Slight tinkering with the title and format for Halloween, but I think the avatar will probably stay. The old avatar, James T. Hart of law school classic The Paper Chase had to be retired whereas I'm no longer in law school. Wasn't sure who to replace him with: Mitch Martin of Old School, Atticus Finch of To Kill a Mockingbird, or maybe Harold T. Stone from Night Court. But can you really get any better than Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer?

Congratulations to Marie...

Marie has announced that she is taking a job as the Head of Office of the Association of Defence Counsel at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. We will all definitely miss her, especially since she leaves in only a couple weeks. Her decision wasn't an easy one, as demonstrated by the pros and cons weighed on this bar napkin:

(The link to the larger graphic isn't working...Still trying to fix it.)

Last day as a law clerk. Tomorrow, the '06 Tommies get their license numbers. And breakfast.

Valerie learns why you never say anything negative about anyone in Small Town America. Link.

MABL's own racism.

How the Minnesota Association of Black Lawyers managed to get away with this, I have no idea. According to an article I ran into courtesy of Minnesota's third strongest man, the MABL recently held an event billed as:

a celebration and summer social for attorneys of color in our legal community...This event is for minority attorneys, minority summer associates and minority law students. No other guests, please. Thanks in advance for helping us focus this event on networking with our peers.

(Read: leave whitey home.)

I have no problem with legal fraternities that are established for the purpose of representing the interest of minorities. Every such organization I knew of in law school not only allowed members of all races to attend events but encouraged attendance and membership by anyone. I might even be able to understand such a group holding an event intended only for members of that particular race. It would be totally hypocritical, but I could at least grasp the purpose behind it.

This is completely different. By inviting minorities to the exclusion of any other "guests," MABL is intentionally excluding members of only one race. It's the very definition of racism. And to add insult to injury, as noted in the article, MABL neither acknowledges their error or apologizes for it. The organization refuses to comment.

Lea: Who does Green Bay play tomorrow?

Me: Does it really matter?

Lea: Shut up.

A Minnesota Nice Mugging

My family all know about this by now, so I don't suppose there's any harm in bringing it up here. I had my first mugging two weeks ago. On Friday night, I was walking home from Brit's after hanging out with Marie, Sejal and Matt at about 1:20 in the a.m. Lea was working a night shift. I walked past the Hyatt along the Loring Greenway towards the door to my building's parking garage (since it's the nearest entrance). I use my keycard to open the door and am about halfway to the door to the building itself when I hear footsteps behind me. I turn and find a gentleman literally two feet away staring right at me. He tries to step in front of me.

"Where you goin' son?"

Kinda started to get the idea where this was going, so I tried going around him. He blocks my path.

"Gimme your money."

I start to take a step back away from him as he reaches behind his back.

"I got a gun and I'll ****in' kill you. Now gimme your money."

At that point I knew things were serious. I told him that I only had a few bucks, but that I'd give it to him. I slowly pulled out my wallet, opened it, handed him eleven dollars and showed him the empty inside. He accepted the cash and thought for a few seconds while staring at the empty wallet.

"I ain't gonna take your license or cards or nothing 'cause you cool."

Well that's nice. And that's when it started to get weird. I started to back away and turn towards the door to the main building. My mugger starts to apologize. He said that he'd been homeless for the previous few days and was "new at this."

"Hey, if you need help from people, then just ask them. There's no reason to threaten a person's life. That's not cool."

He apologized again and offered to give me a dollar of my money back. I declined.

He broke for the door and I went in to tell the front desk of the building, call the police, etc. I've since found out that there have been a recent rash of such episodes on the Greenway, the worst of which involved three men who attacked a woman who had to go to the hospital for treatment afterwards. The building, to its credit, has increased its security measures and (I hear, anyway), hired a different security company. Didn't even know they had a security company. So I suppose that's a positive development. And truth be told, I came off fairly easy. I lost 11 bucks. Shoot, he was lucky I even had any cash since I never carry any. But it make you start to act a bit differently in public afterwards. I always make sure the door shuts behind me now and constantly check to see if anyone is behind me. I don't use the Greenway to get home after nine. I keep the safety on my piece off so I can get a shot off more quickly if I need to.

