The Mr. Brown Network

Since I’m not much on publications, I decided to self-publish my award winning essay, “Sour Apple: The Case for iPhone Jailbreaking”. I wrote this essay earlier in the year for a class I took on Copyright Law, and it was entered into a competition. My paper was awarded the 2nd place prize by a panel of judges, and I happily took the $250 check from ASCAP.

So, now I’m making it available to you. It’s in PDF format, and you can’t copy & paste anything from it, or edit it in anyway. I retain all rights to the paper - do not copy it and claim it as your own or doing anything else stupid.

Click here to download.

It’s time for another review of an exciting episode of America’s second greatest show (behind The Price is Right – speaking of which, I hear the new video game really whips a llama’s ass), Cheaters! In this week’s episode, reality television god Joey Greco and client Jennifer Norris, a 32 year old graduate student, confront her husband, Brennan. But, this is Cheaters – it won’t be any old ordinary confrontation!

Things start out as a typical episode of Cheaters – Mr. Norris tells his hard working wife that he is “going out with the guys”. But Joey Greco’s private investigators know differently… Mr. Norris is going out with none other than the Norris’s babysitter (whose identity has been withheld). Instead of going out drinking with the guys, he’s having a beverage of another sort with his lovely teenage babysitter at what the show only describes as a “cheap motel”.

The next day, Joey Greco’s PIs (headed up by the one and only Detective Gomez) stay at home… the Norris’s residence, that is! Using nanny cams placed in the home, the PIs are able to watch Mr. Norris cheat on his loving wife at home, in front of their daughter!

Finally, on the last day of surveillence, his wife calls him to check on where the heck he is at 2 o’clock in the morning. Mr. Norris gives the douche bag excuse of the century :

I ran out of gas, honey. I’m walking back to the car right now.

Needless to say, this deserves a confrontation. While in the infamous white Cheaters van, Jennifer makes a phone

call to an unknown person, whom we can only assume is one of the baby sitter’s parents. Jennifer makes it a point to call the little teenager a “tramp” and asks the unknown person on the phone to meet the Cheaters crew on location.

The Cheaters crew gets to the locale, appropriately named “Flagpole Point”, and the fun begins. Jennifer runs out of the van to open up the couple’s SUV to find Mr. Norris with his pants down, and the baby sitter’s head in his lap. Maybe she was looking for change?

Jennifer pulls Mr. Norris out of the vehicle, exposing his blurred out genitalia to the world. Not giving him any time to think (nor pull his pants up), Mr. Norris comes up with the best excuse one can think of in that situation:

It’s not what you think!

Jennifer’s response to that is classic:

Then what was it? You’re fucking naked in a park with a teenager!

Joey Greco is speechless, for the most part, during this confrontation, letting Jennifer just beat up Mr. Norris… but she’s not his worst problem. Soon, another car pulls up, and a fairly large, scary looking black man steps out… with a baseball bat.

Big Scary Man with Baseball Bat promptly runs after Mr. Norris and tries to beat the crap out of him. Luckily, Joey Greco’s security squad takes care of ‘em.

For the most part, I give this episode an “A-”. It’s not over the top, like the confrontation with Mr. French, and there could be more Joey Greco/Client interaction. But the Big Scary Man with Baseball Bat makes the episode well worth it!

Amazon.com’s Kindle is an amazing little device, which I would want in a heartbeat… but for a few problems.

I think the biggest problem for me, personally, is that law casebooks aren’t available in Kindle format. I would kill not to be able to have to carry around hundreds of pounds of books at any one time – one thin electronic device to replace them all. But unfortuantely (no fault of Amazon’s), the publishers of such books have their own plans, and want to continue to waste paper and energy pumping out overpriced books, year after year, when the law doesn’t really change.

Additionally, as a law student, I do a lot of writing in the casebooks that I read. The Kindle has no sort of “notetaking” feature, as far as I know.

I love the idea of books on demand and free 3G access to download those books – that’s just plain awesome… but these two things are really deal breakers for me at the moment.

(yeah, I’m totally trying to sell you the Kindle, since Amazon Associates is offering 10% commission on them right now!)

Tommy Habeeb... err.. Grand.

Long ago, long before Joey Greco was stabbed, there was a different host to America’s Favorite Reality Show, Cheaters… his name was Tommy Habeeb, better known to Cheaters fans as “Tommy Grand”. In many ways, we should actually thank Tommy for his contribution to television, for he was also the producer of the pilot that got this wonderful show on the air… but god… he’s an awful host.

Sure, the show pretty much hosts itself – all you really need is a voiceover guy (and they do have an excellent one in Bob Magruder) and a detective to bring the client to the confrontation – you really don’t need the host – but the host compliments the show, and is supposed to help provide for some of the show’s most interesting moments, like getting arrested, getting stabbed, or the occasional “talk to me, Gomez.” Joey Greco does this well… Tommy Habeeb, not so much. Even Jack E. Jett did better than Habeeb when he was called in to pinch hit for Joey after the stabbing incident.

Habeeb hosted the show for its first hundred episodes. Shortly after, he was terminated; a lawsuit followed alleging racial discrimination (even though he doesn’t look like any ethnic or racial minority, and he pronounces “Habeeb” like a redneck would – HEY-beeb), and now he’s relegated to re-runs, pay-per-view specials, and uncensored DVDs.

Joey Greco - God.

