Attorney Work Product

Crazy

2012-02-01T00:18:00.002-05:00

Lots of crazy:

1. My mother. Crazy for many reasons, but the latest thing is her having gallbladder surgery. She's doing that on Friday. So, last week I went with her to the surgery consult, and then yesterday to what was supposed to be an ERCP, which turned out to only be an MRCP (the former being an invasive, sedation-requiring scope, and the latter being just an MRI), so that confusion, rescheduling, and driving to Hometown, kids in tow, really freakin' early in the morning, for no reason, aside, everything's a go for Friday surgery. Husband's best friend is drugging her, she asked him to do her anesthesia. Hopefully he'll send her home with plenty "to go." She needs sedation, sheesh.

2. My eldest child. Our house is a "reverse ranch," meaning we enter in what is technically the basement, and to access the main floor of the house (with ours and the kids' bedrooms), we take the staircase from the foyer. In the basement is a large den, a bedroom (previously occupied by the House Elf, and once again occupied by Husband when he sleeps during the day), a bathroom, and the door to the garage/utility room. The staircase has a nice sturdy gate at the top of the stairs, which we don't usually latch anymore, because Cora really never goes downstairs unless requested to do so (to wake up Daddy, for instance). Although we close it, to keep the dog upstairs, and if it's open, it blocks the hallway to the living room. I do, however, always latch the gate before I go to bed as part of my night-time routine, because I did a little bit of sleep-walking as a kid, and it's always my fear that someday Cora will do the same, and just fall right down the stairs.

Well...

Friday night, we hadn't even gotten ready for bed yet, it was about 11:30, and as of 10:30, Cora was still awake in her room (even though she'd gotten into bed at 9). We were in our bedroom, which is beside Cora's room. We heard the dog rustling around, but that's not unusual when it gets close to bedtime. Then we heard a thump and crying that sounded much too far away to be from her bedroom, and we immediately just KNEW. Found Cora at the bottom of the staircase, her face covered in blood. (Fortunately the Murse was home for this incident, because I would have freaked the fuck out. It's also pretty apparent that, as a result of her first emergency room visit, I cannot rationally deal with any emergent medical issues with this child, because I lose my shit. And I am usually a pretty cool cucumber when it comes to handling emergencies, keeping others calm, etc.)

Anyway, her nose was gushing blood, and she has knocked out one of her top front teeth, the other top front tooth being loose and out of place. She was coherent (well, as coherent as a bleeding 4 year old can be) and weaving together this story of why she was downstairs (multiple stories, actually, none of which pan out... the first was she had lost her Hello Kitty purse, she'd left it downstairs by the couch... it was in her room by her chair. The second was that she'd lost Lamby's blanket downstairs... Lamby doesn't have a blanket. It's a stuffed lamb. It never had a blanket.) The best we can figure is she made it to the bottom of the stairs (for some unknown reason) and came back up, but tripped in the dark, on her blanket she was carrying, and faceplanted on the stairs.

I wanted to take her to the emergency room, but the Murse assured me that she was fine, she hadn't hit her head, just her mouth and nose. The nose stopped bleeding after a few minutes, the tooth was knocked clean out, the gums had stopped bleeding, and although she'd had a lip laceration, it too had stopped bleeding. She was as coherent as she ever is (Lamby's blanket aside), and there's nothing that can be done about the tooth. We called the pediatric dental resident at the clinic (my dentist was out of town over the weekend) and confirmed there's nothing urgent, and I took her to the dentist on Monday for an x-ray. He says the other tooth will fall out. She's already lisping a little, she'll be lisping a lot more soon. Sucks. But she was pretty excited about the Tooth Fairy, who she'd never heard of because she's not supposed to lose her damn teeth for another 2 years or so. Two years without her front teeth. Ugh. Well, she's her father's daughter, he knocked his out as a toddler, as did our niece. Family trait, I'm guessing. She really didn't cry much though, which is funny, considering she'll scream like the world is coming to an end when, like, a friend won't share, but she knocks out her damn teeth, and she's like, yeah, whatev.

And, from now on, I'm keeping that fucking gate latched until she's at least 17. Maybe she'll keep the rest of her teeth for the next 2 years.

3. My clients. Today, I spent 3 hours in a settlement conference to bicker about frickin' household furniture. For reals. Fine by me, because that's actually a paying client, with money in escrow. Sure you don't want to individually name each piece of cutlery in your property settlement agreement? Win.

4. My husband. Started drinking when he came home from work this morning and was shit-faced by the time he went to bed at 3pm. Very bad night at work. He woke up at 7 to entertain his best friend, who brought Cora's best friend J and her little sister over to play (wanted to get them out of the house so J's mom could write her paper). As an aside, Cora made sure to point out where she bled on the stairs. (Nice.) Husband has since headed back down to his man cave to suffer through his hangover.

5. My youngest child. Honey Badger holds a grudge. Vee was being a cuddle whore when we got back from Cora's ballet class, and I was trying to make dinner, but every time I'd put her down, she'd scream. Finally, I just had to go put her in her crib and close the door and let her cry. She screamed bloody murder for about 20 minutes. Then I went to go get her, and she was still PISSED. She gave me seriously dirty looks and continued screaming at me, and it took about 5 or 10 minutes to completely console her. She's really not used to having to cry. She's really just such a good baby, that she doesn't cry unless she wants something/needs something. And usually she's chill at dinner time and sits in her seat and watches me cook dinner, or quietly watches us eat dinner when we're out. Not tonight. You could see it in her eyes, she was PISSED at me. Who knew she'd start gathering material for her tell-all book at age 5 months?

