Ayesha made me do it.

so here goes: Book Meme:

1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the 5th Sentence.
4. Post the next 3 sentences.
5. Tag 5 people.

I’m nerdy. This is from my Criminal Law Casebook. I was in the library when I started this meme.

Pg. 123 is from Chapter 3: Modern Role of Criminal Statutes from the U.S. v. Foster [133 F.3d 704] dissenting opinion by Circuit Judge Trott. Here goes:

“Is he no longer carrying it if he then moves to the front of the truck or returns to the passenger compartment? All of this makes for fun in the Socratic classroom, but it does not work on the streets of America, which is what Congress had in mind when it drafted this legislation. While we have been debating this case en banc, the Supreme Court has granted certiorari in [United States] v. Muscarello[, 106 F.3d 636 (5th Cir. 1997)].”

Law student. Can’t help it.

Tagging: (I was tagged by Ayesha)

Danielle
Yasmin
Samra
Salma M.
Sophia

A memory, from a flight to Canada a couple of years ago.

I had settled in to my seat and was looking through the air travel magazines in the little pouch in front of me. The seats next to me was empty, so I was looking forward to a quiet and uncramped plane ride.

As I was flipping through a magazine, trying to decide which of the featured golf courses looked most pretentious, a mother walked by with her two young children. They had the row behind me, but she obviously realized that she could only seat one of her children next to her and that one would have to sit next to me. Now, the dilemma - which one of the two children could she convince to sit apart from her? The boy was younger, so she tried to convince the girl, about five or six years old, to sit next to me. She brought over her daughter and buckled her in, against the vocal and physical protests of the little girl. Resigned, the girl proceeded to sulk.

This would not do. For my own peace or for the sanity of the mother, who would no doubt soon have to deal with two whining children, one whom she couldn’t really see. I had an idea.

“What’s your name?” I asked her.

“Anna.” Still sulking.

“Hi, Anna. I’m Tai.” (I figured Taiyyaba would be hard for her to say). She shook my hand politely and with little hesitation. This just might work…

“Want to make hand puppets?” I asked, pulling out an air sick bag from the pouches in front of our seats. I stuck one on my hand, using my fingers to move the folded part up and down like a mouth. “All we have to do is draw faces on them.”

Her eyes brightened. “Yeah!”

“Great,” I said, pulling out Sharpies I had in my purse. “Here, get started.”

“Thanks, Tai!” she said, excitedly. I pulled down her tray and she started to draw. Huge oval eyes, colored in with smaller circles. Eyebrows and eylashes. Scribbled hair. Big, pouty red lips.

As the plane started moving, she got scared. I told her not to worry but she still looked concerned, so I offered my hand. Anna grabbed it, holding it tightly while the plane took off. I opened the window and we watched the clouds fly by.

Soon we were done drawing faces, so we put our hands in the bags and made them talk. The air hostess came by, smiled, and asked us if we wanted anything to drink. We had orange juice and those little odd-tasting crackers.

“Now what do we do, Tai?” Right, obviously since I came up with the first idea, I had to come up with the second one, too.
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If you haven’t seen it already - this is a great short movie. To the song “A Land Called Paradise” by Kareem Salama (btw, he’s a lawyer!)

I have a friend, a lovely fairy-like girl who is always a good source for inspiration and philosophy. She told me that when she was younger, she always used to write in pencil so she could erase if she made mistakes. But now, she always wrote in pen because she thought about her words before she wrote them down. Where was the meaning and beauty in words, she said, if you wrote them down without realizing their weight and importance?

Lawyers spend a lot of time with words. Reading them, writing them, speaking them, arguing about their meanings depending on historical use or placement relative to the nearest comma, streaming them into a logic syllogism to win an argument. I’ve never spent so much time debating about what one word means than during law school, especially through statutory interpretation in Criminal Law and Constitutional Law. Words become our life from the first day we step into the study of law. Everything becomes about how we read a statute, how we interpret each word. We must master the art of rhetoric, but also know when one concise statement will win the case. We must learn to be careful with words when speaking with clients, because legal jargon can add pain upon pain to the hardest problems of their lives.

I think lawyers could benefit from my friend’s thoughts. As we become masters of language, we must learn to channel this thunderous power into a controllable thing, something digestable - but always something that carries all of the power and emotion of the entire storm.

I found a poem scribbled on the corner of some notes from a lecture long forgotten. I don’t remember when I wrote it, but the meaning is stronger for me now than ever before.

I think I’m tiring of the words
They all resonate and repeat
And the best ones are now sounding hallow
Bringing back memories of the
Same ineffectual things
But isn’t this ironic?
Am I just mimicking sounds?
I want something powerful and heart wrenching, soul-stirring
Images and feelings that leave no room for words

Ameir asked for the Buttermilk Alfredo Pasta again, so I was looking for something to do with the rest of the buttermilk. I had seen this on various blogs and decided to look for it in my Joy of Baking cookbook and….there it was! This is a “Quick Bread,” according to Joy. It’s easy if you’ve never made bread before (like me), but you’d like to start experimenting. This bread doesn’t need yeast, because the baking soda (hence the name) and acid in the buttermilk react together to act as a leavening agent. It doesn’t get too puffy, but it sure is crusty-on-the-outside, soft-on-the-inside delicious. It would go well paired with a stew, but it’s also very nice on a Saturday morning, hot from the oven and slathered with butter with a cup of tea alongside. Simply Recipes says that this bread dries quickly, so you should eat it in a day or two (ours was gone very quickly, but if you do get to this point, make bread pudding!) Ameir’s mom is part Irish, so I felt like I was doing some credit to his heritage by making this!

Note on flavoring: I made this with raisins, but without caraway seeds as the recipe recommends. If you’re going to make it sweet like this, add more sugar and some other flavoring to the dough (I added cinnamon inside and also sprinkled the top with cinnamon sugar.) If you’re going to make it savory, skip the raisins and add herbs (next time, I’m going to try it with rosemary in the batter and maybe cracked black pepper on top).

Click below for recipe
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