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Monday, May 31, 2004
Buy This Book
If you're a lawyer who cares about good writing, then you probably own a hardcover copy of Bryan A. Garner's A Dictionary
of Modern Legal Usage (2d ed. 1995). I recently discovered that DMLU is now available in paperback --
unabridged. The paperback lists for $27, but you can pick it up on Amazon.com for $19.04 . If you keep your hardcover DMLU at your office, you might want to buy the paperback to use at home --
I did.
Heroes
Mother Jones has this photo essay of soldiers wounded and disabled in the Iraq war.
Definitions in Discovery Requests
Litigators who draft discovery requests often include a Definitions section, defining terms used repeatedly
in the requests. For example, a request for production will often include a comprehensive definition of document.
Many litigators invent their own lengthy boiler-plate definitions, or copy someone else's. In an attempt to make
their discovery requests as broad as possible, they often end up with prolix definitions filling several pages.
For example, I've seen several definitions of document that filled or even overflowed a legal-size
page. The responding party often objects to such definitions as imposing an undue burden, circumventing the
limit on the number of interrogatories, or rendering the discovery request unintelligible.
You can easily write succinct, comprehensive, and objection-resistant definitions. The secret: whenever
possible, incorporate by reference definitions established by statute or court rule. For example, instead
of using a prolix definition of document, try this:
Document includes anything that:
(a) is a "writing" or "recording" under Fed. R. Evid. 1001(1); or
(b) is described as a "document" in Fed. R. Civ. Proc. 34(a).
Another example: A Louisiana litigator seeking information about another party's medical history might
use the Louisiana statutory definitions of health care provider. Thus:
Health care provider includes any person or entity who is a health-care provider under:
(a) La. R.S. 13:3734(1);
(b) La. Code of Evid. Art. 510(A)(2); or
(c) La. R.S. 40:1299.41(A)(1).
Health care provider also includes anyone who is a state health-care provider under La. R.S. 40:1299.39(A)(1).
Definitions like these are as comprehensive as any you might invent yourself. They look better on
paper, are more easily understood, and are harder to object to.
Saturday, May 29, 2004
WWOZ
At right, I've added a link to WWOZ, a local, independent radio station. 'OZ plays all kinds of music that you won't hear on commercial radio, including blues,
New Orleans-style R&B, jazz, Cajun, zydeco, African, and Latin-American. If you live in or near New Orleans, tune your
radio to 90.7 FM. If you live anywhere else in the world, visit the web site and click on "Listen." Or, if you're lazy, just
click here. And if you like what you hear, please consider becoming a member.
Today's oxymoron
The TV reporter said: "The governor signed off on a bill ...."
She should have said: "The governor signed a bill ...," or "The governor approved a bill ...."
Thursday, May 27, 2004
Today's Euphemism
The TV reporter said: "... explosive device ..."
He should have said: "... bomb ..."
Colombian Peace Activist in Danger
[This message comes from my friend, Roberto Foss. The Sojo.net web site that you can link to below is legitimate.]
Dear Friends:
I have received word that my friend, Ricardo Esquivia, a leader and peace worker in the Colombian
Mennonite Church and a friend of Sojourners, is being threatened with arrest by the Colombian government.
Ricardo
is the director of Justapaz: Christian Center for Justice, Peace, and Nonviolent Action, and has had a relationship with the
Sojourners community for several years. I know him to be a man of peace who has risked his life to help resolve
the armed conflict in Colombia - most recently negotiating for the release of a Justapaz worker kidnapped by guerrillas.
Please pray for Ricardo and his family in this time of terror, and please consider emailing a letter of concern to Colombian
and US officials through the following link.
Sincerely,
Roberto Foss
PDF Format?
PDF stands for "portable document format." Thus, saying "PDF format" is as bad as saying "ATM machine,"
"PIN number," or "VIN number." So don't say, "I'm sending you a document in PDF format." Instead say, "I'm sending
you a document in PDF."
Wordy Captions
In my law practice, I often see wordy, imposing captions like this:
MEMORANDUM OF SPACELY SPROCKETS CO. IN SUPPORT OF OPPOSITION TO MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT
This typical caption includes five prepositional phrases and is painful to read. Here's how I would clean it up.
