Several of our law clerks, who are all curiously named after porn star actresses, have scarpered. Nikki finally got her work visa, thanks in large part to my legal work, but then a sudden longterm boyfriend appeared and gave her an ultimatum - if she didn't go back to the motherland and resume their relationship, they would break up. Of course, Nikki decided that it just wasn't good enough to have her own job and income and work visa in a new country where a significant percentage of the male population are extremely interested in dating an Asian woman, and so she returned to be with this one guy.
Work visas don't transfer from person to person, either, so all that work essentially came to nothing. For those of you not familiar with the process, first you have to pay a lawyer a fee and give them lots of paperwork. Then they do a lot of fact checking, economic calculations, advertising of job positions, and presentation of financial and tax data, before they can file your case. Then they cross their fingers, because work visas are extremely oversubscribed and there is a lottery. If you pass the lottery, your case gets examined on its merits. Maybe 50%-75% of all cases don't get past the lottery and are returned. Sorry, bad luck. Once your case gets to the merits, the relevant agency tries its hardest to find weak spots and to demand further evidence. Once you've provided the evidence, it may or may not get approved.
Nikki got through the entire gauntlet of administrative red tape as outlined above - but in one fell swoop decided to leave her job, her new life, and a new country, in order to be with somebody whom she last met on the wrong side of grad school.
Traci left because of a family tragedy and also because her visa did not succeed in the lottery as outlined above. She'll be back in a bit for more study though.
Finally, one of our law clerks may undergo metamorphosis and pupate into a lawyer. Ilona joined our firm and took the bar exam, but didn't pass the first time. It happens. She's taking a leave of absence to try again. I wished her luck, and gave her the same advice that had served me well in my bar exam: "To answer each question, you must apply the rule. If you don't know the rule, think logically and invent a rule. Make it the most sensible-sounding rule you can. Be sure to cite to something really impressive-sounding, because the examiner won't want to take the time to check and they don't want to look stupid. AND IF YOU REALLY WANT TO HAVE FUN WITH THE EXAMINER, INVENT A RULE... AND THEN INVENT AN EXCEPTION TO THE RULE."
Ilona gave me a funny look.