MILP Roundup #237

2012-01-30T23:55:00.001-05:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the Attorney Work Product, Attorney at Large and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. We have added some new blood, and next week, Kate Sherwood will host it.

First, hoping LC's mom gets better and goes home!

-R- has MILP porn (and other randomness).

EH rewrites history: Pea, the Warrior Princess, leads the Celts and defeats the Roman Empire.

CP has family photos.

Izzie's birth plan includes postpartem margarita machines.

Dinei has fish noises instead of bar study. (Much more awesome.)

Kate Sherwood is financial planning.

SuzieJD takes on a new role -- driving instructor.

LL has snowbunnies.

RG describes why men's lifespans are significantly lower than women's.

LEO on family planning.

But I Do Have a Law Degree lunches with the ladies of the blogosphere.

Momttorney has moments.

Cowgirl in the City finds perspective.

Butterflyfish on the more somber subject of checking out.

Also, collecting some perspectives on joining this honorable profession... Ruby Falls started a set of excellent posts on Should You Go to Law School (here and here). We've continued that series in the MILP-iverse, with Dinei, Butterflyfish, LEO, RG, and CM. (Did I miss any? Let me know!)

***If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like them to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

So you want to be a lawyer...

2012-01-19T22:27:00.004-05:00

Ruby Falls has started some excellent posts on the subject of "Should I Go to Law School?" I would love to see all of the Moms in the Legal Profession write a post on this topic to tell our stories. I think the various experiences are important to the discussion, not only for the future members of our profession, but for the current ones.

If you haven't visited the blog of Law Professor Paul Campos, it's worth a read through. (And as a six degrees to Kevin Bacon aside, Prof. Campos also blogs at Lawyers, Guns & Money, along with a professor from my foreign relations graduate program). I am extremely critical of law schools. I hated law school. Which is incredibly ironic, since I'm now teaching law students. Bahahaha! However, I also have extremely strong opinions (involving violent, uncontrollable twitching) concerning the ~~load of crap from two people who have no idea what the legal profession is like on the ground~~ McGinnis and Mangas op-ed from the Wall Street Journal that goes far beyond the criticisms made by Prof. Campos. Legal education may need a huge overhaul, but it cannot be eliminated. It would destroy our profession. And I believe in this profession, as fucked up as it is.

First, some background on me. I worked in the legal profession for six years before I started law school. I worked mostly in insurance defense, but I did some foreclosure and real estate law too. I was not some naive 22 year old, with a gleam in her eye about doing public interest law, saving the world, and hugging it out with some indigent criminal defendants. I knew the employment statistics were rubbish. I knew the career services program at my law school was a total joke. I knew the legal profession was sexist and unforgiving, and generally did not pay very well. I knew a significant number of attorneys are miserable, horrible people, and several are downright sociopaths. But, dammit, I wanted to be a lawyer. Why? I thought I'd be damn good at it. I loved the legal profession, yet I'd never be satisfied being "just" a secretary, or even a paralegal. I wanted to climb the foodchain. I wanted to call the shots, I wanted the responsibility. I wanted a seat at the table. Was it hubris? Of course it was!

It still is. When I think of leaving the profession, going and doing something else, even something more "meaningful," I just can't. I crave being in the courtroom, even though I'm a nervous public speaker. I love the rush. I love problem-solving. I love the satisfaction of doing a good job. I love helping people, even unappreciative assholes. I love a challenge. I love taking something that terrifies me (public speaking) and making it my bitch. (The exception being spiders. Spiders, you win.)

But there are things about this profession I hate. I hate the job insecurity. I hate the sexist, racist, classist, douchebags that dominate this profession. I hate escalating emotional conflict. I hate time vampires. I hate risk. I hate not knowing what I'm doing. I hate billable hours. I really hate running a business. I hate goddamn people with goddamn personality disorders, and they're freakin' everywhere. I hate clients that don't paying their fucking bills as though my time is worthless. I hate clients that insult me, especially when I do a goddamn excellent job for them. I hate opposing counsel that plays nasty tricks, or tries to throw me under a goddamn bus. I hate how stuff keeps me up at night, and I have a hard time putting it to rest.

This is a damn hard profession. I'm a broke ass with a ton of debt, a shitty car, and I only get to eat because I married a guy who made better career choices. I practice poverty law. It fucking sucks. It's awesome when you get a great result and really help someone. It's a kick to the gut when there's someone really deserving that you can do absolutely nothing for. You get a helluva lot more kicks to the gut. I also practice family law, and that sucks too. People are petty assholes. They don't pay their bills. Those things are connected.

But on occasion, you get to do some real good for people, and I'm not saying that was worth the $140K I spent on obtaining three advanced degrees, but it dulls the pain a bit. On Monday, on MLK Day, I spent the entire morning meeting with opposing counsel and our clients concerning a custody dispute. We resolved it without litigation. We took two people who hate each other, and we worked through their issues, and we have a fantastic custody agreement in place that is great for that kid. They are a long way from being effective co-parents, but they took important first steps. It was worth working on my day off. For free. I love alternate dispute resolution. I want to be a mediator when I grow up. It will be a very long time before I grow up.

I took a reduced-fee custody case a few months back for a client who couldn't afford to pay much. Even with the reduced hourly rate, I wrote off several hours of work. I got the other party to sign an agreed custody order, which I took to him at the jail. We set up a visitation schedule and restrictions that will protect the kids, but give him the chance to work his way back up to being a dad, instead of losing his kids after the crap he's done. The client was so grateful. With her Christmas bonus, she paid her bill in full.

