#and there isnt that much demand around exam season

[mothpdf]

i have GOT to quit my job

[zettaiunmeis]

HI THANKS TO @raventrigonsdaughter LETTING ME KNOW THAT OG GAME CARMEN AND JULIA USED TO BE PARTNERS BEFORE CARMEN WENT ROGUE, LET ME PROPOSE: VILE!JULIA.

details under the cut because this got Long

jules is part of the either the same class the ~infamous~ black sheep

and they don’t? really like each other? like julia is still kinda Serious and she doesnt really appreciate the vile squad goofing around and tossing water balloons or whatever and black sheep finds julia a little too uptight even if she’s interested in a lot of the same things (history, etc.)

black sheep’s speciality is Being SLick, as we know, but julia’s is patterns (and also historical artifacts)

ok but the important part of this is that bc julia’s is patterns, she ends up being like a scout or smth along those lines bc she can analyse patterns and report back to help plan the caper

and that basically means that when she graduates, she ends up in far more long cons than any of the others

anyway, after black sheep gets in trouble for the water balloon thing, the faculty decide she’s far too mischievous, and so, they assign her a partner — julia

(side note: its kind of the same thing that ends up happening to jean-luc and antonio a bit later on, but thats more because they work well together, and less bc either one of them needed a grounding influence)

anyway black sheep and jules again. do not like each other. but that doesnt mean they dont work well together — julia’s got an eye for patterns, and black sheep has every thieving trick in the book ready and waiting up her sleeves (alongside an instinct for thievery)

slowly, as they are forced to work together more and more, they kind of reach a less tense partnership and then one day black sheep makes a history joke and thats how they become friends

like julia is still very pointedly Not friends with the rest of the vile squad bc they’re still very reckless and immature, etc

but shes sort of seen black sheep when she’s been more grounded and less hyper/feral and she?? kind of doesnt mind??

bc grounded black sheep isnt constantly trying to prove that she’s The Best and grounded black sheep isnt trying to prove that she’s more than just the teacher’s pet — she’s kind of just having fun with julia and julia’s been so serious about her training that she hasnt really made any other friends and…. its nice

its nice to have black sheep loudly slip into the seat next to her and and tease julia about whatever recent historical discovery she’s researching and pull her out of her own head once in a while

and its nice to have black sheep glance over in the middle of class when sheena — sorry tigress — whines about something or the other and roll her eyes in the same way julia feels like doing, even if something strange sticks in her throat when carmen does the same with gray

she can’t pinpoint the exact moment, but at some point, she starts thinking of black sheep as her friend and it’s an exciting enough thought that she’s got a little smile on her face next time black sheep slips into the seat next to her in professor maelstrom’s class

and at some point julia stops being just julia to black sheep, and starts being jules because we’re in a school for thieves, but we’ve already got plenty of ~jules~ right here and thats sincerely the worst joke i’ve ever heard and oh really ~jules~? bet i could find an even worse one

and like all the usual stuff is still happening in the background — shadowsan-black sheep rivalry, gray and the Squad being black sheep’s friends, the phone and player, etc.

its just that now, black sheep has a bit of a calming influence and that does help!

and they work well enough that most people assume that julia and black sheep will be partners after graduation 

even crackle acknowledges it — despite the jealousy he feels at the knowledge

so things continue and all this happens, but then comes finals.

things go the same. black sheep gets perfect scores in all of her exams, except stealth 101

julia — now the historian — can’t help but check for whether black sheep graduated too and just as she does, she hears crackle say it: she didn’t pass

and she wants to go to black sheep and ask if she’s okay because everyone knows how much black sheep’s wanted this, how much she’s been working for it, but by the time gray’s been dragged off by tigress, black sheep has disappeared and julia has no idea where she’s gone

so she waits for a bit in the cafeteria and in the dorms and anywhere else she thinks that black sheep would be and she sees… nothing

and about twelve hours after the results, the faculty pulls her for her first mission (for context, this is before the whole,,, hear the true name of vile thing) which is basically being a plant for the morocco mission, by pretending to be an archaeology phd student from oxford who’s come to study the findings in the excavation

and she’s busy enough with that that she barely gets to think about black sheep or graduation or anything other than the near-overwhelming anxiety that comes with the horrifying ordeal of potentially being Known but she just manages to figure out like,,, guard rotations, as well as the exact objects that are at the site for the vile squad to steal

