An Open Letter to the RNC

Dear Republican National Committee:

I read with interest today the many headlines announcing that your constituency had paid for more than $130,000 worth of clothes for Sarah Palin and her family from high end stores such as Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Barney's New York. Many of the articles focused on the issue that, should Sarah Palin keep the clothes, or should she use them for personal outings and appearances, they would count as income and be taxable by the IRS. In response to the news, you announced that the clothing would eventually be given to charity.

I would like to offer my services to you as a charity that would willingly accept such donations. Should you agree to donate Sarah Palin's clothes to me, which will otherwise be scrutinized for illegality, I will gladly, immediately, and with my best efforts make myself a charitable organization ready to receive your donation.

1) I would be able to appreciate the quality of Sarah Palin's outfits better than other charitable recipients. Who else noticed subtle sheen of the black silk shantung suit she wore at the Vice Presidential debates? (set off with the Swarovski crystal flag pin - a nice touch!) What about the the round-collar suits, the three-quarter sleeves, the bold but conservative colors? You strove to dress her in a way that would confer experience, legitimacy, and also femininity. You avoided Hillary's tangerine pantsuits and Condi's dominatrix boots, and found a "look" that, I'll admit, rivals Jackie O. and Carla Bruni meeting the Queen. This was not just a shopping spree; it was a transformation. You want to give away these clothes to someone who understands this; these clothes are a part of history.

2) I am a poor/I will put them to good use. I am currently a law student, which means that I am living off of loans, but I am also expected (as soon as I get a my first job) to have a wardrobe with a polished, professional look. I can't get away with Michelle Obama's H&M dresses; I need suits, pencil skirts, and double-breasted mini-trenches. Moreover, in the current economic downturn, it is unlikely that I will get a large signing bonus in order to properly prepare me and my closet for embarking on my career.

3) Sarah Palin's clothes can be tailored to fit me. I do not know what size Ms. Palin wears, but a recent NY Times article said that she wore a beehive hairdo because she is "short." I too am short. Everything else can be taken in. I will cover all costs of tailoring personally.

4) Your donation would be a sign of the Republican Party's willingness to support struggling young women entering the workforce. Moreover, you could point to the fact that I am a lifelong Democrat to show that the Republican Party never plays favorites, and is committed to fairness, equality, and rewarding merit rather than blind party loyalty and backhanded political tactics.

I am happy to name this charity as would best suit your needs. I would like to point out that my maiden name is Hispanic, and thus incorporating this into the charity name would also have the benefit of looking like your party supports minorities, whether you do or not.

I look forward to your prompt response.

Most Sincerely,


MEELS

Fabu-LAW-sity, Part I

In my Civil Procedure class (which only a few days ago I realized was distinguished from "Criminal" Procedure ... ohhhhhh...) we are discussing personal jurisdiction. When can a state gain jurisdiction over a person or a corporation? The early, famous case Pennoyer v. Neff creates a strict rule for establishing general jurisdiction over a person (called, funny enough, the Pennoyer Power Theory of Jurisdiction) which holds that states have exclusive jurisdiction to the persons and property within its territory and no jurisdiction over persons and property outside of its territory.

In later years, the courts had to determine how to address corporations under this rule. Not having a body, but being a metaphorical body, the courts established two "legal fictions" - metaphors - for allowing jurisdiction over corporations who were technically outside of the state: 1) "presence" (i.e. if a corporation has a "presence" in the state, it does a lot of business there) and 2) "implied consent" (i.e. if a corporation was "doing business" in the state, it was implied that it had agreed to jurisdiction there).

These metaphors were deemed illogical by a group of folks called Legal Realists (again with the creativity here) and were swapped out with a standard in a case affectionately called International Shoe. "Presence" becomes "certain minimum contacts" and "implied consent" becomes a fairness test, "such that the maintenance of the suit does not offend “traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice."

But, says problem #6 in the notes on page 97 of my casebook, what about in the case of an individual person, who is NOT a resident or citizen or physically present at the time in a particular state, but who "does business" there to such an extent that it might be analogical to an out-of-state corporation? For there is one (and only one!) such a case, Abko v. Lennon , in which a certain Mr. Richard Starkey was deemed eligible to be sued in the State of New York because, the plaintiff alleged, he went about "doing business" there with minimum contacts and fairness and all the rest.

And to this I said, Well, those minimum contacts and fairness standards stem from (and override) the metaphors of "presence" and "consent," which were only created because of the need to analogize a corporation to a person. Analogizing back the other way, then, would seem to undermine the whole process, because we do have sufficient standards for determining whether a person is under a state's jurisdiction or not. So we obviously need a standard here regulating the types of individuals that this special case can apply to, so as not to offend the entire system of due process. And I would suggest the proper standard here would be that the defendant can be subject to general jurisdiction if it can be shown that he or she is "bigger than Jesus."

