We here at Abnormal Use hope and trust that you had a splendid Thanksgiving yesterday. Today, though, is all about shopping, isn’t it? We understand that there are lots of sales and deals to be found. You’d best get to the store and buy holiday gifts (unless, of course, you’re already in line at the store reading this site on your mobile device, and in that case, we applaud you both on your commitment to consumerism and your dedication to our fair website). Oh, and that’s the cover of Ha Ha Comics #60 depicted above, published way, way back in 1948.

Speaking of the gift giving season, be certain to check out The Hytech Lawyer‘s “Holiday Gift Suggestions for the iPad Lawyer.”

Christie Foppiano of the North Carolina Law Blog offers a Thanksgiving themed piece entitled “Of Mashed Potatoes and Mediation,” in which she formulates “some questions that may be helpful in preparing your client for mediation.”

Another week, another news report on a hot coffee lawsuit.  The Telegraph reports about two potential hot coffee lawsuits soon to be filed in Melbourne, Australia.  Here’s the twist: The two potential Plaintiffs – both of whom were on airline flights at the time of the spill – claim that a flight attendant spilled hot coffee on them during the flights.  (One of the potential Plaintiffs was on a flight to Bali, the other on a flight from Hawaii to Australia).  These cases are, of course, different than the infamous Stella Liebeck McDonald’s Hot Coffee Case, wherein the Plaintiff spilled coffee on herself.

Happy Thanksgiving from the Abnormal Use law blog and Gallivan, White, & Boyd, P.A.!

Oh, and if you’ve not yet read it, please check out our “Thanksgiving in 1810, 1910, and 2010” blog we published this time last year.

Above you’ll find the cover of Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact #6, published way, way back in November of 1958. We couldn’t resist sharing it with you on this day.

(Finally, check out last year’s Thanksgiving Day post here for another Turkey Day themed comic book cover).

Here we are again on the Monday before Thanksgiving.  We, like you, do not anticipate an immense amount of projects being completed this week.  After all, this is the time for football, turkey, pumpkin beer and tryptophan.  Although we usually do not wax sentimental here at Abnormal Use, on this occasion, we feel that we must direct you to last year’s Thanksgiving post entitled “Thanksgiving in 1810, 1910, and 2010.”  Back in 2010, we unearthed a century old magazine article in which the writer, a resident of 1910, looked back 100 years and marveled at the incredible social and technological change that occurred in the previous ten decades.  That writer also looked forward to 2010 and briefly speculated how we, as citizens of the 21st century, might look back at those who lived in his era 100 years before.   That article struck such a chord with us. So, today, we remind you of it once again and direct you back to it 101 years after its publication.

As we proceed through this week, looking forward to stuffing and cranberry sauce, we think of all the things that we are thankful for and wish you a happy Thanksgiving.

“When the Master Jailer imprisons someone, it’s a life sentence,” proclaims a villain, presumably the Master Jailer himself, on the cover of Superman Family #219, published way back in 1982.  But hasn’t the Master Jailer heard of the federal sentencing guidelines? He can’t just sentence someone to life! There’s a complicated scheme by which he must evaluate aggravating and mitigating circumstances before imposing a sentence! (Obviously, the federal guidelines apply because he appears to be in a federally insured bank!)  But the real victim here is Supergirl, who is imprisoned because of the Master Jailer’s apparent abuse of discretion! 

Apparently, there’s a band in Georgia called The District Attorneys.  The Dead Journalist blog reviewed the band’s new EP, Waiting on the Calm Down: The Basement Sessions, here.  We think they should tour with the Pennsylvania band, The Lawsuits, who we interviewed earlier this year here.

Our editor, Jim Dedman, finds himself in Cary, North Carolina today for the North Carolina Bar Association Law Practice Management annual convention (where there is sure to be much discussion of social media, legal technology, and other fun topics).  If you’re there, say hello!

McDonald’s is back in the news this week with yet another hot coffee lawsuit. (Don’t worry, dear readers, we’re not going to do another full post on a hot coffee case for a while, but we did think it merited a brief mention here in this edition of Friday Links).  According to this report from the Law360 blog, an Illinois woman sued the fast food chain after her toddler sustained severe burns from McDonald’s coffee.  We don’t know how the toddler came in contact with the coffee.  For the good of America, let’s hope the beverage didn’t leak from his baby bottle. We suspect this one may be in the news again someday, and if so, we’ll keep you posted.

