The first sport I remember playing was hockey (I'm Russian, it's like being Canadian when it comes to hockey, but a little less weird), but the first sport I truly loved was basketball. Truth is, basketball is an easy sport to love. It requires a minimum investment: you need a ball, and hoops are everywhere (and do not come with a per-hour rate, like ice time). It's a team sport, but unlike baseball and football it can be enjoyed by two people, playing one-on-one.

Some of my happiest memories involve basketball. From after-school games that could go all night if our parents didn't figure out our circular "I am doing homework at fill-in-the-blank's house" stories to playing with my dad, who still has the ugliest three-point shot anyone has ever seen (and I have no idea how the heck it goes in all the time, but it does).

The last Celtics game I went to was the opening game of the '06-'07 series. Red Auerbach had always said that the Celtics would have cheerleaders over his dead body, and he was not kidding: he died a few days before the cheerleaders were to take the court for the first game of the season. So, the Celtics "dancers" were postponed a day, and the night became a tribute to the man behind each of the Celtics' 16 championships. For one night, the Garden felt like the old Boston Garden, loud, boisterous, ready to win. The Celtics lost that game, and they would lose many more that season, on their way to the worst record in the Eastern Conference, and all I remember thinking was that Red didn't make it. He didn't make it to banner #17. Sitting there with my dad, watching the Celtics play I wondered whether both of us would get to see that banner being raised. After the tragedy of Len Bias and Reggie Lewis, after years spent watching the likes of Dino Radja and Sherman Douglass and after Rick Pitino ran himself out of town -- I wondered if there would ever be another banner hoisted to the rafters.

Wonder no more. The Celtics beat the Lakers, they won #17, and they did it in spectacular fashion. That it came against Phil Jackson, a man on the verge of breaking Red's record for most championships just makes it that much sweeter. That they did it when no one in the media thought they could beat the Lakers just makes it that much sweeter. That they did it the first year with KG, Ray Allen and Pierce playing together makes me excited about the years to come.

For the first time in twenty two years: The Boston Celtics are World Champions!

For the sixth time in the past eight years Boston had a parade for a sports team that won it all. Indeed it was -- a beautiful day.

Posted by Leon at 4:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Of course, the converse of that familiar statement is also true: the early worm gets eaten by the bird. Sometimes in life, it is difficult to tell whether you are the bird or the worm, but at other times -- this distinction is perfectly clear.

For example, when, on the hottest day of the year, your right rear tire decides to disintegrate on your way to work in the morning, forcing you to replace it on the side of the highway before the clock even strikes 8:00AM, you are certainly the worm. If you've never had the pleasure of changing a still-smoldering hot, completely destroyed tire while wearing a tie, trust me -- it's not something you should look forward to. Likewise, I would stay away from dead batteries in the dead of winter, while we're on the subject of car-related activities that should be avoided.

In other somewhat work-related news: I got to sit in on a meeting with a couple of Russian prosecutors this past week. In the interests of full disclosure, I should mention that since the then-Soviet government branded me an "enemy of the state" at the age of eleven, I've had what I consider a healthy fear of Russian authorities. However, I have nothing negative to report about this experience. The meeting was fascinating as a way to see the birth of a new system of justice. Being able to observe systems all over the world before settling on the details of theirs has allowed the Russians to "cherry pick" ideas and concepts they think work. In the process, they have built a system that is both very similar and very different to our own. For example, while jury trials are available, they only become a right in cases of serious crime (with the possibility of serious punishment). The juries consist of 12 members, but only a simple majority is needed for conviction. The appeals process seems much more stream-lined than our own. Most importantly, their prosecutors not only get government cars, but also government chauffeurs, a revelation which may have gotten them some new applicants from the pool of current assitant US Attorneys.

One other thing I noticed is that four weeks into working for "big brother" it has finally started to feel like a job, and not a break from school, which I admit is a great feeling.

I leave you with an actual quote from an actual decision in an actual case. The judge was explaining the presence of "exigent circumstances" allowing the police to enter a hotel room without a warrant. As you read it, please remember not only that a real judge wrote this in an opinion on a real case, but that a real human being went to jail as a result.

"Moreover, delay risked the life of the person in the room reported to be dead, if there were such a person."

Posted by Leon at 8:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Notes from the first two weeks of the first job of my legal "career":

1. Any thoughts I had about this being an academic experience evaporated when the clerk said "All rise!"... If you get the law wrong on an exam only you get hurt by it (via a poor grade), but if you get the law wrong in the real world a whole bunch of people are affected. For example, since I am not a member of the bar, if my research and writing is used as a motion or as a basis for oral argument, it's not just my neck on the line. Imagine how horrible you'd feel if you got up in front of a judge and argued your case, only to be asked "well, doesn't the Supreme Court's holding in such-and-such case nullify your point?" Now imagine if it was still you who failed to find the right case, but it's your boss who gets taken to task for it? On the other hand, fail to argue your point well, and a certified "bad guy" fails to get convicted or is released sooner than he should be. Not a lot of room for error.

2. The depth of human depravity has no bounds. In other words, there are some very sick people in this world. Some of them sell drugs, some engage in activities you shouldn't engage in with kids, others just shoot people.

3. There are also incredible people out there whose job, no, whose passion is putting these elements of society behind bars. The more Assistant United States Attorneys (AUSAs) I meet, the more impressed I am by them. For example, one of the attorneys specializes in sex crimes against children. I did about three hours of research for her about a week ago and I still can't get the details of all the cases I found out of my head, that's how disturbing they are. She does this every day, and on top of it has to go into court knowing that she is the obstacle between these people (and I hesitate to use that word) and freedom. That is a lot of pressure to perform, right there.

4. Guns have receivers. I did not know this. Actually, to be honest with you, I didn't know much about guns, seeing as I've never actually held one in my hand. I still haven't held one in my hand, but I know a lot more about them. I learned a lot about drugs, too. Ironic, in some way, I suppose that I went to law school, and chose to work for the government for a summer to learn more about guns and drugs.

5. This opportunity NUSL gives us is truly amazing. Those who have read this space before know, I am the first to criticize Northeastern for things we don't do so well. Without a co-op program, I would only have the chance to work for two organizations while in school. Because my interests lie more in the corporate law, intellectual property arena, I would not have chosen to work for the government, and I certainly would not have chosen to have the majority of my work come from the criminal side of the fence. In doing so, I would have missed an opportunity to learn a lot, and I would have missed an opportunity to broaden my horizons. Lawyers are incredibly specialized creatures, a criminal attorney cannot help you in your civil suit and a corporate mergers and acquisitions lawyer is not likely to go to court to help you defend your speeding ticket. By allowing us the opportunity to sample four different areas of the law, NUSL gives us a chance to make sure that what we think we want do is actually what we want to do.

6. Driving for more than three miles at a time is awesome! Now, talk to me at the end of summer, after I have sat through countless Red Sox-game inspired traffic jams and encountered every latest fad to hit the highway in an attempt to save gas (the latest is something called "hypermiling" which is best described as attempting to inspire rage in everyone around you, while simultaneously causing an accident which results in a ten-mile backup, negating any gas-savings you were attempting to achieve, but all the time feeling good about yourself), but for now, I am ecstatic.

Posted by Leon at 8:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)