Having survived the end of classes, letters of recommendation, birthdays, burning CDs for my neighbor, I am turning my attention full force to getting out of the country for a bit. 24 hours after picking up #1 son, I am dragging his college-weary butt to Ecuador to visit #1 daughter. He is being a good sport about this as he doesn't share my latin american wanderlust, being more inclined to head to Europe or the ever elusive Australian continent.
I have no idea what his desk looks like now (see prior post), but now that finals are over, he is under strict parental orders to have fun until he board glorious Jet-Blue for his transcontinental flight home with his girlfriend by his side and satellite TV to keep him occupied.
In the meantime, I must, today, finish grading, pick up last minute essentials like 30% deet bug spray and motion sickness pills (several overnight bus rides to various locations). I also have to wrap Christmas presents, pack, do laundry, get more cash (yessir, I would like all those small denomination bills new and unmarked, please), and figure out how to repackage a 77 lb. book shelf into something that meeting the size and weight restrictions for airline travel.
The weather forecast calls for freezing rain for the 24 hours before we leave. This may mean we have to go to the airport early and stay at a nearby hotel. I know from experience living here in the boondocks, driving ice covered rural roads at 3 am is not a good way to insure arriving at the airport on time.
This is the last communication for a couple weeks as there will be no regular Internet access where we intend to spend time. And this is a good thing.
Adios y paz.
Saturday, December 17, 2005
Saturday, December 10, 2005
Friday, December 09, 2005
**The Ansel Adam tree**
I took this picture and it filled me with memories of when the tree looked different. In years prior, there would be a garden train underneath, circling the tree in a big oval swoop. Presents would be stacked inside and outside the oval. The kids would bring up the wooden trail set and and build it over all the presents using the wrapped boxes as the foundation for bridges. The little wooden tracks would wind between the presents. All the little wooden accessories, tree, people and the like would be stacked around all the tree. Finally strategically placed among all this mayhem would be an impressive collection of Dicken's Village ceramic light buildings. The scale of everything was wrong, the floor was covered with with stuff and for the several weeks before Christmas that space was the focus of hours of imaginative play (and maybe a little present snooping, although this cannot be confirmed).
**Bad Shiloh!**
Every since the kids have fled, the canine of the house has decided that the life long rules of not getting on the furniture no longer apply. I come home to dog hair on the sofa chair, and "nests" on the futon and bed.My celestial futon cover is shredded from "nest building."
And yet I have noticed that I am not so consistent about telling her to get off the furniture - which she is on as I write.And for some reason, I am not waking up at night when she jumps on my bed, noses her way under the covers and curls up like this in the curve of my stomach. I awake spooning a dog.
I need a life.
Monday, December 05, 2005
**Trip report, part three**
One of the days in Santa Fe, we took off to explore Bandelier National Monument. We didn't go to the main section that sets off behind the Visitor's Center. We went to the northern patch of the park. It is a separate, islotated area known as the Tsankawi section. It is not heavilly traveled - we only saw a small group on the trail towards the end. I recommend it as a companion hike to the main route. It takes just a couple hours including lots of time to gaze at petroglyphs and explore caves.
The first two photographs show the initital hike in along the ridge of a mesa top. One of the common ways to go up and down parts of the mesa was with the classic New Mexican ladder. You also could squirm up through crevasses. Towards the latter part of the hike on top of the mesa, you come along foundations of ruins and an amazing amount of pottery shards littered everywhere.
After going going up and down for a bit, using you final drop down along the side of the mesa. Once below the ridges there were a series of caves that served as enclosed structures a seriously long time ago. They were probably created through erosion. But have clearly been altered by inhabitants as some walls had ridges carved out - probably serving as a kind of shelf. There also were little alcoves carved into the interior stone walls. You could tell which caves were used for cooking by whether there was soot coatings on the walls.
The trails used on this hike have been used for a very long time as evidenced by this rock portion of the path.
But the walk back along the side of the mesa was chock full of petroglyphs. Close to the best collection I have seen in years.
The first two photographs show the initital hike in along the ridge of a mesa top. One of the common ways to go up and down parts of the mesa was with the classic New Mexican ladder. You also could squirm up through crevasses. Towards the latter part of the hike on top of the mesa, you come along foundations of ruins and an amazing amount of pottery shards littered everywhere.
After going going up and down for a bit, using you final drop down along the side of the mesa. Once below the ridges there were a series of caves that served as enclosed structures a seriously long time ago. They were probably created through erosion. But have clearly been altered by inhabitants as some walls had ridges carved out - probably serving as a kind of shelf. There also were little alcoves carved into the interior stone walls. You could tell which caves were used for cooking by whether there was soot coatings on the walls.
The trails used on this hike have been used for a very long time as evidenced by this rock portion of the path.
But the walk back along the side of the mesa was chock full of petroglyphs. Close to the best collection I have seen in years.
Sunday, December 04, 2005
**Why I like December 4th**
Clearly, because it is not December 3rd.
December 3rd was the day I had the delightful experience of taking the LSATs.... again. Now these two questions might pop into you mind... Again? Why? Well for the obvious reason. The only possible reason someone would subject themselves to that experience voluntarily... more than once.
