Merry Christmas

On behalf of the Reason staff, I thank you for an excellent year-minus-a-week-minus-a-day, and wish you the very best for whatever holiday you are either celebrating or decrying or scrupulously ignoring. And I hope that you are not in fact reading this message, having better things to do on a holiday. In any event, best wishes.

Comments

[Paul]

At the risk of annoying a certain cantankerous couple in Bellevue, WA, Merry Christmas, Tim.

http://www.kingcountyjournal.com/sited/story/html/180888

Paul

[Gary Gunnels]

Merry Fuckin' Christmas Tim!!!

Hope everyone got what they wanted!!! 🙂

[Bill O'Reilly]

Oh DAMN, Cavanaugh. It's ON now.

[Jennifer]

My One True Love and I exchanged our gifts last night, and in the mail on Christmas Eve I, personally, got the Gift that Keeps on Giving: a summons for federal court jury duty. If anyone has any info on jury nullification, please email it to me.

And Merry Christmas anyway. At least my other presents were cool.

[Ken Shultz]

Merry Christmas everybody!

[joe]

Merry Christman, kwais.

[kevrob]

Jennifer, you have my sympathies! That OTL guy is one lucky sonuva..., I'll bet. Check here for jury info:

http://www.fija.org/

Happy Merry!

Kevin

[TWC]

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all...and a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2005, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great (not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country or is the only "America" in the Western hemisphere), and without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith, or sexual orientation of the wishee.

This wish is limited to the customary and usual good tidings for a period of one year, or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first. "Holiday" is not intended to, nor shall it be considered, limited to the usual Judeo-Christian celebrations or observances, or to such activities of any organized or ad hoc religious community, group, individual or belief (or lack thereof).

Note: By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher at any time, for any reason or for no reason at all. This greeting is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. This greeting implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for the wishee her/himself or others, or responsibility for the consequences which may arise from the implementation or non-implementation of same. This greeting is void where prohibited by law.

Courtesy of Comic Relief

[Andy]

TWC,

That may be the most absurdly PC shit I've ever seen.

Allow me to wish you a Merry Christmas and if you don't like it, cry me a river 🙂

[Ruthless]

kevrob, you Magnificent horny nerd: the meat is always sweetest next to the bone.

Jennifer,
On about this date in 1965, when we returned from a short, cheap honeymoon, we found the even more dreaded letter in the mailbox:
"Greetings: You are hereby ordered to report for induction..."

Here's my advice for jury duty: Hang 'em high!

Seriously, we should have a special thread here for your juror experience.

Earilier in 1965, I had my one and only jury duty experience. Among other things, we, an all white jury, awarded a record amount to a black woman who had been allowed to fall out of her bed in a black-only hospital in Nashville. She had remained for a time in contact with a radiator which caused some godawful scars. I'll never forget when she took the stand, she was on the verge of revealing those titillating scars when the judge intervened.
If I recall correctly, the jury was allowed, as we got deeper into the nitty-gritty, to smoke 'em if we had 'em. I didn't smoke, but I did, in the jury box, good citizen that I was.

[TWC]

Thanks Andy, and Merry Christmas to you as well.

Ruthless et al, you can get out of jury duty by responding that you can easily spot gulity people a mile away. They just don't look right.

Out here you can't get out of jury duty any more except if there is a death in the family. The catch is that it has to be your death.

And Tim, I actually DO have something better to do but it involves DISHES. Since Mrs TWC is relaxing in a hot bath and the chillen are entertaining themselves with their $20,000.00 worth of Christmas presents next to the actual yule log, I'm downstairs at my desk. But not for very long......

[Ruthless]

TWC,
You don't look right, but happy new year anyway to you and yourn.

[SM]

Merry Christmas, ladeez and gents !
Just incidentally - haos anyone researched how whisky tastes sweeter after the abstain ?
Back to partee.

[thoreau]

TWC-

I wish you a happy holiday (with all due disclaimers on the word "holiday"), with the proviso that wishing you happiness should not be construed as undue pressure or insensitivity if you should happen to suffer from a mental illness that precludes normal happiness.

