Author: James David (Page 4 of 27)

One of the members of my church small group is currently a 1L. His first law school exam is tomorrow. I’d been trying for weeks to meet him for dinner but our schedules hadn’t lined up. Due to my early Thanksgiving celebrations and his returning early from Thanksgiving in order to study for exams, we were able to go out for dinner on Friday. It also marked a rare trip to Raleigh for me.

We talked about plenty of things as it had been a while since we’d gotten together, but the focus of the conversation was on his upcoming exams. Sitting there trying to remember what I did successfully and what I wished I could change about my own law school exam preparations, I can’t say that it surfaced the fondest memories. I habitually buried myself in the recesses of the international law library, a place without natural light and that could only be accessed by navigating the labyrinth of interconnected buildings of Harvard Law School. It was (and presumably still is) the sort of place where you could set a very sad horror movie. At least I wasn’t disturbed much down there; my only human contact would be with a confused janitor. That first semester, though, I tried to study alongside classmates. I did not recommend it to him. I also gave him permission, repeatedly for emphasis, that it is okay to not go back to studying on the same day when you have an exam in the morning. The goal is to be empty when you finish the test, especially with the way many law school exams encourage word vomit and continuing to type more and more until the allotted time is complete, and you need to recharge after that. Beating yourself up over not immediately going back to studying won’t help. I hope he takes at least that message to heart.

The restaurant itself was also very good, a mixed cuisine place with influences from across the Levant and the southern Mediterranean. It will be a recommended spot on the always in-progress restaurant spreadsheet I maintain. Going with another person was nice too because it allowed us to get multiple things and share them instead of me having to commit to a single choice per course. That, though, wasn’t the main point of the evening. The point was to give some encouragement to a young man who is now in the final stages of the marathon that is the first semester of law school and needs to kick hard to the finish.

I celebrated Thanksgiving with my family this weekend, with our big meal on Saturday evening. My immediate family converged on my parents’ home and the house I grew up in for the occasion. This timing was the result of two things, namely the work schedules of my brother and sister-in-law and the end of the modern firearm deer season in Kentucky.

We aren’t a family with deep Thanksgiving traditions. Dynamics and life seasons have meant shifts every couple of years to prevent any traditions taking root. To the extent there is such a tradition, it is that we have both turkey and ham as part of the Thanksgiving meal. There was also both a pie and a cake this year, and neither was chocolate so that I was able to partake in both. We can go ahead and make that a tradition if people would like, especially since my only contribution to the festivities was to be present.

This trip’s timing had a few advantages. For one thing, traffic was at normal levels so I made good time both going and coming. Second, I was able to stop and see my little cousins for a few hours on the way since they weren’t yet on a break from school. This benefit was much more important to me than the first. I arrived in time to have a few minutes with the youngest and then to greet the older ones as they got off the school bus. Now I have some new artwork with which to decorate my house and more positive memories with them. I did not, however, take any updated school pictures with me as the children looked rather too old in those pictures for my liking.

I cannot say it was a restful few days as I awoke early on two of the three mornings in order to be in a deer stand before daybreak, but it was a nice change to be amongst family and nature and to leave my computer off for a few days. That made for a chaotic Tuesday when I was back at work, but that was always going to be the case. Now it’s head down until Christmas week.

A few weeks ago I wrote about how some of the AI lessons I picked up at Rhodium would take up what I described as my “work free time.” Well, after procrastinating around setting things up, I finally entered the world of vibe coding this week. We’ve already built a few agents that we use for internal admin purposes, so I set out on a more ambitious project to build our first client-facing tool. It’s a brave new world when people like me now have access to tools that make me into a software developer.

In the space of about two and a half hours, with a kickstart boost from the leader of an AI community of which I’m a member, I had AI create a python script (complete with a desktop icon) to address a set of two discreet tasks that are part of our larger workflow of reviewing documents redlined by opposing counsel. The goal is to speed up an existing process. I’m not crazy enough to attempt to code myself out of a job. In that short amount of time, I created a beta version and produced a few outputs to facilitate internal discussions. This is still early days, but I may even show the output to a few clients who are attracted to the idea in the coming weeks to elicit feedback if people are open to the idea. There are going to be several opportunities coming up. As for development costs, they’re a rounding error even without me trying to be cost efficient.

Is the tool ready for primetime? No. Will it ever be a solution that could be offered as a standalone product? Probably not. Will I continue to iterate on it to make it functional for its narrow purpose? Absolutely. If I can save us 15-20 minutes each time we do something when we do that thing ~50 times a year then it’s worth spending a few hours to make that tool. And if I’m successful with this one, then I won’t stop at one.

