Dear Cyndy,

The driveway is a sheet of ice and the weather forecast suggests
there won't be much change for the next several days. I've managed
to clear the snow. The cars can be driven into the street. For
tomorrow afternoon more snow is forecast, and I will start anew
blowing it away.

As for the litigation, I shall try not to think about it so as to
be able to resume productive work on the novel.  In retrospect, I
have much sympathy for Mr. Pucci and his fellow lawyers whose
profession commits them to representaions which they do not believe.
I have even more sympathy for the judges whose existence is a
never ending charade, inasmuch as they are committed to an impossible
proposition: that language is capable of expressing experience.
Far from it. Language is only a small facet of experience and can
never do it justice.

I noted with interest that the hearing in my appeal which had been
scheduled as the third of five cases to be argued on February 7,
was postponed to be the last of the quintuplet. Interposed between
cases four and five was a fifteen minute break, and when the "all rise"
was chanted and the judges strode into the courtroom, Justice
Katzmann had been replaced by Justice Grasso. I wondered why, until
I scrutinized their biographies published on the Internet, complete
with pictures. Please take a look at the photo of Justice Katzmann
and tell me whether you think he might be wearing a yarmulke.
You may or may not remember that at the June 27, 2012 Hearing
before the Plumbing Board, Mr. "Butch" Ramos, the pretend assistent
plumbing inspector complained: "Yeah, I just, first, I take offense
for Mr. Meyers sayin' we went in there like the Gestapo, or whatever."
and my hypothesis is that a Justice wearing a yarmulka recused himself
from adjudicating a case in which the defendants claimed they did not
go in there "like the Gestapo." Of course, I don't know.

Another interesting tidbit is that Justice Ullman, the Superior Court
judge who ruled against me, was, figuratively speaking, still wet behind
the ears, since he took his place on the bench only some weeks after 
I had filed the motion for judgment on the pleadings; 
mine was the first of his decisions that was appealed 
to a three judge panel.

You may or may not have been startled by Mr. Gordon's report:

"One of the major objections by NIS (Nantucket Inspectional Services) 
was whether Dr. Meyer personally installed the plumbing at his age. 
That is something of an opinion that would never be allowed in a hearing 
because I was not there to witness the installation and it is not up 
to me to decide whether he did or did not personally do the actual 
installation." 

Mr. Gordon explicitly declines to state his belief that I installed
the plumbing myself. The seeds of doubt were planted by Mr. Ciarmataro
himself. Some months ago, one of our rare telephone conversations,
went as follows:

Gordon: I told Bill (Ciarmataro) he couldn't just go around calling
        a person a liar, unless he had evidence to prove it.
   EJM: Whom is he calling a liar?
Gordon: He's calling you a liar. 
        He's telling everybody that you're a liar.
   EJM: What is he saying that I lied about?
Gordon: He says you couldn't possibly have done that plumbing
        yourself, and he wants to know who did it. 

There's the answer that Mr. Pucci isn't quite smart enough 
to understand. The answer is that Meyer is a witch, and that
the plumbing was installed ... by the devil.

Please let me know about any dreams you have or apparitions 
concerning plumbing or plumbers. Sooner or later all mysteries
are solved.

Stay well, dream imaginatively, and give my best to Ned.

Jochen