If Christ leaves Bethlehem traveling 60 MPH...

Standing here on the train, getting a little creeped out. When people read their Bible, that's one thing. When they highlight and underline as they read? Yikes.

What are you studying for? Is the Rapture your (very) final exam?

The WildMan Cometh

I am very excited to see that Thomas "WildMan" Denny will be fighting on national television this coming Saturday in the Elite XC "Saturday Night Fights" on CBS. Now, if you are a regular reader of this blog, or if you know me at all, you may be saying to yourself, I had no idea Brendon was a fan of mixed martial arts fighting? You would be correct; I am not a fan of the sport. But I am a big fan of the WildMan. He is the star of one of my favorite poker stories. Here it is.

A couple years ago, I was playing a poker tournament at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. We had been playing long enough that the opening jitters were gone, we had lost a table or two, and we were at that stage where people were starting to relax and talk a little more. I had a decent chip stack, so I was more than happy to loosen up and chat. However, there are two consistent questions at Vegas poker tables that I am not a big fan of answering, mostly because of the perception that comes along with both.

Question number one, where are you from? And question number two, what do you do for a living?

When I tell people I am a lawyer, you can imagine the grief that usually comes along with that. When I tell people I live in San Francisco, you can equally imagine the grief that comes with that. Put the two together, and it's a non-stop laugh riot.

So the questions were working their way clockwise around the table, and were fast approaching. Do I lie, and take a chance? Hell, I've been bluffing all morning...what's a couple more? Or do I tell the truth, and let the fun begin?

The guy to my right had been keeping the hood of his sweatshirt up most of the morning, giving him a vaguely Phil Laak-type table presence. He was playing pretty well, mixing up his play and getting aggressive when he needed to. The "what do you do for a living" question got to him, and I'm thinking I need to decide whether to lie or not, when this guy pulled down his hood, revealing a neon green mohawk, along with crazy sideburns shaved to make him look like the devil. He looked around the table, and very calmly said,

"I'm Tom...and I'm an Ultimate Fighter."

The questions never got to me.

For the rest of the morning, every guy at the table sat in child-like wonder as "the WildMan" talked about what it's like being an Ultimate Fighter (not much money until you get a real name for yourself), what his training regimen was like (brutal and regular), whether he would beat up people in real life (no money = no punchy), and so on. He was a real gentleman, patiently answering question after question, and I think he even signed an autograph or two. My favorite moment was when he and I got involved in a big pot; I ended up taking it down after some semi-bluffing that let me catch up on the river, and he acknowledged the bluff. My response was simple: "This felt is the ONLY arena where I have a prayer against you!" He seemed to get a kick out of that.

I had a great time chatting with the WildMan, and I am very excited about his getting national, network television exposure. Good luck on Saturday, Tom, and best of luck in the future as well.

Jimmy Dean...James Dean...

Inspired perhaps by Jen's love of the 80's song, I recently finished the book Rock On, by Dan Kennedy. The book is supposed to be a mostly non-fiction recreation of Dan's work for Atlantic Records in the 90s, and how he sort of slacks through a year and a half making a salary most of us would dream about to work in the music industry, and yet be as far away from the creativity of music as possible. Dan worked in marketing, which explains the lameass description on the cover as this book being like The Office meets This is Spinal Tap. It is difficult to express in words how tired I am of that description of anything. I guess it's like Cliche meets Lazy Writing.

Which, if I am honest, is cliche and lazy writing on my part as well. Damn you, irony.

I love San Francisco

...and its myriad of fascinating, multi-culti advertising...



Limang just happens to be one of my favorite flavors.

Her britches

As you can see by comparison, the wee one is getting less wee by the day...

Success!

[This is us, when we finally arrived at the front of the line, waiting for the next available Apple store employee to sell us our fun new gadgets. This should also be the last photo I take with my old cellphone!]

After an embarrassingly long wait this afternoon, I am finally home, sitting on my couch, and blogging on my new 3G iPhone! How cool is this? I haven't quite figured everything (read: most things) out, but I have a sense I'll get better as the weekend goes on. For now, I'm typing with one finger and having a blast.

More soon...

Subconscious filthiness?

Where, when and how did smokers come to believe that it is completely acceptable to drop their cigarettes on the ground?

I was walking to work this morning when a smoker, walking with two other people, took her last hit and, without even looking, just dropped the filter, stepped on it, and went on her way. She never broke stride, never stopped talking; I honestly doubt she even thought about the actions, let alone the consequences. Neither of her friends seemed to notice, either.

