Selfish Crab

The following sentence is an example of what I have to read, 6 hours a day. See if you can follow along:

On appeal to the Court of Appeals the defendant claimed that the Court of Common Pleas erred in sustaining plaintiff’s motion to strike from the defendant’s answer the defense of res judicata claimed to have arisen by reason of the judgment in favor of the defendant in the action by the insurance company.

First observation: am I the only one that reads that and am thinking, shit, give me some syntax highlighting?

Second observation: isn’t it amazing how you can understand the meaning of each individual word in a sentence, when taken alone, but when put together, the meaning is completely frakked?

# 2007 Mar 29    {law school}    1

Desktop Tower Defense.  flash game based on RTS turret defense maps.  WARNING: addictive.  Especially with the group scores.

# 2007 Mar 29    {Links, nerd}    4

Markus smiled like a wolf.  It was a cross-cut, jut-jawed leer.  Even a punch to his face, drawing blood, would elicit that toothy upturn.  The creep must enjoy the taste of his own blood.  He certainly wasn’t to be trusted.  One day, he would seize control of the others on the island, and for that reason, I must be vigilant.  At least, for now, only I know about the snake pit.

# 2007 Mar 28    {fictive}    #

Fuck me, it happened again. This time I lost 1 week of school notes, and 6 weeks of personal settings and customization. I am livid and downtrodden at the same time. If I were fucking President, every computer would have RAID 5 under federal law.

This is more bad news for my pr0n library. I just cannot bring myself to back up the stuff. It would be like legitimizing it as a valid data, and not as the smutty ones and zeros that they are. But, how’s a guy supposed to amass a decent MrHands collection under these conditions?

# 2007 Mar 27    {Life, nerd}    1

Girl: “Welcome to Wendy’s. Here is a free chicken nuggets sample.”

Guy: “Mm, this is great. I would like three 5-pieces of chicken nuggets.”

Girl: “I’m sorry. That’s not available. We only have cheeseburgers.”

Guy: “Hmmm… well, okay. I guess after thinking about it, I don’t really want nuggets. I’ll have a cheeseburger.”

Girl: “Oh. Really? You do? Um, okay, we don’t have that either.”

Guy: “That’s confusing.”

# 2007 Mar 26    {Life}    2

I am receiving an alarming amount of cheek pinches. A big “aww puddy wuddy” face grab when I am out among my fellow revellers, drowned heartily in the village mead. The candidate reasons for this are the usual, scorned suspects mentioned too often in this space.

Our scientists at the Selfish Crab Labs are working hard on this problem. Someday we hope to have the technology to convert these cheek pinches into something useful, such as hugs, or kisses on the cheek, or kisses on the lips, or “I love you”s.

# 2007 Mar 23    {Life}    2

Video: American Idols cover Modest Mouse’s Float On for Ford Commercial. (More info/snark.) I have had just enough Modest Mouse in car commercials, thank you. See also Nissan Quest adverts.

# 2007 Mar 21    {Links}    #

TimesSelect is free if you have a university email address.   Thank you, alumni forwarding.

# 2007 Mar 20    {Links}    1

14 Rules for the Skunkworks team at Lockheed Martin. (#5: “There must be a minimum number of reports required, but important work must be recorded thoroughly.”, #4: “A very simple drawing and drawing release system with great flexibility for making changes must be provided.”)

# 2007 Mar 20    {Links, nerd, work}    #

News: John Backus, FORTRAN and BNF developer, died.  We had previously covered this Columbian ahead of his time.

# 2007 Mar 19    {Columbia, Links}    #

To: [bracket pool]
From: Selfish Crab.
Subject: day one, march madness

Peers,

I must admit that I am a wee dismayed at the first day’s results. According to the standings, I am only trumping Mr. Weiss, who technically failed to fill out a bracket and will forever yield zero points. There is an old Chinese saying: no glory befalls those that prevail over corpses in footraces.

I was lured into this “bracket” game of yours by promises of prestige, riches, and fellowship. Your bracket-mongers assured me any heuristic would suffice in choosing my bracket. My method was: “If the schools’ avatars faced in a bout of physical combat, who would be the victor?”