If people want to tell me about some things they’ve automated with AI, I’m open to inspiration. It doesn’t even have to be something you vibe coded. Heck, it doesn’t even need to be work related. I know one guy who set up automations such that a text message to his wife gets drafted every morning when he leaves his house and all he has to do is approve and send it.

Sunday evening, I didn’t have curling due to ice maintenance. As this freed up my evening, I took my friend up on his invitation to join a group of people for dinner. Not that I actually responded to his text invitation, but whatever. It was shameful for me as I hadn’t responded the last time he had asked me to join this regularly scheduled outing when I had curling a few weeks prior. The reason was that he and his wife were expecting a baby very soon at that point and now I didn’t see a great way to ask how things were going. The last thing I wanted was to offer a reminder if something had gone seriously wrong. While I don’t think it was the easiest birth, nothing terrible actually happened and both baby and mother are healthy.

I’ve never been around a baby that young. The little guy wasn’t yet two weeks old and looked so tiny in his stroller setup. Even his brother, who is only about three years old himself, dwarfed him. He was sleeping so I didn’t dare touch the baby, but I could not help watching him. There is just something magical about new life like that. Maybe I wouldn’t feel that way if I had to wake up every few hours to feed the newborn, but that’s not where I am in life.

After people ate, a few of us went outside the restaurant into a fenced area where the children can run around and play. The fascination of the evening was in seeing who could find the biggest stick to use in a futile attempt to fell a large tree. One child found such stick and the others became very upset when they were unable to find a similar stick. This one was the older brother of the newborn and a child I’ve gotten to know and who knows me now that we live in the same city, a child who indirectly influenced my own life when he was a baby in a stroller. His little world has changed forever, but he’ll adjust and be better for it.

I watch some strange shows and movies. I’m reminded of this every time I get into a discussion about what people have been watching lately and I (1) often have no idea about whatever the rest of the group is fixated on at that time and (2) am met with blank stares or slight horizontal shaking of the head as if to say not again. Even in these missives I’ve written in recent months about a few gritty foreign detective shows and an anime series.

Well, this weekend I partook in a foreign film instead of a television show. On the recommendation of one of my law school classmates, I watched The Seed of the Sacred Fig. This was a movie that was nominated for best international film at the Oscars this year and won several other awards on the 2024 circuit. The film was produced in conjunction with French and German organizations, but it is an Iranian movie. I watched it with the original Farsi audio and read subtitles. According to some of the reports about the movie I read while writing this post, footage had to be smuggled out of the Iran as the film is hardly kind towards the regime.

Figs aren’t really a part of my own culture so some of the imagery was lost in translation, but the film takes on themes of struggle, pressure to conform, the desire for freedom, control of information, gender dynamics, and more without ever resorting to beating the audience over the head with the directors’ own beliefs. The director certainly has strong beliefs and doesn’t hide them, which is why the film had to be smuggled out of the country, but the story always stays at the forefront of the film. In terms of plot, the film is set mostly in Tehran and focuses on a single family of four. The two children are young women, one in high school and the other in university. The father gets a promotion in the clerical court system around the same time that a wave of protests roils universities. When one of the girls’ friends is injured by police during a protest, this precipitates the family unraveling in a tragic though not quite predictable manner.

The movie itself has a feel similar to other modern Iranian movies that achieved some success in the West. It is a slow burn and there is a lot of dialogue with stationary cameras. It’s not that there are no action scenes in this one. There are. There just aren’t as many as the visual candy that makes up most contemporary cinema but leaves you empty afterwards. This one ends with an image that sticks.

On Thursday, I ventured west on what turned into a five and a half hour drive to Bryson City, a little mountain town abreast the Nantahala River and up against Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The drive was longer than I’d hoped (and the drive back on Sunday was mostly spent in the rain of a tropical remnant), but the trip accomplished most of what I wanted.

I did not time the foliage well as I was at least a week early to see the peak fall colors, but this was the time I had available and there is always some variability in those forecasts. My parents joined from Thursday to Saturday, which meant a more leisurely Friday than might have otherwise been the case. I worked in the morning before an afternoon walk to see the three waterfalls that are readily accessible from the Deep Creek entrance to the national park. Then I made a regrettable dinner choice of a place that put way too much cheese on their pizzas and we called it an early night so they would be rested for their drive back.

