latin for dork. Not the level of maturity most employers are looking for.

* Watch That 70's Show if you don't get this part.