...

OK, I didn't say that last part aloud. It's a hundred person class. But I sort of wish I did. ;)

law school accessory edition: lunch

I hate sandwiches.

Well, that's a slight exaggeration. I like, for example, buffalo mozzarella, fresh basil, and tomato on focaccia. I like that with prociutto too. I like most paninis. I like grilled vegetable sandwiches. And I like baguettes with brie.

OK, I like some sandwiches. But they have to be fatty, vinegar-y, or hot. And they can't, can't, CAN'T be on crappy bread. I am no PBJ girl anymore.*

So what's a commuting girl to do when lunch is on the line and proverbial moths are still fluttering out of proverbial pocketbooks? Answer: buy a really expensive lunchbox.

No, really; look at this:



This, my friends, is the Zojirushi Mr. Bento Lunch Jar, and it will be my new best friend in 5-9 shipping days.

An "American" sandwich won't even FIT in here - instead, I will have a four-course extravaganza, kept hot by Japanese Bento-technology. It is awesome looking, practical, and even has a CULT FOLLOWING! Seriously, if five thousand "Mr. Bento Porn" pictures can't stimulate some rockin' lunch ideas, I am worse off than I ever imagined...

YUM!

*One exception. I will still eat a tuna fish sandwich with Doritos wedged inside - a favorite of mine from high school.

I can haz broccoli??

What is this, a B Vitamin deficiency??

Hey there, cats don't eat pie!

Matt and I welcome the very cute, very intelligent, super adorable, worth at least sixpence (twice as much as your cat, Dave!) NEW KITTEH!

Already our dissertations are in peril!


Um, and not just metaphorically.


Kitteh finds the sunny spots!


Kitteh learns about glass table tops!


Vicious Aloysius makes a friend!

More pictures - and his name - once he loses the ridiculous vet cone.

law school preparations: accessory edition

Well and now it comes to it! We are back from our travels and ensconced back in our lovely apartment, which we had left mostly clean with only a few straggling dishes from our hurried breakfast before catching our early flight. And now I have a whole month to focus on the one thing that really matters before the fall: what to wear on the first day of law school. (Did you think I would say "dissertation"? Really?? Ha, I laugh...)

Since the last time I opened my metaphorical pocketbook I only got those little moths you see in the cartoons, the first step for my wardrobe was Repair and Rehem -- I had the soles of my favorite fall shoes replaced, my too-long jeans hemmed (yes Beth, the ones you made fun of me for not hemming, I've finally hemmed), and some holes patched in a knit sweater. I will also probably get the lining of my leather jacket replaced... hmm... maybe I'll do it in something besides black... like purple! I will have to ask my special alterations lady, whom I LOVE... maybe I'll do a post just on her next...

But there is one item from grad school which will NOT be making the transition to the law school wardrobe: my backpack. I will graduate from law school and turn 30 at about the same time. Wearing a backpack at 30 is a sign of failure (or back problems. Uhh... or camping...) - but ANYWAY, my inherent fabulousness (fabu-LAW-sity! ha! still cracks me up!) and the fact that I've been using one since FOREVER that I've been in school precludes it utterly. So to the question: what miraculous shoulder bag contraption can fit a laptop, my books, my snacks, my electronics, the most recent issue of Vogue, uh, I mean The Economist, and everything else a girl needs?

I was stumped. What *are* all the cool kids carrying these days? So I consulted the professionals at Corporette - they usually do work wardrobes, but I hoped they would take pity on me, on the cusp of entering the world of "professional" school, and respond to my query. And they did! Twice! (I didn't even have to tell them that I'm a recovering medievalist!)

And their main bag reply was:

- a large nylon bag — you want something durable as well as lightweight, because your law school books will definitely be heavy enough by themselves. We’ve suggested a few for you below, but in general we’d suggest looking at diaper bags and beach bags as your main campus bag. If you have back problems, you may want to look into a rolling backpack, as most of the ergonomic bags are a bit too small for law school textbooks.

I was highly gratified to see them recommend a diaper bag, actually, because I'd been shopping around myself on Zappos and seen this:



Pinstripe! Teal! Looks pretty much perfect, no? But one of the gazillion reviews said it "looked kinda like a diaper bag" which I was mildly concerned about. Until Corporette sanctioned the nylon! Yay!!

Zappos will have it here tomorrow! For a test drive I plan to fill it with my laptop, Lewis and Short, and LaRousse Gastronomique and prance around the house.

Now I ask myself, can little pocketbook moths buy themselves a new MacBook???

travels never cease...

... but sometimes, I wish they would!