So that's my big city mugger story. Here's to hoping I can keep the count at just one. :o)

Pictures are finally out.

They're all up on Pictage.com. Find it here.

You're governor of what state?

Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer was on Colbert Report last night.

Colbert: "Now you are the governor of Montana. No speed limits, right?"

Schweitzer: "No--"

Colbert: "Pedal to the metal, Sammy Hagar country."

Schweitzer: "We finally got speed limits."

Colbert: "What?? (Crowd moans) Wait, that's finding out there is no Christmas--"

Schweitzer: "We gave in."

Colbert: "You gave in to what, you pulled it?"

Schweitzer: "We pulled it."

Colbert: "You gave in to the feds?"

Schweitzer: "Like a cheap suit, yep. They said we were gonna lose our highway funds unless we implemented a speed limit, so..."

What?? This guy actually runs the State of Montana? Apparently he missed the enormous uproar back in late 1998 when the Montana Supreme Court declared the "reasonable and prudent" speed limit unconstitutionally vague in State v. Stanko, 1998 MT 321, 292 Mont. 192, 974 P.2d 1132. Guess he also missed the part where Montana was without a speed limit until the Legislature finally passed the 75 mph during the 1999 session. No one threatened our highway funds. Congress took off the leash a few years prior--that's why there's no 55 mph limit anymore. Our governor? Oblivious.

You know, it's one thing to announce the new Russell skull quarter without so much as a mention of Charlie Russell. It might even be excusable to some extent to not be aware of how Montana came to have a speed limit. It's outright inexcusable to make up some story about the feds forcing us to pass one--especially in a state that until 2005 refused to pass an open container law and lost millions in federal highway funds simply out of spite for the federal government trying to strong arm it.

I guarantee you Bob Brown wouldn't have made that mistake.

Minnesotan by way of Montana

This is something that the Minnesotans in the crowd may find interesting. As it turns out, I do come from this state, albeit very indirectly. I've always known that my grandmother on my mom's side of the family was born and spent half of her childhood in St. Rose, Minnesota (a very small town in the St. Cloud area). But while I was back home for the wedding in Montana, I discovered that the Clark side derives from the Gopher state as well.

Back in the latter half of the 1800s, before my great, great grandfather W.S. Clark took up mining in Parrot, Montana (Twin Bridges area), he grew up and received his schooling in none other than Red Wing, Minnesota. So having been the first of my paternal line since W.S. to have taken up residence outside of Montana, I guess it makes a lot of sense to have settled only a stone's throw from where we came from in the first place.

Snaps from the nuptials...

Wedding photos are finally up. First of all, our photographer for this wedding, Larry Stanley of Livingston, was the best photog I've ever seen--at anything. He did an absolutely phenomenal job. Some of these are so candid that they look like they couldn't possibly be candid. Absolutely bang up job.

Larry put together a slide show that's linked on his blog, Montana Weddings.

Bar Exam

Passed it. Get to be sworn in. Get to keep my job.

Wonderful. :o)

The Wedding Post, Part II

Moraine Lake in Banff National Park, Canada. This is the view from a hill made from boulders deposited there by glaciers.















The entire area is beautiful, especially in the fall. Not too many tourists, the temp isn't too high, and the larch trees are all turning orange. The larches are a deciduous pine that only grows at 7,000 feet and higher, so come September, the mountains develop a big orange belt of trees.















Lea and I on a canoe ride.




































On a hike to Consolation Lake. If a trail in the park goes through known grizzly habitat, then the law requires that you travel in groups no smaller than six people, so the lodge offers guided hikes to ensure you've got enough for your hike. We ended up on one with two groups from the UK. Nicest people in the world, but they had no conception of what a grizzly bear is actually like. They've got their cameras out, asking if they might see some grizzly bears as if they were going to meet Winnie the Pooh.




















