Muttroxia

We found five comic book stores within a few blocks of each other. I particularly liked this one that specialized in Tintin. We got a Tintin notebook for one of the kids.

Here are the two facts that most surprised us:

• The bloodline of Louis XIV is still alive. We assumed they had all been killed off. Not so, there are many descendants. They are the equivalent of Americans descending from George Washington. It’s an interesting thing to know about someone, and that’s it.
• Storekeepers can only have sales at two times during the year.

The second was the more shocking of the two. We happened to be there during the spring sale (that’s the “soldes” sign from the last post). They simply can’t have a sale at any other times during the year, by law. That’s just crazy. How on earth can a shopkeeper compete? Maybe that’s why every store and every restaurant looked the same – they are legally constrained from differentiating themselves. (That’s just a theory. I would think that if your prices have to stay the same, the only way to get more business is to differentiate yourself in some other way, yet no one does. Culture or Law, I wonder which.)

That’s real socialism in action.

They sure make them big in France.

Allright, so Muttroxia is a little backed up! Our trip to France was 3 months ago, but we’re finally sorting things out now. Sadly, our journal, a work of art, so very literary and insightful and humorous and… well, it doesn’t matter because everything after page 4 got lost somehow. We’re pretty sure our daughter put them down the toilet.

We do have the photos though. For the next couple weeks, Muttroxia will feature photographs of odd little things that struck me as interesting. Allons-y!

One of the perils of suburbia is Mrs. Muttrox getting invitations to things like Bunco (some people think this is a game of skill) and even Tupperware parties. I can’t believe these things still exist. It feels like something from the Mad Men days. I imagine it is hard to sell the stuff. I mean, I can buy plastic bins at the supermarket, ya know? One clever parent combined the sales schtick with a get-to-know-you of our childs class.

This part of the invitation just killed me.

Dads and children are invited to play outside and enjoy the slip n slide while moms mingle and see the newest in reusable products.

I don’t know which is funnier: That Dads are seen as boisterous morons who will be delighted to be exiled to the slip n’ slide, or the prhase “newest in reusable products”.

(or at least the fairly well-to-do middle-class)

I missed a couple payments on my credit card. I called up and asked them to take off the late fees and interest charged. Sir, were there any special circumstances? No, I just don’t want those charges. OK sir, let me see what I can do. 2 minutes of silence, and then, “Thank you sir, those charges have been removed is there anything else I can do for you today?”

Why on earth does this work? Because I have been with them for 21 years, and I have a good credit score and enough money that they want to keep me as a customer. They think it’s worth refunding me that money to keep my business.

The crazy part is, I’m a terrible customer for them! I haven’t paid any fees to them for the last 15 years! Whenever they get me with something, I call them and they take it off. They don’t make a dime off of me. They just keep extending me short-term loans (that’s what credit is). Free money!

(As ad-libbed to the kids a few nights ago, when they demanded a made-up story.)

Once there were a people who lived in the deep deep South. They were called Mexicans. The Mexicans were good people. They worked hard. They liked the same things we do. The liked their families, they liked Rajon Rando, and they liked deep rugs and comfy blankets.

They had one big problem. They worked hard and because they worked hard they had money, but all the money was a kind of money called pesos. And nobody liked pesos. Pesos!? That’s not money!, the shopkeepers would say. Come back with dollars. Pesos – is that even a real word? So the Mexicans went hungry. They hadn’t had any food for years. They would turn to each other and say, “These are tough times, we’ll get through this somehow.” Of course they would say this in their own language, which is called Spanish, even though they weren’t from Spain. Don’t ask about that part.

One morning, a young lad (for there weren’t any other kinds of lads) had an idea. He had seen Joan Rivers on TV a few days ago (imagine one of the skeletons from Scooby Doo), remembered his Dad telling him about a superhero who could help them. He called for Letterman!

Letterman saw the problem. He took the pesos, and turned the “P” into a “T”, the “e” into an “A”, and the “s” into a “c”. The day was saved!

And that’s how tacos were invented. Now go to bed.

There is a new category in the Emmys, interactive media. The first winner is Star Wars Uncut. Check it out.

Star Wars was chopped up into 15-second segments. Then anyone who wanted to could film their own version of a 15-minute segment and send it back. Eventually, they ended up with the entire movie, redone. It’s incredibly entertaining. One segment will be serious, the next will be legos, the next will have children actors, the next will be animated, you never know what’s coming next.