For starters, don't be afraid of lower-case letters. Contrary to what many lawyers seem to believe, the word
caption does not mean "all caps"; nor is there any court rule requiring all caps in captions. I suggest
using what the Chicago Manual of Style (14th ed., § 7.127) calls regular title capitalization or headline style:
capitalize the first letter of the following words:
- the first word
- the last word
- all other words except prepositions, articles (a, an, and the), coordinating conjunctions (and,
but, or, for, nor), and to in infinitives.
If you want the caption to look more imposing than the rest of the text, use bold text and a larger font.
Applying these rules, our caption goes from this:
MEMORANDUM OF SPACELY SPROCKETS CO. IN SUPPORT OF OPPOSITION TO MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT
to this:
Memorandum of Spacely Sprockets Co. in Support of Opposition to Motion for Summary Judgment
That's much more readable -- but still too wordy. Let's make two more changes.
First, let's change Spacely Sprockets Co. to a possessive and get rid of the of.
Second, let's change the oxymoronic in Support of Opposition to, by deleting Support of. The result:
Spacely Sprockets Co.'s Memorandum in Opposition to Motion for Summary Judgment
If you're feeling particularly brave, you might even delete Memorandum in:
Spacely Sprockets Co.'s Opposition to Motion for Summary Judgment
Compare that to what we started with above, and decide for yourself: (1) Does the "after" version
contain any less useful information than the "before" version? (2) Which is more readable?
Wednesday, May 26, 2004
On-Line Etch-A-Sketch
This on-line Etch-A-Sketch is almost as good as the red plastic toy that we 40-somethings grew up with. It's simple: use the arrow keys to draw, the
space bar to shake-and-erase.
Low-Rider Bill Fails
The Louisiana Legislature has derailed a bill that would have outlawed low-riding pants. Said one legislator, "There
is only so much we as a Legislature can do to deal with people's conduct.... This is an issue that should be addressed by
the parents or the teachers or the coaches." Good call. You can read the Times-Picayune's story here.
Tuesday, May 25, 2004
A Christian "Onion"?
At right, I've added a link to LarkNews.com. Think of it as the Church section of "The Onion." My favorite
headline in the current issue: "Student who chose Bible college over Yale now feels 'royally screwed.'" Here is
a link to the front page.
See Your House Here.
Type in your address here, and see a satellite photo of your house and neighborhood.
Monday, May 24, 2004
The Subservient Chicken
Type in a command here, and watch the chicken obey.
For Sale: Wedding Dress - Worn Just Twice
A guy gets a divorce, somehow gets custody of the wedding dress, and sells it on eBay to raise money for baseball tickets
and beer. For photos, he can't find a model, so he models the dress himself. His web site is here.
Sunday, May 23, 2004
Cicadas v. Formosan Termites
In parts north, the cicadas are swarming. This happens every 17 years. Meanwhile, down here in the subtropics,
the Formosan termite alates are swarming -- this happens every year. Alates are flying termites. They don't eat
wood; they just fly around looking for someplace to reproduce and establish a new colony. But the colonies they establish
do eat wood -- lots of it. As termites go, Formosans are voracious.
LSU has on-line information about Formosan termites generally here, and about the flying swarms here. Meanwhile, National Geographic has an article about cicadas here.
The alates swarm at night, and are drawn to light. So if your house is leaking light and has a crack
that they can squeeze through (such as a window that's not hermetically sealed), in no time you'll have dozens of them flying
around inside your house.
Cicadas are larger and noisier than Formosan termites. But at the end of swarming season, the cicadas will disappear for
another 17 years. And they don't eat houses. The Formosan swarms will be back next year, and the next. And between swarming
seasons, the termites eat houses and trees. So to all those annoyed by cicadas, I say "Count your blessings."
Friday, May 21, 2004
The Poster Child of Clichés
Poster child has become a cliché to describe a prime example of something. I think it originated with
Jerry Lewis's telethon to fight MS, or maybe with Easter Seals or something similar. The phrase originally referred to
a child with a crippling disease, who appeared on a poster as part of a campaign to raise funds to fight that disease.