As we’ve previously mentioned, our editor Jim Dedman is now contributing one monthly post to the North Carolina Law Blog.  Yesterday morning, his second submission was published at that site.  The topic: “Social Media Discovery – Timing is Key.” Jim’s post is a response to an earlier blog entry by Ernest Svenson at his Ernie the Attorney blog, which you can find here.  Jim’s post begins:

Timing is everything in litigation. That’s certainly true in the discovery arena, even when dealing with the (still) relatively new field of social media.  Recently, Ernie Svenson a/k/a Ernie the Attorney wrote a fascinating post about the perils and pitfalls of subpoenaing Facebook for an individual’s social media profile and underlying private data.  According to Ernie, Facebook usually refuses to produce a meaningful subpoena response – the good stuff you’re hoping to get will likely not be in the company’s formal response. Accordingly, he offers some alternative approaches to obtaining that data through the formal discovery process. There’s not much to add to his very thorough post; but I would offer the following tips on timing such requests.

Read the rest of the post here.

Once you start issuing subpoenas for social media discovery, you’ve tipped your hand to your opponent.  In his post, Jim offers some suggestions on how to structure and time one’s social media discovery to maximize results and avoid potential spoliation.

From the November 11 edition of The New York Times:

Today it is possible to write the date with the repetition six times of a single digit.  It is the eleventh day of the eleventh month of the eleventh year, and so one may save time and just put it down 11-11-11.  It will be a century before the same thing can be done on Nov. 11, 2011 though, of course, on Dec. 12th next year there will be a close approximation to it with 12-12-12 as a correct presentation of the date.

Still today for the last time until the error is changed will one digit appear seven times in the date, however it be written.  Today, 11-11-1911, 800 years ago this was beaten by writing 11-11-1111, on Nov. 11, 1111 but it is not likely that the precise monkish scribes at that time would have allowed so slovenly a method of recording an essential fact.  As none of us is likely to be living in the year 11111, it would be well for those who delight in curious trifles to take their fill of enjoyment out of this method of dating today, 11-11-11.

“Today is 11-11-11; Date Can’t Be Written in This Way Again for a Century,” The New York Times, Nov. 11, 1911.

We love sharing these fascinating historical artifacts with you.  We greatly suspect that the writer of this 1911 New York Times piece wondered what we here in 2011 might say about this curious temporal phenomenon.  Imagine that writer in Manhattan a century ago penning this article looking forward a hundred years wondering if we here in this day might look back to his article a hundred years in the past. Mission accomplished!

We’ve previously brought to your attention other fun historical notes like these.  You will remember that last Thanksgiving, we unearthed a 1910 magazine article in which the writer, living in 1910, looked back to 1810 to note the enormous societal changes that had occurred in that century.  At the end of that piece, the writer speculated what we the citizens of 2010 might do to celebrate Thanksgiving.  Last December, we brought to your attention a series of editorials, published in the New York Times in 1931, speculating what the year 2011 might be like.

So, sometimes its fun to abandon true legal blogging for a day and remark upon these fun finds.

Dude. The cover of Young Romance #196, depicted above and published way, way back in the early 1970s, has got to be the most depressing legal themed comic book cover we have ever seen.  Usually, we profile silly comic book covers featuring superheroes in court or other such nonsense.  But look at this!  “Father has a new family now, Mother, but you won’t be alone! I’ll always be with you . . . I promise!” says the daughter.  Look at how sad her mom looks! In the background, we see the father embracing his new paramour, while a young man – with a very 1970s haircut – asks “But, Debbie, what about us?” We’re not sure who that guy is, but if that’s Debbie’s boyfriend, then he’s got some bad timing. What’s he even doing in the courtroom, anyway? What was DC Comics thinking? This is sad stuff!

Recommended reading for the day: “My iPhone foreclosure.”

If you like our posts on the Stella Liebeck McDonald’s Hot Coffee case, you’ll love Ted Frank’s “Questions for Susan Saladoff about ‘Hot Coffee’“, which ran Monday on his Point of Law blog.

Friend of the blog Alan Crede of the Boston Personal Injury Lawyer Blog had some kind words for us this week regarding the occasion of our 500th post. Thanks, pal.

The Lexis Nexis Litigation Resource Community is soliciting nominations for the Top 25 Tort Blogs. If you enjoy our work here, we would humbly request that you head to their site and nominate us.  Apparently, all you have to do is briefly register for their site and then post a comment here nominating us. We would greatly appreciate your support!

Don’t forget! This month is National Novel Writing Month! There’s still time to pry yourself away from those discovery responses and pour your soul into a manuscript. (Hat Tip: The Faculty Lounge).