We just got back from a great Christmas with relatives in LA. We even saw the star of "My Big Fat Obnoxious Boss" (he's an in-law of an in-law, basically). There was only one problem: On the way back our engine overheated in stop-and-go traffic, so we had to pull over, let it cool down, then drive to a gas station, then let it cool again, then add coolant. That added some time to the trip.

But if that's the biggest complaint I have over Christmas, it's a blessed Christmas indeed.

[Jennifer]

Ruthless-
If they WOULD start a thread for "advice for a first-time juror" I truly would appreciate it. I know there are plenty of ways to get out of jury duty--act racist, pick your nose in front of the judge, insist you have proof that JFK faked his own death and is now CEO of Halliburton--but I can't quite bring myself to do any of that.

Kevrob-
He is, he is. And he knows it, too.

[TWC]

Ruthless, my wife keeps telling me I don't look right. Had a cop tell me that once at 2:00 AM--he was less diplomatic, told me I looked like a criminal and that's why he stopped me. Now that I'm old that doesn't happen anymore.

Tho-row, thanks, and I am a few bricks shy of a full load so I appreciate your sensitivity. Merry Merry to you too,

Christmas in LA....Glad it was just the way it should be.

We stayed put on our rock infested hillside where the cold winds from Utah nearly blew the house off the map on the 23rd. But Christmas dawned lovely, peaceful, and a bit chilly but warmed up nicely as it often does in So Cal.

I think Christmas morning is probably the quietest time of the year. It is an eerie kind of quiet, too. Sort of like something out of a time warp in a Stephen King novel. No traffic, no frikkin dirt bikes, no tractors, construction noise, kids hollering, lawnmowers, or dogs barking....just the sound of the breeze in the trees and the beating of a hawk's wings as he dive bombs some poor schmuck of a rabbit.

[Ruthless]

Jennifer,
I was thinking of a new thread titled: "Jennifer does the jury (thang)" with you as the prime commenter.

Tim,
Be in touch with Jennifer.

TWC,
Have you ever seen a raptor at the moment it actually catches something in its claws? That would be the holy grail for a bird watcher. I've only come close.

[Joe Majsterski]

Commenting on Paul's link: the Christmas Tree is a Pagan symbol!

[TWC]

Ruthless:

"Have you ever seen a raptor at the moment it actually catches something in its claws? That would be the holy grail for a bird watcher. I've only come close."

I'm far from a pro bird watcher, for example, I didn't know we had eagles here until my cousin pointed it out.

I have seen the local hawks, of which we have zillions, catch a snake once and other small prey here and there but the most intense interaction I had with one of them there hawks was when he flew past my head from above and behind at about 500 mph on his way downslope (we live on a pretty steep mountainside with lots of varmints) to grab something that I couldn't see.

He was going so fast and was so close that the wind marking his passage literally rocked me back and forth on my feet. And I'm a pretty big guy. It startled me as I wasn't expecting it and it scared me a little bit when I thought about what would have happened if he had miscalculated and hit me in the head instead of zooming by a foot or two away. Never had that happen again, I mean a hawk get that close. We do have a noisy ass owl that wants my white cat really bad though. This thing will rise up the side of the house (slowly) like an Apache gunship until it gets above the deck railing where it then tries to get the cat (who is oblivious and never seems to get got). If the owl ever grabs that fat mean cat he is going to be sorry because the cat weighs more than the owl.

[TWC]

I wrote something about jury duty in So Cal and how the prospect of sitting on a jury has improved of late (that was before breakfast). I duly noted that the legal system is STILL all about the convenience of the lawyers and judges, but, the system has begun to treat jurors as human beings of late. Then instead of posting it twice I lost it. Figured it wouldn't do much for Jennifer anyway since she is back east somewhere so I didn't try to fully re-create it.

[Rick Barton]

Merry Christmas everyone!

[Kevin Carson]

Jennifer,

Expressing any sympathy for jury nullification should get you out of there pronto.

