Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Slowly Returning to Normal


1L is finally done. Not totally and completely. But no more work. Legal writing was back-breaking, finals were intense and exhausting, and the writing competition was 10 days long, working all day every day, and I still had to write the footnote numbers in myself right before I had to hand it in. That was what, yesterday? I started a new job on Monday, at a small public defense firm. That's my part time job. I don't start doing the US Atty thing until Tuesday. We only have 2 grades so far, and they were OK. Not great, not bad. Still have to wait for 3 more and the results of the writing competition. The competition is to get onto a journal. The most desirable is Law Review, for which you need to be in the top 1/3 and write a really good paper. The other journals havel lower standards (and smaller offices). But I am looking forward to law school leaving my mind for a couple months and going in and doing some real work.

Things are looking up: the Yanks took 2 of 3 from the Sox. I am 1/3 done with law school, and I just wrote a 22-page paper, 12 pages of which were endnotes.

All that proofreading experience payed off, maybe.

I look forward to experiencing a bit of the world again. Playing some video games, doing some reading for pleasure, playing basketball, and generally living the good life.

I finally got a disposable camera developed that I shot while my brother & I were on Mt. Washington last summer. What an awesome trip that was. I hope I can get out and do some camping this summer very much.

Monday, May 14, 2007

Holy Shit

That's the only way I can respond to this little news item:

Teachers Stage Gun Attack on Elementary Kids

Microsoft Attacks

 Use OpenOffice.org

Microsoft Claims Patent Infringements in Open Source Software

It's so easy to hate Microsoft. It's like hating Starbucks or McDonald's. But they just keep doing things to make me hate them. I haven't been following this closely, but, apparently, Microsoft, losing profit as companies make the switch to open source, has decided that it will not tolerate companies using open source software without paying Microsoft for it. Not that Zerox and their ilk can't defend themselves from Microsoft's lawyers, but I am sure Microsoft's ultimate goal is that every user of open source software must pay a license fee to Microsoft.

I have an idea for you Microsoft: why don't you return to your "core competency" of making operating systems that infringe on Mac's intellectual property rights. Or try and get some idiot to buy the hapless Zune. Just leave OpenOffice alone!