hats off.

to you, mr. vonnegut. anyone who fancies himself or herself a writer of darkly saturated humor owes you a huge debt of gratitude.

i suggest "harrison bergeron" as a good place to start with vonnegut. mother night is also exceptionally good, although neither can really compare to slaughterhouse-five.

i'm not even going to attempt a eulogy [eugoogley, according to mr. zoolander] for mr. vonnegut. instead, what follows is a favorite passage of mine from "harrison bergeron":

and then, neutralizing gravity with love and pure will, they remained suspended in air inches below the ceiling, and they kissed each other for a long, long time.

circle of life

oh, springtime.

that glorious time of year when the sun's rays slant ever so happily against the northern hemisphere, creating the perfect environment for love-addled teenagers, squirrels, and mockingbirds to publicly demonstrate the strength of their romance.

of course, it's also that wonderful time of year when people get the "itch." and i'm not talking about a disgusting dermatological disease. i'm talking about the "itch" that young men and women get to leave the chains of relationship-bondage and run screaming back into the liberated world of "single."

now, i myself have not fallen prey to the "itch." thank g-d. but i know people who have. and whether or not that decision to flee was the right one has yet to be seen. i just wish them the best.

sidenote: make the pollen go away. and tell sybil to quit messing with the austin weather.

**addendum: it has been a long day, and it's only eleven. in the morning. however, i thought i would take this time to drag my soapbox out from under the bed and stand on it again. law school. i have yet to pontificate regarding the hazards of law school, but it's about to start. law school is something like an a la carte menu of psychological disorders exacerbated by close proximity and external pressure. megalomania? section 3. generalized anxiety disorder? down the hallway. i am constantly amazed at law school's ability to break even the most confident of fraternity members.

this should be taken with a grain of salt. if you happen to be a natural at the law, then i'm sure none of this applies to you. of course, then you should be at yale, or harvard, and far away from me. additionally, should you find yourself to be a savant, you ought to get yourself checked out by the federal government for high levels of radiation, because only nuclear exposure could turn a human being into the kind of freak experiment that would "naturally" understand future interests.

i do enjoy the subject matter. there's something oddly satisfactory about crushing an objection with a "present sense impression" exception. but that's about all that's satisfactory about law school, at the moment. ask me again when my first year is over and i've started summer school.

what's that smell?

only recently has the psychological stress of coming out of the closet been brought to my attention.

it makes me very, very sad to see self-loathing boil over until you can almost smell it. it smells like fear, really, and i wonder if it's fear of the unknown or fear of society. if it's the former, then only happy experience can tame that beast. and if it's the latter, you ask?

then we have a long way to go in our quest for acceptance of universal human dignity, frankly. and i'm not idealistic or stupid [same thing? tune in next week] enough to claim that america's primary, foundational purpose is the protection of human dignity. that said, i do think, as a country, we do as good a job as anyone else. and truthfully, maybe better, though i'm not going to open that can of worms.

but watching a friend of mine squirm and persecute himself at the end of society's hook is neither something i enjoy watching or that i enjoy passively allowing to continue.

i am a short person [think napolean with two "x" chromosomes and fewer soldiers], so even when i stand on a soapbox, i'm only just as tall as everyone else screaming out their opinion into this blasted wasteland of a marketplace of ideas. i'm not asking you to become a card-carrying member of the glbt alliance [but if you do, kudos to you]. i'm just asking you to think twice before using "gay" as an insult. last i checked, its first and primary definition was "happy." and that's not insulting, is it?

unless you're trent reznor.

another slap-dash rant.

it's not actually a rant.

those of you interested in the year zero album, due out in 7 days and 9 hours [not like i'm counting], rejoice! trent reznor finally committed the ultimate act of rebellion against record labels.

the entire album has been leaked on his official website. and it's most definitely worth a listen. his singing chops are vastly improved, and he's absorbed some influences from tv on the radio [with whom he toured this summer] especially on the last song, zero sum.

also, just for your information, and the information of all those anonymous readers crouched in front of flickering, glowing screens: i adhere to a strict blogger etiquette protocol. if it appears in this blog, then i assume, rightly or wrongly, that it is now common knowledge, or at the very least, publicly disseminated. the same can be said for facebook or any other networking site on which i have virtual space. i do not have an expectation of privacy for the internet, or anything i publish over the internet. so, if i get mad at you, or otherwise express unreasonable emotion towards you for the mention of information referenced herein, do me a favor:

smack me with a dictionary open to the definition of hypocrisy.

