V.O.T.E.

I love this story of a long-lost painting in CNN.com: "300-year-long lost painting heads to the auction block." It reminds me of a novel I very much enjoyed, Headlong by Michael Frayn (2000). I may just have to reread that book, actually....

Via Gawker: "Roll Call reports: 'The juror who was dismissed from the criminal trial of Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) to attend the funeral of her father in California admitted Monday that her father had not died, and that she went to California to attend a horse race.' Everything about the Ted Stevens trial was and is hilarious." I can't get behind all the Alaska hating in the comments section, but it is pretty incredible that someone would lie in a federal trial so that they could go bet....Sigh. Alaska. Wild place.

An ongoing discussion about being out in the legal workplace at AboveTheLaw.

"Top 10 Wired.com Yellow Photos, Decided by You."

I thought this was a rumor but it appears to be true...Palin prank.

Also, Hulu's got all the new episodes of one of my favorite shows/guilty pleasures, Bones.

She works hard for the money. And it ain't much money.

In Neil H. Buchanan's recent paper (reported in Ms. JD, Daddy Bonus, Mommy Penalty), "Why Do Women Lawyers Earn Less Than Men? Parenthood and Gender in a Survey of Law School Graduates," he found a correlation between parental status and salary.  Unsurprisingly, the correlation was not the same between the sexes: while men who were fathers tended to receive higher salaries than non-fathers (the "daddy bonus"), mothers earned 10-15% less than their childless peers (and therefor 25-35% less than fathers!) (the "mommy penalty").

From Boston: For black voters, elation, dismay.

Maybe this bilingual (and adorable) design blog will help me, finally, learn Spanish....El Beso!

I love this clean, modern, yet sweet set of bird designs (left).  What a great way to start the day!

Another design blog I'm loving: The Style Files.

I appreciated this discussion of women making other female friends - socializing in general seems to take a lot more effort than we all expected.  Some of my friends have a good "going out" crew but not many close friends.  Others are the exact opposite.  Some seem to have, like one of the women in the article, lots of couple friends but no one-on-one options for socializing.  After almost three years in Boston, I am finally starting to feel like I have a community...and now I'm looking at moving to a very different place - Miami.  Different climate, different culture, different....almost everything.  And I've been thinking about how I will go about finding a community of people now that I won't have a built in school life, for instance.  I definitely think it's doable, but I also think it's nice to see people acknowledge it takes a little effort.

One of my favorite pieces from The Onion: Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury, Marry Me.

I'm ready to pre-tire...

Pretty excited about this!: "Sources say that Maya Rudolph will return to SNL this weekend to play Michelle Obama!"

On that note: "I'd like to think I'm one part practiced folksy, one part sassy and a little dash of high school bitchy."

"Pre-tirement" in the WSJ. Also, Corporette's poll results re: professional women and tattoos.

"Tracy Jordan—er, Morgan."

And, finally, the Chemerinksy v. Jacobs pro-bono debate (for us law nerds), which began with these comments made by Judge Dennis Jacobs at a meeting of the Federalist Society recently:

. . . In honor of this occasion, I am going to make some remarks that are perhaps more than usually provocative. . . I will touch on some of the anti-social effects of some pro bono activity; I will try to explain why such observations are virtually never made by judges; and I will encourage the kind of pro bono activity that is an aspect of traditional American volunteerism. My point, in a nutshell, is that much of what we call legal work for the public interest is essentially self-serving: Lawyers use public interest litigation to promote their own agendas, social and political. . . Lawyers and firms use pro bono litigation for training and experience. Big law firms use public interest litigation to assist their recruiting–to confer glamor on their work, and to give solace to overworked law associates . . . There are citizens in every profession, craft and walk of life who are active in promoting their own political views and agendas. When they do this, it is understood that they are advancing their own views and interests. But when lawyers do it, through litigation, it is said to be work for the public interest. Well, sometimes yes, and sometimes no.

Tattoos and Short Skirts...in the Workplace

My smart and stylish friend Politichick recently reminded me of Corporette. The site talks a lot about appropriate professional wear for the stylish young woman (which I find fun and also, actually, helpful - you may be horrified to learn that lawyers and judges actually care if female attorneys wear nylons and skirt suits. Whether they should care is another question entirely). This week Corporette did a poll close to my heart: Are visible tattoos ever appropriate for professional women?

As a professional women with a tattoo (that is undetectable when wearing a long sleeve shirt/suit) its something I struggle with. While I have never regretted getting my tattoo, for what it represents to me and also for the time in my life I made the decision, I will admit that it is more of a pain in the butt professionally than I anticipated. When I got it I thought, hey, whatever, it will be covered up when I'm in court so who cares. And I'm not gonna change for The Man! But there is so much time when I'm not in court and I don't want to be paranoid about always wearing a long sleeve shirt/jacket. I think it will become less of an issue in the coming decades, because tattoos are so popular in my generation, but I still think it's an interesting question. Especially since I find myself being oddly conservative and judgemental about what other people wear in court - I think any skirt above the knee is inappropriate, anything tight has no place, and wacky haircuts etc can distract from your job as your clients representative....but what do I know?

Note: apparently I'm not the only one considering skirt lengths. I would generally agree with option "C" but this doesn't take into account slits in the back of skirts, which can take a suit from decent to completely out of control....