Yes, there are clients who are just assholes, and some days, some weeks, those clients over-shadow everything else and I just want to quit, go do something else, anything else. I still haven't figured out how to make this profession profitable. I'm too much of a bleeding heart, even still. I'm getting better though. I took a case for an old friend, and she hasn't paid me yet. And if she doesn't pay me, she can file her own responsive pleadings. I'm done doing pro bono for awhile. I'm so far over my recommended hours for the year, it's ridiculous. I'm tired of drowning in debt, while working my ass off. I need to take a page from a few colleagues, and pull out my Square device, plug it into my iPhone, and swipe some credit cards. (See above, where I discuss the $140K in student loans.)

However, if our grant money comes through, I'll be giving up solo practice to join the non-profit legal services world full time for the next 5 years. I will be making 2/3 the amount I was making at my first law job, out in Appalachia. (However, at least I won't be spending money on a second residence.) I will, however, have benefits, including free tuition. Husband's going back for his Doctorate this fall. I may do the same. Of course, I have to do another Master's first, since my Master's is a professional degree, without a thesis. But I think if that happens, I'll try to climb the food chain within the hospital. Work my way into middle management. I dunno. Try something different. But I just have a hard time giving up the idea of actually practicing law. I always had a hard time giving up poisonous relationships though. Why should law be any different?

MILP Roundup #234 -- Highlights of 2011

2012-01-03T00:33:00.003-05:00

(If you hadn't noticed, we managed a bit of a hiatus on the roundups.)

First, an announcement. If you are a regular blogger in the MILP circle, and would like to help host the weekly roundup (and put in at least the bare minimum effort I've managed all this time... you can't get much lazier than me), please let me (or Butterflyfish or EH know). It's time for some new blood! (Some of us old blood need a break.)

As we have entered a new year (2012, if you haven't been paying attention), this roundup is dedicated to the retrospective, and introspective, of 2011, and wishes for the future.

Starting with...

RG and SuzieJD summarize the year.

CP reflects on four years, instead of just one.

Kate, Izzie and CM look back on achievements and forward to new goals.

For EH, 2011 sucked considerably less.

LEO definitely had one of the best years ever.

Momttorney brings in 2012 with hopes for the new year.

Cristy thinks money for 2012.

LL is up for new adventures.

Googiebaba lets go.

LC has an anniversary.

-R- gives her man a birthday to remember: sushi and car murals.

Jenny has the best new year's resolution ever: Drink better beer. (She needs suggestions!)

2011

2011-12-30T23:56:00.000-05:00

At the start of 2011, I had just begun working part-time at the Clinic, was doing some contract work for a friend, and doing some solo work for myself. I had one kid. I was unknowingly pregnant. I'm reasonably sure it's my husband's, and not that of a mass-murdering angsty teenage rape ghost. But you never know.

Throughout 2011, however...

I wrote grant applications to fund my job that we didn't get.

I drafted a syllabus to pitch an externship we did get.

I lost a hearing and a friend went to jail. That friend lost to his addiction, and we lost him.

I grew a baby. It made me ill and uncomfortable, but thankful that everything was normal.

My car exploded. It tapped my savings to fix it.

A cousin got married. Another cousin had a baby. My husband's grandparents celebrated 60 years together.

We paid off most of my credit card debt.

My contract work dried up.

The world didn't end.

My kid plays the violin. I'm starting to remember how.

I applied for jobs and I didn't get interviews. I interviewed for jobs I didn't get.

In one month, I actually paid to practice law.

I had a baby.

I turned 29 again. My driver's license says 32. It's a fucking liar.

The Cult hurt my family once again. We had a roommate for 5 months. He learned to change diapers.

We refinanced our mortgage.

I had a baby baptised. I had another baby turn 4.

Husband is applying to graduate school for his doctorate. I'm waiting on a grant to see if I can work full time. So I can go back to school for my doctorate. We can't get enough of school.

Cora left her old school; her last day was today.

In 2011, I regained my confidence but lost my faith. I re-learned that I simply can't please some people no matter how hard I try. I learned that you make your own idea of success, and sometimes just rolling back the expectations helps. Keeping it simple helps. I had some wins and some losses. I think that's how it's always going to be. There were some people I really helped; there were others who just couldn't be saved. I try not to carry that with me, but it's impossible not to feel the weight of it anyway. I try to not let this profession engulf me, but it does. I struggle to not let it completely define me. But with two sleeping babies, a sleeping dog, and a husband off at work, it's what keeps me up at night.

Bi-weekly blogging

2011-12-17T16:29:00.004-05:00

Not doing a very good job of blogging, but so much has been going on, I can't even keep up.

I now have a four-year-old little bunny. All kinds of sassy.

Sassy

Cora very much enjoyed her birthday. On her birthday, I made dinner. (Good Eats Meatloaf, mashed potatoes, broccoli, and macaroni and cheese. Not pictured.) Cora really enjoys setting the table and eating dinner at the dining room table, so we've been trying to do that a bit more. But we held off on her presents until Saturday at her party. I spent several weeks cleaning the house, going through stuff, putting stuff away, trying to get the house ready for the invasion of family.

We no longer have a house elf. He moved out the day after Cora's birthday, once his finals were done. Just in time for the family invasion. One sister and two nieces flew in that night, so MIL picked them up at the airport and drove them in from Louisville. Begin tornado effect.

