Newc

Back to the good stuff, now that the weather is cooling down and it is less humid.

Watches, wine, whiskey, any sort of gear (ski, camera, climbing, whatever). I’m an obsessive hobbyist.

That’s really neat. I was not aware these co-signed pocket watches existed for a Louisville jeweler.

I have an 8-watch case where I keep my daily watches. I will probably need another one before too long. I keep anything of value / non-daily watches in individual pouches in a safe deposit box with desiccants.

That’s a cool watch. I prefer the size of the new yellow one but I prefer the Tiffany blue color.

Well, looks like he won’t be engaging in much hanky panky with unwilling women anymore.

According to reports, Nims took “the implication” pretty far with female climbers.

Not mine, but sure wish it was. In a nutshell, why I think watches are awesome.

First, the (pocket) watch in question:



Second, the story (from Hodinkee, which is briefer than the lot essay):

quote:

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Arguably the most historically important lot of the year (maybe for the past few years), this watch was gifted as the "Victory Watch" to General Charles de Gaulle for the Allies' win during World War II.

Four pieces were given to the Allied leaders on Christmas 1945. The project was undertaken in secret, with Louis Cottier himself a part of the effort, and the famed Stern Frères (yes, the family that owns Patek, for those who don't know) was tasked with the dials. The watch here features Joan of Arc with an hour hand in the shape of the Cross of Lorraine (the symbol of Free France during the resistance). The caseback has a "V" for "Victory" encircling the globe, and an engraving around the edge.

President Harry Truman's watch had the Statue of Liberty, with the hour hand in the shape of an olive branch; Joseph Stalin's watch had a worker in front of a steel mill, the hour hand the communist 5-point star; Winston Churchill got a depiction of St. George (the UK's patron saint) slaying the dragon, with the hour hand a trident. How it came back to market, I have no idea, but the estimate is CHF 300,000 to 600,000, and I hope a museum in France gets it. It's incredibly moving and important, and damn near flawless.

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Third, here is a link to the lot: Phillips Geneve

I can hardly think of a more beautiful and historically important watch. To paraphrase Indiana Jones, “this belongs in a museum.”

Season may be over next week, at least for Colorado/Utah. High pressure dome settling in around mid-March. Not sure how Colorado/Utah will recover from that.

I’m a lawyer, and I’ve spent a lot of my time the past 2-3 months incorporating AI into my practice. I’m a little over 15 years removed from law school. Here are my observations:

1) Engineering prompts / delegating to AI takes more time than delegating to a senior associate. However, if you give AI a detailed roadmap, it can chop off a ton of associate / review time. I’d say that a complicated motion to dismiss on an issue I did not have much familiarity with took 5-6 hours of my time instead of 2-3 hours of my time plus 20+ hours of associate time.
2) Litigators are safer than transactional attorneys. I think transactional attorneys will lose a lot of their workflow. As long as there are human judges, opposing counsel, ethical rules, human clients, etc., litigators will be needed. Business lawyers? Tougher sledding.
3) Due diligence and doc review hours will be gone. Paying an attorney to review thousands of contracts to flag certain key contract terms is over.
4) Young attorneys are in trouble. I’d rethink going to law school right now.
5) The work that you get from AI is serviceable but it is not inspired. It’s like B, B+ work. That’s probably fine for the vast majority of legal work.
6) This could be the technology that makes the legal profession work closer to the way it should work. The cost of litigation is obscene right now. I’d rather be in court and in depositions than behind a desk slogging through discovery.
7) This technology will come for everyone. Legal is impacted because the same code that applies to software engineers also applies to legal (ie they are both rules based).

In short, I’m glad I’m more than 15 years into my career and have some measure of experience and judgment. I imagine I will be doing more high level, judgment-based work, and will just be working with AI instead of young attorneys. Figuring out how to monetize the practice of law is going to be challenging.