What Does Age Got To Do With It?

         There is a proliferation of bar associations and their subset "bar sections."  They are multiplying like bacteria on Viagra.  I thought it was distinction enough to be lawyer, to have passed the bar examination, enabling one to practice in most any field and join a specialty bar association, even before one knows anything about the specialty. 

         We have bar associations named after the field in which its members claim expertise.  And many lawyers belong to more than one specialty bar association.  What does a specialist in Admiralty Law know about Cyberspace Law or Fashion and Apparel Law?  Yes, there is such a specialty.  We also have bar associations bearing the names of countries, geographic regions large and small, and the ethnic and cultural backgrounds of its members.  I appreciate the pride one takes in his or her heritage, but the Left-Handed Lawyers with Type AO Blood Bar Association may be carving out a niche too narrow. 

        

         In a similar vein, the Los Angeles County Bar Association boasts a large list of special sections.  There is a relatively new section for the aged, the Senior Lawyers.  Members of the section asked me to be the emcee for their "Trailblazers" awards program last year.  The Senior Lawyers sought me because I was "a natural."  I was highly offended.  I thought they were from the "Senile Lawyers" section.  I expected the event to include dinner at 4:30, bingo after the speeches, and Jello for dessert.  I was wrong about that.   

         One has to place the moniker "senior" in context.  It often signifies an unmistakable cache when, for example, it precedes the word "partner."  Not so often the case when it precedes "account representative" or "service advisor."  But even when "senior" signifies prestige, such status is evanescent.  It vanishes at the crossing of an inevitable time line; the senior partner acquires a new epithet:  "retired" senior partner. 

         I admit I am sensitive about the "age thing."  In one of my columns, I wrote that I was in my seventh decade when, in fact, I am in my eighth.  I was "jumped" into the AARP.  I turned them into the authorities for possible prosecution as a gang, but the judge who denied my motion for injunctive relief was a charter member.  True, I have been a member of AARP for 20 years and I do enjoy the discounts.  It is just so irritating the way they hound you to join, even before you are eligible.  They recruit when you become old enough to vote.  An elderly gentleman knocked on my door and tricked me into signing a membership application under the pretense that I would receive a free subscription to the Watchtower.

         The courthouse where I try to figure out what young lawyers are writing about in their briefs is in Ventura, a few blocks from the fairgrounds.  Now and then I go to the annual Ventura County Fair to see the pig races.  I will tell you about the pig races in a minute.  But first a little about the disturbing incident at the ticket booth.  I approached the booth, which is a kind of cage, and told the large, pleasant ticket lady seated behind the bars that separated us that I wished to purchase a ticket.  I surmised she was in her mid-50's.  (Although her age might have marginal relevance to my narrative, I mention it because she could well have belonged to AARP.)  She smiled broadly and tore off a small red ticket from her roll of tickets.  Note this fair has a definite 1940's atmosphere to it.  The perceptive reader might have gathered as much from the very mention of a pig race. 

         The ticket lady told me the price of admission.  It was markedly below the listed admission price.  I immediately informed her that she had undercharged me.  She smiled a good-natured, grandmotherly smile and said, "You get the senior discount."  Needless to say, I was incensed.  I inquired, "Wouldn't you like to see my driver's license?"  Can you believe it?  She broke into peals of laughter.  She told me to "go on into the fair, honey," and enjoy myself.  She reminded me there were several benches throughout the fairgrounds.  I was furious, but my mood brightened at the prospect of watching the pig races.

        

         The fair has many attractions.  I love to talk to the kids who belong to the 4-H clubs and hear about their goats, cows, lambs and hogs.  And there is a terrific hypnotist.  I asked him to come to one of our conferences at the court.  I thought he could help me get another vote, but he refused.  But as I mentioned, the pig races truly capture my attention.  At the starting bell, little piglets race around a miniature track and spectators like me cheer them on.  We place informal bets and the winner gets a generous helping of corn meal.  I cannot say what the winning piglet gets.  What do the pig races have to do with seniors?  Good question.  I mention it only because I think it is beside the point that the spectators are mostly little kids and seniors. 

         At the Trailblazers awards program last year, the Senior Lawyers honored two highly distinguished members of the legal profession, Presiding Justice Joan Dempsey Klein and Attorney Nowlan Hong.  All agree that they each had earned their distinguished stripes before and after they were assigned senior status.  All agree they are no less or more worthy of our respect because they have Medicare Cards. 