You can also vote any particular version of a segment up or down. If there are enough votes, a segment will be switched out. Every time you watch the movie, it will be a little different.

How to do Facebook wrong.

A very pleasant walkway

Very sad picture

Girl quits her job on dry erase boards – fantastic HOPA resignation. It turned out to be a hoax, and you’ve probably seen it by now, but it’s still funny.

Scissors beats paper

You will never look at ducks the same way

What about Norway?

Matt LeBlanc auditions to be Matt LeBlanc

Slogan win

I don’t want directions

Heros essay

Nirvana’s viewpoint on lip-synching

A serious badass

A victim treats his mugger right

Understanding a PhD

Hello from my lighthouse

Squid attack!

Just a terrible terrible football play

Meanwhile in Australia

Chicken McNuggets rage

Spidercan makes me giggle

Jenny McCarthy bodycount

Yes another high school classmate of mine has a novel out (there are at least 4 other published authors from my class). I went to the web to figure out what it was. I found his website. And couldn’t log in. Yes, I had to log in. I am very confused by this. You’d think the first thing any author would have is a publicly available website with everything and everything about them and the book.

Anyhow, here’s the book.

My biggest flaw in poker is my inability to read people. I’m not an expert with the math and game theory, but I am more than strong enough for the level I play at. I’ve never been that kind of social person, I am not that great at reading cues from body language and tone. My nerd background focuses me on actions and content, it assumes people are doing their best to communicate the truth.

Playing poker without reading people well is playing with a serious handicap. I have been playing with the same group of people for three years or so, and I don’t even try to read at least half of them, because I just can’t.

Last night was worse though. Last night I had good reads, but I didn’t trust myself.

Hand One: From the small blind, I min-raise with A-3. Three of us go to the flop, which is A-A-x. I suspect that the big blind also has an ace with a bigger kicker. Sure enough, he raises. And I can’t let go of my trip Aces. I just can’t. I manage to convince myself that he’s bluffing. Eventually he turns over A-8 and I have lost half my stack on that one hand. Ugh.

Hand Two: A conservative player raises pre-flop. I call with A-J. The flop is Q-8-5 or something. He raises again. I don’t believe him. Even with his tight playing style and two raises, I think he has nothing. Or at least not very much. I call. On the turn he goes all-in. I still don’t believe he has a Queen or a monster hand. But with nothing made in my own hand, I grudgingly fold. He turns over 7-2. (We had a 7-2 bounty.) Nyarrgghh, I almost never have a read on him, and when I did I didn’t believe myself.

Hand None: There is one player I have a strong tell on. When he has the nuts (e.g. he has Q-J, and Q-Q-J comes out) he does the same thing every time. I discovered the tell two years ago, and I haven’t been able to utilize it. Just by chance it hasn’t come up in the last two years, he’s never had a monster hand against me. That’s annoying. And even if I did get to use it, it’s not very cool to just fold. It’s much more interesting to have a tell that let’s you know when he’s bluffing.

In summary, it’s taken me three years to get a few partial reads on a few people, and I don’t trust myself to use them. Not good!

Why was in court? Because I failed to pull over for emergency vehicles. This was a law no one had told me about. Everyone knows you should pull over for emergency vehicles. But most people don’t know that you need to pull over for stopped emergency vehicles. And most people don’t know how far you have to pull over. You have to pull over far enough so that there is an entire free lane between the you and the emergency vehicle and yourself. Like this:

The fact that I slowed way down and that I was driving very safely doesn’t matter at all. I also happen to live near the newly incorporated city of Dunwoody, which is making up it’s budget problems by issuing ridiculous tickets. They set up a trap to get people with this law, and they got me. How much do you think the ticket is? (I hope this works – my first poll.)

[poll id=”2″]

$695. That’s right. Six hundred and ninety five dollars. Don’t forget the points and the inevitable raise in insurance rates. This was worth fighting.

I went to the arraignment phase to get a deal cut. But the conversation went wrong, and before I knew it I had agreed with the Solicitor that yes, you’re right, I am pleading not guilty, and I want a full jury trial! I’m still not sure how that happened. Six months later, I got my summons to DeKalb Superior Court and it was time to argue my case.

I have a lawyer buddy who occasionally works cases like this. He got his partner Charles to meet me at court that day to help out.