Friday, poorly-timed, Cora and Vee had doctor's appointments, including shots. It was a very traumatic experience for Cora. She got four shots, in the legs, and howled horribly. Two of the shots are very painful, I'm told. Poor little bunny. Husband and I took turns carrying her back to the parking garage, and when we got home, they took a long nap. When she woke up, she was still snuffly, but Grandma was there to snuggle, so life was better.

The rest of the family got in on Saturday in time for the party. I had 10 children in my house, along with parents and Cora's grandparents. It was a rather insane idea for her birthday, but it worked out well. We had wine (which helped tremendously). We had nibbles (mostly cheese). We did crafts. I got a bunch of wooden picture frames from Michaels for a dollar each, and a bunch of craft stickers to decorate them. Also got a bunch of felt snowflakes to decorate, and gingerbread cookies. It was a big hit. They were all girls (other than my nephew, who didn't participate), the oldest being 10 and the youngest 2, but most were about 4 years old. Total, probably spent about $60 on the craft stuff. I also had beads to make necklaces, and I was going to print out coloring pages, but we never got to it. I expected the kids would get bored, but they were pretty excited about it. An hour and a half later, they were done, and it was time for cake and presents. I got gluten-free cupcakes from a local bakery for my nephew and MIL who have celiac. They were pretty good, considering [anything gluten-free usually tastes like ass]. And Cora had her Hello Kitty cake, which she had picked out. (Everything's Hello Kitty these days. It's invaded the daycare. All the kids are obsessed with it. I'm like WTF? Cora's even watching the cheesy Hello Kitty's Furrytale Theatre on Netflix, made back from the 80's. Weird shit.) I'm still waiting for the group photo from my FIL of the kids, and I'm going to get one printed for each kid so she can put it in her picture frame.

After the party, we all went to a local sushi restaurant, and got a room. Hyped up on sugar, it wasn't the most pleasant with the kids, and I'm sure the restaurant would have been pissed if it wasn't making a butt load off of us (with seven adults and five kids who can seriously do some damage on sushi, sake and Japanese beer). At least we were contained, so we (mostly) weren't bothering other patrons.

Then Sunday was the baptism. Vee was a very good girl. She wore the Christening gown that was made from her great-great-grandmother's wedding gown, and that all the kids for the past three generations have been baptized in. Husband's older sister is her godmother and his best friend is her godfather. She made no fuss when she got wet, nor when she was passed around for everyone to make the sign of the cross on her forehead. She's a chill baby. Then we came back to the house for more cheese (and other nibbles... but mostly cheese) and wine.

Catholic Baby

The family left on Monday, and whew, it was nice to have the house back to normal. We have yet to put up a Christmas tree (since it's so late in the season, we're just going to put up our artificial one, which I prefer, because I'm allergic to the damn things but Husband still insists on buying a real one every year).

Since then, I've been working on putting the house back into order, and also getting work done before the holidays. My co-worker at the Clinic has been on vacation and things have been NUTS. I also arranged for interviews for my friend/colleague, who has been needing a real secretary for awhile, but just keeps putting it off. She interviewed six people. Hopefully she'll finally pick one. Still no word on our grant money, but I don't expect we'll hear anything until January.

In the meantime, we've got more birthdays to celebrate, Christmas parties and New Years parties to attend. Last night we went back to the aforementioned sushi place to celebrate our friends' daughter's one-year birthday. We left our hellions at home with Grandma, that was nice. Grandma watched our kids, as well as Cora's BFF J and J's little sister S. Good to have a night out, child-free. A few other friends' kids were there, and I did feel bad for one of Cora's other friends (she was disappointed Cora and J weren't there), but it's nice to not have to monitor your children and actually enjoy your meal!

Anyway, we went to dinner, then went to see the new Sherlock Holmes movie. It was nice, because we rarely go to the movies, unless there's something we really really want to see. Anyway, enjoyed it a lot, even if it is "kung-fu Sherlock." On the other hand, the BBC show Sherlock is coming back on in January for the second series. Super excited about that one, much more excited than I was about the new movie. Just re-watched the first series, and it's just so freakin awesome. (It's streamed on Netflix, if anyone hasn't seen it.) Of course, anything Stephen Moffat does is freakin' awesome, but the show is one of the rare modernizations of classic stories that really works (as opposed to really offending me), and speaks to how timeless the characters really are. (For example, the original Dr. Watson served and was wounded in Afghanistan in 1880 in the *second* Anglo-Afghan war. 130 years later, the Brits are back in Afghanistan thanks to us, where Moffat's Dr. Watson is wounded in battle. I guess some things don't change, and after numerous wars there, we haven't learned to stay the fuck out of Afghanistan yet.)

In other news, I'm getting ginormously fat. I rejoined Weight Watchers, and gained even more weight after that. I managed to gain 10 pounds since Violette was born. Fail. I crawled back on the wagon, and I've since dropped a few of those pounds, and now am only 5 pounds above post-pregnancy weight. Ugh. I have a friend willing to train me, for free, because he wants the experience. I'm going to take him up on that after the new year (and pay him some too).

Cora starts her new school in January. It makes me want to cry just thinking about it, but Cora seems excited about it, so that's good. Maybe she's less sentimental than me. She definitely doesn't have an issue making friends.

So, that's that. I think I covered everything. Yeah.

Instead of working...

2011-12-06T01:00:00.006-05:00

Basically, since Vee was born, I've been working "part-time." My contract work dried up over summer, and I don't have any plans of going back unless they really really need the help. My court appointments have also dried up, but that is totally okay by me. I got the experience, and the time is not worth the money. I should finish out my last two appointments next week.