         And last week at this year's Trailblazers awards program, I was the emcee for honorees Supreme Court Justice Joyce Kennard and Attorney Patricia Phillips.  The appellation "senior" applies more to their achievements than to their age. 

         When Justice Kennard was a child, she was interned with her mother in a Japanese prison camp in New Guinea during World War II.  Her inspiring journey to the United States eventually led to her appointment to the California Supreme Court where she distinguishes herself as a precise and eloquent writer no matter what the issue or subject matter.

 

         Patricia Phillips is one of our premier family attorneys.  She opened, then unhinged the doors that had been closed to women lawyers for so many years.  She became the Los Angeles County Bar's first female president in 1984, and proved beyond all doubt that women in high places do great things.  After Ms. Phillips' term of office, just look at the women who rose to leadership roles in the local bar associations and in the State Bar. 

         Pat told me that being a "senior" in the legal profession is like a medicine, a good tonic to give us renewed energy and vigor.  I agree, but sometimes when I realize that I am a "senior," I hear in the recesses of my brain a low-pitched voice rapidly uttering warnings like what one hears in a television ad for a prescription medicine:  "may cause extreme depression, sudden mood changes, hives, jittery nerves, suicidal tendencies, fear of heights, depths, open and closed spaces, German Shepherds, and Shepard's Citations."

         But when that happens, I know how to get in a good mood.  I go to the pig races and cheer them on.   

An Alternate Universe for the New Year

         Lawyers who yearn for a satisfying professional life are often chagrined to find that the practice of law is not as fulfilling as they expected or, to be more precise, not at all what they expected.  But after law school, what did they expect? 

         A few years ago, Vance Woodward, who had been a civil litigator for eight years, realized that "civil litigators are typically a far cry from trial lawyers."  He did not get to try cases.  Today, it is even less likely for civil litigators to be trial lawyers.  The odds would be greatly improved if there were courts in which to try cases.

         Woodward's answer to his frustrating dilemma was to take a two-year vacation.  He wrote about it in the Daily Journal, November 28, 2012, in an article entitled Realizing the 'Great Escape from Reality.'  Among other things, he climbed Mount Aconcagua in Argentina, "the highest peak in the world outside Asia"; he went kite and sand boarding, rock climbing and cliff jumping; he scuba dived, brawled with a green moray, and counted underwater fauna populations in Honduras; and he wrote three books.  Now he's back and looking for a job as a litigator.

         Years ago when I was a "litigator," I thought of making my own great escape, and in a way I did.  Only, unlike Woodward, I had my fingers crossed.  I was reminded of my pseudo escape that had occurred decades past when I read about the recent passing of the world's master Indian sitar player, Ravi Shankar.  The sitar is a long-stringed instrument that looks like a guitar with a medical condition.  If guitars were on a basketball team, they would want the sitar to be the center.  In the 60's (no one says 1960's, not even Republicans), I was a young lawyer. 

         After a day of mind-numbing depositions, I attended a concert at the Music Center, featuring Ravi Shankar and the great tabla drummer Alla Rakha.  I was knocked out by the complex rhythms Rakha's nimble fingers produced on the tabla drums, and the inventive, improvised lines Ravi Shankar could endlessly create.  The richness of Indian music's microtonalities, the "inflections" or tones that occur between individual notes of our Western twelve-tone chromatic scale, blew me away.

         Instead of walking out of the law practice and moving to India to study Indian music, I decided to learn to play the tabla drums at night at a conservatory of Indian music that Shankar created in Los Angeles.  This was to be my escape, my adventure.  I studied with the master player Alla Rakha and later with the master teacher Taranath Rao.  My study was intellectually and artistically challenging, but it had its physical demands as well.  I had to overcome seemingly insuperable barriers.  Let me explain by describing my instrument, the tabla drums.  They are two small drums that look somewhat like kettles.  A cow or goat skin is stretched over the top of each drum.  The player strikes the drums with his or her fingers and palm, creating a variety of sounds.  The left drum is shaped like a squat bowl and is the bass drum.  The right drum is narrower, has a smaller head and produces a higher tone.  The drums are placed on either side of the player who must sit cross-legged while playing. 

