Hello. If you’re wondering why you’re here, it’s simple. We’re working on the new version of Philalawyer.net, in a new format, on a new server, which will be up and running on this page by the end of the week.
Currently, we are working on the graphics and putting the material from the old platform into new architecture here. This should be completed by the end of the week, and provide readers with a streamlined, better organized version of the pieces on the old site. During the interim, if you have any questions, suggestions, whatever… offer a comment here. I’ll address as many as I can.
My apologies for the delay and any confusion this may cause. Transferring a site the size of Philalawyer.net from one server to another is a complex process. It appears I wrote a lot more than I thought I had.
As always, thanks for your patience and support,
PL
Hi, this is another comment. Tucker Max is a doucebag. Sic. Sick, also. Like, in the head.
Yep.
PL: I only reply to this because I have a policy of replying to all comments. This is silly. If you don’t care for his work, don’t read or watch it. It’s just that simple.
Did I miss something?
PL: No. Just switching servers because the old platform I was on closed.
As soon as I heard most Rudius Media sites were getting shut down, I came here to make sure you were all right. Thank God you’re sticking with this site.
PL: Thanks. Awfully kind. But your thanks should go to my original editor at Rudius, D. Miller, who has done most of the heavy lifting on this transfer. Without that assist, a Luddite like me would be screwed.
Damn, and there I was working my way back through the archives again. After reading the book, I’d forgotten how many gems are actually stored away. I’ve read Lit Up two or three times, and been more impressed each time.
PL: Thanks. They’ll all be up again shortly. We’re 70% of the way there.
Might be too early/technical but will the RSS feed remain the same or will there be an updated feed pointing to this new server? Just want to make sure I don’t miss anything…
I’m a practicing attorney, working only on plaintiffs-side class actions. It’s very rewarding and not at all the shitty experience you had practicing law – altho if I did corporate defense work I’d not be saying the same thing!
At any rate, I thoroughly enjoyed the book – despite my happiness at work I view myself as a 1%er – thanks for all the great reading.
PS- what is it with you and the Little Caesar’s motto?
PL: The Pizza Pizza! thing is a friend’s tag line. How his mind works I wouldn’t deign to guess.
I think the RSSFeed stays the same. Though you can ignore the last message in it. We thought we’d need a placeholder site for a day, but we didn’t.
I am a big fan of the site, and curious to see the new stuff. I just graduated from law school and for the last few years your writing has helped me to realize the full depth of the overall sickness and perversity of this profession. Now that I’m a lawyer that picture is even clearer. At least once a week people ask me for advice on whether or not they should go to law school, I directed one such person to your book and it made them want to go more. I’m not really sure how that happened.
PL: Because people are idiots. And the “law school is a ticket to success and happiness” narrative is offered to you at age 22, just when you think you know everything about everything. Nobody can tell a 22 year old who has it all figured out just how stupid he actually might be. He has to learn the hard way, after he’s wasted three years paying professors’ bloated salaries.
And some people think “Debauchery is awesome!” is the whole message of the book. Perception’s reality. Here’s to hoping your friend doesn’t learn the hard way. But he probably will.
Hey, I have an off-the-wall question…I saw on your twitter that you think the Kenneth Cole-style square toe shoes with the flared soles are retarded. Well, dammit, that’s about all I have, though I do need some new footwear. What’s your style and rec’s? (I’m 32, an attorney, size 14, black shoe > brown shoe kind of guy)
Much obliged, and I look forward to your new site. I really enjoy your writing.
PL: Thanks. You have to dump those shoes. They went out of style around 2005. I go with Ferragamos, Santonis and Aldens. Yeah, I know – “That shit’s a fortune.” No, not really. A pair of Aldens will last longer than the average wristwatch. Most durable shoe made. Ferragamo, not as long, but they look nice. Santonis are a bit pricey, but they are the most comfortable shoe I’ve worn and amazingly durable.
Buy for the long term, I say. And go with classic styles. If it’s trendy, it’ll be dated before you get 60% of the value out of the purchase.
You know that bald bookkeeper down the hall, the one with yellow teeth and sores on his scalp? He masturbated into his bathroom sink before leaving for work this morning.
Out of all the witty comments and little pearls in this book,
this is what I laughed at the hardest.
Why you ask?
Not sure.
But I do realize that however disturbing this excerpt is it sums up in many ways what I liked about your book.
We all know it but only few say it.
It was smart to write anonymously…
PL: I’d have never been accepted. I’d have been banished and considered crazy. And yet it’s only what we’re all thinking. Strange world… I blame Puritans for turning us into the liars we’ve all become. But that’s a long story, and you probably know what I’m saying there without me saying it.
