Not enough time to polish up a full entry for tonight, so I figured I’d go with bullet points of random things that crossed my mind today:
I made some minor behind-the-scenes changes to the blog, mostly to correct bad coding practices I was too lazy to fix before now The only thing you might notice is the blog heading: instead of “law:/dev/null – Musings of a Computer Scientist turned Law Student” as one über-huge title string, it’s now just “law:/dev/null” with the second half as a lower-level heading underneath it. It should still visually look the same, but if it doesn’t hit refresh on your browser to make sure your computer isn’t using a cached version of the stylesheet.
The spam problems that prompted this entry on .htaccess files also appear under control (fingers crossed). Spam comments are still annoyingly frequent, but at least with a fleshed-out .htaccess file I’m only averaging 4 a day instead of 50+
I’ve met 3 incoming 1Ls over the past 4 days; two are folks I corresponded with through this blog before I knew they were coming to NCCU Law, and the 3rd today just happened to visit the SBA office while I was in there. It’s a lot of fun being able to answer their questions, but it also reminds me how little (translation: none) exploration I did before Orientation. Maybe I wouldn’t have been so nervous if I had?
After that 2-mile run the other day my muscles were tighter than a Nancy Pelosi facelift. It was a remarkably unpleasant experience. Lots of stretching and untold milligrams of ibuprofen later, I knocked out another 2 miles today. We’ll see how I feel tomorrow… (fingers crossed again)
Speaking of politicians — horrible segue, I know — I’ve been really disappointed in this recent GOP talk of trying to amend the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to eliminate birthright citizenship. I mentioned back on Cinco de Mayo that to me there was something fundamentally un-American in penalizing a child for the sins of his/her parent(s). In re-reading the Constitution for ConLaw I next week, I noticed in Article III Section 3 that it bans “corruption of blood”, an old British punishment where the offspring of a parent convicted of a high crime were themselves sanctioned by being disinherited by the government and often condemned to a life of poverty as a result. How sad that the Founding Fathers (who crafted the Constitution) and the ancient Republican Party (who crafted the Fourteenth Amendment) both agree with me on this principle, but the modern Republican Party (of which I’m a member) does not — and would advocate needless tinkering with the most effective and enduring governing document on God’s Earth for the sake of one election…
I’m also disappointed that “Pretty Boy Swag” ranks as high as it does on the iTunes Top 100. When did sh*t like this become mainstream rap?
To close on a more upbeat note, while I was handing out those Orientation t-shirts I met a 3L who came in asking for one. My admittedly-untrained eye thought she looked like she needed a Small, so I apologized and told her we were out of the Smalls and a Medium would be the best I could do. That comment triggered a huge grin and a laugh that I mistook her for someone who needed a small t-shirt (turned out I was off a bit ). My face turned beet red — I don’t really know why in hindsight, I guess just embarrassment for sticking my foot in my mouth? — but I’m glad I brightened her day
That’s it from me y’all — I’m heading to bed so I can get up in the morning and head to the law school to help out with Orientation!
After trying to get the previous batch of late entries edited and posted, I ended up falling behind on this week’s entries… which are now finally all edited and posted as well.
So law:/dev/null is officially up-to-date for the first time all month
And I even have an entry prepped on how to fight WordPress comment spam for tomorrow, so I can stay that way
For this past week’s entries though, here’s a quick listing in chronological order to help you get caught up:
Back when I was a college dropout, I developed a really intense interest in economics — probably owing to the fact I was perpetually broke and working low-wage jobs
I started reading some of the economics books that were out at the time (I’ll confess to even reading a Paul Krugman book or two) in addition to the classics like The Wealth of Nations. Then at some point I read Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt which, the title of the book notwithstanding, is a comprehensive, accessible, and mind-changing analysis of economics and government.
After reading Economics in One Lesson I found myself falling into what is known as the Chicago “school” of economics, and from there read a string of books from folks like Friedrich Hayek, Ludwig von Mises, and Milton Friedman.1 Friedman in particular was fun to read because he had a similar intelligent-but-accessible style as Hazlitt. He even had a ten-part TV series on PBS talking about economics
Anyhow, at some point while roaming around the web today I saw this video among the “related videos” links you get on YouTube. It reminded me of the Socratic method of law school a bit… but also reminded me that I miss Milton Friedman and economists who can engage their audiences.
Here’s the video:
Have a great evening y’all!
Hayek and von Mises are actually considered part of the Austrian school, but I’m lumping them all together here because they have similar principles — don’t send me hate mail if you’re a Hayek or von Mises fan [↩]
…all of the entries from last week have finally been edited and posted, following what I’m pretty sure had become the single greatest writing backlog I’ve ever had in my life
Here’s a quick listing to help you get caught up, in chronological order:
Disclaimer for any of you who become regular readers: any time I write that I’m going to do/say/explain something “tomorrow” or “soon” or “shortly” or any other chronologically-oriented word that would indicate a time horizon in the relatively near future, add at least a week or two to it.