What the hell? If she had watched me finish a can of soda and then just casually drop it to the ground, and then step on it, would she have noticed? Would she have cared? Would anybody?

Are smokers as a group so deluded that they believe the filters are biodegradable, when in reality it takes years for cellulose acetate (a form of plastic) to degrade? Or does the fault lie with the rest of us, who have come to see this as normal and give smokers a "pass" on littering?

I have already sparked a Larry David-esque discussion (read: friendly argument) on the train with a couple commuters who think leaving their newspapers on the ground is a form of recycling, so I guess it's time to start with smokers. Curmudgeon powers, activate!

If I ever become a stripper...

After my BART ride this morning, I have figured out my stripper name. I choose this name not only for the double entendre, but I also like the current-events vibe, given the heightened state of alertness in our country today:

"Suspicious Package"

Now on the main stage...

Job security

For anybody new to this blog who doesn't know what I do for a living ( which also, sadly, includes large portions of my family and friends), I practice dependency law, which is a specified area of the law that deals with the issues arising from and around foster care; more specifically, dependency law deals with the issues that arise when a child is removed from the home of her parents due to abuse, neglect, or other codified reasons that represent a danger to the safety of a minor, and said danger rises to the level that requires government intervention by removal of the child from the home. Needless to say, my job stories are hilarious, and I am a big hit at parties.

What is especially sick about what I do is that my job security is basically premised on the idea that parents and guardians will continue to beat, neglect and/or fuck their children so often and to such a level that my services will continue to be needed. That can mess with your head, to say the least.

So, pushing aside all of my guilt aside for a minute, and looking at things from a purely solipsistic and monetary point of view, I am so glad that NBC is airing awful, awful garbage like The Baby Borrowers. Thank you, NBC, for showcasing terrible parenting choices in primetime. Thank you for ignoring reputable and accepted data that shows that even three days away from their parents (which, to my understanding, was the length of time it took to film the newborn sequences) can be traumatic for babies. Thank you for making parenting a "game."

Ultimately, thank you for ensuring I can continue to pay my student loans. I appreciate it.

Believe the hype

Mario Kart for the Wii? With the optional "Wii Wheel"? Imagine how fun you think it is, then...double it.

Took some wrangling to get it home, but very worth it. I see us wasting many, many hours on this one. And regretting very few of them.

I guess "piss" isn't so bad anymore?

Picked up the book, Comedy at the Edge: How Stand-up in the 1970s Changed America, by Richard Zoglin, at the library on Saturday; I have been looking forward to reading this for a while now, especially after I read Steve Martin's autobiography.

As of Sunday, I have a new reason to appreciate the book. I cannot now lie and say that I was a huge fan of George Carlin, but I certainly appreciate anybody who champions free speech and free thought, and to do it as long as Carlin did it? That's just impressive.

Here's the man himself, with his seven dirty words. I remember reading the US Supreme Court case in law school that dealt with Carlin's bit, and I remember seeing part of the transcript that was used in that trial. Fun...filthy, filthy fun... :)

UPDATE 6-24:

Just finished the chapter on Carlin this morning, and thought the following quote on pg. 39 summed the man up very nicely (apart from using the word "virtually" twice in the same sentence):

Carlin's longevity as a stand-up was virtually unique among comics of his era - a top touring comic for four decades with virtually no boost from Hollywood, Broadway, or a hit TV series. It was a testament to his ability to stay on the edge, even as the hair and beard went gray. He evolved from white-bread media parodist to counterculture provocateur to curmudgeonly uncle to apocalyptic pessimist; but what remained constant was his eye for the world's inequities and absurdities, and the caustic eloquence with which he called them to our attention.

A nice send off.

When kittens try to check their email

Poor thing. Nobody ever taught her the home row. And then there's the whole "not having thumbs" thing.


More likely, she fell asleep on the keyboard. But the idea of her trying to check her email? That's just a lot of fun.

High standards

Saw this job posting today:



You may be wondering, where would someone with such multilingual aptitude be applying? A financial institution? A law firm? The United Nations, perhaps?



Nope, just a third-rate cellphone store down the street.

I don't mean to get all Baz Luhrmann on you, youth of my neighborhood, but given that we are nearing graduation season, I feel I need to say this: if you speak three languages, you can probably do a LOT better than Freecomm.