and then she’s out before they even get there — julia’s pattern recognition and historical knowledge made her pretty useful when it comes to planning capers so it meant that she’s always travelling around the world ahead of each caper, but would also make her a pretty invaluable asset to vile, so they can’t afford to get her caught

julia doesnt hear about black sheep nearly messing up morocco until much later, and even then, she doesn’t have all the info

all she can do is wonder why the hell the faculty would fail someone who somehow managed to sneak out of vile island without anyone realising until much later

and yes, maybe a part of her misses her old partner, but she knows that it wouldn’t matter anyway — she was the mole, and she’d barely get to work directly with carmen so.

but then cut to a year later, when a vile counterfeit operation in boston is suddenly sabotaged

cut to the moment when, julia, despite not having seen her in a year, is still able to somehow recognise black sheep’s work

its Slick. its the Slickness that tips her off, and part of her is reluctant to tell the faculty who it is, but her allegiance demands it and she tells the faculty and she hates herself for it when she sees the murderous rage on each of their faces

and somehow, that — her ability to recognise this carmen sandiego — gets her in a new position, as a mole in interpol, passing on the information they get as they try to track the scarlet super thief as well

and then one day, in poitiers, julia sees her

its black sheep. it’s undeniably black sheep under that red trench coat and julia wants to go and talk to her capture her and bring her in to vile but her new partner ~chase devineaux~ is everything that once made her turn away from her interest in law enforcement and he orders her to call for backup while he tries to stroke his own ego

she does, of course, but maybe she delays it a bit, if only because she’d rather let carmen sandiego get away than have devineaux’s ego get any bigger

and the rest of the season goes much the same except after julia ends up in acme, she reports to vile about everything that’s going on, and they no longer suspect devineaux of helping carmen etc etc

and she can’t help but somewhat sympathise with what carmen’s doing — she’s returning invaluable historical artefacts and julia’s always loved history and- it’s just… altruistic. and that’s admirable. and that’s the only reason i feel so torn about helping vile. that’s it, that’s the only reason.

and then comes the chasing paper caper

what was originally the first real conversation between julia and carmen goes completely differently

(note that most vile operative outside of jules’ graduating class do not know of her existence bc she barely interacts with most of them since she’s more a spy/mole who’s out of the picture by the time anyone else gets on the scene)

carmen still needs to be able to spy on paper star without anyone noticing, so she still goes for the seat right in front of the cute short-haired girl sitting alo- and oh my god jules?

and its the first time julia has heard that nickname in over a year and oh God they were just friends this should Not hit this hard what the Heck

and carmen still sits down and just quietly grills her as to what the hell is going on bc she Knows that jules is a always a mole and never an active part of a caper and she doesn’t?? understand??

and jules is kind of in a daze, but she’s been Trained so she feeds carmen her cover story:

she defected from vile when she saw how they were treating historical artefacts — melting down gold, selling priceless works of art to the highest bidder, etc. etc. — and that since then she’s been silently helping interpol with taking down vile ops, etc.

and it takes a bit but carmen kind of starts to believe it — she knows julia loves history with all her heart, and she’s… well, she’s never been the kind of recruit that carmen’s expected to see in vile anyway, so. it’s not out of the realm of possibility, is it, for julia to be a defector working against vile? after all, isn’t she the same?

so she starts looking around, while waiting for paper star to make a move, and she ends up noticing the briefcase in the seat next to her, and for some reason, those initials — clearly chase devineaux — make her want to scowl

“new partner?” “oh… its… well, work. work... partner” “oh.”

uhhh anyway i might actually. write this? idk don’t count on anything lmaooo.

[duaneodavila]

Not The Droid You’re Looking For: Embracing Your In-House Counsel Limitations

Alright, friends. Confession time. I’m not a securities lawyer.

For those of you who read this column regularly (first off, thank you. You’re awesome. And intelligent. Did I say intelligent? I meant genius.), this will not come as a shocker. I blissfully gave up public company counseling when I left Bigaw without so much as a backwards glance. Because despite being half-way decent at it, I despised it. To this day, the mere mention of an SEC comment letter makes me want to yark.

