SWEET FREEDOM — No, there’s no Carson City dateline on this one, people. Despite heavy winds, power outages and an unusually large number of Nevada Highway Patrol troopers on I-395, we left the capital today, refusing to stay for the oh-so-lame 23rd special session of the Nevada Legislature. Why give them the satisfaction, we figured?

Anyway, Gov. Jim Gibbons‘ proclaimation calling the special session — including a list of bills to be considered therein — is in .pdf form on the Legislature’s handy website, if you’re into that sort of thing. After two weeks in the capital, we’re sure not.

We’ll have a legislative wrap-up in this week’s issue of CityLife, but right now, we’re just going to pretend the whole thing never happened while we catch up on some much-needed sleep. We’ll be back later this week with regular blogs.

UPDATE: OK, just because we can’t resist and we’re dorks, two things about Gibbons’ proclamation:

1. The governor uses the language of the state constitution in calling the Legislature into special session, as he must. But that language is interesting: "The governor may, on extraordinary occasions, convene the Legislature by proclamation…" (emphasis added)

It seems to us that the Legislature failing to meet its deadline is an all-too-ordinary occasion these days. In fact, it’s only happened once in the history of the 120-day limitation. To us, extraordinary occasion means something unusual, an urgent or compelling situation that requires legislative intervention immediately. Missing the deadline? Not it.

If we were governor (and that sound you hear is state Sen. Barbara Cegavske shuddering) we would be of a mind to tell legislative leaders that we weren’t going to call a special session, specifically killing a number of good proposals that will otherwise die, because we want to make a point about the bullshit hostage-holding of bills that takes place in the waning hours.

Like kids with a ball: If they can’t share, take away their ball. Maybe next time they won’t be such dicks. And we’re talking about the state Senate, of course.

2. The proclamation indicates that the session would begin at 5 p.m. today and end at midnight tonight, enough time to go through the legislative motions of getting 11 bills introduced, heard in committee, reported out of committed, read for the second and third time, passed and sent over to the other house, where the procedure will repeat.

It’s interesting to us, because we couldn’t find anything in the constitution that gives the governor the authority to designate the ending time of a special session. He can call them and he can tell them exactly what they can and cannot consider during them, but there’s nothing in that section of the constitution about prescribing when they must end.  Only in the case of a disagreement among the leaders of both houses of the Legislature may the governor adjourn the proceedings.

It’s not that we want things to drag on up there, especially for the sake of the good people in the press corps who we left behind today. And given the disgraceful, time-wasting way the Legislature (especially the Senate) conducted business this week, it was probably a good idea to put a clock on it. We’re just saying we can’t see where the governor is legally entitled to do that. Anybody else?

CARSON CITY — The state Senate came back into session at 2:36 a.m. Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio said he’d spoken with Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley and other leaders, and that they had agreed on a list of bills that didn’t make the 1 a.m. deadline and requested Gov. Jim Gibbons to call a brief special session to approve those bills.

CARSON CITY — After Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley paid a visit to the offices of Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio, the Senate went back into session briefly to start its own sine die ceremonies.

Raggio said he spoke to Gov. Jim Gibbons, who is considering a special session for the purpose of passing the few bills left undone at 1 a.m. When that might happen — and, more important, what bills will be on the list — isn’t clear as we write this (at 2:12 a.m.).

“It’s nobody’s fault,” Raggio said, blaming the time needed to get bills from one house to the other. “It’s just the mechanics.”

Of course, he’s wrong. Raggio’s been a senator since 1973, and he cannot be ignorant of how long it takes to process bills, even at top legislative speed. He had to know that it was impossible to complete the volume of bills in the time allotted, and he even took a final Senate agenda out of order to get a trio of measures out before 1 a.m.

But Raggio went on to say what we blogged earlier: Actions taken after 1 a.m. are void. Some have said that the bills should be enrolled anyway, but Raggio said he wasn’t willing to take that chance. “This is one senator who’s going to follow the constitution,” he said.

CARSON CITY — That’s all, folks!

The Senate has stopped all action, the hour of 1 a.m. having arrived. But over in the Assembly, action is proceeding, despite a clear and unambigious declaration in the state constitution that all actions taken after 1 a.m. are void.

We’re not clear as to what bills were passed after the witching hour-plus-one, but we are clear that everything done after the deadline isn’t valid.

Clearly, this was occasioned by the Senate’s last-minute wrangling with bills. But that can’t cure what’s going on here. A member of the capital press corps has counted seven bills approved after the deadline. Make that eight.

This is quite a spectacle, with lobbyists crowded into the back of the chamber, watching what clearly is an illegal procedure. And while some Republicans have ceased voting, nobody has mentioned the missed deadline.

It’s now 1:12 a.m., and Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley has appointed the usual sine die committees. A total of nine bills were approved after the deadline.

Please, God, don’t tell us the state Supreme Court is going to get involved again.