         Most of the "standards" and jazz tunes with which we are familiar are played in "4," four beats to a measure.  But I had to learn to play in "11" or "17," or any other number of beats.  That alone was hard enough to learn, but the position in which I had to sit, on the floor, my legs crossed in front of me, was a challenge I could not meet.  I am not flexible.  I am talking here about physical flexibility.  Still it does not sound good for a judge to be inflexible.  I attained a modicum of proficiency on the tabla drums, but neither yoga, nor intense stretching made me limber so that I could sit in one position cross-legged for more than a few minutes at a time.

         Nevertheless, I persevered in my determination to create a separate reality apart from "litigating," to also exist in a non-parallel universe.  In my day world, I was unflappable trial lawyer (a front:  in truth, I was intensely flappable), dressed in stylish Italian suit, monogrammed shirt and silk tie.  But in my night world, I was a player of Indian music, seated (although in agony) before my tabla drums, dressed in my Indian outfit.  I strived to produce rhythms that would create awe and wonder in an American audience.

         For a while I kept my musician identity secret.  No opposing counsel, no judge, not even my partners knew anything of my other universe.  But one evening Los Angeles Times columnist Art Seidenbaum, who also hosted a television show on the arts for public television, showed up at the school with a television crew.  He filmed us playing, and the camera caught me in my full Indian garb, sitting before my tabla drums like a misshaped pretzel about to break.  A week later I attended a local bar function attended by many lawyers and judges.  I was surprised to learn how many had seen the show.  My alternate universe had been discovered.  It was the big topic of the evening.  They remarked more about my apparel and awkward pose than my music. 

         The trial lawyer in me had to find a way out of this fix.  Let me first explain that nothing irritates me more than people who feel a sense of self-importance because of people they know.  Yes, I had met some famous people at the school.  The great violin virtuoso Yehudi Menuhin and I compared Western and Indian music.  And, yes, Beatle George Harrison and I chatted at length about Indian rhythmic patterns.  Ho hum.

         Can you imagine anyone more pathetic than a person who seeks recognition by whom that person knows rather than by whom that person is?  But when the bar attendees asked me if I knew any of the famous people who were buddies of Ravi Shankar, I did let it be known that I had met George Harrison and Yehudi Menuhin.  Well, what would you have done?  I had to divert attention away from my white robe, beads and bare feet.  Through my fleeting association with "the great," I gained respect and a respite from ridicule.

         After a year or two, I took my leave of Indian music.  My body could not handle it.  And I vowed never again to capitalize on my brief association with the famous artists I had met.  And I kept that pledge, except when I taught a course on American jurisprudence in Moscow with retired Judge Judy Chirlin.  We traveled one evening to a small town outside the city to have dinner with her cousins who lived there.  They were gracious hosts and welcomed me as if I were one of the family.  On the mantelpiece of their home were two photos, one of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and the other of Yehudi Menuhin.  How could I resist?  I told them of my meeting with the great master.  I believe my celebrity status earned me extra servings of borscht.

 

         I acknowledge that my adventure does not compare to Woodward's.  He battled a green moray.  The closest I came to a clash with a wild animal was in Kenya in 1977.  My party and I were in the wilds at a campground near a river.  I was sitting on the ground outside my tent going though my belongings.  A mongoose, reported to be a camp pet, approached me.  I offered a friendly greeting, but the mongoose went straight to my camera bag and proceeded to fling out of the bag, one by one, all of its contents.  I pushed him away, and he pushed right back with his little claw-like forepaws while emitting high pitched whistle sounds.  No sooner would I get something back in the bag, than he would throw it out again.  The pushing encounter ended with a ferocious battle over a lens and a roll of film.  The altercation came to a close with the mongoose keeping the film and me keeping the lens.  I won.  The film had been over-exposed.

         The legal profession can be one of the most demanding.  It requires constant attention to detail and at times can make the embattled lawyer feel like he or she is in a protracted match with morays, green or otherwise.  But for you lawyers who have not had the opportunity to take a break from the demands of your practice, I advise you to consult Tim Tosta's insightful columns in the Daily Journal on how to live a full and gratifying life as a lawyer.  He will take you on adventures that explore the wondrous terrain of the inner life.

         Woodard took a leave of absence and for two years lived a life most of us only dream about.  Like many in and out of the professions, he is looking for a job.  I am convinced he will find one that suits him, and he will be all that more accomplished in whatever he does because of those two years.  I am also convinced that the more lawyers explore their inner and outer worlds, the more wisdom and insight they gain into handling cases, clients, opposing counsel and judges.  And, yes, the adventures that enhance a lawyer's life and profession apply to judges too.  These explorations belong on a list for New Year's resolutions.  And in whatever universe you inhabit, may you enjoy a Happy New Year.

