Today, as it happens, is Lawyer's Day. I probably wouldn't even have remembered if belyh hadn't sent me a congratulatory telegram text message. Since it's a holiday, it brought a story to mind. Back when I was a student, I went to England for two weeks with a classmate, supposedly to improve our English. It was one of those typical programs where you stay with a host family. Of course, we didn't improve our English at all; we skipped classes and explored London's seedier spots instead (with little success—we simply didn't know the places, and there was no one to ask; we couldn't exactly ask our hosts). But that's not the point. At the first lesson, the teacher asked everyone, "What will you be when you grow up?" Around the group it was things like "engineer," "journalist." And my buddy and I went, "I'm a lawyer." Damn. The teacher's face changed, and he suddenly launched into a ten-minute lecture about how lawyers are the worst of all human beings, and whether they even count as human is an open question, and that their only job is to prove that black is white and white is black. That kind of thing. During the lecture, the other students in the group were looking at us like we were child murderers. Apparently the guy had been through an expensive divorce. Obviously, the whole thing comes down to the legal system. In countries with the civil law tradition, people don't get nearly as worked up about lawyers. But ever since then I've been collecting American lawyer jokes: - On a highway, a hedgehog was run over in one place, and a lawyer in another. The bodies have already been taken away. How can you tell who was hit where? - Where the hedgehog was run over, there are skid marks. Happy holiday to everyone who Update. Great link on the subject.