I'll Habeas Your Corpus All Right...

"ENOUGH!" I yelled, that little muscle in my temple pulsing like a Morse code beacon. "There's no more running, and there's no more screaming. Do you understand?" It had been a long day and L & N were doing their best to extend the evening as well. While I momentarily had their attention I sought to seal the deal. "I want a test for understanding," I said. "N - what did I just ask you?"

"No more running and no more screaming," he said a little cowed.

"Good. L - what did I just ask you?" She gazed up at me with a mildly inquiring look as if I'd just caught her attention. I envisioned her sliding a pair of glasses a little down her nose as she flipped casually through a few legal briefs.

"No running. No screaming," she repeated. "But," she stepped up to the bar, "if we scream, and you can't hear us, then it's OK, right?" She looked up from her dossier. "And if we don't run, but we walk really fast, that's OK too, right?" She made a few quick illegible notes on a subpoena or something, then looked up at me blankly, awaiting the verdict.

"The court accepts the conditions of the plea," I said, not really knowing what options the court really had. "Case dismissed."

She and N walked off (very quickly) while I immediately jumped on the web to check out the Harvard Law School admissions policies.