Next up, Philadelphia, Cleveland, and DC. Unfortunately, Dissertation Station is the very last stop on this ride, and I was really hoping to spend more time there this summer. You know, before I hit Fabu-LAW-sity. OMG I should totally start that blog... Dys-FUN-ctional can be grad school, Fabu-LAW-sity can be law school!!!!

pictures

up.

and then there were links...

When I was in the tenth grade, my French teacher arranged a trip to France through one of those mid-grade educational tours -- the one where she gets to go for free if so many people sign up, and then 10 more for her husband, etc. I obviously HAD to go, and I did -- I was the French "prodigy," we'll say, of my central Oklahoma high school, managing to skip ahead through independent study and yada yah. I have very vivid, blurry memories of this trip - my first out of the country, ever. They're like snapshots from an old camera (and probably, if I go back though my photos of the trip, that's exactly what they are - the photos, not the real memory...).

I remember a half-dark plane crossing the atlantic. I remember Paris, it was overcast and cold, and the sand-colored gravel around the Louvre was not the lush palace garden I'd expected. The Mona Lisa was behind glass that glared, and was hard to see. I had a crush on a boy who was also on the trip, who wore a long black trench coat and looked like the Highlander -- I remember that very well. He was sort of a loner, and spent his time wandering around with the science teacher/chaperone Mr. Nole, who was also the detention teacher, and so knew him well. I tagged along - both of them were happy to be willingly followed by someone who could order cheeseburgers for them and didn't really want to go shopping at Le Printemps. I remember they ordered a Heineken together at a bar, and I didn't know whether I should get alcohol (isn't it illegal for a 16 year old to have alcohol??) or a coke. I remember some ice cream, and a crepe, and a car museum. I remember having a charcoal drawing done in Montmartre. I remember a prostitute was arrested in the lobby of our hotel at night, and it was the first time I'd seen one. I remember the painful decision - Mrs. Tippen wanted to see the Eiffel Tower at night, but Mr. Tippen had agreed to accompany some students to the Latin Quarter. Everyone grouped up with Mr. Tippen and it was down to me... I'm sorry Mrs. Tippen, I would've been branded a dork for life. The bartender could toss the bottles in the air and twist them as he poured. At least I got everyone back on the metro all right.

Then I remember a train, and we went south to a lot of towns that start with N... Nimes, Nice, a bus. Sun, and we were quite tired. Things are hazy, I remember a fountain and we went to a candy factory and a perfume factory - Fragonard, because I still have the bottle of "Rendez-Vous" that I bought there. I bought some chocolate "seagulls eggs" but ... I thought I had more francs than that... I could only get one bag. More time on the bus, an hour in Monaco, a jostle of people, what? a prince? I can't see, too short. More bus, into Italy, to Milan, it was overcast and the city smelled like piss. We only had four hours until our flight home, and I stayed on the bus.

Back in Oklahoma, about a month later, I flipped open one of my French books and found 300 francs. They said not to keep your money all in one place. They said it was safest, for our own good (nevermind that Mr. Tippen was the only one of us to get pickpocketed! from an exterior pocket of a fanny pack on a crowded subway!). And I had, like an idiot, and it was too late, the chocolate was gone, and what had been the name of it anyway...?

Over the years the memories grow dimmer and I remember these chocolate eggs, the enjoyment, crunchy sugared shell and chocolate inside, but something else too, another flavor. The disappointment that I couldn't afford more at the time. The regret of "playing it safe" with my francs. Ahh... the evanescence of youth, travel, experience.

Except now. In the internet age, what is ever lost? For a recent random internet search has yielded fruit - I, the traveler, passed through and went on, but the candy factory is still there, and doing quite well -- it's called Confiserie Florian and it's right next to Fragonard in Grasse, along the Cote d'Azur. Another traveler will tell you all about them on Frommers. "Rendez-Vous" has been discontinued, but Confiserie Florian still has its Oeufs de Mouettes and I can order them at any time; for the right price, they deliver all over the world. Cliquez-ici.

I meant to order them earlier, so we could have them delivered in the EU, but I put it off. I loved this candy, I search for its equivalent every year - I eventually turned to Cadbury mini-eggs every Easter as a pale, shadowy substitute (interestingly, another candy whose appeal partially comes from its limited availability). But... do I want to order them? ... What if they ... taste different than I remember?? I am not the same, perhaps my tastebuds more so. Am I prepared to revisit the flavor that I have dreamed of, idolized, searched for, and resigned myself to keeping and holding only in my memory, a memory tied up in youth, travel, searching, escaping, longing... And now I can just order that off the internet???

I will try them, one day. But... perhaps I will hold on to my memory a little longer.

oh noes! a grai hair!

