Shirt for sale!

Shirt for sale! Go to eBay and bid, bid, BID!

I fool them all again!

Well, the results are in, and to quote the California State Bar website:

"The name above appears on the pass list for the July 2004 California Bar Examination."

Wild.

So now the job hunt begins again, and now I can apply for the jobs I really want, the ones that require Bar membership before they'll even look at your resume. I'll let you know how that goes.

By the way, if you want to learn a little more about this horrific process, read this press release from the Bar. After I read it, I got more than a little sick to my stomach.

B-Day is upon us!

So, the looming date on my calendar is finally here: tonight at 6 PM PST, the California State Bar releases the pass list for the July exam. Whether my name appears on that list or not decides the direction my life takes for the foreseeable future. I'll post again soon with the results, or you can look them up for yourself starting Monday when the results are posted to the public.

Pray for Mojo.

Celebrity Poker Showdown Conspiracy Theory

Maybe it's just me, but did anybody else think it was really weird that Dave Navarro, last season's runner-up and seemingly good poker player, this week played what can at best be called horrendous poker, making horrible decisions and acting as if he'd never seen a deck of cards before? My theory: Dave threw the game. Why? Because I don't think he was interested in playing at a championship table where (at least) two-fifths of the players had slept with his wife.

Facts supporting my conspiracy theory:

• Last season, Dave won his opening round, and then narrowly lost the championship to Seth Meyers from SNL. Dave played outstanding poker in both games, showing a real knack for playing good hands and bad hands with equal skill.
• This week, Dave played won the first two hands by playing in that same aggressive style. However, for the rest of his game, he then played just awful hands, and more importantly, played them in such a way that he was assured to lose: he consistently called raises, but never in an aggressive manner that could have scared the other player out of the pot. Additionally, he did so with cards that clearly were not winners.
• When Dave was the first one out and on his way to the Loser's Lounge, he was shown calling his wife Carmen Electra and telling her, "I lost, and your ex-husband won."
• Regular viewers of the show know that Dennis Rodman, married famously in a drunken Vegas wedding to Carmen Electra, won his round, and would be playing in the championship.
  
• Regular viewers have also figured out that an entire season is usually taped in a couple days, and so it is very possible that Dave watched Dennis play and win, and knew that if he won, he would be sitting at the same table as Dennis within hours.

So there you have it: my case for why Dave took a dive. If I'm right, I am disappointed, but I understand; tough to bluff a guy who is going to look at you across the table with that knowing look in his eye (emphasis on the Biblical definition of "know"). Especially when that guy's nickname is "The Worm."

I think he could have won the whole thing, but now, my money is on Doogie. You?

My civic duty

If I heard Chris Matthews correctly last night, blogging is mainly supposed to talk about politics. I looked back at my entries, and I mostly talk about poker and puppets.

So today I'll try to make more of a political statement with some "talking points," as the kids today are calling them. Here goes:

• I vastly enjoy maps over listening to four people argue, and this is my favorite one. I especially like that you can click over to how it looked in 2000; for all the talk about how much has changed over the past four years, it looks surprisingly similar.
• I almost gave myself an epileptic fit last night as I flipped from channel to channel, looking for said maps and some sort of unity about the electoral college count. I found Dan Rather's forced folksiness the most annoying, followed closely by Brit Hume's smugness. I can't point to any one channel's coverage that I especially liked (I don't count watching Jon Stewart since that is a comedy show, Tucker!), but I probably watched CNN the most, since I did like their big board-o-numbers (mmm...shiny graphics!).
  
• I'm not pleased that Dubya won, but I am glad that somebody actually won this time, and won solidly enough that it doesn't look like there will be weeks of recounts, lawsuits, and explanations of pregnant chads.
• I don't live in Kentucky anymore, but what I have heard and what I saw when I recently visited leads me to believe that Jim Bunning is an embarrassment and a good example of how divided our country is right now. I want to believe that people voted this guy in because they voted for the Republican party, or against the Democrats and/or Mongiardo, but not actually for this guy. I really want to believe that.
• Dear Democratic Party: four years ago, Ralph Nader didn't steal votes from you; you lost votes and voters because instead of working for your base and representing the party's values, you took the liberal vote for granted, just assumed they'd vote against Bush = for you, and worked hard to move to the middle and swing undecided and moderate Republican voters. You lost that election. Period. Now, I bring this up because in the coming days, months, and years, you can play the blame-game again if you want to, OR you can start planting the seeds for a real groundswell in 2008. If you want my help, you need to ask, not just assume. I'm willing to help if you're willing to work with me. Sincerely, One of Many Prodigal Sons.
  

I hope Chris thinks that's enough. Now, back to poker and puppets!

No porch lights, maybe?

We didn't have any trick-or-treaters last night. Granted, we had no candy, so it was for the best, but still...shouldn't there have been a couple? We figure the local kids either drove south to the Burbs for some hot candy action, or did the whole mall/zoo thing that has become increasingly popular. This pushed us into a reminiscing fit last night about our shared memories of suburban Halloweens: how the streets were crawling with kids and parents, the fear of razor blades in apples, and houses that didn't decorate and give out Zagnut bars were the rare exception, not the rule. We also discussed the "that one house" rule: apparently all suburban kids had that one house in the neighborhood that went way too far in the Halloween spirit (for me, it was the house that dug graves in the front yard, complete with people jumping out of them...graves!)

So relying on said suburban training, we turned off all the lights (we don't have a porch, so we figured complete darkness would be our version of the universal signal that this house is not participating in your fun, little Spiderman) and went out for Malaysian food (mmm...jicama). Seemed like the thing to do.