A Conversation with Elizabeth
1998
Lost Track

From:          Elizabeth  
To:            LMixson@PEC.com
Sent:          Tuesday, July 21, 1998 9:29 AM
Subject:       Lost Track
 
I thought I wrote late Thursday or Friday--but all I can remember is speculating about whether Wendy and Sean were getting along.  This was after you said you got a tart reply.  I've been busy as well, with a lot of walk in requests.  Mainly though, I've been trying to use my free time for L.S.  I had a paper due and my breaks and lunch I've been using on that.  I finished it yesterday.  It's not due until next Monday, but I never like to cut it close.  Last semester, some baboon pressed too hard on the xerox machine in the Law Library and broke the glass the weekend before we had a major paper due.[1]  I wasn't caught in the bind, but some students bit the dust, with their papers being late as a result (a letter grade a day which is costly).  I actually got more interested in my paper than I thought I would.  What I did it on is what is called the Confrontation Clause of the Constitution.  The class is Con Law.  The CC gives you the right to "confront" witnesses who claim you have done something wrong, in your trial.  What's happened though is that recently in 1990 or so the Supreme Court decided that victims of child abuse don't have to confront, face-to-face, their abusers, because that could be additionally traumatizing--so now we have videotaped testimony allowed for them, etc.  Now, the exemptions are getting extended--to rape victims, the elderly, and the disabled.  It's an interesting erosion of a long guaranteed constitutional right.  At first I was just happy I found something to write about that was semi-interesting, but as I researched and wrote I got really interested in it. 
 
Otherwise, I'm reading a fiction/novel you might like--but woefully I can't remember the title.  It's a techno thriller.  The reasons I think you might like it are that it is set in Washington, mostly, centered around the National Security Agency; it's sort of informative in that it includes a lot of information about things like encryption etc. It's relatively light and it may turn out to be so-so as I'm not too far into it, but it's been interesting so far.  I'll get the title.  I think it's Digital something. 
 
I had a strange dream Sunday night about my sister, and then last night I dreamed about my Mother.  That to me means things are "cooking" in my brain somehow.  The dream about my sister was strange--she came to my "house" and brought "things"--packages and items, but she went about hiding them under my stuff, so I couldn't tell what they were.  When I uncovered the stuff she had brought, it wasn't what I expected--but I don't have any specifics attached to what she brought or what I expected. 
 
Strange, you've got the heat and we got some relief.  Last night was quite cool.  This morning, because of laziness, but trying to be motivated, I didn't make it out to walk until 6:15.  Usually by then it's already too hot (incredible isn't it), but today it was quite tolerable.  I finally bought a sun reflector for my car this weekend for the windshield.  I didn't get to test it yesterday though, as when I left work it had already cooled down and clouded over.  My car at work is in an open lot. 
 
I saw a list published yesterday of the 100 best English novels of the century.  It was fun to look at it, and also recognize how many of the books I hadn't even heard of.  Some I'd read--Lord of the Flies, 1984, Grapes of Wrath, etc, but there were some authors I had never heard of.  Also interesting was to note how many of the "books" I knew instead as "movies" but had never read the book.  You might want to get the list to look at.  I imagine our local paper won't publish it, but the Post may. 
 
Well, long note.  Nothings "wrong."  I sort of lost track of when I last wrote.  Oh, I think I also wrote you about that rafting accident in Alaska where the Alabama lawyer/representative was killed when the raft got flipped over by a dead tree.  Elizabeth

[1] Possibly broke the glass from Xeroxing his rear end which was a thing at the time, pull down your pants, sit on the glass and hit copy.

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