An international Incident

It sure is funny the way things turn out.  Strike that opening sentence.  Instead, how about “A chance encounter on a warm day in August led to an unexpected Thanksgiving dinner, which in turn led to what might have been an international incident."?  Now I have your attention. 

Openings are important.  It drives me nuts to see a judicial opinion or any written piece that begins:  "At the outset..."  Excuse me, we know it's the outset because… it is… the outset!  Geez.  And what about "Preliminarily we note…"?  Not necessary to tell us what is about to be noted just before it is noted.  (For purists, the words "it is" in the preceding sentence are implied.) 

Now that I got that off my chest, let's get back to our national holiday and how my seemingly unconnected post-Thanksgiving dinner relates to our discussion about grammar in my last three columns.  It is apparent I have become touchy about the subject. 

It all began with the e-mail I received from Justice Manella several months ago.  If you recall, she playfully chided me for a past column in which I used a “that” instead of a “who.”  I exposed my vulnerable underbelly and disclosed the contents of the e-mail to you, my devoted readers.  And then I eventually held a contest.  I gave my book Under Submission to the first five readers who discovered a grammatical error that I intentionally placed in the column.  This in turn led to a moral issue.  What about the unintentional grammatical errors that could or, to be more accurate, would undoubtedly turn up in the column?  So many of you poured… I mean pored over my vulnerable prose in a relentless search for the most picayune errors you could find.  And you found them.  And I had to be forthright and acknowledge them, whether defensible or not.

 

Those past columns had garnered dozens of e-mails.  But now a quiet has set in.  The fear of embarrassment inhibited many people from writing me.  How do you think I feel?  I hope that the rules I periodically visit in my dog-eared copy of Strunk and White I have applied more often than misapplied.  I have written 207 columns for the Daily Journal, but I still fret over the possible grammatical blunders and lapses in clarity that brazenly mock my negligent eye.  The implacable deadline is no excuse.  I sympathize with lawyers struggling to get that brief or motion in by the due date.  But sympathy alone does not prompt a continuance.

I give thanks for your past e-mails and thoughtful comments about how we express ourselves.  That reminds me, I was going to tell you about Thanksgiving.  Flash back to a hot, muggy day in August.  I am on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Los Angeles shortly before noon.  I am about to enter a music store.  As I pass three young Chinese women standing on the corner, one of them says, "Pardon me, Sir.  Can you tell us where there is a mall?"  How I hate to be called "Sir."  It is almost as bad as yelling "Judge" in a crowded place, including a theater.  "Do you mean a shopping mall?" I ask.

We have a short discussion.  I learn that they arrived from China the previous day and they are exchange students who will begin studies at UCLA, my undergraduate alma mater.  I drive them to the Westside Pavilion, a mall that should satisfy most of their shopping needs.  We exchange phone numbers in case they need assistance in this foreign country from a responsible adult.  (That last adjective may be open to question.)

I drop them off and they thank me profusely.  When I arrive home, I discover one of them left a camera in my car.  I return the camera to them the next day and take them on a tour of Los Angeles, including Chinatown.  We have a photo taken of us in front of Disney Hall.  The three students are in their 20's; they are intelligent, enthusiastic, charming and funny.  Their English is impeccable.  I caution them about getting into cars with strangers and they break into laughter.  We have lunch at a delicatessen and they have their first dish of cheese blintzes.  I take them home.  We hug and say goodbye.

Fast forward to a few days before Thanksgiving.  You may have had a similar experience to the one I am about to describe.  Friends, strangers, and even the checker in the market wished me a Happy Thanksgiving.  I do not recall such enthusiasm and joy for this holiday in the past.  Are all these people Democrats?  Perhaps they are the same people who are loath to say "Merry Christmas" for fear of offending those who might be Jewish, Muslim or an atheist.  "Happy Thanksgiving," on the other hand, is a safe bet.  You can mention the name of the holiday instead of voicing the bland "Happy Holidays."

Thanksgiving Day arrives, and we have an early afternoon "dinner" at our home to accommodate my 100-year-old mother-in-law.  In early evening, just when we have consumed the last piece of pumpkin pie, and I am slipping under the table, the phone rings.  "Happy Thanksgiving" says one of the Chinese students at the other end of the line.  She explains that because everyone has been greeting her with "Happy Thanksgiving," she wanted to pass on the greeting to me. 