Serendipitous then, that I’ve always had the privilege to work at a place with a securities lawyer who does all of the annual and quarterly filings and handles those mind-boggling “does it require an 8-K” questions. Oh, and the proxy. Shudder, proxy season.

She and I get on famously, although I’ve always suspected she views my day-to-day in much the same way I think about hers: I’d rather clean up after a petting zoo on a hot July day with nothing but my bare hands. How could anyone do such a crappy, thankless job and still be a relatively cheerful person?

Alas, with our corporate transformation, we are now flush with business partners who are new to public company life and don’t quite understand the whole insider trading or material non-public information thing and are freaking out. In fact, we rolled out our code of conduct in January with the new insider trading training certification and it’s still Defcon 5 around here.

And because the securities lawyer doesn’t sit in the office I do, I field a lot of public company questions. Sure, I’m good for the talking points on what constitutes material non-public information and how to avoid being led away in handcuffs. I can even give several helpful examples with minimal hand gestures. But once we get into the bar-exam-level twists, I’m useless. For example, a business partner, who is always on the restricted list because of the nature of his work, recently asked if his twin brother, who lives in the adjoining apartment of a duplex owned in its entirety by both brothers, could still buy our company stock on the open market. I bet some of you reading this column know the answer to this off the top of your head. You smug people are not my people. But I’m adult enough to admit that I have no freaking idea. So, after a few facial contortions and a non-committal “something about this just doesn’t feel right, Carl,” I refer him to the securities lawyer.

My next public company crisis comes three days later when the securities lawyer is traveling for work. This guy, let’s call him RJ, needs assistance with a form 4 filing. Back in my Biglaw days, I seem to remember there were these three forms for employees who held more than 10 percent of the company’s stock. And I seemed to remember that filing these things was an enormous pain in the ass because of the two-day deadline to file them.

RJ unfurls this incredibly complicated story involving a trust, a guarantor, and several beneficiaries whose name all start with J. This is no ordinary form 4. This is one of those ones that’s going to require a footnote to a table. Shudder. That realization immediately sets off alarm bells in my head as my thoughts harken back to Section16.net, this incredibly helpful website that helped associates figure this stuff out, and that I no longer have a subscription to. I politely shoo RJ out of my office so I can dig through Section 16 myself and after about 40 minutes, I determine I am in no way qualified to competently fill out RJ’s form 4.

Luckily, RJ insists on returning to my office so I can give him the good news in person. He’s going to have to wait for the securities lawyer to respond. Like any reasonable adult, RJ takes the news well. No, I’m kidding. RJ immediately turns red in the face and demands to know why I can’t help him with his legal problem. I tell him the truth (probably a mistake given that my explanation makes him turn the color of an eggplant): in terms of form 4s, this is over my head and it could result in a serious mistake that would likely have repercussions for him.

RJ’s response is classic. “I thought you were a lawyer,” he snorts.

And my tip of the tongue response is equally classic. “I assume you wouldn’t go see a foot doctor when it’s your ass that’s on fire, right? This is just like that. This is not my area of expertise. You need an ass doctor.” Of course, I don’t say this aloud because I’m a consummate professional.

While I covertly text the securities lawyer to see if this is indeed an emergency that needs her immediate attention, I fight down that creeping guilt and insecurity bubbling in my stomach. RJ is one of my business partners and he’s in need of assistance. I want to be the person to solve his problem. I’m not one of those lawyers who passes the buck. It stops right here in this office. But I also know this isn’t one of those situations where I don’t know the answer and can punt it until I have more information with a suave, “That certainly sounds like an intriguing proposition. We’ll need to circle up on internally before we can respond,” or something of the equally clever ilk. Section 16 filings have never been my thing and RJ’s situation is miles from cut and dry. In short, I’m annoyed and frustrated because I’m not the droid that RJ is looking for. At best, I can direct him to the right planet.

But at least I know that, and I’m confident enough in my own practice to own that. Because I may not be the all-knowing droid that every in-house counsel aspires to be, but at least I’m not the droid that blows smoke up your Millennium Falcon’s thrusters. And that’s gotta count for something.

Kay Thrace (not her real name) is a harried in-house counsel at a well-known company that everyone loves to hate. When not scuffing dirt on the sacrosanct line between business and the law, Kay enjoys pub trivia domination and eradicating incorrect usage of the Oxford comma. You can contact her by email at KayThraceATL@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @KayThrace.