** disclaimer: this did, in fact, turn out to be a rant.

retributive justice.

for what it's worth, my stance on the death penalty is as follows: people who put forth a deterrence argument need to be smacked upside the head with a pavlovian response paradigm. why? because deterrence really only works once you've experienced the deterrent mechanism. last i checked, you can only die once**.

the death penalty serves retributive justice, and perhaps too a rehabilitative purpose in relation to the families of those affected by the criminal act. i don't think it's too far-fetched to say that the original purpose of government was to enforce some sort of retributive legal system, and death certainly plays a role in that. if you infringe upon my natural right to life, then frankly, i assume that you've given up your natural right to life in exchange.

that said - i have sincere issues with the policy implications of the death penalty, especially as practiced in the united states. the criminal justice system is stacked against those of lesser economic standing. that is just a simple fact. if you can afford a better lawyer, the odds of your being sentenced to death decrease exponentially. there are countless cases of similar crimes committed by an african-american and a caucasian, and the end result is usually that the caucasian gets life without the possibility of parole and the african-american ends up on death row. how is that fair or right? that doesn't serve retributive justice. that serves the maxim, "with wealth comes power." so, in sum, i think the death penalty serves a purpose, and i'm not at all opposed to it.

but we need to fix the system.

i would like to apologize for the disjointed nature of this post.

in other news:

iran is celebrating national nuclear day. the president of iran [may his name be erased] is expected to announce the installation of 3000 new centrifuges.

it definitely sounds like the sanctions imposed by the united nations are working.

** again, with the disclaimer: this disregards a multitude of religious stances that state you can, in fact, die more than once. let's just stick with one lifetime for the sake of argument.

a spoonful of sugar.

in this day and age, it's very rare to find someone who isn't on medicine of some sort. pink pills, green pills, pills shaped like glandular organs. and i'm sure that some of these are just concoctions promoted aggressively by drug companies hoping for a quick buck from a public dying for a quick fix.

that said, medicine serves a purpose. far be it from me to decry skepticism as something to be avoided. i'm a law student, for crying out loud. idealism and romanticism died with my acceptance letter.

i am an advocate of natural remedies. diet, herbal supplements, and vitamins. but i recognize that there are some things that cannot be helped by st. john's wort or slippery elm. depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder are just as physical as endocrine problems or birth defects**. you cannot fix your brain chemistry. you can try and regulate it via biofeedback, acupuncture, feng shui, but if you are predisposed to a lower level of seratonin, all the logic in the world will not help hoist you out of the angry reds or the sour blues.

scientology, for this reason, gives me the symptoms of an aneurysm. "if it weren't for my horse...". thoughtfully prescribed medicine is not a crutch, or something that characterizes a patient as inherently weak. you would never hear the following conversation:

"she's on chemotherapy."
"oh, you mean she can't tough it out? pathetic."

and since depression and other mental disorders have been proven to be chemical imbalances in some cases, you likewise should not hear or promote the following:

"she's on zoloft."
"oh, you mean she can't tough it out? pathetic."

that's my two cents for the day. more like a dime, but it's pesach, so i'm running a special.

**disclaimer: this presupposes that you have been to therapy and undergone extensive psychological treatment for said disorders, and the symptoms have still not dissipated or weakened. supposedly less than 10% of depression is likely caused by chemical issues, and most of the time, those can be linked to other underlying disorders, such as hypothyroidism.

you win some

you lose some. we of the utlaw community were recently alerted by our dean that our school slipped in the usnews rankings not because we deserved it, but because we have integrity.

seriously, dean sager. we're neophyte attorneys, to be sure, but even we can smell an half-hearted attempt at spin a mile away.

give us some credit.

after all, we are at the 18th ranked law school in the country.