Can you believe it?  This post – this very post that you are reading right now – is our 500th blog entry here at Abnormal Use.  We are just as stunned as you are, but we have had such a good time engaging in this blogging business that we nearly lost track.  But here we are, at 500 posts, armed with plans to continue this site well into the future.

As you know, we pause occasionally to reflect upon our milestones at this site.  Earlier this year, in January, we reflected upon our first birthday and shared the (little) wisdom we had learned at that point.

Way back in May of 2010, we commemorated the occasion of our 100th post, an celebration which now seems almost quaint.  At that time, we noted:

It has been just four short months since we unveiled this products liability blog with a formal mission statement. Whereas we feel certain that blogging may come naturally to some, our first foray into the blogosphere was not without some trepidation. Naturally, we asked ourselves: Will there be sufficient source material? But we quickly learned that this was the least of our concerns. Fortunately for products liability bloggers, in the rapid, ever-changing world of litigation, there is rarely a day that passes without something newsworthy, whether it be a new court decision, an interesting verdict, a product recall (an augury of imminent litigation), or a story on a future Plaintiff’s new and “inventive” use of a product that, predictably, went awry. Needless to say, we have found plenty of cases and news items about which to post. We are also proud to have presented several original interviews with law professors in our series which we affectionately call Abnormal Interviews (more of which are to come in the future).

Aw, weren’t we cute at that age? As we write today, we are just two months away from our second birthday (and we’re sure we will pause again that day to reminisce even further on our blogging history). Nostalgia aside, we are encouraged by our progress at this site.  In January of 2010, we were a brand new blog, entirely unknown, and with few friends in the legal blogosphere.  Now, in November of 2011, we have built up a solid archive of posts and have made a number of friends and contacts in this enterprise.  It’s been rewarding to write about the law, as well as other off topic items, and see the responses of you, our dear readers. Certainly, this endeavor would not have been possible without the support of our writers: authors (Phil Reeves, Stephanie Flynn), regular contributors (Nick Farr, Frances Zacher, Steve Buckingham), guest authors (Mary Giorgi, Laura Simons, Mills Gallivan, Childs Cantey Thrasher), and other alumni.  Without their support and hard work, we would have few, if any, posts at this site.

So, on this fateful occasion, we will share with you three things we have learned about the advantages of legal blogging.  A legal blog is often a Herculean task; it requires time, diligence, and patience.  Some firms are dissuaded from the enterprise due to the time commitment, while others throw themselves into the task and quickly burn out.  But, for those who persevere, there are rewards.

So here’s our purported wisdom:

1.  A legal blog raises your firm’s profile.  This is something that Mark Hermann, formerly of the Drug & Device Law blog, noted in his “Memoirs of a Blogger.”  It is certainly true, as we here at Abnormal Use have been cited by a number of legal publications that have taken notice of this site, including The New York Times, NPR,  Scientific American, and a whole host of regional newspapers, law blogs, and other publications.  (We were even invited to host a webinar!) It is unlikely these sources would have mentioned or contacted our firm under those circumstances absent our blogging effort.

2.  It’s an entirely new way to network with other attorneys across the nation.  Really, blogging is a hobby as much as it is a business development mechanism.  Legal bloggers tend to have similar interests, and the shared interest in blogging is often a great way to break the ice, either online or in real life.  Accordingly, as we have noted before, this site has enabled us to network with and meet lawyers across the country that we would not have met otherwise.  That’s a good thing, for networking purposes, but also because it allows us to meet interesting people with similar interests irrespective of potential business development efforts. That’s not so bad, right?

3. As we work to bring you new legal content at this site, we are also learning new things ourselves, allowing us to keep informed of the latest products liability developments across the land.

Plus, it’s loads of fun. We here at Abnormal Use enjoy bringing you legal commentary and fun links on Fridays.  We hope you will continue to stay with us as we continue this enterprise, and we thank all of you, our dear readers, for your support over these last nearly two years.

Legal research can be our bread and butter.  Often, we scour the reported opinions, sometimes chancing across decades old opinions chronicling long ago cases argued by long dead attorneys.  It’s interesting, sometimes, to think that those lawyers from days gone by were just as invested in and frustrated by their cases as we are here today, although it’s difficult to feel a connection to the ancient facts and archaic language.  Too much time has passed. However, I recently re-visited a 1927 case with an intriguing family connection:  Dedman v. Dedman, 155 Tenn. 241, 291 S.W. 449 (Tenn. 1927). Yep, I’m a Dedman, too, and the parties to that 80 year old case are my relatives.