[Paul]

Joe Majsterski
Commenting on Paul's link: the Christmas Tree is a Pagan symbol

Everyone who's anyone knows that. There are two groups who are largely particularly confused about it, however. 1: modern christians, 2: secular white liberals.

In the case of the article link, it's an 'atheist who's a committed Jew'. I have sent that comment out to top experts worldwide, and as of yet, none have gotten back to me as to its possible meaning. Anyone, especially committed Jewish atheists, please explain.

Signed,

Confused

[Ruthless]

"He was going so fast and was so close that the wind marking his passage literally rocked me back and forth on my feet."

Those of you who have despaired that the ignorant, indifferent world seems incapable of going "our" way, behold the raptor! She (not he) symbolizes the "phase transition" of society.

Paul (Saul),
How could you, of all people, be confused about committed Jewish atheists?

[Jennifer]

Kevin-
Well, my OTL tells me that since I have to go in on a Friday, that means there's a good chance I'll only have to sit there a couple of hours before being sent home. I don't know what he's basing that on, but I hope he's right. If not, I suppose I can print out some Internet document with the words JURY NULLIFICATION in huge letters across the top, and wave that around.

I just hope this isn't offset by the fact that I look so darned respectable.

[Jason Ligon]

"Expressing any sympathy for jury nullification should get you out of there pronto."

Heh. You don't have to even go that far. An expression of libertarian inclinations will get you automatically crossed off of every prosecutor's list when voir dire comes about. It happened to me. The funny thing was that the prosecutor called me up in front of the judge and tried to argue that libertarian positions made me unfit to serve in any case whatsoever. He tried to get me dismissed for cause so that he wouldn't have to burn one of his dismissals on me every time.

The judge asked me a series of questions that started out with whether or not I could serve as a fact finder - if I could tell the court whether such and such a person acted in a way that met such and such a criteria, even if those criteria ran in opposition to my general beliefs. I responded that I was probably a pretty good fact finder. The prosecutor then asked me whether I could consider the full range of penalties for the trafficking charge at hand. I responded that I had probably put more thought into that area than almost anyone else in that room - I had definitely CONSIDERED the full range of penalties presented under KY law.

The judge smiled a bit and asked for clarification on my libertarian inclinations. I said that after giving the matter much consideration, if the criteria presented before me indicated that a crime had been committed, it struck me as a crime much more similar to Jay-walking than to capital murder. The judge indicated that since the range of penalties for those crimes overlapped, it was difficult for the prosecutor to dispute that point. He had to burn a dismissal on me every time I was selected for the duration of my duty.

Sad as it is, that was the best striking back agaist the man I could manage.

[Jason Ligon]

Oh, and I hope all Reasonoids had a happy holiday weekend. May the government not intrude too visibly on you all during this holiday season.

[drf]

merry christmas all.

here's to a prosperous, safe, healthy, wiser 2005!

(has anybody else already broken resolutions for 2005 already?)

best,
drf

[TWC]

Good job Jason.

"May Gov't not intrude........."

My motto is to keep a low profile and ignore them as much as possible. It works to a certain degree.

[Stevo Darkly]

I belatedly would like to wish that everyone had a merry Christmas, or happy holidays, or at least a good weekend. Take your pick. (I'm kinda religious, but I try not be an asshole about it. Bear ye witness.)

[thoreau]

This article from last week's Onion seems appropriate for this group:

Weed Delivery Guy Saves Christmas

From the article:

"That stranger brought us something so much better than any store-bought gift," Moynihan said. "I don't know his name-it's considered bad form to ask-but he taught us that Christmas wishes can come true, if you believe."

And so it was that the weed delivery guy-hardworking, dedicated, and discreet-saved Christmas in the nick of time.

"We may not have had a big tree and all that," Moynihan said. "And there wasn't eggnog dusted with nutmeg, 'cause the only time we ever had any nutmeg in the house was the time we tried to trip on it. Not recommended, by the way. But we had a happy Christmas all the same."

It wasn't long before all through the house, not a creature was stirring up off the couch. The boys opened the baggie and packed a bowl with delight, murmuring, "Happy Christmas, weed delivery guy. You did us one right."