First of all, here is an interesting inside look into clerking at the U.S. Supreme Court (dare to dream).

A thought popped into my head this morning: how do our troops, currently making ready in the Middle East, feel lately, knowing that what seems like the entire free world is vehemently against the very objective for which they've been working, sweating, not bathing, laboring, agonizing, living apart from their loved ones, training, dreading? Those poor men and women. They're just trying to do their duty and stand up for what they believe in too . . .

Well, now we can move onto the good stuff = BIZARRE THEORIES.
Elizabeth Smart, the kidnapped 15-year-old gal from Utah, is safe at home now, but one has to wonder . . . does she really want to be there? Maybe I'm being blasphemous. After all, the girl was allegedly kidnapped, allegedly suffered during months away from her loved ones, allegedly was brainwashed, and allegedly had awful things done to her that have turned her into a "changed" young woman. But my co-clerk Hooch and I smell something fishy going on, and we don't like it one bit.

Why didn't Smart, a physically-fit teenager, put up some kind of fight when a strange dude dragged her out of bed in the middle of the night, led her through her home and out the back door? Was the dude even a stranger, or had they chatted while he was working on her house and plotted a way to get her away from her boring, good-girl life in Utah? Why would Mitchell choose to kidnap an almost grown young woman, instead of a more docile, more likely-to-be-frightened, easier to transport 9-year-old little girl, sleeping in the very same room? What the heck was the 9-year-old sister doing awake at that time, anyway? Had Smart confided in her little sister about some great adventure upon which she was about to embark? Why would Mitchell take Smart away from Utah, then bring her back to within miles of her home and a continuing search (not to mention the thousands of "Missing Child" posters of herself that Smart seems not to have noticed)?

They are all just so smiley and happy about being together -- Hooch and I certainly don't mean to diminish the family's elation of having their daughter back within the fold (not that they would read or care about what I spew on my little blog anyway). But there's something very creepy going on here and I want to know what it is. Also, the cheery glossy photos with the huge "Children of the Corn"/"we are perfect but evil" aura are freaking me out. Somebody better buy the book, TV and movie rights, so I can find out what really happened here . . .