The suit was brought by Plaintiff Mrs. Elizabeth Fariss Dedman (my grandfather’s mother) against Defendant Mrs. Joseph M. Dedman (the mother in law of Elizabeth Fariss Dedman). Like so many cases since, the facts centered around an automobile accident.  The plaintiff was injured in an auto accident while riding in a car owned by the defendant and driven by her chauffeur.  Apparently, the the trial court entered a judgment for the plaintiff, which was affirmed by both the court of appeals and the supreme court.

As recited by the Court, the facts were these:

The parties lived in Columbia, Tenn., about 40 miles from Nashville. The plaintiff is the wife of defendant’s son. The defendant had a daughter, Mrs. Henry Moore, also living in Columbia. Shortly before Christmas, 1924, Mrs. Moore had arranged to make a shopping trip to Nashville with some lady friends. It was Mrs. Moore’s intention to go to Nashville on the bus and spend the day. The defendant had been ill, and before leaving for Nashville Mrs. Moore called to find out what her mother’s condition was, and informed her father who answered the telephone that it was her intention to go to Nashville that day if her mother was well enough for her to leave. Mr. Dedman communicated this information to his wife, the defendant, and the latter at once objected to Mrs. Moore and her friends making the trip on the bus. About this time the plaintiff dropped in to ask about defendant, her mother-in-law, and defendant told plaintiff to call up Mrs. Moore and say that defendant desired that Mrs. Moore make the trip to Nashville in Mrs. Dedman’s automobile. Defendant also suggested that it would be a good opportunity for plaintiff to go to Nashville and do Christmas shopping, and suggested that plaintiff join the party. All the ladies agreed to this arrangement, and the defendant directed her chauffeur to get out her car and take the party to Nashville.

Mrs. Moore asked two other ladies in Columbia to make the trip, and they accepted the invitation. The party then started out in defendant’s large closed car. The chauffeur and the plaintiff sat on the front seat. The other three ladies sat on the rear seat. They proceeded about 18 miles along the highway toward Nashville, when in passing through the village of Thompson Station the Dedman car collided with another car at a road crossing and plaintiff received the injuries for which she sues.

The parties lived in Columbia, Tennessee, where both my father and I were born.  It’s strange to read about a family outing in the factual background section of a Tennessee Supreme Court opinion; stranger still to see that one relative was suing another for injuries.

The plaintiff attempted to prove at the trial that the defendant’s chauffeur was negligent and speeding during the outing. The jury apparently agreed, and the brand new Tennessee Court of Appeals – created in 1925 and after the accident at issue – affirmed the verdict. On appeal to the supreme court, there was an issue relating to the defendant’s responsibility for the chauffeur and the extent to which the guest is responsible for her own safety in the automobile. In dealing with the rights and responsibilities of an automobile guest and passenger, the case is not unlike many that we encounter today in transportation litigation. Interestingly enough, the opinion was authored by Chief Justice Grafton Green, currently the record holder for the longest term of service on the Tennessee Supreme Court. In this case, Green wrote that “the question of the guest’s contributory negligence has been held to be one for the jury” and reaffirmed that principle. Wrote he: “Comparing the respective contentions of the parties thus outlined, we are satisfied that reasonable men might differ as to whether the plaintiff acted with ordinary care under the circumstances disclosed–as to whether she conducted herself as a prudent person ordinarily would do. In this plight of the case, the question of her contributory negligence was one for the jury.”

It’s been cited nearly 40 times since 1927, most recently in 1986 (and now by one blog in 2011).

It’s funny to think how many moments of history are captured in our case law.  Of course, I’m not just referring to legal history; rather, I also reference the basic facts of every day life which are recited in court opinions.  Often litigants are arguing about what might be one of the worst or most difficult days of their lives, and if their case reaches the appellate level, then those facts are chronicled for posterity.  How else would I know about an automobile accident in the 1920’s involving my forebears from that era?

We here at Abnormal Use wish you a safe and eventful Halloween. As lawyers, we are many years from the halcyon days of our youth, but we fondly remember Halloween. It’s unfortunate that Halloween falls on a Monday this year, and we suspect some of you may have already celebrated this holiday of holidays this past weekend. But, we hope you saved some candy and scary stories (and perhaps even a pumpkin beer or two) for today. If not, we hope you at least have plans to do something fright inducing to celebrate the day – like answering written discovery. Last year, to celebrate the occasion, we shared with you our favorite scary movies. This year, we are a bit more low key. But yes, that that’s the cover of Bugs Bunny’s Trick ‘N’ Treat Halloween Fun #4, published by the Dell Giant Comics Series way, way back in the mid-1950s.

Happy Halloween!