Sorry for the long disappearance y’all. I’ve been on a mini-vacation for most of the past week and have a half-dozen draft entries in a not-quite-ready-for-publication state that I planned on posting during that vacation… but things didn’t quite turn out that way
I’ll try to get them up over the next 12ish hours now that I’m back in the Bull City If you’ve sent me an email and I haven’t gotten back to you yet, I’ll reply by the end of the day!
One of the things I’ve always hated about most vacations is how the last day usually gets wasted. Packing, traveling home, unpacking, etc etc etc — it’s a pretty blah way to end an otherwise-fun excursion.
So 雅雅 and I decided to fix that with a random side trip down North Carolina’s Outer Banks
I don’t know what exactly I was expecting, but what I found definitely wasn’t it. And I mean that in a good way
But I’m getting ahead of myself. First we crossed over the state border and stopped in Moyock, the global headquarters of Xe Services LLC (formerly known as Blackwater). The folks at the visitor’s center in Moyock loaded us up with various maps of the Outer Banks area, and we continued on our way south down US Highway 158 S.
One of the spots on the map was a shop called Lammers Stained Glass & Gifts. Originally we were planning on skipping it — folks selling stained glass didn’t exactly strike us as something worthy of “tourist attraction” status — and I actually did drive past the building as we headed south. But after seeing the shop on the drive-by, deciding it looked interesting, and concluding we had plenty of time for sight-seeing, we turned around and went in.
I’m glad we did
First, the place is almost comically huge. From the road it looks tiny, and even the room where you enter through the front is only about the size of my living room (roughly 187ish square feet). But then you walk in… and notice there’s another room. You walk into that room… and see another room. You go in there… and see another room. Then there’s a long hallway. To another room. Attached to another room. Attached to a whole separate building.
Just in case there's any doubt about my career aspirations
We’re talking almost 9,000 square feet total, with nearly every single inch packed with various types of stained glass, crystalware, ornaments, frames, jewelry, and various other odds and ends. The building in the back is a practical warehouse of antiques with all sorts of cool stuff you’d typically see on a show like Pawn Stars or something.1
Given my future vocation, I decided to grab something for my living room window before we left
After spending about an hour at Lammers Glass, we then resumed our journey south and east to the Outer Banks, then pivoted north toward the Currituck Beach Lighthouse.
As we’re driving through Duck up toward Corolla (where the lighthouse is located) one of the things that is hard not to notice is how isolated everything feels. NC Highway 12 is basically just a two-lane road in most places. It seems like a phenomenal place to vacation2 but the first thought that ran through my mind while I was driving was “wow it must be a real pain in the @$$ to evacuate during a hurricane.”
The whole area is incredibly beautiful. We got to the Currituck Beach Lighthouse about 45 minutes after leaving Lammers, and walked around the lighthouse grounds to check out the guardhouse and such. 雅雅 didn’t like the idea of paying the entrance fee to climb the lighthouse3… but really didn’t like the idea of waiting around while I climbed it, so we both started up the spiral staircase of the ~15 story structure.
View from the bottom (L); View from the top (R)
The view at the top was pretty amazing I took a bunch of photos to stitch a 360º panoramic view together, but until I get around to finding some software for that purpose you’ll have to settle with this single shot of the Atlantic Ocean
After hanging out at the top for a few minutes to snap photos and soak in the view, we headed back down and then ventured over to the gift shop.4 Some of the items in the shop reminded us that we needed to check out Corolla Beach, so afterwards we decided to see how far north we could get on NC-12. Feral horses roam all through the northern reaches of the Outer Banks, but the whole area is only accessible by 4-wheel drive vehicles because it’s not paved — you basically have to drive along the shoreline until you get to Carova Beach, adjacent to the Virginia border.5
But with my non-4WD Ford Focus, we decided discretion was the better part of valor and turned around about a quarter-mile in once I noticed the sand starting to pile high
From there we headed south back toward Duck (population: ~500), where we stopped for lunch at the Sunset Grille & Raw Bar. Their outdoor seating area is set on the Currituck Sound so we got to enjoy the view while enjoying a superbly-cooked cheeseburger, french fries, and sweet tea After that I pulled out my BlackBerry, consulted Google Maps, and we decided to head south toward the Wright Brothers National Memorial down in Kill Devil Hills.
We checked out the building, which includes exhibits on the history of the Wright Brothers, pieces of the planes they built (as well as a replica), and other historical items about flight such as the first military aviation folks, the first female pilot, and so on. After that we ventured out toward the granite markers that designate where the Wright Brothers’ plane landed on each of their 4 test flights… and came to a realization.