I have a few paying clients still, nearly all family law, and haven't been looking for any more lately. I've been hoping that we get the grant money we were sort-of promised, which will make me full time at the Clinic, I can then get employee benefits at the University and go back to school for free, and get my Ph.D. in something that will actually get me a job. Pipe dreams. I've been putting off doing anything else until then, so I'm in limbo. Moreso than that, I've been working in the direction of closing up shop. Closing out cases, wrapping things up. Getting things done I've been putting off. It's nice to not have anything pending.

It's different being a solo, and especially working from home. When I worked for my former boss, I could leave it at the office. I didn't do work on the weekends, or even most evenings. Rarely did I bring work home. I'd usually stay until 7 or 8 on the nights I didn't have Cora, but that was more out of a feeling like 40 hours isn't enough for an associate to work. But now, working for myself, I just don't stop working. If there's something to do, I feel like I need to be working on it, instead of reading a book or heaven forbid writing something for fun, like blogging, or trying to craft something academic and get published. So, even in the evenings and weekends, I'm not getting anything else done. I realized that it was really stressing me the fuck out. To the point that it was crippling me from getting anything done or enjoying myself at all. Anyway, I'm working on it. I'm hoping to blog more. I'm hoping to write more. I want to read more. I want to enjoy my time working part-time, before I either start working full time for the Clinic, or I have to devote all of my time to practice building.

But, days spent with Vee are so nice. She's an even better baby than Cora was, and Cora was a really good baby. Vee only cries for a reason. Cora would occasionally have bouts of inconsolable crying for no reason, but Vee never has. That's a huge stresser for me, the crying for no reason, and the times it happened with Cora, generally had me a total mess. I think I'd have a nervous breakdown if I had a colicky baby, so Vee must be the universe cutting me a break for once. Vee's a cuddle whore, but she is (mostly) sleeping through the night, and we've finally gotten the hang of nursing. I still have to supplement with formula, though not as much. We're probably up to about 70/30. Part of it is that I never got back up to production after the horrific mastitis episode, but it's also because she just eats a lot. Probably because she also yacks a lot, in a terrifying, Exorcist sort of way. It doesn't bother her though, and she's definitely growing a lot. I anticipated calling her "Flower" (Violette, get it?), as I still call Cora "Bunny," but something so nice-smelling and delicate is not fitting for this baby. Most of the time I refer to her as Honey Badger. (She's really nasty, and oh! it's eating again! She does not, however, run in slow motion.)

Honey Badger don't give a shit

Cora, not surprising, is sassy as ever, and is constantly giving me attitude. She also punched some boy who pissed her off at school (ugh), and then, being my Mini Me, was horribly upset because she got in trouble for it. I try very hard to help her cope with her emotions, but I fear constantly that I end up treating her just like my mother treated me, which did not help, and at least in part, created most of my childhood emotional issues. Suck. And I see that most dealing with the violin. She has made remarkable gains with the violin lately though, and we've been fighting a lot less, thankfully. She had a little Christmas group class last weekend, which was cute (although she missed half of her song because she was dawdling in the bathroom, but oh well). She does so love an audience. She asked me the other day what "shy" meant. I told her "The complete opposite of you, my little ham."

The kid turns four on Wednesday. Holy shitballs, FOUR! Sassy and girly as can be.

Yes, that's an almost four-year-old in lipstick. And a "horsey dress," one of her favorites. (If you play some Where's Waldo, you'll see me too.)

Other than kid stuff, I've been trying to branch out and do some stuff out of the ordinary. For instance, leaving the house other than to go to court. My college roommate writes poetry, and she was the featured poet at this poetry... reading? I guess, I dunno. Poets, poetry, poems, read out loud, etc. So, I dragged Husband out to listen to some poetry. It was actually pretty fun. Although I'm big into other areas of literature, poetry is totally not my bag, other than some erotica and the occasional Haiku, but I really enjoyed it. And of course, my friend was awesome. I discovered she has a blog too. She's much more entertaining than I am. She's getting stuff published soon, so I will shamelessly plug it when it's made available for purchase.

Another thing I did recently was go attend a play, starring this (I try really hard not to call him a little boy, but he's closer in age to my daughter than me... I'm so fucking old, Jesus!) young man who is a classmate of Steven's at the community college. He's adorable, and he apparently wants to be a lawyer, so he obviously suffers from poor judgment. Anyway, the play was interesting, this one. Well done, at least for a community college performance with freshmen talent. It ain't Broadway, folks, but oh well.

Anyway, this weekend is going to be insane. Family coming in for Vee's baptism Sunday, and we're doing Cora's birthday on Saturday. Steven's moving out on Thursday into his own apartment, then we've got to reorganize and clean since one sister and her kids are staying with us, as well as (I think) Husband's parents.

I also cooked twice this week so far, and didn't take pictures either time. First time, it was because the presentation was an epic fail, the second time (tonight), I just forgot. Oh well. Tomorrow is my Crock Pot experiment with a big chunk of dead cow. Then Wednesday, I'm doing a birthday dinner for Cora (meat loaf... Alton Brown's recipe, which is awesome). Thursday will be boring ol' chicken.

MILP Roundup #232

2011-12-05T23:48:00.000-05:00

Is here.

Progression

2011-12-02T00:38:00.009-05:00

I'm still in the running for the double oven. Nearly the end of Week 2. Two down, 50 to go!

I promise this won't turn into a "food for the kitchen-handicapped" blog, but I need to document it somehow, and I figure blogging is good evidence to back up my performance of the aforementioned contract. (Not that the husband reads the blog anyway, although he makes claims to the contrary.)