Not The Droid You’re Looking For: Embracing Your In-House Counsel Limitations republished via Above the Law

[etnanotvshows]

❤ Veronica Mars ❤ Big Binge(Re)watching on one of my favourite series. ❤ It's summer, in this moment of the year usually the empty tv schedules lets me some holes in my (limited) free time and so i decided to do something that was rolling in my mind for quite a while now: rewatching veronica mars conpletely. This serie is one of my favest ever and i rewatched it a lot of times through the years but since the movie came out i never rewatched the whole thing all together. When i went to watch the movie at its release date it had been quite a while since i last saw veronica mars and so i'm sure i missed a couple of references here and there. Now i wanted to catch 'em all. XD With that said, after a few weeks spent on rewatching this pearl of a serie i have a couple of thoughts and question marks i have to note down. As a refresh of memory season three left us with many questions: - Veronica was with Piz at the end of the serie but when Logan beat up the ass of the scumbag that released her "sex tape" out in the open she smiled at him like a thanks (or something that could be seen as more for the LoVe fans) so we do not get to clearly see who she ends up with. - The Sheriff election: with Don Lamb now dead Keith was temporarily filling the place but only an election could make him permanent. However at the last minute his investigator and rival Vinny Van Lowe joined the "race" and emerged as his counter part in the fight for the job of the sheriff of Neptune. Since Vinny has been cooperating with the criminal family Fitzpatrick during all season 3, and was also plenty supported by them during elections, it was going to be a hard fight for Keith to win; however we do not get to see who the winner is, we are only left at the final scene of the last episode with Veronica voting for her dad. - Veronica's "stage" for the FBI is plenty mentioned during the serie, although when she misunderstands her Criminology Professor's intentions she makes a stepback in the will to join this stage but after that, when all is cleared, she still shows greatly interest for this opportunity. We are left with her happy about the acception from the FBI for her internship in virginia and Piz's face not exactly excited. - Wallace was joining the summer program of the group helping the child-soldiers in Uganda in the 18th episode of s3. - Mac left animalist Bronson (whyyyyyy?????) for helper-cheating-in-exams Max but in her last scenes wasn't too happy of Max's total lack of interest in college since his extra curricular activity was more than good for his wallet. And that's about it.. Probably some other minor stuff but that's what strikes out my attention the most. So here we go, beware for anyone that didnt see the movie yet from here on there are SPOILERS. Now we go to the 2014 movie of Veronica Mars. Set around 10 years after s3: - Veronica's lovestories have a hole from "9 years ago" to "1 year ago". The movie starts off having her together with Piz but it's been mentioned by Piz that they have not been together for these past 10 years. Veronica and Piz are back together only since 1 year and he mentions they had a relationship in college (that we know in fact) 9 years ago, but that's it. Logan also is surprised to find out that she is currently with Piz, but anyways they didn't stay in contact with eachother for these past years. - The current sheriff of Neptune turns out to be another Lamb, Don's brother, however more corrupted and less "capable" than the Lamb we know of. (wtf a brand new brother pulled out of a magic hat) A question mark remains: who won, years before, the election? Keith or Vincent? Nothing has been clearly stated about this in the movie; however when Veronica refreshes the viewers' memory with a brief description of the characters, at the moment to introduce Vinny she just says "private eye" and nothing else. She could have added "former sheriff" or any of her classic subtle comments to let us know his incapability to do the Sheriff but she did not. This leads me to think that Vinny didn't win the election. Just speculatively speaking, Keith could have won and stayed in her Sheriff job for the 5 (? Correct me here, im just guessing) years as the rules/laws say, so i can suppose that Neptune got worser after Keith's sheriff career finished. Right now he's returned to his private eye job with newer and technologic spy stuff. He is still mentioned as "former Sherif" by random characters but it's not specified the period of time they refer to (if when the Lilly Kane's murder occurred or if it was years later post elections). - The famous FBI internship.. Was blandly forgotten in the movie. Back then, after s3 finished, the staff produced a teaser trailer known as 4×00 where Veronica was FBI (letting us assume that the internship went well and that, possibly, after college she became an FBI agent, giving a pretty decent idea of what season 4 would have been about. Sadly as we all know, that never happened due to low ratings), but as of now, in the current storyline of the movie that important opportunity, that was also overly stressed in s3, was like never happened. What's more is that when we