Before reading further: don’t judge me please
For whatever reason, when I learned about the Wright Brothers in my K-12 education I had the impression they took off from the nearby hill where the monument stands. I never really got the big deal, since if they took off from the hill and landed on the ground below they weren’t really “flying” so much as gliding to the ground. But standing there, seeing the piece of railroad track they used to take off, realizing (20+ years later) they took off and landed from the same height — I could only imagine the exhilaration they must have felt by that achievement!
Thinking I must have just been remembering my childhood years wrong, I told 雅雅… who admitted thinking she got taught the same thing. Maybe that’s a weakness in the current K-12 curriculum since we came from 2 entirely different states but both recalled getting taught something inaccurate?
Anyhow, at this point 雅雅 and I were both pretty exhausted from all the walking around but I couldn’t resist heading over to the aforementioned hill so I could check out the monument. Similar to being at the top of the lighthouse, it’s a long climb but the view from the top is worth it I recorded some video on my camera phone to give you an idea of what it’s like. I start off facing the Atlantic and circling around clockwise. The field you see at the start and end of the video is the area where the Wright Brothers made their first successful flights; the sound you hear is the wind whipping around like crazy
After heading back down the hill and checking out the recent additions in the pavilion — which includes a replica of what Kitty Hawk and Kill Devil Hills were like back in 1903 as well as information chronicling the history of flight since then — we once again consulted Google for the nearest tourist-worthy attraction and decided to head over to Roanoke Island.
On our way there we happened to pass by the Lone Cedar Cafe, owned and operated by state Senator Marc Basnight (D – Manteo). President Pro Tempore of the North Carolina Senate, Basnight is widely considered the most powerful politician in North Carolina. He never went to college but is a tremendously huge supporter of the 17-campus University of North Carolina and ensuring NC students have the ability to pursue a quality higher education in this state Even though I’m a fairly conservative Republican, and I disagree with the Senator on a fairly wide range of issues, I consider myself a Marc Basnight fan just based on his support for higher education.6
This live oak is 400+ years old!
Roanoke Island is home to the Lost Colony and is part of modern-day Dare County, named after the first child born in the Americas to English parents. Once we got on the island we headed north just before realizing it was getting near closing time for government agencies. We skipped past the NC Aquarium and instead headed toward the Elizabethan Gardens, an English pleasure garden built half a century ago in tribute to the colonists. The whole trail through the gardens is about 1.5 miles. I’ve never been a garden type, but I see why people enjoy stuff like this
Particularly cool was a super-massive-huge live oak tree that is 400+ years old — basically meaning it was there in that same spot when those colonists first set up shop on the island! It’s pretty neat being able to stand underneath a tree and imagine that someone four centuries ago once stood in that exact same spot of that exact same tree
By the time 雅雅 and I finished checking out the gardens, it was a hair past 7:00pm and time for us to start making the 3.5-hour drive back home to Durham (we had left Virginia Beach around 9am ). We took US Highway 64 W, following along the Alligator River before seeing endless fields upon fields of North Carolina’s famed agriculture.
After driving for about 2 hours we decided to stop for dinner in Robersonville, a teeny-tiny town of roughly 2,000ish people7… and home to the most technologically-advanced Bojangles’ restaurant I’ve ever seen
The building was brand new, and included all of the “green” tech stuff you’d expect from a new building. The registers had the gizmos in the front where customers can swipe their own credit/debit card (an anomaly for Boj’s restaurants in the Triangle). There was free wi-fi. Even the bathrooms had Dyson Airblades — the first time I had ever seen them, and which worked surprisingly well.
Needless to say it was a fitting end, having dinner at a tourist-worthy Bojangles’ after all of the other bona fide tourist attractions we spent the entire day checking out
Folks who have worked with me know I’m an obsessive planner, and I’ve never been one to randomly take the day off and go somewhere out of the ordinary. But once I’ve cleared some days in my calendar as “time to go adventure” days, I absolutely love not having the slightest clue where I’m going and instead just figuring it out as I go along. I’ve spent a ridiculous amount of money over this past week, but it has undoubtedly been the single best vacation I’ve ever had for that reason alone: no work, no Student Government, no class, no excuses for staying tethered to life back home — just taking a few days off to unwind and explore without a set schedule or agenda.
