I don't remember which old fogey I was sharing a conversation with about M.U.L.E., but this site offers a Windows download for an online version—as well as a homepage with a replica of the state-of-the-1983-art Atari-800 graphics from the opening sequence.

Play San Juan in Java.

World record buffet at the Las Vegas Hilton.

My first me-based correction, this in the Portland Press-Herald.

From: Ted
To: Slim
Date: March 28, 2006, 8:11 pm

I did really badly on the on-line Jeopardy! test tonight. I feel so old. How could I not remember who was on the $1 coin before Sacajawea? Susan something. B Anthony? Too late now. I still probably passed, but I feel I'll do terrible if I make it on the air.

===============

From: Slim
To: Ted
Date: March 28, 2006, 8:28 pm

Susan B. Anthony, suffragette!

Even if you did get on the show, any money you'd win would be dwarfed by my massive law firm salary.

===============

So Slim's better-looking than me, smarter than me, went to a better law school than me, and is about to make more money than me. And cooks for me, since she won't let me near a stove after deciding she didn't like my grandmother's tomato-paste-based spaghetti sauce recipe. And was born in the waning days of the Carter administration to boot, as compared to me and the previous Democratic president. Not sure how I lucked into this, but I'm sure not complaining.

If, as is rumored, one needs 35 right to pass the Jeopardy! test, I passed; I'm confident I got somewhere in the low 40s. If Wikipedia is good at one thing, it's obsessively encyclopedic articles about noncontroversial television shows.

I previously passed the Jeopardy! test in 1999 or so, but was disqualified because of my then-employer's relationship to Sony. Another time, Ruth dragged me along so she could try out for the Fox game show Greed, and I ended up being the one who wowed the producers, and was invited to be on the show—except the show was cancelled two days before my taping. The producers went on to create The Weakest Link, and called me at home to be on the pilot week's episodes, but I was again disqualified, this time because of my employer's relationship to NBC. (The hazards of working on the Avenue of the Stars.)

I am stunned at the number of people in the world who seem to think they have my gmail address, and sign up for important things using it.

Anyway, Trisha Frank, that's why you didn't get your $60 coupon for fleece, and why, Todd Frank, Kelly Services never got back to you about your job application.

Also, if anyone knows a polite way to suggest to a law review editor that the conclusion of a syllogism laid out in the preceding sentences of a paragraph doesn't need its own individual footnote, I'd much appreciate it.

I'm not sure the blog format is the best way to handle this, but Tyler Cowen went that route. Nicely links to other reviews. I think Cowen doesn't give sufficient respect to the secret Thai restaurant, but I'm just as happy that only my closest friends know about it.

It's generally bad form to correct one's own Wikipedia entry, but I'm sorely tempted.

Or perhaps giant tribbles. Some quadrotriticale will clear that right up. And I'm a bigger geek than I realized, since there are only 763 google entries for quadrotriticale.

Why "Victoria" is perhaps the funniest I've ever heard. Though perhaps on the level of a sixth-grade camper's "Pamela Proler said she likes you." No basketball knowledge needed for the link. (Via Kirkendall.)

One of the commenters notes that Pruitt doesn't shoot that well on the road, so one can't completely attribute the poor performance to the Berkeley crowd, but it sure makes a better story that way.

ObLackOfBloggingExcuse: I'm organizing or co-organizing six panels on five conferences in eight weeks, which ended up being more time-consuming than I anticipated.

Old Furry Lobster!

Ray's the Steaks apparently closing out of frustration with the customers. Which may explain why we couldn't get a reservation for the 18th a month in advance.

We had late reservations for Ray's this summer; the people occupying our table beforehand arrived late and took their sweet time, and Michael Landrum was very apologetic that we would be seated so late. It didn't bother us at all, because it so clearly bothered the owner much more than it would've bothered us. (And normally, it would bother me: I still won't go back to Butterfield 9 or Felix because of bad experiences I've had there with overbooked reservations.)