What else could I do but invite the three students and four other exchange students who they met at UCLA for a Thanksgiving dinner at our home on Saturday evening?  What would they know from leftovers?

We had a wonderful evening and laughed a great deal.  I gave a talk about the Pilgrims and the Mayflower.  The Wampanoag Indian Tribe gave the Pilgrims food and taught them how to survive.  Too bad we did not learn how to reciprocate.  We also discussed Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken."  Not only did a few of the students know the poem, but their analysis was thoughtful and perceptive.  We also discussed American expressions and what they meant, like "Catch-22."

But, as usual, I was faced with a moral dilemma.  I gave my book Under Submission to a few of the students.  They thought it would help them with their English.  So did I.  But the next day it occurred to me that if any person read at random just one of my columns, he or she would likely discover a grammatical error here or there.  Imagine how many there must be in my 463-page book.  It could be replete with questionable syntax, misspellings, a variety of solecisms, and, yes, even typos.  Under Submission could undermine these unsuspecting students' mastery of the English language.

Overcome with guilt, I called one of the students and expressed my concern that the book could lead her astray.  She laughed much in the same manner as when I cautioned against accepting rides from strangers.  I think she said she had sent the book to Beijing for translation and distribution throughout the land.  I feared that over a billion people would be corrupted by my grammar and syntax. 

The horror of this prospect vanished the next day when my wife and I had dinner at a Chinese restaurant.  At the conclusion of our meal, I broke open my fortune cookie, squinted, and read from the small slip of paper.  My fears vanished in an instant.

Confessions of St. Gilbert

In Edgar Allan Poe's chilling story, The Imp of the Perverse, the deranged protagonist commits the perfect murder.  That no one knows about his perfect crime drives him crazy.  Wait a second.  He already is crazy.  Let's just say it drives him crazier.  He craves that everyone know that he has committed the perfect murder.  But that would mean revealing his identity as the murderer.  Sounds crazy, doesn't it?  The compulsion to reveal the secret of his identity wells up in him beyond his ability to control it.  While he is walking down the street, the dam bursts, and with "distinct enunciation," he confesses in detail how he committed the perfect undetectable murder. 

         I have a lot in common with this guy.  No, I'm not a killer.  Notice I did not say "deranged killer."  If I had, some smart ass reader would have remarked about the "negative pregnant."  The protestation "not a deranged killer" implies a run-of-the-mill killer.  If deranged, I am not a killer.  I do not kill errant spiders or other small creatures that scuttle across the floors of our home.  I catch them in a glass under which I carefully slide a thin piece of sturdy paper.  I carry them outside where I free them in the garden to roam, forage, kill or die.  This I believe is why my wife buys into the deranged appellation.   

No, I am not a killer, but like Poe's murderer, I am a compulsive confessor.  I should have been Catholic.  In my last few columns, I publicly confessed to the commission of grammatical errors.  (If I had written "I publicly confessed to my readership," the phrase "to my readership" would have elicited howls of exclamatory protests:  "redundant," "superfluous.") 

         In view of my confessions, it is not surprising I am a tad prickly.  I was heartened that so many of you took an interest in our written language—even if it was at my expense.  To promote literacy, I deliberately placed a grammatical error in last month's column.  I promised to send an inscribed copy of my book Under Submission (2008, The Rutter Group) to the first five readers who found the error.

         The response was overwhelming.  I now have 320 new pen pals.  I had to take a few vacation days to respond to all the e-mails I received.  Court of Appeal Judicial Assistant Carolyn Kornoff urged consistency:  "e-mails" or "emails."  I used both.  Dashes get short shrift.  I thought they deserved some recognition.

         Only seven people caught the intentional error, and because they responded so quickly, they all received a book.  The intentional error is one thing, but what about the plethora of unintentional errors that so many of you detected?  I was touched by the gentle tone in which you noted the errors.  But at the time you did not know whether they were intentional or not.  Thanks anyway.

         Before I announce the intentional error and the winners, let us review some of the more provocative comments about the unintentional mistakes in my previous column.  I wrote about "Vice President Dan Quayle" and his misspelling potatoe, I mean potato.  A savvy reader up on his politics pointed out that Joe Biden is the Vice President.  Good point.  My Judicial Assistant Bonnie Edwards notes that titles outlast the office.  My Research Attorney Lauren Nelson suggests "former" could have preceded "Vice President."