Strangely, we were back in the arraignment phase all over again, only in a different courtroom. Once again, the judge spent twenty minutes going over the ground rules, and then asking each person if they were pleading Guilty, Nolo Contedere, Not Guilty, or if they wanted to talk to the prosecutor before deciding. I already did this part, why am I in reruns? If I had known it was going to be this stuff again I would have pled Nolo on my own or bargained with the prosecutor myself, I would have never bothered getting a lawyer.

There were 89 cases scheduled. In a standard 8-hour work day, that means about five minutes per case. That isn’t a lot of time to dispense justice.

I have my own bench. They made everyone move over because there are so many cases. But most people don’t show up, and Charles is exiled to the jury box to save room, so I am all alone on my bench. I don’t mind. There is about 50% attendance. That is sad. The guard later told me that most of the people who aren’t here can’t get time off work. Then a warrant goes out for their arrest and things get even worse for them. Sad.

There is a man on the bench behind me sleeping. He was sleeping when I walked in. He is half-snoring. It’s weird. Maybe he works the night shift? He is taking up two or three spaces and everyone else is squeezing around him like he doesn’t exist.

The prosecutor walks in, and Charles gets to him before he can even sit down. It took Charles all of thirty seconds to make a deal. He and the prosecutor whispered back and forth. I hear the prosecutor say, “What does he want?” then nod okay at the reply, and the deal was done. I probably saved a couple hundred dollars worth of my time, just by getting this taken care of and being out the door early.

Demographics: It was 90% Black and Hispanic. The dress was often informal, but never disrespectful (unlike last time, where one guy wore pants down to his knees and a Lakers jersey). It was mostly sneakers and polo shirts. I am the best dressed person here by a country mile. I don’t think dressing up nicely actually influences anyone that much. If this has ever influenced a judge, it hasn’t been around me. I suppose that’s a good thing.

Three out of four white people have lawyers. That’s not a percentage or a ratio. There are four white people, and three of them have lawyers.

Public Defenders now cost $50 (used to be free), but the fee is waived if the case is completed on that day.

It sucks to be poor. Off the top of my head:
• I got a lawyer for free, just because I know many lawyers in my regular life.
• I took time off work (not everyone can do this). I probably won’t even get charged a vacation day for it.
• Charles was telling me about the usual cases they have here. In car accident cases, Insurance agencies identify the poorest plaintiffs and purposefully offer terrible settlements. The companies know the victim doesn’t have the resources to fight and are likely to take any offer as “better than nothing”.
• The $50 charge for a public defender. I am surprised. I thought if you were poor enough it was a guaranteed constitutional right to have a free lawyer.
• In rural counties, they’ve outsourced probation. As a result, it cost $200 just to be on probation.
• Court is just plain intimidating. It’s easy to make a mistake and screw everything up, and you are painfully aware of that all the time. If a mistake is relatively catastrophic, it makes the scenario even more frightening, making it more likely that you’ll make a mistake.

A woman just pled an agreement with the state for shoplifting at WalMart. It was arranged that she would go into a shoplifting program of some kind. But she only speak Farsi. Can the program handle Farsi? Her son is interpreting for her. But when she was called up to the stand, her son was outside feeding the parking meter. So she stood mutely for fifteen minutes while the judge decided whether to delay everyone’s day waiting for the son, or to move on to the next case.

The mix of electronics and paper is ridiculous. The judge and her workers have computers to record the flow of cases and determinations. But all the actual information about the case is in old manila folders that would look fine on Mad Men.

“How do you plead?”
“I am not guilty!”
“Do you have a lawyer?”
“I am represented by Edmunds and Associates, and they will. Get. Me off!” Maybe not, but I’ll bet they are screwing you pretty well.

I was wrong, there is another person here dressed well. A middle-aged black man outshines me easily. The judge asks, “How are you doing today?” He answers, “Blessed.” I like that.

Remember the man sleeping behind me? They call his name, but he isn’t there. The security guard speaks up. “I had to remove him to the sick room, he’s on some kind of medication.” “Okay, so he is here, but sleepy?” “Yes, he can’t stay awake.” “I hope it’s not marijuana. That’s what here’s for!” The whole courtroom laughs.

“Sir, is this your first case of this kind?”
“It’s my first case of any kind!”

When it is time for the arranged pleas, I go first. I pled (or rather, my lawyer pled) Nolo Contedere. Interestingly, I was given my choice of two charges I could plead to. Either the original not Moving Over for Emergency Vehicle, or I could change to “Unsafe Speed for Conditions”. I decided the latter sounded a little better. $200 plus court costs poorer, I walk out.