It's funny: politeness is very important to Landrum, so important that it (incorrectly) creates an impression that he is rude when he's simply trying to avoid being forced to violate his code of honor by failing to seat people when they have reservations. It's an interesting issue of market supply and demand: by providing such a high-quality meal at such a low price, Ray's has excess demand, which creates the problems that Landrum complains about, but raising the prices would change what the restaurant is. I hope he can find a happy medium, and I hope the place opens up again and will get around to taking reservations.

Fun New York mag article on the band of brothers with minor parts as Tony's goons in "The Sopranos," all of whom make about what a senior biglaw associate makes in a year, none of whom have any real hope of getting a part anywhere as good for the rest of their lives. Fun anecdote: the actor who didn't want to get a mortgage until he was sure that his character wasn't due to be killed. Second fun anecdote: the very big surprise regarding Vito's character last season was the actor's idea. Third fun anecdote: James Gandolfini issued sizable gift checks to all of the cast members, Tony-style, in anticipation of allaying resentment over his huge payday.

The DVDs are outrageously priced, but they'd still be cheaper than upgrading to HBO, but I'll probably do that anyway some time this week.

Tom Kirkendall had coffee with me and Slim on our weekend Houston visit, and, in between trading great war stories, pointed out the latest Laurenzo-family restaurant venture, El Tiempo Cantina. (I didn't know that Mama Ninfa Laurenzo invented the fajita. Good for her.)

Slim and I didn't need much of an excuse for a lunch quest, and we didn't regret the choice. In the giant menus, our eyes were seized by the same taco-enchilada-fajita combination, and everything (save the pea-ridden rice) was quite tasty; the chile-cheese enchiladas skimped on nothing. And, of course, there was green sauce with the chips. Best Tex-Mex I've had in recent memory, and just really puts DC to shame that noone has come close to duplicating it here while places like Rio Grande and Austin Grill thrive.

While researching this blog post, I learned that Marco's, a childhood favorite Mexican chain because of its ludicrously cheap fajitas, was launched by the same Pakistani immigrant who turned around Two Pesos and sold it to Taco Cabana. Slim and I stopped by one of the surviving Marco's, and the fajitas lived up to childhood memories. The neighborhood, a triangle around Main, Kirby, and Old Spanish Trail, in the shadow of Reliant Stadium, also has a Luther's and an Antone's within the same extended parking lot as Marco's (the anchor is a Fiesta), as if to provide a central location for all my childhood favorites.

I've always thought that one didn't need to be a brain surgeon to recognize the Nigerian Internet "Send me money so I can withdraw more money" scam as such, but perhaps you do, because being a neuroscientist allegedly isn't enough.

The history of the Brokeback Mountain joke (via Throwing Things).

subject: maternity leave
poster: curious22
date: March 01, 2006 04:44 am

what is the maternity leave package like at [firm redacted]?


subject: Re: maternity leave
poster: OneCog
date: March 01, 2006 06:23 am

I believe that if the child survives 6 mos. he or she is allowed to assist you with your doc review.

This Throwing Things post provoked my inner talent-agent to discuss the fate of the "Friends" cast: who's made the best and worst career choices? Who's going to have the best post-Friends career? Some of the cast have made choices that were bad in hindsight, but I can't say that any made choices that were bad when they were made.

Keep in mind the baseline. Jennifer Aniston has opportunities that David Schwimmer and Matt LeBlanc simply aren't going to have. All six made enough money from years at $1M/episode that they never have to work again.

Schwimmer is correctly recognizing that his future is not in acting. He made a nice guest-turn in "Curb Your Enthusiasm" as "himself," and has stuck to producing and theater. It's hard to see what he could have done instead.