Hey man, what the hell am I supposed to do now during a two hour Contracts lecture that goes until 9 P.M.? I know you won’t say pay attention, because that is nothing short of impossible- for us well adjusted law students at least. Got any ideas of what can keep my ‘educated’ mind busy while I wait for the best site on the net to continue saving my sanity one post at a time? Thanks… and keep up the good work.
PL: What the hell are you doing there in the first place? I recommend skipping them all, as that drunk, or failed practitioner, in front of you right now can’t teach you anything you can’t glean from a cursory review of an Emmanuel’s outline. But if you must attend a few classes in law school, Contracts isn’t one of them. Contracts and Property are the simplest classes you’ll ever take. Pay attention in classes like Torts. That’s got a lot of moving parts. Contracts is mostly simple logic, and Property’s memorization. Leave, now. Go out and get a good seat on someone’s couch to watch the World Series.
I love the book and the site. But I’ve got to ask: what’s with the new paperback book cover? It reminds me of something out of the “… For Dummies” series. Totally irrelevant to the content and a fairly pointless detail, I know, but I just thought the original image of a blackberry drowning in a glass or bourbon with a black background was perfect. It seemed to set a more serious tone for the book. I imagine that’s not even a decision that you have anything to do with.
PL: They wanted something that jumped out a bit more. The previous one was great, but a bit foreboding, and this is a commercial endeavor. The other part was, we wanted to appeal to more than just lawyers or professionals. The themes go further than that. This cover grabs the eye and the subtitle leaves nothing to be misconstrued.
I’m a 2l and hating every second that I have to be anywhere near school. Right now I’ve been procrastinating (aka drinking) for the past week and not writing a brief that is due in 11 hours. I’m drunk, and have 50 nitrous chargers in my closet. I realize you’re not an advice columnist, but what should I do?
PL: Down three Red Bulls (or a stronger amphetamine if you have it), blaze out a pile of slop on the paper (make it neat… neat’s half the battle… the prof probably won’t pay much attention to the substance anyway– oh, and fill it with legal buzzwords, enough to give off the appearance you had a clue what you were doing). This won’t get you an A or a B, but it should garner the “Gentleman’s C.” And that’s all you need in circumstances so dire.
As to the 50 chargers, always remember, as my college career advisor (or maybe it was Bobby Brown) once said, “after a dozen, there ain’t no brain cells left to kill, at least today.” Those are precious little bombs. Don’t waste them. For the rest of my suggestions, if you’ve a copy of the book, or you can find it online, look up this term: “Stonewall Jackson.” He was a fine general, and a patriot. But that’s beside the point. The point is the cocktail his name describes. And what you’ve got in the closet is the mixings for a rare and delicious “Stonewall Oxide,” a high octane version of the drink that I assure you, as my great aunt Clarice assured me when she passed down the recipe – “three will make you forget you were ever even born, let alone dumb enough to have matriculated to law school.” Godspeed.
I know that you think law school and the legal profession is a joke, but do you think you would be where you are today without attending law school and becoming a lawyer? Do you feel like you owe any gratitude to the profession or would your writing be the same without you having become a lawyer?
PL: Yes, it made my writing better. But generally, no. I put in my time to get what I got out of the profession. We’re even.
It did, however, give me my wife. Had I not been where I was I wouldn’t have met her, and I wouldn’t have been where I was if I wasn’t a lawyer.
“Gratitude,” though? That’s tripping my gag reflex. Ask any sane litigator in Philadelphia if he’d do it again.
Looking forward to the new site and rereading some of my faves again. Nothing better than reading stories of someone who was as disillusioned as the rest of us but has the talent to put it in words that make sense and can make you laugh. I am pretty sure that if I were to try to write on my experiences in the corporate world that it would just be a pile of discombobulated turd (I am not a lawyer; IT, so awful in its own right).
Keep up the good work!
PL: Thanks, but you know, change is just a few connections away. Most of us think what I wrote, and ideas work like cancer. We’re all only held in a system we don’t like by the myth of enforcement. And they myth of enforcement (that we’d be crushed economically or socially if we said “Screw it” and walked away) is only as strong as the enforcing mechanism’s ability to keep people believing in its power. If twenty million Americans decided to default on their credit cards en masse, they’d get the populist revenge on banks they want in an awful hurry. If a few hundred thousand decided not to pay their property taxes, they’d learn their local govt had little, if any, power over them. I’ve beaten this Melville quote to death, but it’s worth repeating: “Genius all over the world stands hand in hand and one shock of recognition runs the whole circle round.” I probably mangled that as I did it from memory, but you get the point. Guy Fawkes is alive and well. It’s just that he’s in millions of little pieces, scared. But if they all get together at some point, it’ll be awfully interesting. I’m not advocating anarchy, of course. I’m just saying, That feeling of being trapped? The same feeling millions of desperate faces wear in traffic and on commuter trains every morning of their lives? That’s curable. People just have to start talking about it, openly. And if need be, putting their money where their mouths are. The machines you don’t like run on two fuels – labor and money. Starve them of either and the gears seize. It’s just that simple.