So, I got a little bored for meal 3, didn't want to go to the store, and decided to do "breakfast as dinner." Voila! Spinach omelet and french toast for dinner:

It looked ugly, but it was tasty.

I got a little more creative for meal #4 that first week. This one was baked pork chops, using a rather expensive package breadcrumb mixture. There was a berry mixture green smoothie as well. For sides, I made mashed potatoes using only milk, not butter, which was more heart healthy but just not very tasty (cholesterol = yum). However, not pictured here, because I ate them before I remembered to take a picture, were extremely tasty mushrooms. I sauteed (ooh, cooking term!) sliced baby bellas in The World's Most Awesome Salad Dressing a/k/a the salad dressing from Nagaski Inn (our local Japanese restaurant). They just recently started selling the stuff in bottles. It's not exactly like it is in the restaurant, it's a bit thicker in the bottles. But damnation, it's tasty. When we go to Nagasaki, I will seriously drink the salad dressing. Anyway. Used on mushrooms = win.

Mushrooms are in my belly.

Not pictured is Thanksgiving dinner, which I'm totally counting, because per our agreement, if at any time I intend to cook, but he kicks my ass out of the kitchen, I get to count it. This occurred on Thanksgiving. So, instead, I poured wine for his parents, cleaned the house and set the table.

The first day of Week 2, I stepped out from my comfort zone and used an ingredient I've never cooked with before, and that's squash. I made Giada's Butternut Squash Risotto to take to friends' house for dinner.

Risotto love

The next night was a bit of a hodge-podge of things. I made chicken, using a Hawaiian marinade sauce and threw pineapple slices in for fun. The smoothie also had pineapple in it. I also made broccoli with cheese sauce (not heart healthy), and we had left-over risotto, left-over carrots and salad.

Cholesterol makes it yummy

The third meal is very simple: cheese quesadillas. Oops! Not heart healthy. It had sauteed onions and tomatoes. There's also refried beans from a can, with melted cheese on top, and Mexican rice from a box. Three ingredient minimum on the quesadillas makes it count.

And sour cream ftw!

The fourth meal of the week is not pictured, because apparently I totally forgot to take one. However, it was not terribly tasty. I cooked some steak on the stove in olive oil and thyme. The flavor was good, but the steak was kind of rubbery in texture. Didn't like it. Dead cooked cow fail. I also made broccoli and cheese again, but this time it was from a bag of frozen broccoli, and there's a definite taste difference. The House Elf assisted by making baked potatoes, but those took quite a long time, so we didn't make it for dinner, it became second dinner (not a foreign concept in this house).

The fifth meal was tonight, and is apparently on drugs. It was chicken fajitas. I sauteed green peppers and onions, then cooked chicken, used a package of seasoning, and voila, fajitas. Husband helped by chopping tomatoes and lettuce. At the same time, I was set to have dinner tonight with my law school friends, and made another batch of the butternut squash risotto to go with my friend's lasagna. So, technically, I cooked twice. Hell yeah, I rule!

Fajitas on crack

So, two weeks down. I rather enjoyed it, and (most) of it was tasty. I did, however, manage to burn myself twice. Once on the tea kettle while making Husband a cuppa. Second was tonight while making the risotto. I have yet to cut myself (knock on wood).

Also, I should totally get to count this, because it was quite an ordeal (even though it came from a kit):

Gingerbread construction.

My entire house is now covered in dried powdered sugar. But Cora had a great time and loved the finished product.

Stay tuned for more Idiots in the Kitchen next week, with three-ingredients or more (but not much more) meals.

MILP Roundup #231

2011-11-29T20:32:00.002-05:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product, Attorney at Large and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Except when I do it, because I totally fail.

PT-Lawmom's Pumpkinhead is making grown-up decisions.

Butterflyfish dropped the Thanksgiving bomb.

But I Do Have a Law Degree had the Thanksgiving plague.

EH and RG is thankful for the tough things in life, the unexpected blessings that result.

SuzieJD is still thankful, post-layoff, (and will have to let me know how to get teenage daughters to still like me.)

LEO has a happy family and a happy life. As does LL.

Momttorney also has much to be thankful for.

Izzie and Kate are experiencing the true meaning of Thanksgiving for a law student: the end of semester crunch!

Dinei has trouble on her hands with B and the older ladies.

CM has mobility.

Googiebaba has historic Thanksgiving.

CP has an upcoming trial!

Cowgirl in the City weighs in on the protests.

Deals with the Devil

2011-11-21T12:53:00.005-05:00

I've been bitching about our antique oven for the six years we've had our house. I'm reasonably certain it isn't just made to "look" 60 years old, I'm pretty sure it actually is 60 years old.

Exhibit A

Adorable, right? Yeah, except when you set it for a certain temperature, it likes to randomly get between 25 - 50 degrees hotter than it's supposed to. Problematic. (Also, I like modern, not country antique. I rather hate those cabinets too.)

I've been advocating for a new oven for awhile now, and even better, I want a double oven. Husband scoffs at the double oven idea, even though he's the one who cooks more often. He claims the only time we'll ever use both ovens is Thanksgiving. I told him we'd use it every time we entertain, which should be more often. Anyway, like most things technology-related, Husband scoffs at it until he finally breaks down and gets it and then he's all, oh my god, how did we ever live without this?! i.e. digital camera, his Passat (which is now overdue for a trade-in), laptops, phones with text-messaging, phones with the interwebs, the DVR, etc.