get to see our sweet former cop-agent Leo D'Amato he asks Veronica about the famous FBI thing but she says something like "you have heard wrong" or something. It's officially never happened. Moreover, according to Veronica's inner monologues she has left her investigative career (which we could guess it includes the possibility of the FBI internship) because -and here a brand new line of stortytelling starts- it was too addictive to her like drougs are with toxic-addicteds or like alchool is for alcholists. I have to say: this complete "take over" of the serie's main soul transformed into "something bad" it disappointed me. Now we get to see an apparently changed Veronica who has totallt left the private eye career and is now facing the chance of a Lawyer career. Wow. That is some change. Isnt it? Im not disappointed in the idea of change of interests for our protagonist, im disappointed instead in the "change of personality" the movie gave her and in the "exorcising" process of her private eye experience which was like her whole world. Her being. On a side note we get to see someone else changed: Logan is in the military now, aviation if i must guess. - Wallace's experience in Uganda: never spoken of. Well not that we can demand that 10 years later they are still talking of what they did so much time before, but even a super small slight mention wouldn't have hurt anyone. Well, let's talk abou Wallace a bit more: he was an extremely talented athlete and his dream was to become an engeneer. He wasn't super smart at was having some difficulties in his engeneer class but he was trying hard and it seemed he was achieving enough results to pass the class but who knows what happened. In this department as well nothing has been said anymore. For what regards his athlete talents it looks instead that he didnt pursue a professional athlete career but remained in the "same field" acting as a coach now, completely different from what fans might have expected. - Mac. She is always been a nice character, now we see her adult version working for Kane industries, a short cut of hair and woth no mentionable-worthing love stories currently. She is alone, i was sorry to see her with no one (well Wallace also is still single), of course no comments about her previous boyfriend/s be it Bronson or Max here either. Now to a new point to discuss that arised: - Weevil. Personally i always loved his character, probably almost as much as i love Logan. Thankfully they didnt make his character going out of the stage with the arrival of Herst college in s3, and since his arrest at the end of s2, made a sensed storyline that he strived to find a job that hired former inmates therefor he was hired as the janitor in Herst college to wisely keep him in the cast. Back in s3 he was interviewed in criminology class and confessed that it was hard for him not to go back to his old bad habits but that he was also trying hard to pursue the right path. Now in the movie he is surprisingly changed a lot: he is married with a beautiful wife which he visibly loves, in addition he has a lovely daughter whom he adores. He has a proper job now, he has his own car workshop. He dresses with normal clothes and is 100% legit. Doesn't touch a bike since 5 or so years (which is when his daughter was born). I loved how he changed. However he can still be a badass if needed (see when he joins Logan in the fight to protect Veronica's honor at the high school reunion) and also brave and selfless (see when he helps that car assaulted by the new generation of PCH bikers band). However that is exactly where i want to go: the scene where he helps the "poor person" in the car (which we later find out was the damn Celeste Kane). In her panic the stupid rich woman shoots at Weevil who was just going to help her and not only she hurts him but she also doesn't say anything when the Sheriff fabricates evidence and place a gun in Weevil's hand. The thing goes on and he's at the hospital and has to face assault accusation and the Kane bitch still doesnt say anything. Now. I don't know if it was just the damn Sheriff's fault (but i don't think she would get easily intimidated by him, since she is way more powerful than him) or if it was her idea to blame Weevil just to avoid any news of her shooting at her helper, but still what the hell man. What the hell. Concerning Weevil's case, later we see Keith in car with agent Sax that was willing to testify about the illegal behaviour of the sheriff and his men but he get murdered with a planned car incident. So we have no evidence to help Weevil's case. Keeping on with this his storyline we jump ahead to the end of the movie: we see him at Keith's office and they say he is still not out of the woods. Damn! The video esposing Sheriff's illegal behaviour of willing to pursue Logan as murderer just because he didn't care, didn't proof his illegal corrupted behaviour as well regarding the arrest of innocent people falsily accused like Weevil. So that video didn't proof Weevil's innocence and his charges are still on. I was hoping for the movie to solve that part of the story too but they just did not. They left it there. C'mon! This thing pissed me off. Poor Weevil, he deserves more love! He has a family now, he cant face false charges.