The obvious criticism of Matt LeBlanc is that he should have anticipated the failure of the flawed-from-birth "Joey" better. But it's hard to see what he could have done instead. Yes, the show was bad: Joey was, at best, a B- or C-story comic relief character in an ensemble cast, and trying to build a show around him had predictably unwatchable results. But the best LeBlanc can possibly hope for is the Owen Wilson role in a buddy action movie, and that's also pretty lame. LeBlanc was offered the lead in a tentpole show in a great timeslot with the biggest potential built-in audience. If you're his agent, you're going to tell him to turn that down for... what, exactly? Yes, "Joey" sucked, but it wasn't LeBlanc's fault that someone offered him wheelbarrows of money to make a bad tv show that had at least a good a chance of success as a good tv show in today's environment.

Lisa Kudrow did an indy film, and an indy-themed comedy series that came out too dark for its audience (and hit the same painful note of humiliation far too often). She strikes me as the smartest of the six, and I root for her as my favorite, but her sensibilities and goals don't appear to be commercial ones, so it's hard to compare her to an Aniston or Cox. But I'm all for as many Don Roos/Lisa Kudrow movies as they can make.

Aniston is thinking right—make romantic comedy movies where she plays a Rachel-type, but needs the strike of lightning in the script to make it work. But once she does, she could be the next Meg Ryan; it's hard to see what she should have done differently than the romantic comedy script that had more buzz than any other in recent memory, and it's not her fault the movie flopped, though the flop shows that her A-list celebrity status doesn't translate into movie-star status. For comparison, she's fifteen months younger than Julia Roberts, but only seven years younger than Meg Ryan (who sacrificed about six years of her career to Russell Crowe), so perhaps "Meg Ryan" isn't a realistic career aspiration. Possible scenario: she becomes Christine Taylor to Vince Vaughn's Ben Stiller. It's hard to believe that she's capable of moving Vanity Fair off the stands, but not opening a movie.

Courteney Cox could also follow a rom-com career path at a slightly worse odds than Aniston has, but that doesn't seem to be an aspiration for her. Then again, someone who marries David Arquette doesn't strike me as the most ambitious person in the world. Her FX series has potential if it's written well, but most FX series flop.

I like Perry's choice the best. He's found himself a lead role on "Studio 60" where he has the potential to make his obituary about something other than "Friends." "Studio 60" is about as close to a sure thing on television that doesn't have "CSI" or "Law & Order" in its title in years: the return of Aaron Sorkin, who critics adore, and an amazing cast. (NBC, showing an amazing talent to screw things up, is competing with itself by putting on two shows about backstage shenanigans at a live weekly comedy sketch show. Tina Fey is also a critical favorite. Plus, other networks are going to gun for the Studio 60, hoping to kill the goose early before it starts laying golden eggs for NBC.) But, in a best-case scenario, the show could give Perry (who did a great guest turn on "The West Wing") a second hit series, and a good shot at an Emmy, plus pay dividends if he becomes a regular featured player in future Sorkin projects. (Speaking of which, Bradley Whitford signs to "Studio 60.") Perry also benefits indirectly by Hollywood's bias against over-40 and over-50 actresses; he'll have more opportunities to take great parts than Aniston or Cox will, though Aniston is aging very well.

I'm also looking forward to the 2030 sitcom where Cox and Perry guest-star as the lead's parents. If I'm NBC, I start developing the legal procedural drama that reunites Cox and Perry in 2012.

I have another gripe about the Law Professors blogging network. I've left multiple comments to multiple posts on multiple blogs, and they've disappeared into the ether, with none of them being printed. Now, they have no obligation to print my comments; there are some illiterate and profane screeds left on the Overlawyered comment board that I don't publish. But that hasn't been the case in the comments I've left, one of which I'm annoyed about because I went through the trouble of finding a cite to a study that refuted the argument that a position I took was "willful ignorance." Perhaps the professors don't feel like moderating the comments that are left, and they ignore them, but then, why have a comments board at all? (Bill Childs is again an exception.)

I'd be more annoyed if the blogs in question were getting as many as twenty hits a day, so perhaps I shouldn't care, especially since a good percentage of that miniscule traffic is from me. Even this shmatta of a blog gets many times more traffic than that, and I make no effort to make this blog accessible. But then that doesn't explain why law.com gives so much publicity to the network.