April 16th, 2024  Assigned as required or recommended reading at law schools throughout the country, 1L of a Ride: A Well-Traveled Professor’s Roadmap to Success in the First Year of Year of Law School provides a candid, comprehensive roadmap to both academic and emotional success in law school’s crucial first year.
Legal education continues to evolve and so does this classic work, now in its fourth edition.
Told in an accessible first-person voice, covered topics include: pre-planning, top student fears, the first-year curriculum, the Socratic and case methods of teaching, effective class participation, the top habits of successful students, essential study techniques, legal research and writing, exam strategies, maintaining well-being, and much more.
Combines comments from hundreds of law students, empirical research, and authentic samples of signature documents from the 1L experience, including exam questions, Socratic dialogue, and student case-briefs, class notes, and course outlines.
McClurg taught at six different law schools and received numerous awards for both teaching and research.
April 15th, 2024  McClurg’s fifth novel, Funeral Daze, under his pen name Dorian Box, is out and getting terrific reviews. Check it out on Amazon.
Praise For McClurg’s (aka Dorian Box) Latest Novel
“FUNERAL DAZE by Dorian Box manages to be laugh-out-loud funny, heartwarmingly tender, and full of lively action and suspense, all at once—a thoroughly entertaining and engaging read.” — IndieReader (5 Stars; IR Seal of Approval)
“Funeral Daze is a novel that takes both light and dark elements to present a fantastically engaging, emotionally resonant story in a deeply humorous and satirical fashion. Unmissable reading.” — 2023 Readers’ Favorite Silver Medal for Humor Fiction)
“A hilarious page-turner that effortlessly blends crime, humor and South Florida beach culture. … Award-winning author Dorian Box (Psycho Tropics, The Hiding Girl) has always employed brilliant doses of well-timed levity in crime fiction, but he pulls out all the stops for this laugh-out-loud caper.” — BestThrillers
“The story unfolds at a crisp and steady pace, with plenty of thought-provoking moments once 12-year-old Jessica enters the scene, offering Danny surprisingly mature reflections on tragedy and a knockout mystery to occupy his time. … Funeral Daze delivers an appealing spin on the mystery genre through rich characterization and an abundance of insight throughout.” — Publishers Weekly BookLife Prize Seminfinalist
“A perfect beach read, this zany mystery has the thrills, quirky characters, juicy plot twists, and gripping conclusion you’re looking for!” — Reedsy Discovery
“Time and again, Box has proven he can write a tense thriller that is funny, dark, and completely endearing. It’s the perfect combination of a smart storyline and characters that keep you reading well after bedtime. Fantastic!” — NetGalley
“Funeral Daze is a macabre and hilarious novel that intersects the lives of several bizarre and oddly compelling characters. … Dorian Box masterfully directs the story into a series of unpredictable and uproarious events that are deliciously ironic, unexpectedly thought-provoking, and always edgy and dark.” — D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review
And don’t forget McClurg’s (Box’s) other award-winning novels.
November 6th, 2024 
Not surprisingly, not to name any names, but people frequently lie under sworn oath, including in depositions. So you have to appreciate, as did the opposing lawyer, the sincere honesty of this deponent.
[Opposing Lawyer] was deposing my 19-year-old client. Her dad died in a collision near Hope, Arkansas on I-30. He had been in and out of prison all of his life.
My opponent was asking her about her dad’s habits:
Q. Did he use drugs?
A. He smoked marijuana.
Q. Okay. You know how often?
A. After he went to report for probation.
Q. Oh, my goodness. You
Read more…
October 14th, 2024 
Beware of Dog. Would you believe the referenced dog in the pictured sign that escaped through this wrought-iron fence was a five-pound miniature poodle named Fluffy?
I wouldn’t believe it either, just as I’m not sure I believe the sign in this admittedly funny picture is real, or just something someone Photoshopped onto the fence. (Obviously, no dog broke through the fence.) I mean, why would “DOG” be in quotation marks?
I don’t post many funny warning signs anymore because I assume most of the ones I see (and I see a lot on Facebook) are phony, which is a real shame for aficionados of true wacky signs.
Read more…
April 30th, 2024 
According to the Lancaster Medical Heritage Museum, Lee’s Save the Baby, made by William W. Lee & Co. in the early 1900s, was a children’s cough suppressant to be applied externally to the chest area (although the back cover of the box pictured here said it could be used “Externally or Internally”). The main ingredients included camphor.