Joey Greco is just far more superior than Tommy Habeeb. For example, if confronting a cheater and his now obviously pregnant mistress, Greco would say something like:

Would you like to explain this love child to your fiancée?

Tommy Habeeb, on the other hand, would say something like this:

Are you pregnant? Is this baby his? <awkward silence>

It does not end there. While Joey will gladly step in and help the injured party during the confrontation, if they’re attacked, for example, Tommy will just stand by and let his overly large security guard with the cowboy hat take care of it. Joey sticks up for his clients, Tommy doesn’t.

Luckily for us, the viewer, Tommy has moved on from Cheaters; now, he promotes cheating through his show “STAG: A Test of Love“, which in my humble opinion, is an awful piece of garbage. It is nowhere near the high quality that Cheaters PIs provide us with every night on Cheaters.

…brought to you by Cheaters P.I.’s on Cheaters!

It’s a sentence familiar to all of us late night television viewers… one that starts off every great, spine tingling episode of Cheaters.

If you’re unfamiliar with the show or its premise, it’s simple – spouses/significant others contact the “Cheaters Detective Agency”, they follow the other partner around with cameras, catch ‘em “in the act”, and then there’s always a nasty confrontation at the end. It’s really a great show, and deserves a better timeslot than midnight (or 3am in my soon-to-be-residence of Springfield, Missouri). There’s nothing quite like it anywhere else.

Anyways, I was watching the “Steve French” case last night; appropriately, he shares his name with a porno producer who puts out “Cheating Wives” smut (hey, just Google it!). Mr. French, being the douche bag that he is, decided to cheat on his long time girlfriend with one of her friends who moved into her apartment during a nasty divorce!

Now, Mr. French, as portrayed by the show, is no doubt a violent man. During the surveillance period, he got into no less than three fights with other people, and got kicked out of no less than two bars. The confrontation was no exception to his violent behavior.

Instead of, you know, stabbing Joey Greco, which is entirely appropriate and acceptable, he proceeds to kick out the window of the mistress!

But, oh no, he’s not finished yet! He then attempts to pull the mistress out of the vehicle! Like she would want to go anywhere with him after this confrontation.

Finally, after his girlfriend tells him to “face her like a man,” Mr. French loses it and cold cocks the girlfriend!

Joey Greco, being the most excellent specimen of man that God has to offer, tackles Mr. French to the ground and puts him in a choke hold. A blurred-out rent-a-cop comes and slaps some cuffs on him.

Mr. French then does the unthinkable – he runs off, with the cuffs on, and gets away from Joey and the gang!

Mr. French, if you’re out there, I believe most of America thinks that you’re a douche bag, including myself.

I went to Office Depot today with Jennie to purchase just a few things – namely, paper and a new USB thumb drive. While we were there, a printer caught my attention, the HP OfficeJet 6500 All In One Printer, mainly because we’ve been in need of a fax machine for a while, and I want a printer that I could use to print out the occasional color photo (right now, we have a HP LaserJet P1006 Printer, a nice, and cheap, laser printer that prints for about 2-4 cents/page, depending on the settings).

While I’m looking around, a female employee comes up to me. She asks me if I need help with anything, and as always, I say, “No thanks, I’m just looking around.” I hate dealing with floor employees – most of them have no idea what they’re talking about, and they’re just trying to earn a commission. Luckily, this one went on her way.

I go back and meet Jennie in another section of the store, and another employee comes up to us; this time, it’s a guy. He asks the same annoying question, and I tell him the same thing, immediately turning and heading out of the section. I mention to Jennie that I saw a printer that I liked and made my way over to the section. Little did I know the employee was following us because he overheard us talking about printers.

Immediately, he asks “Do you need help with anything in this section?” I tell him the same thing – no we’re just looking. Instead of leaving us alone, he starts asking about our printing needs. I tell him I have a laser printer, and I’m just looking. He then asks if I print some ridiculous (75,000) number of pages a month, and I tell him no – I do not tell him anything about my printer, toner cartridge, etc.

He then proceeds to tell me that I’m getting ripped off by my printer, despite the fact that he knows nothing about it. He tells me that my printer is costing me over 6 cents a page to print, and that the ink jet I’m looking at costs about 3 cents a page to print… obviously, both amounts are (on average) more than what it actually costs me to print. I tell him we’re just looking and we’re getting ready to move, thinking he would get the hint that we’re not buying today, and to leave me the hell alone.

Instead of walking away, he suggests that we buy a $399.99 printer!!

Needless to say, I will no longer be making printer purchases in-store; instead, I’ll be going to the good ol’ rainforest of Amazon.com.

It’s simple actually… My schedule. This is what I do on an almost daily basis:
6:30 – wake up, take a shower
7:15 – head to work
7:30-10:30 – work at LSU
10:30-10:50 – drive to SULC, speeding the entire way to get there in time
11-11:50 – Corporations law
11:50-12:20 – drive back to LSU
12:30-3:30 – working at LSU
5-9 – back at SULC for Fed J&P and Security Devices

Yeah I don’t really have much free time… Ever.

Wow… just wow… I can’t believe they spelled “biscuit” right.

(i totally ripped this photo off from my friend Anne’s facebook)

…how much I hated basketball (mens & womens) before I started working at Guaranty and began running the basketball games on weekends.

Thank God I have a TV in the control room.

(the views expressed here are solely my own and do not represent the views of my part-time weekend employer)

I don’t really think there is anything that needs to be said — even the most liberal of Democrats don’t want to see this bozo in the United States Senate.