It’s good to be back in the Bull City of course, but that was definitely a blast And it reminds my why I’ve made North Carolina my home for the past 12 years
Including restored gas pumps from back in the early-1900s [↩]
Definitely more laidback than Virginia Beach. Example: it’s possible to find parking [↩]
Where I picked up a lighthouse ornament for the Christmas tree [↩]
It’s pretty cool if you pull it up on Google Earth, seeing the development in Carova Beach totally separate and apart from… everything. I’m determined to buy a Hummer or something so I can go check it out some time in the future [↩]
Which is actually a bit weird, because many of my predecessors in the UNC Association of Student Governments dislike him for various reasons even though they’re much closer ideologically to the Senator than I am [↩]
N.C. State has over 33,000 students, by contrast. [↩]
The vacation to Virginia Beach continues, spending today celebrating the 234th birthday of these United States… my favorite holiday of the year
雅雅 and I first spent the afternoon unsuccessfully trying to find parking somewhere near the Oceanfront, eventually giving up 2 hours later. I’m so accustomed to being at the beach either early in the morning or late at night that I totally forgot how insane it gets in the middle of the day
Moving around was a little difficult due to quarter-sized blisters I got on the balls of my feet Friday, but a pair of bandages and some flip flops solved the problem. I even took the opportunity to ride The Hurricane, the crazy high-speed contraption in the photo.2
I chickened out back in 2008 but figured I’d give it a shot this time around. It was an experience
Then we headed back to the grandparent’s house for the usual Independence Day grilled hamburgers, hot dogs, corn on the cob, and various other summer food… and ice cream After that we took the 10-minute walk to Mount Trashmore Park for the annual fireworks show.
I know y’all couldn’t be there with me, so I recorded a bit of video on my phone and posted it on YouTube so you can pretend
Hopefully all of you had a fun and festive day! Have a great night y’all!
Our 3rd theme park in 3 days: we went to Busch Gardens with the family yesterday, and to Water Country USA by ourselves the day before. Crazy expensive but sooooo much fun [↩]
For my NC-based readers, the Hurricane is similar to the Dragon’s Den ride at Emerald Pointe… except you’re not on an inner tube. It’s just you. [↩]
With the 234th birthday of the United States coming up — my favorite holiday each year, edging out Thanksgiving — I’m getting ready to take 雅雅 with me on a trip to Virginia Beach to see Nan & Pops for the weekend.
And since financial aid refunds got disbursed yesterday, I’m planning on making a bona fide vacation out of it
I’ll be drafting posts during my absence; the June site stats entry is actually already in progress. But I can’t guarantee when I’ll get everything posted, so don’t be surprised if things are sporadic over the next week.
Not sure if we have any fathers who read law:/dev/null, but if there are a happy Father’s Day to you!
This is a weird holiday for me, has been for awhile. I’m a father in the definitional sense — Son of TDot turns 12 years old next month — and because of that some of my friends will send me text messages or give me a call with well wishes. But I also don’t play any meaningful role in his life1 so today isn’t really meant for people like me.
It does remind me, though, how traditional the “nontraditional” has gotten. I’ve never met my biological father, and was adopted by my dad when my parents got married… but spent a majority of my life growing up living with Nan & Pops. Even though Son of TDot knows who I am in an abstract way, he was adopted when his mom got married too. I know a number of colleagues with two fathers, both in the “my mom got divorced and remarried” sense and the “my parents are gay” sense. I know a larger number with no father in the picture at all, raised by single moms filling both the mother and father roles. And I know folks who were/are foster children, and others raised by their grandparents. The list goes on.
It’s those folks who are supposed to get recognized today. So if you’re a father, a grandfather, a stepfather, an adoptive father, a single mom filling in as a father, or anyone else holding that role in a family, I hope you have a very happy Father’s Day!
And to the rest of you, have a great night
I’ll spare you the details and attendant documentation; suffice to say I acceded to what I was told would be best for him despite regretting doing so most of the 10 years since. [↩]
The only thing you might notice is the blog heading: instead of “law:/dev/null – Musings of a Computer Scientist turned Law Student” as one über-huge title string, it’s now just “law:/dev/null” with the second half as a lower-level heading underneath it. It should still visually look the same, but if it doesn’t hit refresh on your browser to make sure your computer isn’t using a cached version of the stylesheet.
— I’ve been really disappointed in this recent GOP talk of trying to amend the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to eliminate birthright citizenship. I mentioned back on Cinco de Mayo that to me there was something fundamentally un-American in penalizing a child for the sins of his/her parent(s). In re-reading the Constitution for ConLaw I next week, I noticed in Article III Section 3 that it bans “corruption of blood”, an old British punishment where the offspring of a parent convicted of a high crime were themselves sanctioned by being disinherited by the government and often condemned to a life of poverty as a result. How sad that the Founding Fathers (who crafted the Constitution) and the ancient Republican Party (who crafted the Fourteenth Amendment) both agree with me on this principle, but the modern Republican Party (of which I’m a member) does not — and would advocate needless tinkering with the most effective and enduring governing document on God’s Earth for the sake of one election… 
It’s pretty neat being able to stand underneath a tree and imagine that someone four centuries ago once stood in that exact same spot of that exact same tree 