Gotta love the foresight to include the disclaimer stating:
The name “Save-The-Baby” is not intended to imply that the product will save babies …
The Lancaster medical museum says:
“The liquid medication has a dark yellow color and it is contained in a glass bottle with a red
Read more…
December 17th, 2023 
Talk about a wacky sticker. We’ve all seen the billboards and city benches and bumper stickers, etc., bearing advertisements from plaintiffs’ personal injury lawyers along the lines of:
INJURED? You may be entitled to compensation. Call Tammy the Terminator today for a free consultation!
But walking to a gym last week, I passed a car with this sticker on the rear window:
INJURED? GOOD
Yikes! Surely it’s a joke … I hope. If anyone recognizes the two dudes pictured, let me know.
April 22nd, 2023 
When you come across a motion to file a box of crayons in a case seeking a writ of certiorari in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, you just have to know more. Specifically, why are the lawyers asking “FOR LEAVE TO FILE ONE PACKET OF CRAYOLA COLORED PENCILS”?
(I borrowed this from the Facebook page of a former student of mine at the Florida International University College of Law.)
February 10th, 2023 
This effort to forge a license plate’s vehicle registration renewal sticker must have been art for art’s sake, because it surely had no chance of fooling anyone.
Bartlett is an incorporated suburb of Memphis. The Bartlett police recently posted this picture on their Facebook feed.
Give them credit for their sense of humor. “Nice try, but no,” they said.
January 28th, 2023 
Help me figure out this wacky warning/instruction sign in a bed of stones that says “Do Not Mow.” Comes via a friend of a Facebook friend.
Possibilities:
The property owner recently redid the landscaping and replaced the grass with rocks. The property owner lacks confidence in the skill and judgment of the person or company responsible for maintaining the landscaping. The property owner’s lawyer is one of my former Torts students to whom I taught the adage, “Tort law is a world where everything that can go wrong does.”
September 26th, 2022 
“Criminal,” the highly rated podcast of true crime stories run by former NPR reporters, interviewed me for its newest episode called “Mantrap.” It addresses civil liability for harm caused by deadly booby traps set to protect uninhabited property. Here’s a link to the website podcast and here’s a link to all of the links where the podcast can be heard (e.g., Spotify, Google Play, iTunes, etc.).
My contribution involved one of my favorite tort law cases, Katko v. Briney, the infamous Iowa spring-gun case.
Plaintiff Marvin Katko broke into Ed and Bertha Briney’s uninhabited farmhouse in Eddyville, Iowa, in search of old jars and bottles he considered to
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July 13th, 2022 
Karl Llewellyn, Roscoe Pound, Ronald Dworkin … McClurg?
And you thought 1L of a Ride was simply a helpful law school prep book, but it’s the number #1 Best Seller on Amazon in “Jurisprudence.”
Yale, Chicago, Harvard, I’ll be waiting for your calls.
June 25th, 2022 
At lawhaha.com, we love what we call “rolling torts,” also known as “accidents waiting to happen.” A rolling tort consists of an effort to move large objects via a vehicle in a way that creates an unreasonable danger to other motorists.
Courtesy of a former student, here we find a valiant effort to transport a full-size washer and dryer with a compact car. To the driver’s credit, the elaborate straps show a solid effort to arrive at the destination without disaster.
More rolling torts can be found scattered through these pages, including here, here, and here.
April 11th, 2022 
“Eminent domain” is the power of federal and state governments to “take” private property for public use. In 1879, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the power “requires no constitutional recognition” because it is an inherent power of sovereign governments. But governments can’t just take your property without paying for it. The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that no private property can be taken for “without just compensation.” Here’s a good history of it.
The Fifth Amendment eminent domain clause is often called “the taking clause,” for obvious reasons. While it only applies to federal actions, all states provide for the power of eminent domain in
Read more…
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Funny Law School Stories
For all its terror and tedium, law school can be a hilarious place. Everyone has a funny law school story. What’s your story?
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Product Warning Labels
A variety of warning labels, some good, some silly and some just really odd. If you come encounter a funny or interesting product warning label, please send it along.
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Tortland
Tortland collects interesting tort cases, warning labels, and photos of potential torts. Raise risk awareness. Play "Spot the Tort." |
Weird Patents
Think it’s really hard to get a patent? Think again.
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Legal Oddities
From the simply curious to the downright bizarre, a collection of amusing law-related artifacts.
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Spot the Tort
Have fun and make the world a safer place. Send in pictures of dangerous conditions you stumble upon (figuratively only, we hope) out there in Tortland.
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Legal Education
Collecting any and all amusing tidbits related to legal education.
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Harmless Error
McClurg's twisted legal humor column ran for more than four years
in the American Bar Association Journal.
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