Frustrated with Law Review

I sent this email to the Law Review Chief Notes & Comments Editor, and thought I'd share.

SHORT, CONCISE VERSION:

I still have no feedback on my paper and my editor is AWOL. I am stymied and very, very frustrated.

LONG, RANTING VERSION:

On November 4, I turned in a 56-page draft.

On November 6, I emailed an electronic copy to my editor, [EDITED], at her request. She said she would make comments directly on the copy and email it back to me. At the time you and Michelle both said it would be perhaps after Thanksgiving before I would get back any comments. I said fine.

Thanksgiving came and went. On December 6, she wrote, "After finals ... I truly don’t have time to look at it until after then. You are well ahead of the curve as far as your paper goes, so I think you should have plenty of time to incorporate changes etc. Are you leaving town or anything over the break?" (She's had it for a month and says she will LOOK AT IT after finals? How does she know I'm ahead of the curve if she hasn't looked at it?) Again, I said fine.

Then on the evening of December 22 she wrote, "I think it would be better for you to see the comments. Please let me know what your schedule is and we will plan to meet briefly to discuss your paper. I do not think that sending you comments by email would be adequate or helpful." (I think it would, since I've heard nothing at all for the past seven weeks!)

I wrote her back immediately and said we could meet the next day (Dec. 23rd) but as of 9:30 this morning, December 26, I still haven't heard back anything. It's been four days. I know it's Christmas. I also know people were working on projects in the office on December 23.

It's now AFTER CHRISTMAS and I still don't have any comments. The whole point to getting a draft in early was so I could get feedback early. I wanted to finish this paper before the Spring semester started. It's no secret that students use their break between semesters to get the bulk of the work done. That break is half over and I haven't been able to work on it because I have received no feedback whatsoever about my paper.

In short, I'm feeling blown off, delayed, inconvenienced, and, frankly, PISSED.

Habla Ud. leet?

Microsoft actually has an article on how to read and write 1337! (In case you don't know, that's not a number there, it's the word "leet" as in "elite"--a peculiar way of spelling supposedly adopted by teen computer nerds. I have seen articles on it in the past but I can't say I've ever seen anyone actually using it. But then, I haven't hung out in chat rooms in quite some time, and I don't text-message anyone in middle school, so what do I know? "ph34r my 1337 5xilz! |\|0\/\/ 1'm 4n 3xp3r7!" D16?

TSO

Last night Nora and I went to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra perform at the Toytoa Center. Here's my review:

First, whoever designed the Toyota Center should be forced to sit in one of those seats for three hours a day until he repents and publishes a public apology. There is no leg room whatsoever. Your calves can be pressed against your seat cushion and your toes will still be touching the back of the seat in front of you. So your legs start to go numb, and the only way you can move your legs is to turn your feet at odd angles. I hate it, hate it, hate it.

The concert was divided into two parts. The first part was called "Christmas Eve and Other Stories," in which a narrator comes out and recite a bit of a story, in verse, about an angel travelling the world on Christmas Eve. The story he tells introduces the next musical piece, and after the selection ends he trots out to give you a little more of the story. He uses a deep, husky narrative tone that is supposed to evoke a sense of enchantment and wonder, but it mostly comes across as annoying. Honestly, we decided to bolt after the first hour. About twenty minutes later they reached the halfway mark, and they paused in the performance to introduce the band. We hopped up to go. On our way out I asked a security guard about the second half. She said it was much better than the first half, so we decided to give it a few minutes and see if it was different. We're glad we did. It was sooo much better. No story, no poems, just good music and an amazing light show with lasers and pyrotechnics. One of the showstoppers was their rendition of "Carmina Burana," (really--does that ever fail to thrill?). They also played a little of Bach's "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor," Guaraldi's "Linus & Lucy," and other favorites. By the time it was over, we were glad we'd come and glad we'd stayed.

Rant

New Orleans was one of the top ten most violent cities in the US. And when they needed our help, we were there. Now every day someone in Houston is carjacked and/or killed in an apartment parking lot on the SW side. In all fairness, I can't say what proportion of these animals are from Houston, New Orleans, Mexico, or somewhere else. I don't know, because HPD hasn't caught them. In fact, they recently let a convicted killer on death row escape by walking out the front door of the prison. How many more have to die before the mayor stops talking about it and does something substantial? We could run DNA tests, but our lab is corrupt. Our safe & clear plan needs to be a zero-tolerance, clean-up-the-streets plan. So far the violence is mostly contained in SW Houston and a few isolated pockets. Don't the honest people there deserve protection? Come on mayor! Stop it now before it gets out of control. Spend money if you have to.

Today a fight between New Orleans students and Houston students at a local high school led to 30 arrests. In order to keep things even, they arrested 15 H-towners and 15 NOs. But get this: According to the Houston Chronicle, "Of the 15 Houston students arrested, 12 were boys and two were girls. Thirteen girls and two boys from New Orleans were arrested." I don't know what's more disturbing, that the 12 Houston boys were apparently fighting with 13 New Orleans girls, or that the Chronicle has a profound inability to perform basic math.

Stop the madness!