I was surprised the other day to see a "Lawyer X" posting on the Between Lawyers blog.

Well, maybe I wasn't surprised. Here's the story.

When we started this blog, we asked Hylton Jolliffe if he would set up an author account called Lawyer X that any of us could use. One of the many reasons we like being part of the Corante family of blogs is that Hylton immediately agreed to do so.

The idea of Lawyer X was fuzzy, at best. First and foremost, we saw it as an easy way to bring guest bloggers (especially those who might be risking their reputations to be seen blogging with us) into the blog. It could also be used as a way to play devil's advocate, raise issues in different ways, and as a way for any of us to "step out of character" to make the blog more lively and creative.

And, if you know us, this will be no surprise, it gave us another avenue for mischief and fun.

I remember saying at the time that the danger of creating a Lawyer X was that there was a risk that one day we would all be posting as Lawyer X and no one would be posting in his or her own name. I believe someone pointed out the name of my blog and expressed doubt that I'd ever be posting anonymously.

Although we've talked about having Lawyer X make an appearance on the blog on several occasions, we finally decided last week to bring Lawyer X into the conversation at Between Lawyers.

Now, I have to admit that my first reaction to unveiling Lawyer X at this time was to say, "But everyone will know that Lawyer X is Marty."

Denise's response to that, by the way, was: "< whoosh >milk through nostrils< /whoosh >".

Marty, the serious one in our group, then said, "It doesn't matter, there's a point to using a penname even if some know who it is.and you're free to use lawyer x as well, unless you would like to really fool them and use lawyer D or something."

So, Lawyer X has arrived. Let's go back to the purpose of Lawyer X. Lawyer X is intended to be (1) a vehicle for a guest blogger and/or (2) a rhetorical device in the form of a fictional character that can and may be used by any or all of us.

Now, I have to admit that I'm not really sure who is posting as Lawyer X, although I'd probably be saying that even if I was using the Lawyer X penname (and, Marty, I got the dig about using "Lawyer D").

So, that's the story. Several people asked me in the last few days who or what Lawyer X was. I'm happy to have gotten the chance to identify him or her and to clear up any mystery about his or her identity.