USLSA - Western Region 23rd Annual Legal Education Conference
Santa Barbara, California
January 3-6, 2017
So many awards, so many deserving attorneys.
Office of the Year.
Special Project of Excellence.
Outstanding people in general.
And then there's the Miss Lake Mexia Rides Again award. Sounds impressive, doesn't it?
Yeah. It's not.
USLSA Patriarch, Ray Schiflett, III, found a trophy of a female body builder flexing her muscles in a bargain bin at the local Trophies R Us store in central Texas. The plate on the front read "Miss Lake Mexia Rides Again". Even though he had absolutely no idea what that meant, he couldn't resist paying the $3 asking price and breathing life back into Miss Lake Mexia, whoever she might have been.
It seems only right at this point to get everyone on the same page about Mexia, a city 40 miles east of Waco. It's pronounced "Mex-ee-uh".
No, I'm kidding. While that's how we would pronounce it in Kansas (Canz-Ass), let's go with "Muh-hay-uh", shall we?
Lake Mexia is a fishing lake that seems to be mediocre at best and prone to flooding if the interwebs can be believed (and the interwebs CAN be believed right? I mean, it got donald trump elected president).
Back to the award, Ray paced the floor, lost sleep, chose a ditch to die in, and decided to give this award (and I use the term loosely) to someone with a good sense of humor who would keep it for a year and then, at next year's conference, pass the torch to another funny person.
That's it. Nothing else required. Only laughter.
I've can do that.
After all the "real" awards were handed out, photos were taken and everyone (me) insisted that the winner of the Miss Lake Mexia Rides Again award be included.
Here's my plan for Miss Lake Mexia (thanks to Jon Carlos Senor): she and I will travel the globe and I will take her picture at various places and with random people. I'll post here and keep you updated on our adventures. An added benefit is that she fits nicely in my purse so I'll rarely be without her. This is going to be quite a year!
Because it's on my mind, why do you suppose Miss Lake Mexia is riding again? Where did she ride the first time? Why is she a body builder? Did she get those muscles reeling in fish from the lake? Why was the trophy never picked up? Did Ray pay too much for it? Perhaps these questions and many others will be answered over the next 12 months. Perhaps not.
But, the quest will be a hoot.