The phrase crept into class-action litigation, where a particularly sympathetic class member was selected to present to the
jury as the "poster child" for the class. In that context, the metaphor fit, as the class representative's purpose was
the same as a literal poster child: to make money by eliciting sympathy. But now we often see the phrase misused
to refer to anyone and anything that is a good example of something -- regardless of whether the example serves the same purpose
as a literal poster child.
Whether or not poster child is misused in a given context, the phrase is certainly overused.
Let's give it a rest.
Get the Lead Out
The past tense of the verb lead is led. The verb led should not be confused
with the sound-alike noun lead ("Pb" on your periodic table). People who confuse the verb led
with the noun lead commit errors like this one: "Moreover, the district court found that Blinder, Robinson
intentionally mislead [read misled] its customers ...." Hoxworth v. Blinder, Robinson & Co., 903
F.2d 186, 193 (3d Cir. 1990).
Thursday, May 20, 2004
Disturbing Auctions
7:45 pm | link
Museum of Bad Art
It really exists. Check it out here.
Wednesday, May 19, 2004
World's Coolest On-Line Clock.
7:59 pm | link
Monday, May 17, 2004
Progressive and Pro-Life: No Place to Stand?
From the current issue of Sojourners: "What does it mean to be "pro-life"? For some, the term is understood
very narrowly as the opposition to abortion, particularly through legal sanction. Others are committed to reducing the number
of abortions, truly making them rare, but favor policies that don’t criminalize abortion—and prosecute women and/or their
doctors—to do so. And as U.S. Catholic’s Heidi Schlumpf explains in this article, many people, on both sides of the legality
question, see a genuinely pro-life stance as one that embraces respect for the human person at every stage—a position that’s
hard to find in today’s polarized politics, and one that cries out for broad (and civil) dialogue across our various divides."
I'd like to give you a link to the article, but I've had trouble getting the links to work in the blog section of this
site. To read the article, click on the Sojourners link at right, then click on the picture of the magazine
cover.
Reference: A Noun, Not a Verb
Refer is the verb from which we draw the noun reference. Don't use the noun where you need the
verb. For example, don't say, "The Jones case is referenced repeatedly ..."; instead say "The Jones case
is referred to ..." -- or better yet, "The Department refers to the Jones case ...."
Tchoupitoulas Barathon
Last Friday I ran the 22nd Tchoupitoulas Barathon -- and took pictures. Before and after the race, I used my trusty
Nikon digital camera. During the race, I carried a couple of Kodak disposable cameras, snapping pictures en route.
The best ones are posted on the Barathon web site.
Saturday, May 15, 2004
A Tortuous Mistake
If you write anything related to tort law, please remember the difference between tortious and tortuous.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, tortious means "pertaining to or of the nature of a tort."
Tortuous means "full of twists, turns, or bends; twisted, winding, crooked, sinuous," or, figuratively, "not direct
or straightforward; indirect, irregular, devious, circuitous, crooked: esp. in a moral sense." When you mean tortious
but write tortuous, you torture your readers who know the difference.
Thursday, May 13, 2004
Trouble no more
In raving about Son House, I neglected to credit the artist who steered me to him: John Mellencamp. On "Trouble
No More," he does two by Son House: "Death Letter" and "John the Revelator." The opening number is one of Robert
Johnson's: "Stones in my Passway." Imagine Robert Johnson playing an electric guitar -- that's what "Stones" sounds
like.
Wednesday, May 12, 2004
I'll be there; I'll be there; I will be there.
Emerson Lake & Palmer was one of my favorite groups in the 70's. I just got a CD of their "Brain Salad
Surgery." My musical taste is far different from what it was in the 70's, yet "Karn Evil 9" still sounds great.
When something holds up well under time, we call it a "classic." Or as my Webster's puts it, "a work of enduring excellence."
This record has endured.
Monday, May 10, 2004
Son House
Today I discovered Son House. A CD of his songs, titled "The Original Delta Blues," has been in my car's CD player
since Saturday. But I didn't really hear it until today. The verdict: Son House had more humanity in his
little finger -- the one that works the bottleneck slide -- than most people have in their entire selves.
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