Hey PL, like the move…but why? Anywho, something I have been thinking about in the recent is this quote that suddenly popped in my head during work. So I work for a giant bank, and everyone (mostly in my age group) is obsessed with trying to be so damn smart…but at the end of the day, the math is high school level at best, the fundamentals are all pretty interchangeable, and then it clicks: genius ‘looks’ cool and sounds impressive, but common fucking sense (essentially keeping it to the facts and big picture) will probably drive you a hell of a lot further over time. Why? Because most (99.9%) of the shit has already been figured out. Here’s the kicker…I read your site and your recent stuff about the litigator who made partner in 6 years because he sells like a motherfucker. Well, the senior guys in my office, they are regular dudes that do just that… They break the bank (no pun) selling…even now. No, they aren’t from prestigious schools or trust funds. They kicked the fucking door down to get in and now close deals. The guys that don’t sell? They “supervise” the transactions and make petty comments (change this or add this) and realize what they’ve been reduced to via their lack of social skills. Ouch. Like you say, Mr. Management will never frown on a large, constantly growing, and profitable client list.
Best.
PL: I didn’t move. I’m lazy as hell about that shit. Rudius stopped hosting and, selah…
On the rest, you’re dead fucking spot-on about your industry.
But remember, law isn’t banking. I know a lot of bankers, and they aren’t like lawyers. Well, at least not like litigators. Law is a tool festival, the chosen hierarchy of misfits and social defectives who want to fight and argue about minutiae with their lives, etc… In that world, the guy who knew how to get the gold star on his homework was a player of sorts. Sales was considered a lower level skill set, street smarts a lesser gift. And that still holds a bit. It’s ending, but the shift from toward rewarding production, rather than “scholastic prestige,” will be slower than it’s been in your industry.
If you’re reading this, then I’m already dead… PIZZA! PIZZA!
PL: $108,000.00 for a pond full live Hippopotami. Goddamned highway robbery, if you ask me: http://moray.ml.duke.edu/projects/hippos/Newsletter/news138.html Affiliated with Duke. Figures.
Thanks for the quick response. Your reply has me wondering what are your thoughts on bankers? It seems like the greatest fucking heist in history that everyone is forced to deal with…a necessary evil of sorts. I like what I do, but at the same time I’m not a sadist. When anyone asks what I do they look at me like I’m a prick out to end the world.
So, I finished the book, and it has been kicking around my mind for a while. It is a wonderful piece of work, and I plan on buying a few paperbacks as Christmas presents. Yes, I am going to be that guy.
Your observations are just as applicable across the pond here in London. We suffer under greater intrusion on our public lives as politicians seek to cure their disconnect with the public by legislating on questionable moral issues. There is a mass retreat from active participation in public life to a simple desire to be left alone, get slaughtered at the weekend and slosh our way through the week pouring what’s left of our enthusiasm into busywork that slowly kills the soul.
At twenty two I’m stuck with no university education and a comfortable job, and a fear that if I have any talents I’m too busy trying to pay rent to find out what they are. Some of my friends are content with that. Others rail against it. When I read the latter sections of your book, and the way you kept banging your head against the same brick wall it was a deeply uncomfortable moment of recognition. The tension and climax were superb.
I look forward to your next book and the questions it raises.
PL: We’re both definitely leading the charge on intrusive regulation, and not of merely large businesses and individual rights. The level of regulation on a small businessman in this country is beyond comprehension. The red tape… filing your goddamn taxes is a monumental exercise. And all of it for what? So more dysfunctional agencies can pay people who didn’t want to compete in the private labor market a fat salary to sit on their asses for 25 years and retire on government pensions?
On the moral side, I won’t touch the issue of our scolds. Thirty percent of this country attends megachurchs, believes the Earth is 5000 years old and thinks its a divine duty to inflict their regressive views on the rest via legislation.
But those weekend warriors? They’ll hit the wall. I’ve seen them do it, and nothing’s more painful than to watch a man give up and say, “This is just how it is.” I understand why and don’t hold the decision against anybody, but even if you have to do it quietly, below the surface, never concede that the merry go round is right, and you’re wrong. Milk it, manipulate it and beat it… abuse it and suck it dry. But never embrace it. It’s not Your Life. It’s just a way to make money to pay for your life.
Well, unless you’re one of the fortunate who gets to do exclusively what he loves for a living. Or inherits a boatload of money and can opt out from the starting gate, sit back and laugh at the carnival from the good seats.
Damn, I can get ALL those hippo’s for only $108k!? Pablo Escobar, you dissapoint me… It’s a sad day when you find out your hero occasionally gives himself the stinky pinky when he whipes his ass, just like everyone else does. PIZZA! PIZZA!