Aim higher, class of '08.

Honestly, your better is probably better

Maybe Nike commercials aren't the best place to find new music, but when it comes to finding motivating music for my morning run/walks, I takes what I can gets.



Thanks, Spinner.

iKitten

Apple is known for making good products that are simple and easy to use. I did not realize that they also design their products with small kittens in mind:


I had no idea our wireless router could also serve as a kitty hotplate. This seems to be her favorite place to sleep (I have a sense that will change as she grows), and since I haven't noticed a drop in my signal strength, I guess my only "concern" is that WiFi may give my cat cancer.

I have let her read all the articles, and she is not convinced. She wants to see more double-blind studies. She also urged me to change my desktop wallpaper. Both good ideas.

Up, up and away!

I finished Jay Lake's Rocket Science a short while ago, and even now, I smile a little when I think about it. A solid, fast read, and a definite ode to the golden age of sci-fi, complete with Communist agents, secret Nazis, and a talking computerized rocketship that requires oil to fly back to Mars. Brilliant!

I do wish that this book had been written in a more "pulpy" style, complete with super-short chapters and the requisite cliff hangers at the end of every one. I think that would have been a nice touch, and another knowing nod to the genre. However, I still really enjoyed this book, and if you are in the mood for some 50s nostalgia mixed with atomic hijinx, I recommend this book.

The tongue bath heard around the flat...

If you read a couple posts down, you will see that our new kitten (as far as a name goes, we're leaning towards Starbuck, since the kitten is pretty frakkin' crazy) has been with us for a week, and we have been slowly integrating her into the household. So far, both cats seem pretty okay with the other, and we've only had a couple episodes where we thought the big cat was playing "a little rough."

Today, I was on the computer, and I realized I hadn't heard them chasing each other in a while, and the eerie silence started to worry me more than the normal noise. I went out to the front room and found this:



Oh my. I backed out quietly, and hung a necktie on the front door. That was a little more kitty love than I was ready to see.

I think they're starting to get along.

Oh Yeah!

I don't want to be confused for a shill for the Gatorade corporation, but if you grew up in the 70s and liked orange Kool-Aid, I highly recommend the new G2 Orange. Just like Mom used to make!

I thought I might be alone in having strong feelings for orange kool-aid, but I was wrong. I don't have quite as many issues about orange Kool-Aid as this guy, but I also had no idea that the term could be used like this. I swear I am just talking about a powdered drink, nothing else.

Introducing...um...

We brought home a new kitten this weekend. She doesn't have a name yet; suggestions are welcome.



The process of adopting a kitten from San Francisco Animal Care and Control is...intense. There were several forms, a short interview, discussions about other pets in the home, and a criminal background check (I made that one up, but it seemed like the next step). And all of that was before we were allowed to touch the cat. Seriously. At one point in the interview, we were asked how many hours, on an average day, we're gone from the home. When we picked "10-12," the interviewer asked who would be watching over the kitten during those hours. I answered honestly, if admittedly like a bit of a smart ass, that this role would fall to "the other cat." The interviewer was not amused.

Overly invasive procedures aside, we're glad to have her home. They suggested we wait up to a week to introduce the two cats. We opened the door, our older cat sniffed her, licked her head, and that was about it. They've been playing all weekend, and with a minimal amount of what I call "poofy tail." If you don't have cats, trust me: that's a good thing.

Justice...is done

Went to jury duty yesterday; this is the second time I have been called since I have lived in California, and the second time that I made it into the jury holding pen, sat around for a couple hours reading a book, and was eventually told that they had as many jurors as they needed for the day, and was sent home. Very anti-climactic.

To be honest, even though it would utterly wreck my current court schedule and make things very difficult on my co-workers, I would LOVE to get on a jury (doesn't say very nice things about me, I guess). The work I do currently is in a juvenile court, and because of the age of the children I represent and the nature of the cases, all hearings, including trials, are closed to the public and confidential. Translation: all of my trials are bench trials, and I have no jury trial experience. I would be very interested in seeing it in action, let alone watching the court process from the other side of the room. Maybe next time.

The most annoying part of the experience, other than the backbreaking hours I have been putting in for the past few weeks getting my cases prepped in case someone else needed to handle them, was watching the Jury Orientation video. Wow, it was soooooo bad. See if you agree by watching it here. Maybe I am a bit jaded (probably), but the phrase, "The verdict is read...justice is done," made me want to laugh out loud. I held it in.