This is why I divined the Davidson Wildcats to defeat the Maryland Terrapins. Surely a wildcat, that sleek package of claws and fangs, would best a mere turtle, a chelonian idol of impotence. Alas, even the most ferocious felines run into foul trouble.

And so I lie, in the dregs of the standings. The “sittings”, if you will. I am steeled for the worst of it. A day shall come in which I will smite you all. Look for that day.

Best,
Selfish Crab

# 2007 Mar 16    {greatest hits, law school}    #

I met many new people since law school started. Girls mostly, I admit, but this is merely congruent with my convivial nature. I am surprised to report that never in my life have I been deemed “mean” (or its hysterical cousin, “asshole”) so often or so repeatedly. “Douchebag” gets an alarming number of plays. Maybe I am meeting a disproportionate amount of women with fragile psyches or damaged emotional cores. I tip-toe quietly on moccasins through the eggshell fields and yet here I am, a jerk.

Feel free to comment on your own sightings of Meanie Crab.

# 2007 Mar 14    {law school}    3

Happy ? day.

# 2007 Mar 14    {nerd}    #

Top 5 conversation topics among 1Ls:

1. how much reading we have for tomorrow
2. who is the hottest girl/guy in the section
3. who in the section is, might be, or should be hooking up
4. who in the section do you hate
5. what was the latest stupid thing they did in class

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comity – n. courtesy and considerable behavior towards others; an association of nations for their mutual benefit

# 2007 Mar 13    {law school}    2

Spectator: Matthew Fox (CC ‘89) of ABC’s Lost selected as 2007 Columbia College commencement speaker. Some decry the selection as unsatisfactory.

U.S. News & World Report should rank “Schools Excellent In Insular Outrage”; Columbia would score well. It is Harvard’s prerogative to blow $40,000 worth of someone’s potential financial aid to bring some comedian onto stage to make a canned speech. CC does not need to keep up with those Joneses. The Internet was built for watching other school’s commencement speeches.

On a appreciate-what-you-have note, the Engineering School has silently suffered through years of unknown and uninspiring speakers. The engineering students are more secure in feeling that they actually learned matters substantial and worthwhile, and they do not need a high-profile speaker to validate their 4 years of education.

Lastly, people are underestimating Mr. Fox. The man has wisdom to impart. After all, he is a courageous physician who rallied a band of airplane crash survivors on a deserted island. Also, he has life experience from dealing with his parents’ deaths and the care of his 4 brother and sisters.

# 2007 Mar 11    {Columbia}    #

The audiobook version of John Hodgman’s The Areas of My Expertise, read by the author himself, is delightful, insomuch as what is on 1 hour 27 minutes into it. The writing is absurd and charming, and it has begun to change my mind about what I am doing in this space.

Discretion needs to rule here, as you saw from my 24-hour rescission about my ruinous romances (though “‘Slake myself’ is hardly a battle cry for springtime in New York” is just gold). I shall find more extrinsic topics, or just delve into sheer fiction.

My writing needs to improve. My stalwart readers, your tolerance for my current style, which I can only describe as “Immigrant With A Thesaurus”, is admirable, but shant be tested much longer. Sarcasm, wit’s lazy cousin, is no longer an operative form of humor around here.

We shall see.

- – - -

prolepsis - n. anticipation; the anticipation and answering of possible objects in rhetorical speech; representation of a thing as existing before it actually does or did so.

# 2007 Mar 6    {meta}    #

I meet the weekend with bare-chested enthusiasm. The shitfest is finally over; the memo, submitted; resumes, sent; casebook reading, ignored.

I am already receiving rejection letters, so I consider myself well on the way to finding a summer job. One firm was polite enough to reject me then offer, in consolation, a position as an “unpaid file clerk.” I appreciated it, and let them know so.

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cavil – v. to make petty or unnecessary objections; n. an objection of this kind;

# 2007 Mar 3    {law school}    #

NY Times’ Frank Bruni reviews the steaks at Penthouse Executive Suites. Not sure if he had more fun writing the review or researching it. Pitch-perfect.

In related news, I have quietly amended my dailiy commute so as to travel past Hawaiian Tropic Zone. C’mon, law school is hard. Every diversion, no matter how base, helps. Those scant seconds as I walk by are hardly… pedestrian.

# 2007 Mar 1    {Life, Links}    #