The health care bill just passed the house. Christ, what a mess. If that thing doesn’t lead to a fiscal crisis in the next decade then I’ll eat my foot. Hopefully the Republicans will kill the thing on the floor of the senate. I’ve learned a valuable lesson about what happens when a party gets too much power. I mean, it’s astonishing that they’ve gone from feigning neutrality to bludgeoning the other party with a stick in a few months. I don’t want to know what the primary domestic agenda will be by 2011.
PL: I always default to this: “Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss.” Change will be agonizingly incremental, if it comes at all. Obama is no fool. He doesn’t want anything radical enough to screw up his chances at a second term to occur. And what he’s not cynical about, Rahm Emmanuel is. There’s a mahine behind “Hope,” and it runs an a very different energy, and has very different goals, than its gullible followers would surmise.
This bill will be a huge wet kiss to the insurance companies when the Senate’s done with it. It will screw the upper middle class, but will appear to reform just enough of the system to allow its architects to declare victory and ride that wave in 2012.
PL- Why on Earth would Rudius stop hosting you? You’re their best author!
Next Q:
I’m a 3rd year biglaw atty. My firm is good enough that we haven’t done any freezes or anything like that so I’ll make the big jump this year (along with my “market” hahaha bonus). Been a fan of yours since the blogspot days, bought multiple copies of your book to give to friends/colleagues/etc. and generally think you hit the target 90% of the time.
Obviously hate my job but have strangely come to peace with it. Clearly there are other things I’d rather do, but the money is good (ie better than a joker like me deserves). So, two parter here, A) Am I just surrendering? B) How did you deal with the money hit once you quit? Not that I’m too addicted to my lifestyle and save decently, but I’ve only recently slain that bitch Sallie Mae.
Thanks and even if you don’t respond, I really appreciate your writing.
PL: I don’t know what occurred with Rudius. But I’m here now, so it’s irrelevant. I hope the company reappears. It’s a good idea. But either way, I’m glad for the experience.
Thanks for buying multiple copies and circulating them. That’s above and beyond what I could expect from anyone, and truly appreciated.
A. You’re not surrendering. I had this odd little skill, and the fact is, I’m not a person who plays well with other lawyers. I can handle them, but I’m kind of odd. I don’t care for processes and am only interested in getting to the end. In law, that’s kind of a liability. Makes enemies and hurts revenue in a unit-oriented billing system. If that sounds like you, you’ll inevitably leave law. If not, don’t lightly chuck a position in this economy. And don’t ever think you’re surrendering for being rational.
B. I had cash coming in from a business when I shifted out of full time practice in Philly and Lisa works. I had to find a way to make the finances work for us, and it took a lot of risk and cutting back initially.
Do I miss the cash? A little. But I’ll get back to where I was on that, and getting there’ll be an adventure, and a learning experience. And working for yourself is an irreplaceable feeling. I don’t have any little Napoleon giving me guff, and that’s worth a lot of dollars.
So when can we expect some new content? Your writings great man
PL: This was a piece of new content. As to stories, shortly. Some traditional, some in a different format.
Congrats on the new site Philalawyer.
Might be worth looking into setting up a Feedburner feed though.. if you need help doing this, feel free to drop me an e-mail, I’ve done it a few times.
PL: We’re doing it. But thank you.
Glad to see that you’re still around! I’m a long time reader, loved the book, but I have one little gripe with the new system. The old Rudius RSS feed would show your whole entries in Google Reader (which I use at work). The new system only shows the first few lines of each entry (in looking at the feed XML code, it takes from the “summary” tag of the ATOM feed instead of the “content” tag which seems to be missing), so to get the whole article, I have to leave Google Reader which has all my feeds and go to the actual philalawyer.net site. I understand you might want to drive traffic to your actual domain, but it’s a nuisance as a consumer of your art. I also don’t particularly want too many sites like “philalawyer.net” to come up on our net monitoring software at my work.
Anyway, keep up the good writing!
PL: Sorry about that. I’m a Luddite, and struggling with the new set-up. But we’ll get there.
Just finished your book and I loved it. I’ve been a slave to the system working in a sales environment and am so fuck’n done with it. I’m actually willing to do other sales positions, but four years selling the same products I’ve been doing is enough for me. I need something new and refreshing though.
Working out of the house and with my boss several states away I spend most of my days fucking around. I shoot out a few emails and make a few calls. That pretty much finishes my days for work. All in an hour.
Kind of wish I’d get laid off, that’s for sure. At least I could start collecting and be forced to make a move. I like many others have become too comfortable and need to get my shit together. Thanks.
PL: It took me forever to make a move. The fear of not having that easy check is enormous. But then you do it and you realize you can survive, and suddenly, the whole artifice – everything they’d told you, everything you’d been lead to believe was ironclad truth about how to succeed, how to survive, what you have to do to get ahead, rings like so much bullshit.