VIRGINIA LAW WEEKLY

4 ColumnsVIRGINIA LAW WEEKLYFriday, 06 February 2009Big Girls Don’t Cry. Unfortunately, I’m Quite Small.I used to be an emotionalrobot. For years, I laughed atpeople that got “super-upset”Allison Muth ’09Columnistabout anything,especially whenit ended in tears.I had emotionprecisely once a year. I likedto call it my “lovably nervousbreakdown.” Cute affectionatename! For the worst day in mylife. It always occurred duringcross country practice, alwaysbegan during the team meetingleading up to a tempo run, and italways REALLY hit the fan abouta mile in. Apparently, I HATErunning. Once a year.Anyways, so this “emotionalwithdrawal” continued untilI got to college. I have a hypothesisfor this. Just a guess, Iwould say “emotions are highlycorrelated to the amount of irresponsibledrinking being done.”The beer wants to escape! Out ofyour eyes! So, in honor of February,and the odds that at least afew of you will have a touch toomuch to drink at some point, I’dlike to explain a few commontypes of tears.Happy Tears. If we pretendfor a moment that this is not amyth, this is what happens whensome guy proposes to some girlthat he loves. Usually, she startstearing up. That’s assuming itwould be happy tears, not hercrying desperately as she thinks“oh s*** s*** s***, I KNEW notdumping him would f*** me atsome point, but now I’ll NEVERget away from this jacka**.” So .. . woo . . . happy tears.Tears from Movie Trailers.Once I became “in touch” withmy emotions, I couldn’t shakethem! I feel like Britney Spearsand her loyal paparazzi. Nomatter how many times I run,the emotions still find out I’mgoing commando! (Somethinglike that?) Anyways, now, sometimesI cry during movie trailers.I’m not sad, I just feel verystrongly about meaningful movies.There’s Miracle or that oneabout the Irish kid whose momtells him his dad is a sailor on aspecific ship (lie!) but eventuallythe ship will dock at Galway(where they live), and he’ll getto see his dad! (but his dad isn’ton it), so his mom hires someonea little sketchy but ultimately ridiculouslyattractive to be hisdad (and the mom and “dad” fallin love . . . obvi), BUT then someother kids yell down to him forlornlystanding on the wharves,“You don’t even have a real dad.”Heartbreaking. If you don’t tearup a little during that thirtysecond spot, you hate children.Which is blatantly against culturalnorms, so you might wantto work on it.Buddhist Tears. This is prettyself-explanatory. “Any and alltears that happen in Buddhist.”Got it? The story-line for Buddhisttears usually goes somethinglike this: Leave apartment.Get to Buddhist. Three Sols.Happy! Three more Sols. Sad .OMG, there’s that guy you onceliked, with some girl that yousort of know but don’t really,and they look like they’re talking. . . which means they’re inLOVE. Tears! After that, it’s sortof “Choose Your Own Adventure.”Path One: go home, wakeup in the morning with the realizationthat you don’t actuallyeven remember his last name.So, boy, that was silly. Path Two:confront them dramatically. I’llleave it to your imagination/skipto page 147/next trip to Buddhistto see how that one ends.Sick Tears. Nothing is quiteas debilitating as unrelenting illness.With no end in sight, andreally nothing else to do, cryingstarts to seem like a viablealternative. Thought process:“Could I really look worse at thispoint?” Probably, but not THATmuch worse.Depression Tears. Depressionisn’t funny. Um, depressionmakes you cry because you viewimage courtesy of hubpages.comThere’s no crying in baseball. Unfortunately (again), Allison doesn’t playbaseball.the world in an overly pessimisticway? Yup, that sounds familiar.Completely InexplicableTears. Okay, probably my favorites.Sometimes your eyes juststart leaking. As you reach up totouch your face, you realize thatthose are not indoor raindrops,but actually water coming outof your eyes. Magic! There’s noreal explanation, but you stilldon’t have any control to stopthem. I find that laughing showspeople that you are not cryingseriously. But it also makes youlook a little bit crazy. So, one ofthose trade-offs again.Tears For Which You Deserveto Get Smacked. I wouldtell a story about myself cryingat some point where it was completelyirrational and unnecessary,but (1) I’m pretty sure I’vealready done that, and (2) whynot tell this one? During highschool beach week (if you didnot have this at your high school,it’s a week . . . at the beach), Istayed at my boyfriend’s housefor a night. Due to the financialstraits of the participants, therewere four people, plus me, in thepocket-sized room. During thenight, my boyfriend started tosnore. Loudly. In a mature way,his best friend starts punchinghim in a devoted effort tomake him stop. Instead of stopping,“Brian” mutters a littleand swings his arm a bit. “John”continues hitting, so “Brian”reaches back and (still sleeping)punches. Me. In the stomach.In a mild rage, I take all ofthe blankets and go to sleep onthe floor. Fast-forward to morning,at which time I refuse to getback in bed and cuddle (whilehe refuses to believe my “talltale” of what happened duringthe night). At this point, “Brian”starts to cry, and tells me thathe misses his ex-girlfriend. Seriously?Fights with the Parents Tears.Are you still fifteen-years-old?No? Good. See above category.Sympathetic Tears. Tears canbe like disease, and SPREAD.