The main purpose of the trip for me was the two half day hikes that I took on Saturday. Both were similar in that they went straight up ridges to high vantage points, with lots of elevation gain and dirt and gravel underfoot. I wanted the hikes to be hard as a reminder to myself. And I like to hear the sound of crunching under my boots. I was actually breaking in new boots on this trip as my old reliable footwear finally succumbed to time while I was in the Faroe Islands. The view was better and more unobstructed at the top of the first hike, a shorter one up to a fire tower in the national forest south of the national park, than at the top of my longer afternoon hike in the national park. The net effect of the hikes was that, for a few hours anyway, I was able to turn off my phone and just keep putting one foot in front of the other. My mind never emptied, but it was as close to a Zen experience as I’ve had in a while.

I opted to stay at a bed and breakfast out of town and close to the park entrance. I wanted both to save a little by getting breakfast included and be away from any late night noise. It was certainly quiet, and the breakfasts were all good as the operator used to be a professional chef. The best two meals of the short trip, though, were at permanent food trucks, one a plate of Korean-style sweet short ribs with rice and vegetables and the other a pastrami and corned beef sandwich on rye. I put yellow mustard on mine and nothing else, which tends to lead to slightly befuddled looks. Not that that has ever stopped me. I don’t expect I’ll be going back to that particular little town again soon as there are closer options, but it was refreshing to breathe some mountain air and to wake up nestled against a different part of the same mountain range that was an ever present during my childhood.

I kicked off my version of the Broadway season last night. No, I didn’t make a quick trip back to New York. Instead, I drove downtown to see The Sound of Music at DPAC, a theater that is really much nicer than should be in a city this size. I’ve probably written that before, but I’m reminded of that fact every time I go.

I ate dinner beforehand at a restaurant that tries to transport you to the French Quarter in New Orleans. While it doesn’t quite achieve that set in a renovated tobacco warehouse as it is, the gumbo is good. The hostess seemed surprised when I asked to sit at a table instead of at the bar. And I get it, as a table for one means an empty seat. But I was also eating early and there were open tables the entire time I was there. I’ve long since gotten over any anxiety about eating alone if that’s the concern. Then I took a short, leisurely stroll over to the theater.

This year, I decided to upgrade my seating. Previously, I’ve always been in the upper deck, often towards a back corner. Last night, I was in the second row of the middle deck. It was a worthwhile upgrade. Not only was I closer to the stage and so could see more of the actors’ expressions, but I also didn’t have as many people in front of me fidgeting around and so had a clearer view of the stage. I did have a few children behind me last night, but their sound effects added to the show instead of detracting from it. I’ve purchased a ticket for three shows thus far and may add a fourth once the tickets for Hamilton go on sale. If nothing else, it gives me something different to do on a few Tuesday evenings.

The show itself was the longest I’ve seen in some time. There was even an intermission. The child actors were poised and composed and the lead actress is a star in the making. Having seen the movie more than once before, there weren’t any surprises, though at least they stuck to what worked and didn’t attempt a contemporary political browbeating and that was refreshing. It ranks in the top 5 for me, and I’ve seen enough shows for that to have some meaning.

Three trips to New York City in a year are at least two too many. I especially feel that way when all three were for work. This one was the hardest of the three, not least because I slept the worst this time. The buildings seemed to press down on me even more too. I also don’t really have the disposition to be successful over long stretches of a conference with lots of ambient noise and background conversations. It isn’t playing to my strengths. Even though I push through when called upon for conferences like this, it is draining to do so. This conference was at least more like two meeting sprints each day rather than two marathons. We almost never attend content sessions at conferences; that’s not the reason we’re here. Conferences like this one are all about 1:1 (or 1:2 as the case may be) meetings making and deepening connections with potential clients and partners. And we won’t really know if it was a success for at least a few months.

I tried to keep things positive. I continued my practice of exploring the New York food scene on this visit. We had two dinners, so I chose one exotic place and one more traditional. Last night’s Bolognese was very good at the Midtown Italian restaurant that was our more traditional NYC dinner. It was also a shorter walk from our hotel, but I preferred the Cambodian restaurant on the Upper East Side where we had dinner on Monday as it offered something I cannot quite get at home. While it was a far cry from sitting on a brightly colored little plastic stool on the street eating frog legs in Siem Reap, not least because it was air conditioned, the food was all very good. We had beef skewers with a peanut sauce for an appetizer and I ordered duck breast in a tamarind sauce, a tangy sauce that paired well with the duck fat and didn’t overpower the rice. The Angkor artwork adorning the walls was also a nice touch. Then I had passionfruit gelato on the walk back to add some Latin sour into the culinary mix for the evening.