 

All Venerate the Altar of the Lam Gods

Our recent trip to Bruges and Ghent had both Matt and I worshipping at the altar of "Het Lam Gods." For Matt, it involved listening to all 40 minutes of the audiotour of Jan van Eyck's famous altarpiece. For me, it meant eating a humongous rack of lamb in red wine sauce.

No, I kid. (kid! har har.) Matt had the lamb and I had fish. Really, it was Matt who worshipped the Lamb Gods all weekend, and I stuck to the Chocolate Gods. Well, to be honest, most of our time was spent prostrated to the Beer Gods, under the spiritual guidance of the lovely Brugse Zot.

Well, we had to try a few different kinds.

Pictures up in the usual spot.

procrastination...

well the weather has suddenly become summery, I've spent a couple hours on the beach this week, watched several dozen episodes of gilmore girls and law and order, and read over 1000 pages of Harry Potter (vols. 1, 6, and 4). It can only mean one thing.

dissertation chapter.

Hmmm, I think I have to go do some dishes...

whirlwind tour

The latest intallment of "where's that hottie?!" took me from Geneva, back to the Hague, and out to the San Francisco Bay Area, and back (to the Hague again). (Go frequent flier miles!) I had 5 surprisingly jam-packed days -- two in Berkeley, three in Palo Alto -- to determine the location of my impending continuing education plans. Homesickness made the decision harder than you might think, particularly after a tasty lunch, multiple rounds of house-made lemon-mint soda, and a run-in with my favorite crook-tailed orange cat, Pony Boy. (OK, I didn't actually see Pony Boy on this trip... I saw my dissertation adviser. She's less furry.) Anyway, addled by the scent of Berkeley in full spring bloom (and probably by jet lag) I was highly biased against my other option by the time I got back down to Palo Alto. And yet... and yet. With the cards on the table Berkeley just couldn't beat Stanford where it counts.



(Uh, that would be the financial aid package. and the generous joint-degree offerings that will give me credit for finishing my dissertation. and the incredibly with-it staff. and the high ranking. and ... you get the idea.)



Oh, and the classrooms have these chairs. Oh, yes. :)

my new friend Alice, aka the Doomsday Machine

I went to visit Alice on Sunday. There was a big special open house day that apparently 50,000 other people took part in too. See, there's this 27 km tunnel -- you might have heard of it recently because some people think its going to destroy the earth, or at least Hawaii -- because the LHC particle accelerator in the tunnel is used to speed particles up to just below the speed of light, and crash them into each other. Then there are these big "detectors" at the crash sites, which measure for different things. Alice is one of them, and hopes to measure the smashing of large ions (hence the name... A Large Ion Collision Experiment) i.e. lead nuclei and to be able to recreate quark-gluon plasma. Quark-gluon plasma (not to be confused with quark-gluon plasma, which is probably much tastier) is what existed in the tiny fractions-of-a-second before matter was created after the big bang. So, according to the German CERN intern who was ahead of us in line to get tickets, if anything is going to create a black hole (or a dragon, see article) it's going to be the Alice experiment.

Neat, huh?

A Large Ion Collider Experiment

(Why would it create a black hole? Well, you see, when a star dies, its matter cools and condenses, becoming smaller. It has such a huge amount of gravity that all the atoms get squished closer together than normal and occasionally the atoms collapse into each other and the protons and the electrons start to touch and cancel each other out and then you get a neutrons-only playground but then those keep collapsing and you get ... "nothing" -- mostly because the gravitational pull is so strong, that you can't figure out what's in there and come back out and tell NASA. So... some people think maybe if you crash two nuclei together at just below the speed of light then conditions would be right to create a black hole, though ... it's only two nuclei, not an entire star's worth and, you know, we're still on earth and not in space and it would be subject to earth's conditions, so see, it's all very unlikely.)

SCIENCE!

new year, new look, new locale

One of these years I will start blogging again and be in the exact same place I was when I left off. No such luck this time. :) Where did we leave off, Milwaukee? Well, we made it to California and stayed there all fall, enjoying our favorite enclaves and walks, sunny days, the vegetable market, and even braving the fish monger's and a new pizza place. But, as is in our nature, as soon as the weather turns cold, we go and fly off somewhere colder. To the Netherlands, this time. Oh sure, you might think of tulips and wooden shoes, but let me remind you about a little something called...

THE NORTH SEA.

That's right, frosty, frothy waves slapping against giant metal fishing trawlers, the wind wailing through the rigging of the ships at harbor, kicking sand up into your face and hair as you walk along the dead empty sand-grassy dunes where rusted green German bunkers squat -- oh yeah, THAT North Sea.

Of course, now it's April, so it's more like the North Sea with the row of summer-only beach clubs, bungee jumping, casinos, ice cream stands, windsurfing and para-sailing. But everyone is still wearing coats.