Money.
My law school deferral is up this year and I either enroll or shelve my plans. Permanently. I have no money to go. Between the costs of two private college educations (albeit, I contribute a small percentage of the sticker price), gourmet dog food and my own penchant for sushi, there is nothing left. And at my age, I am not about to take on the kind of debt it that would result from financing law school.
So law school, in particular, this law school has been weighing heavily on my mind. I was thinking about this reception this law school holds for admitted students. It typically is at some fancy schmancy law firm. These kinds of things fill me with angst. It begins with the fact that I have no clothes for such a thing. My angst then shifts to my own personal challenges interacting in large groups of people I don't know. I think they were peddling medication for this condition at one point. Social anxiety disorder was the diagnosis of fashion.
I imagine the hosting attorneys asking us newbie admits what kind of law interests us. Each area of law that I get exposed to, starts to fascinate me. So currently on the list is obvious media law and all its subdivisions, such as intellectual property law, FCC regulations, First Amendment jurisprudence, etc. Especially, when these issues hit the appellate level on constitutional questions. I also am interested in civil rights law because of my work with the ACLU. And then there is family law - thanks to my experience with my ex - although I probably would not raise this one at a reception. Would probably scare off most big firms.
One observation occured to me as I walked into town this morning - a chilly, foggy morning, but not raining, to my great and pleasant surprise. I was thinking about how interesting is the concept of blind justice. We (and I mean the generic "we") seem to toss around this term as some kind of descriptor of our legal system, or at least as some kind of ideal, and yet it is not achievable nor is it really desirable in my mind outside of matters involving the state as prosecutor.
When I sat in court this past October, and watched my attorney talk to the magistrate about how she sits on a court of equity and has the discretion to reach an equitable solution as opposed to a blind application of the most narrow reading of the statute, I realized he was arguing that blind justice is, in fact, not desirable. Blind justice leads to the unsituated application of statutes, regulations and policies without recognition that each sitution comes with its own unique set of facts. Blind justice leads to the comments from judges along the lines of, "...clearly the respondent/plaintiff is a slimeball, but the law lets him be a slimeball. And until the law changes..." A court of equity can account for someone being a slimeball, trying to manipulate the system and use loopholes to advantage.
Blind justice doesn't see the slimeball.
So now I am interested in whether there is a reconciliation between Rawl's notion of blind justice and the court of equity. Possible essay topic if I can free my mind up to dwell on it a bit.
December 3rd was the day I had the delightful experience of taking the LSATs.... again. Now these two questions might pop into you mind... Again? Why? Well for the obvious reason. The only possible reason someone would subject themselves to that experience voluntarily... more than once.
Money.
My law school deferral is up this year and I either enroll or shelve my plans. Permanently. I have no money to go. Between the costs of two private college educations (albeit, I contribute a small percentage of the sticker price), gourmet dog food and my own penchant for sushi, there is nothing left. And at my age, I am not about to take on the kind of debt it that would result from financing law school.
So law school, in particular, this law school has been weighing heavily on my mind. I was thinking about this reception this law school holds for admitted students. It typically is at some fancy schmancy law firm. These kinds of things fill me with angst. It begins with the fact that I have no clothes for such a thing. My angst then shifts to my own personal challenges interacting in large groups of people I don't know. I think they were peddling medication for this condition at one point. Social anxiety disorder was the diagnosis of fashion.
I imagine the hosting attorneys asking us newbie admits what kind of law interests us. Each area of law that I get exposed to, starts to fascinate me. So currently on the list is obvious media law and all its subdivisions, such as intellectual property law, FCC regulations, First Amendment jurisprudence, etc. Especially, when these issues hit the appellate level on constitutional questions. I also am interested in civil rights law because of my work with the ACLU. And then there is family law - thanks to my experience with my ex - although I probably would not raise this one at a reception. Would probably scare off most big firms.
One observation occured to me as I walked into town this morning - a chilly, foggy morning, but not raining, to my great and pleasant surprise. I was thinking about how interesting is the concept of blind justice. We (and I mean the generic "we") seem to toss around this term as some kind of descriptor of our legal system, or at least as some kind of ideal, and yet it is not achievable nor is it really desirable in my mind outside of matters involving the state as prosecutor.
When I sat in court this past October, and watched my attorney talk to the magistrate about how she sits on a court of equity and has the discretion to reach an equitable solution as opposed to a blind application of the most narrow reading of the statute, I realized he was arguing that blind justice is, in fact, not desirable. Blind justice leads to the unsituated application of statutes, regulations and policies without recognition that each sitution comes with its own unique set of facts. Blind justice leads to the comments from judges along the lines of, "...clearly the respondent/plaintiff is a slimeball, but the law lets him be a slimeball. And until the law changes..." A court of equity can account for someone being a slimeball, trying to manipulate the system and use loopholes to advantage.
Blind justice doesn't see the slimeball.
So now I am interested in whether there is a reconciliation between Rawl's notion of blind justice and the court of equity. Possible essay topic if I can free my mind up to dwell on it a bit.
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