KUBLACON!

I was in San Francisco last weekend, visiting Claire. Since the move-in/move-out situation at Mengting’s apartment was still in flux, we stayed at an airport hotel on Friday night. To my delight, the Hyatt that Claire chose was hosting a Kublacon Convention that same weekend. For those unfamiliar with the concept—which I presume is nearly all of you—Kublacon is a way for nerds to get together and play role-playing games, board games, and trading card games over the course of a weekend. You literally could not walk five feet without bumping into someone toting Warhammer figurines, twenty-sided die (in a dozen different varietals), or Magic cards. It was one of the most awesome things I’ve ever seen, principally because there were so many of them. And they all looked like some variation of the Comic Book Shop Guy from the Simpsons. The meek had inherited the earth, or at least the SFO Hyatt.

I used to want to own a comic book shop. I told my parents this when I was 14, and they were chagrined. It seemed very logical to me at the time—the comic book shop guys were cool people and all they had to do on a weekday was go to their store, read comics, play video games, and eat fast food. Somewhere along the line, however, I kicked my D&D habit and found better things than comics to spend money on. While I still have a passing interest in superhero exploits (on a whim, I recently bought two subscriptions and dropped some dough on a five-year X-Men run on ebay), I was sad to find the same men and women working at my old Singapore and San Diego comic book stores, thirteen years later. Some of them recognized me, some did not. It’s strange to revisit your adolescence and discover that the guys that you thought were neat at thirteen were still personable and witty people, but unmistakably diminished by their place in life, an element that had once been part of their charm. They were pathetic. I couldn’t help but think that. Which was an absolutely stupid fucking thing for me to think.

Since I got off trial, I’ve been kicking around the office in 2nd gear. I’ve been going home for lunch to work out, and catching a movie or two on the sly. This is going to end relatively soon, because I’m starting to fritter away all of the excess billable hours that I salted away in March and April. But in my spare time, I’ve been trying to identify what motivates me in my career. It isn’t the money, per se, because if I wanted to be a really heavy-hitter, I should have been a banker. While I enjoy the intellectual rigor of my job, in all honesty, it’s not brain surgery. Not even close. I don’t do it to survive, or to put food on my family, because I don’t have a family and moreover, I was fine three years ago with less than a third of what I earn now. Despite what Claire thinks, I can still live in shit-hole apartments if it comes down to it.

So I came to conclusion that what motivates me in my professional life is the fact that in raising me, my parents built your prototypical Asian status-whore. Now that’s pathetic. It’s not that I want the extra dough that Associate A (who left the firm to go to a NY shop) makes—it’s just that I need to be better than Associate A. It’s not that Northwestern is a bad school—it’s just that I’m constantly aggrieved by the fact that HLS grads have the UPPER HAND. It’s all very, very stupid. My parents instilled in me a strange dichotomy—they were effusive with the compliments (which led to an oversized ego), but never really laid a solid foundation for that high self-regard because everything they told me was dependent on my substantiating their opinion through some sort of actual accomplishment (grades, etc.) So now here I am, twenty-odd years later, flourishing, but knowing that it’s never going to be enough.

I’m a pretty big douche-bag to think that someone who’s smart, cool, and happy doing what they do is a pathetic human being. Sorry, comic book guys.

In defense of earnestness.

I have to give Jody credit. Out of all of the blogs that I’ve found on the internet, hers is far and away the most earnest. I admire that, as well as the length to which her posts expose her vulnerabilities. Very nicely done. I wish I could say the same for myself. By habit, I say a lot of things that I truly mean, but in terms so outrageous that the possibility of irony is always present. For example, my post about children. I meant that, but it’s not entirely clear that I did. So anyway. If you had any doubt, I most certainly meant what I said about the big nipples. Definitely non-negotiable.

Someone that looks like Miss December 2004.

I am really fucking bored. We closed our evidence on Friday, and I spent the weekend working on some papers. We filed those briefs with the court this morning, but got a call from opposing counsel later in the day, informing us that the judge was postponing closing arguments until Wednesday. I'm not doing the closing and my partner and I have already gone back and forth on his argument to the point that we're both sick of each other. He still wants me in the courtroom though, so I'll be hanging in Cambridge for another two days. I have half a mind to take a cab to a liquor store, buy a bottle of red, and drink it by myself because I have nothing to get up for tomorrow. It's times like this that I wish I was single. As things stand now, I don't think it'd be acceptable for me to have a whore keep me company. I probably should go to Boston, but I'm incapable of doing things solo, since I prefer having people show me around.

I've been meaning to post this for awhile, since there's been all this wedding talk in the air. I'm probably getting married within the next two years. Someone needs to step up and manage my bachelor party. It's not a job for the faint of heart. I have a very limited number of requirements, but there is one thing that's set in stone: I want a hotel suite and some strippers. Two strippers. One will be white, with black hair and blue eyes. The other one will be asian, and brown. Large nipples are also non-negotiable. Let's make it happen.

Do you remember when we first met?

I now have trial experience. This is regarded as valuable, as most litigation associates in large firms don't sniff the inside of a courtroom for many years. I intend to add my trial work to my website bio, if only to attract more headhunters. But from a practical standpoint, it's not that big of a deal. Our trial was a week-and-a-half bench trial. Since only two live witnesses were offered into the evidence, I was not asked to do any of the examinations. Instead, I spent my days handing stuff to the partner running the case, and doing my best to make sure that he understood what was going on with the factual minutiae. For instance:

Law firm partner: "Where's-uh-where's the org chart exhibit?"

Me: "It's 88."

Five minutes later...

Law firm partner: "I....can't find the org chart exhibit."

Me: "88."

Next day...

Law firm partner: "Hey--we need the org chart exhibit. Where is it?"

Me: "Still 88."

Or,

Law firm partner: "Hey-who was the Vice President of Finance?"

Me: "Pochinksy."

Law firm partner: "Popinsky?"

Me: "No, Pochinsky."

[Unspoken internal commentary: IT WAS POCHINSKY WHEN WE FIRST ASKED OUR CLIENT ABOUT IT, IT WAS POCHINSKY THE 100 TIMES THAT SHE WAS MENTIONED DURING DEPOSITIONS, AND IT WAS POCHINSKY THE LAST TWO DOZEN TIMES HER NAME CAME UP DURING THIS TRIAL.]

And so on. As with life, trial work is 90% preparation.

I am a hamster.

Whoever gave our management committee the bright idea of posting monthly excel spreadsheets on our intranet which keep a running count of everyone's billable hours is an evil fucking genius. I check those damn things more assiduously than sports scores now. Now when I walk by someone in the hallway, I can smugly think to myself that they're the worthless chump that billed less than two hundred hours last month, and I'm not. I bet the management committee is out on a yacht somewhere, drinking cristal while being fellated by well-endowed brown people, and laughing their asses off about how easy it is to punk out all the psychotic junior associates who take friendly competition a little too seriously.