Pretty soon, they forgot about the bears and enjoyed the scenery.















Hey, she's taken, bud.































On Thursday, we came back to Great Falls for a couple days. I had the rare opportunity to see one of my little sister Kirsten's soccer games...















...and an even rarer opportunity to see my other sister Kendra as homecoming royalty at Great Falls High.














All in all, great week. Beautiful scenery, deserved relaxation, and an opportunity to spend some quality time with the family along with a new addition to the Clarks. As soon as some photos from the ceremony and reception are in, I'll be sure to post them.

Put the "curse" to use.

If this Madden Curse is for real, then let's put Bin Laden on the cover. Since we're not going to find him and put him on trial or anything, we might as well cause him to sprain an ankle or something.

Observation

The Padres' mascot bears a striking resemblance to Torquemada.

One can only conclude that the Padres' owners, players and fans are antisemitic. Don't root for the Padres.

The Wedding Post, Part I

All of the work, celebration, and relaxation is over now and I have to say that the wedding couldn't have gone much better. We had a busy week before the wedding (as is the case with most) that need not be elaborated upon--because who really wants to hear about that? I don't.

We drove out the weekend before, leaving at about 5:30 in the morning and arriving at about 7:00 at night--just in time for Dad's birthday dinner in Great Falls.














Montana welcomed us in its usual fashion.















We had our rehearsal dinner on Friday night and Mom and Dad hosted a dessert at their house with the wedding party, out of town guests, etc. It was Lea's and my first opportunity to see a number of our relatives in years. It was also the first time my old crew from high school had gotten together since graduation (Joey, Greg, me, Jarred).














The next day went a bit differently than planned. Originally we were going to hit some small ball over at Anaconda Hills. When we got there, there was a frost delay. Oppression. On top of that, there was a golf tournament going on...involving a number of men in dresses. Yeah, you read that right. Apparently this particular tournament abides by the unusual rule that if you wear a dress, you can hit from the red tees and there are always a few willing to emasculate themselves to shave off a few strokes. Sorry, no pictures.

Anyway, it was taking forever so we decided to hit the Prospector for some breakfast and then roll over to Kirsten's high school soccer game. I only got to see her play for one half (she had to go get her hair done for the wedding after that) but would get to see her the Thursday following the wedding.

After that, put together the hotel room, corralled the groomsmen together in the Holiday Inn Express, and rolled over to the Meadowlark Country Club to meet Lea. Originally, Lea didn't want us to see each other until the ceremony, but over time it became unavoidable. We could either do that or actually have some pictures in day light. Tough choice, but we went with the pictures.

We made the right choice. We gathered all of the groomsmen together on the bank of the Missouri River and had Lea walk over from the club house. The pictures aren't back yet, but the conditions were absolutely perfect: green grass, blue water, clear skies. Can't wait to see them and I'll post some the second I get some back. We had a fantastic wedding photog who put up a bit of a teaser on his blog. He did a beautiful job. Check it out.

After the country club, we set out for St. Ann's Cathedral for the ceremony. Father Dick Schlosser from Holy Family presided. Lea and I exchanged vows in a 35 minute ceremony that went off without a hitch. As I said, as soon as I have some pictures of the ceremony itself, they'll be posted here.

Back to the country club for the reception. Lea's bridesmaids all joined in on a toast together. Goss gave a pretty darn clever one as well...And now I have more house keys than I could ever know what to do with. ;o) Don't ask. My little sister Kirsten then took the mike and gave her own toast. It was heartfelt, genuine, and included what were probably the nicest things ever said about me.

Lea and I cut the cake, swigged some champagne, jigged a short rumba to "At Last" by Etta James and enjoyed a wonderful party. Again, pictures to come.

And since Blogger has apparently decided not to upload any of my pictures from the honeymoon in Banff, I'll have to add those later in another post. Miss it all, but good to be back...