         Attorney Matthew Zawol nailed me with a logical conundrum.  He acknowledged that I could "intentionally insert a grammatical error into a sentence," but that "it is impossible for me to intentionally place a mistake into a sentence."  I was on solid ground when I deliberately placed "a grammatical gaffe" in the column, and "gaffe" is a synonym for "error" or "mistake."  But in the penultimate paragraph, I wrote of my "intentionally placed mistake."  Matthew, how about giving me a break on this one. 

         Justice Peter Siggins wondered "where" was I "when" (not "where") I was reversed by the Supreme Court.  I was hiding under the bed, humming Rodgers and Hart's "Where or When."

         Many of you poured salt in the wounds for my "pouring" rather than "poring" over columns.  I made the same error years ago and vowed to correct it.  So much for my vows (wedding vows still count).  I had not yet poured my morning coffee when I was rapidly proofreading.  Attorney Richard Marks appropriately entitled his e-mail "Poring, Pouring, Boring."  He wrote, "[T]o pour is a verb that means to transfer liquid or some other stuff from a container.  It must come from a Latin verb, purare, 'to purify.'  In ritual practice, objects are purified by pouring water over them. The English word is 'pure.'…  [In a] football game, … one pours a beer and pores over statistics and other boring information."  Justice Nora Manella gave me a grammatical pass on this error.  She characterized it as a spelling error.  I was always a lousy speller.  (See McDonald v. John P. Scripps Newspaper (1989) 210 Cal.App.3d 100.)

         Attorney Jim Marks disapproved "Can he partially be correct?"  He opted for "Can he be partially correct?"  Appellate Specialist Benjamin Shatz preferred my version, arguing that the other version is "archaic and stilted."  And speaking of fine appellate lawyers, Ed Horowitz wrote, "None is [not "are"] shy about pointing them out to me."  Fowler defends me on this one.  "It is a mistake to suppose that the pronoun is singular only and must at all costs be followed by singular verbs etc.; the OED explicitly states that plural construction is commoner."  (Fowler, A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (2d ed. 1988) p. 394.)

            Attorney Eric Munson landed a direct hit with his comment that my deliberate gaffe must have been in these words I wrote:  "I cannot help but compare this ritual …."  Munson goes on to say, "In the late 70's I read a William Safire article about that phrase -- it is OK to say 'I cannot but compare' or 'I cannot help comparing,' but it is grammatically incorrect to use cannot, help, and but, all together, in that manner."  Oh how I wish that gaffe would have been deliberate. 

         And some pointed out a sentence fragment here and there.  You bet.  I call it style.

         And some asked about The Daily Journal's editorial review.  Suffice it to include here a portion of the indemnity agreement I signed relieving staff and editors "from any and all responsibility, accountability, liability, wrongdoing, out of or growing out of either directly, indirectly, or by implication, any and all errors, including, but not limited to, grammatical, typo, spelling, … etc., in columns authored by Arthur Gilbert and submitted at the very last moment, precluding careful if any significant editorial review."

         And now at last the deliberate error.  It occurred in this sentence:  "The arbitrary decision of the judge, that's me, is final .…"   Yes, Fowler allows for the colloquial "It is me."  But as Justice Manella pointed out, a person is a "who" not a "that."  "Who is I?"  I'm sorry, but "Who is I" or "Who is me" does not pass my ear test.  Thanks, Jim Davis, for recommending Patricia O'Conner's book on grammar, Woe Is I.

         But certainty about the law or language can elicit a refutation.  I said (wrote) that no one says "It is I."  My friend Sacramento Superior Court Judge Jim Mize reminded me that in Camelot Robert Goulet sang:

C'est moi! C'est moi, I'm forced to admit.
'Tis I, I humbly reply.
That mortal who
These marvels can do,
C'est moi, c'est moi, 'tis I.

         The winners are Jim Davis, Esq.; Michael J. Faber, Esq.; James P. Fox, Esq.; David M. Luboff, Esq.; Bruce Monroe, Esq.; Hon. Charles G. Rogers; and Ms. Melissa Scribner.

         To all winners:  Please note an additional contest rule:  Without exception, you are prohibited from communicating to me any and all errors, including, but not limited to, grammatical, spelling and punctuation, you may divine in your copy of my book.  Violation will result in forfeiture of the book.