So, I made a deal with the devil. (The devil being the Husband, of course.) The deal is that I will cook 5 days out of the week, for 52 weeks. If I manage that before next Christmas, he will suck it up and remodel the kitchen to put in a double oven. We are even executing a written contract to this effect, including exclusions, exceptions and stipulations. I told him he can have his attorney look it over before he signs. (Heh.)

The only problem? I don't cook.

Okay, so I *can* cook, but I just don't like to. I can do basic stuff. It's just that if it requires more than a few minutes of prep time or has more than 3 ingredients, I lose interest. Seriously. Most of the things I make have very few ingredients and take about 15 minutes to make. I could start a cooking show. "Three ingredient meals for the undomesticated professional." I imagine it would be something like Bitchin' Kitchen, but I'm an Italian-American with a slight southern twang not an Italian-Canadian with a... what exactly is that accent anyway? And there would be more setting things on fire than actual cooking. And my shoes are much hawter.

Anyway, since Husband works three nights a week, dinner also has to be packed up to take with him.

So, here we are so far:

Steak with mushrooms, green beans and mashed potatoes

Green smoothie

The steak (and I couldn't begin to tell you what sort of cut of meat this was, I'm just reasonably certain it's dead cooked cow and it was on sale) was pan fried in a little bit of olive oil, along with salt and pepper for seasoning. In a separate pan, the mushrooms were fried in some olive oil and a package of mushroom gravy mix and water was added after the mushrooms were cooked. A bag of green beans was microwaved and I made the potatoes by scratch (peeling and boiling them). I only added milk to the mashed potatoes, no butter, which made them less cholesterol-hiking but much more bland. The steak was fantastic, the green beans were green beans, and the potatoes would have been really good with butter. Next time I'll suck it up and use butter.

The green smoothie consisted of bananas, pineapple, prune juice and spinach. It was quite tasty. The green smoothies are blended and are a tasty way of getting in more leafy greens.

Spaghetti alla mia, and green smoothie

This spaghetti is my heart-healthy version of Husband's spaghetti. First, I use higher-fiber spaghetti that tastes quite good. It's Ronzoni Smart Taste, and it has 7g of fiber per serving. I chop (I guess it's chop, I dunno. Could be mince for all the hell I know.) green pepper, onion and garlic (garlic is probably minced, I guess). I saute (ooh, there's a proper cooking term) it in olive oil, and add some oregano and some other spice out of the cabinet that might sound good (this time it was tarragon). Then I set it aside and cook some ground turkey breast. Drain it, then put it back together with the veggies, a jar of Ragu (whatever is on sale, this time it was Mushroom and Green Pepper), and add a can of black olives. Once the black olives are softened, throw it all together with the spaghetti.

The green smoothie was pears, peaches, prune juice and romaine lettuce.

Cora, Vee and I had dinner plans at a friend's house, however, so only Husband and our House Elf enjoyed the spaghetti. I tried a few bites and was pleased with the result. And it had like five ingredients, so I felt pretty adventurous on this one. Although the meal at our friends' house was much more tasty. And they'd made empanadas, which were fabulous. (From a Paula Deen recipe.)

So, two meals down, three more to go this week. I think pork chops with broccoli and brown rice are on the menu for tonight. Then maybe tacos tomorrow. We're going to very quickly run out of things that I can make without a recipe, and then I'll have to start going through and finding recipes. The other thing is too, that I need to make heart-healthy recipes. So, like, Alton Brown's meatloaf and Paula Deen's quiche are probably not going to cut it, which is unfortunate, since those are two of my favorite recipes. I also need to slowly wean myself from using meat as the centerpiece of the meal, and get more adventurous with seafood and my old standby of tofu (which I stopped cooking with because Husband wasn't a big fan).

Anyway, suggestions of heart-healthy, 3-ingredient meals are welcome. I'm also going to try using a crock pot for the first time. Definitely adventurous. But it will take a lot of planning since, three nights a week, dinner has to be ready and packed up before 6:30. And it's harder to cook with Vee, considering she also wants her dinner between 5 and 6, and I usually pick up Cora from daycare at 5:30. Not to mention, our favorite pasttime is eating out, so we won't be eliminating that all together. So, if I prepare a meal for breakfast or lunch that day, it will also count.

I figure I will continue to document what I make, when I make it, and how it turned out, so that I can slowly improve, and maybe actually learn to like it. Doubt it. But I like a challenge, and I definitely like making Husband buy me things, and we need to start controlling what we eat to lower our cholesterol (not to mention my weight is creeping up again now that I'm not pregnant), so it's a win-win. Except for the whole me having to cook thing. Ugh.

MILP Roundup #227

2011-11-01T23:45:00.004-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product, Attorney at Large and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday.

Happy Halloween from the MILPs!

LC, Izzie, CP, Momttorney, LL, and SuzieJD have costumes.

Dinei battles monsters (in law), and But I Do Have a Law Degree battles monsters (in law office), and PT-Lawmom just puts up with shit.

Dakota went Disney.

No treats for CM, just oatmeal.

Googiebaba has pumpkins.

Jenny looks to a future without law school.

Butterflyfish is in a winter wonderland.

Kate does the math.

Cristy bites back.

For EH, it was just another Monday.

LEO keeps it in the suburbs.

RG runs.

GAL has troubles (and needs some positive thoughts sent her way.)

Happy Halloween

2011-10-31T23:59:00.001-04:00

Tiger momming

2011-10-14T14:00:00.002-04:00

Cora's been taking violin for about two months now. She's still very enthusiastic about it, but damnation, some days it is just plain hard. It's really our biggest struggle as parent and child, and she is just as damn stubborn as I am. She's pulling the passive resistance bullshit, and it is about all I can do to not throttle the child some days. While being Mini Me has its advantages, because I know exactly her motivation, it also has its disadvantages, because I know exactly her motivation. Ugh. Only *I'm* allowed to be this infuriating, dammit.

