While it seems like ancient history, the first trial that HBA ever conducted, the famous (or infamous) Zulu trial took place about 2.5 years ago. While it’s generally agreed that this trial was a disorganized catasrophe on all counts, like every HBA trial, there is still much to be learned from it– namely, how to NOT conduct a trial (the HBA decidedly has not learned anything from the Zulu trial to date).

I had the privelege of being prosecuted during this defining moment of the HBA. Also referred to as [REDACTED] vs. HBA, the trial was a momentous ocassioun, held in the esteemed Lunchroom Court. In front of honorable judge [REDACTED], the prosecution, headed by [REDACTED], first laid out the facts of the case. [REDACTED], a trusted (very prominent) member of the HBA, had recently defiled (slightly edited) a holy document compiling all the evidence of the Hecretary Birds and Snaxii into a report. Oh, and defiled (modified) it he had! The entire document was converted into Zulu. Why zulu, as well as the motives for this heinous (very reasonable) crime, has never been determined to date.
Evidence submitted by the prosecution, utilizing a before-and-after view to display the degree of damage modification to the document done by “that dunderhead” [REDACTED].

The trial was increadibly chaotic, as all HBA trials were. It set an important precedent that the landmark Treason Trial followed in full. During the trial, nobody was really sure of their part, and there was absolutely no organization whatsoever. Several jury members were, in fact, unable to be present at the proceedings, as they were held captive at the time by a mysterious entity known only as Lun Schline. The others fared little better. At least the Zulu trial was worlds better than the Treason Trial, in which the defendant, [REDACTED], somehow was acquitted with absolutely no evidence and for no reason at all, while the prosecution had solid (even if untrue) evidence of treasonous activities. In addition, that very same [REDACTED] ended up changing the focus of the trial so that another member was tried, and escaped completely. I suspect backroom deals.

Going back to the trial I’m not getting paid enough to cover (@boss: hint hint), the judge and jury, made up exclusively of members of the HBA, ruled in favor of the HBA (Of course they did). [REDACTED] was (un)justly sentenced to a week-long suspension from all HBA-related activities. Legend has it (but what do I know if it’s true or not?) that his brainwaves were constantly monitored for the slightest thought of birds, organizations, or even the letter H.

All in all, this was a very important trial, and has an important place in HBA legal history as the first trial that the HBA presided over (Cases that the HBA did not preside over, as a rule, generally went much more smoothly, sich as Snaxely v. Birduson and Storkbury v. Pebbleson.)

Ah, shoot. The boss set us on a minimum word limit again, to “improve article quality”. Personally, I think that this is pretty unecessary, considering this newly published and extremely compelling article. But then again, that wonderful piece of rhetoric does have quite an impressive character count, so maybe the boss is right. Eh, I don’t know.

What I do know is that whatever the article above was talking about, it was definitely good stuff. Very good. Superb. Yep, practically spotless. Oh, I could keep praising myself for a good long bit more, but I see that minimum word requirement coming up like the ribbon across a finish line. So…close. And you already know I’m not going to write a single word past it. Dang it, seven words under. What ever shall I do? Double dang it, three words over. This actually sucks.

Ah well, that’ll be it for me. No sense in dragging an article that I’ve been dragging out for the last couple paragraphs any further. The end.