“My best friend is crying abouthow her relationship is fallingapart! Oh GOD, my life suckstoo! ” Alright, that mightnot actually show sympathy orempathy or whatever, but realizingyour life sucks too is upsetting.I’m pretty sure zero male readersmade it this far.Email: aam7x@virginia.eduAnd Who’s To Say That Reptilian Alien Lizaroids Aren’t Ruling the World?Matt Farmer ’10ColumnistAfter days of intensive investigatoryresearch, this columnisthas uncovered a series of seeminglycoincidentalfacts and occurrences.But makeno mistake: thereis nothing coincidental aboutthem. Like the hidden messagesMicrosoft embeds in its Wingdingsfont, this is very real. The administrationmay have you believethat chance is the only thing behindwhat you are about to read,but I’d suggest that you not be sonaive. Just like when you realizedthat NASA faked the moon landings,the following informationmay shock you.On January 29, PresidentObama named UVA Law ProfessorDavid Martin Principal DeputyGeneral Counsel of the Departmentof Homeland Security.David Martin just happens tobe an expert in immigration andrefugee law.David Martin’s new boss is newSecretary of Homeland SecurityJanet Napolitano. Janet Napolitanowent to a little school—youmight have heard of it—calledUVA Law.David Martin and Janet Napolitanoare longtime friends. Wellisn’t that convenient. Maybe alittle too convenient?On January 31, Justice SamuelAlito spoke at UVA Law on theimportance of public service.Where was David Martin for thistalk? In the front row.This was the same Justice Alitowho, not a week before, hired26-year-old Winn Allen to be hisclerk. And where did Winn Allengraduate from law school? Yep:UVA.David Martin andJanet Napolitano arelongtime friends. Wellisn’t that convenient.Maybe a little tooconvenient?On top of this, staff writersfrom the Law Weekly werecaught last weekend breakinginto Student Record’s transcriptsarchives, but not before they discovereda valuable piece of information:Winn Allen was a studentof David Martin’s in 2007. Honorcode violation? Most definitely.Coincidence? Oh, no, no.While all of this was going on,other students at UVA Law weregearing up for the start of FebClub, a collection of 29 consecutivethemed parties.That same weekend, formerDean John Jeffries was spottedwalking around the law school inplain clothes. But where wasn’tDean Jeffries spotted in plainclothes? I’ll tell you: at any ofthe first week Feb Club parties.Because he wasn’t there? Or becausehe was in costume?February 1 was the first day ofFebruary. This actually seems tocheck out.The first day of February, however,was not the first day of FebClub. That day happened to fallin January—the same month inwhich Barack Obama becameAmerica’s president. And what isthe theme of one of the Feb Clubparties? You guessed it: America.At the first Feb Club party,there was someone who wasdressed as George W. Bush. PresidentGeorge W. Bush. But there’sonly one catch: he’s no longer thePresident.Oh, by the way, the followingnight—February 1—was SuperBowl XLVIII. Guess what was noticeablymissing on that night? AFeb Club party.And just where was Dean Jeffriesthen? We. Don’t. Know.One of the teams playing inthe Super Bowl was the Cardinals.The Arizona Cardinals. Atthis point, you might be wonderingwho used to be Governor ofArizona. Well I’ll tell you: it wasJanet Napolitano.And the score of the SuperBowl? 27-23. The year Janet Napolitanograduated from UVALaw? 1983. No problems there?Well, get this: 1 + 9 + 8 + 3 =21. Also a common football score,as it turns out.And maybe you were wonderingwhat Janet Napolitano’s favoritecolor is. Well, brace yourself:it’s Red. The same color asthe Cardinal’s uniforms, and thesame color as the walls of WinnAllen’s bedroom when he was astudent at UVA Law.I’ll tell you what else is red:the ink all over my Federal IncomeTax final. How do I knowthis? Well, I don’t—it’s been twomonths and I still don’t have mygrades. Call me paranoid, but Ijust have a feeling it’s not goingto be pretty.Strangely enough, both WinnAllen and Barack Obama tookFederal Income Tax, and bothhappened to get A’s. But do youknow who failed the very samecourse? That’s right: Tom Daschle.Now, if you take those two A’sand add a third, that gives youAAA. What does that stand for?Oh, I think you know: Trip Aces.Precisely the hand that recentlylost me $400 in Professor Martin’sweekly poker game.But there’s more. The winninghand—a club flush—was held bynone other than 1L Sam Poole.Which seems innocent enoughuntil you realize that Sam Poolevoted for Barack Obama.And ‘round and ‘round wego. Honestly, I wouldn’t havethought much about all of thisif it weren’t for a conversationI overheard between Dean Jeffries,Professor Martin, and WinnAllen in Slaughter Hall the otherday. They were laughing, talkingabout how law professors don’tactually read exams but insteadassign grades randomly. That’swhen it dawned on me: thesethree had no business being atthe law school on a Saturday!That’s when I began to get suspicious. . .Email: farmer@virginia.eduExperience the Difference at Jefferson Ridge- Our ConvenientLocation has easy access to I-64, is just 7 minutes from the LawSchool, and is just 7 minutes from downtown