When that whole Tiger Mom book came out with that ivy league law professor who stood over her children with a cattle prod to make them practice piano and do their homework and make sure they never have a single moment of fun ever, I remember thinking, shit, is it that important the kid never slacks off, ever? Is being The Best at the detriment of everything else in childhood necessary? I mean, it's important to push your kids to challenge themselves and to do their best, but I don't want to be as tough on my kids as my mom was on me. And it's weird. My mom never really "pushed" me, and took very little interest in my actual work, but it was more just general disapproval. Just like Cora, I'm a people-pleaser. I want approval. I never got it. I got "Only an A? How come you didn't get an A+?" And of course, "Next year is going to be a lot harder than this year was. You won't get good grades next year." I never got money with a good report card, or bragging phone calls to grandparents. "Just, huh, an A minus in math. You should have tried harder." Blah. Fortunately, I was motivated by a desire to get the fuck out of dodge and make something of myself. Not that either actually happened, since I'm still in dodge (or 10 miles north of it), and I don't think "underemployed lawyer" is much of anything. Double blah.

But I'm trying to balance the whole "Tiger mom" thing out. While I want Cora to work hard at the violin, I also don't want her to be miserable. I want her to continue enjoying it and being excited about it. Even if she doesn't make a career of it, even if she never plays in an orchestra or in front of an audience, I want her to enjoy her instrument. I want her to experience the beauty of creating music, of challenging herself to play a more difficult piece of music and the satisfaction of mastering it.

So on nights like last night, where she refuses to even get into play position, I just don't know what to do. We have the rule that if she isn't finished with practicing by 8:30, she can't watch the episode of Dora. And if during the lesson, she starts goofing off and won't do it, if I tell her, okay, but we can't watch Dora, it just makes things worse and she starts pouting and crying. I even try to mix it up and make it a little different each time, but it doesn't help. But, I dunno, then sometimes it just clicks. Last night, after having a massive fight about stepping into play position (spreading her legs out), something very simple and she knows exactly how to do, she buckled down and breezed through the practice and mastered something new (this "monkey" song that is essentially playing a scale). I don't understand it, but hey, it works. And she was so proud of herself and I was so proud of her, and I gave her a cookie afterward and we watched Dora, and all was right in the world. Ten minutes after spending fifteen minutes staring at me blankly and refusing to move her feet, and crying every time I told her she'd run out of time to watch Dora if she didn't do it.

Oh well. This is why we're paying a professional instead of me trying to teach her. It's hard enough getting her to practice some days.

Decisions and Sentiment

2011-10-13T18:54:00.003-04:00

So, I broke the news to Cora's preschool today that she would be leaving (sometime) at the end of the year. As to when, we're still hashing that one out. I tend to get all emotional and shit when I talk about it. It makes me sad. It's kind of ridiculous, considering I am not the touchy-feely one in this household. But I'm sad that Cora will be leaving her friends. And I'm sad that Violette won't be going there at all. I'm sure the new school will be fine, but that's all it will be is "fine." I like the place she's going now, and I think they do a great job with her. Of course, if she were starting kindergarten next year, then I could convince Husband she should stay, but she won't start until 2013. Sucks.

I feel bad she's leaving her friends. She is quite the social butterfly apparently. Hopefully that means she'll adapt well, and make new friends, being the new kid in school. I've never had to do that, so I don't know how that is. I went to school with all of the same people, from kindergarten to graduation, I was never "the new kid." Most of the people I went to high school with stayed in the area and went to the University. Even in grad school, I already knew people (two of which I went to high school with), and in law school, several of my grad school classmates were there and even one from undergrad. Husband, on the other hand, was an Army brat, so he was always the new kid. After high school, he moved two hours away and came here, instead of going to the university closer to his home. So, it's really not a big deal to him for her to change schools.

I've been talking to her about it, but I'm not sure she understands, even though we took a tour of the school. I tell her she'll be going to a new school, and her friends won't be there. She'll need to make new friends. She'll have a new teacher. I think she fully understands though. She told me that she'll be going to a new school because she's big and Violette will be going to her old school because she's small. So, she sort of gets it (even though Vee will be going to her new school eventually).

Oh well. And of course over the next year we have to figure out where she'll be going to elementary school. If we don't win the lottery for the Spanish immersion program in the public school, which is our first choice, then we have to decide if we want to send her to Catholic school. Our parish has a really awesome school K-8, and it's cheaper than we'll be paying for preschool even at the new place. But I'm not sure about sending her off to be indoctrinated. We're Catholic, but we're not *that* Catholic. Depending on who you ask, we aren't even Catholic at all, being all pro-gay and pro-choice and whatnot. So, I don't want my precious little snowflake coming back and being all "gay sex makes the baby Jesus cry" and asking why Mommy likes killing babies or whatthefuckever nonsense that gravely offends me. I want to make sure "Catholic education" doesn't equate "Catholic indoctrination of conservative politics."

And of course, the annoying thing about the Spanish immersion program is that they don't take sibling priority, so if Cora gets in, Vee might not, or vice versa. I guess it won't be terrible for the girls not to be in the same school system, but it's kind of weird. And a bit inconvenient. Even with one in middle school and the other in elementary school, it's usually still the same school system, same school board, etc. Oh well. The other option is to stay in the district we're in and send them to the elementary school across the street from the house. Which wouldn't be that bad, although the elementary school is okay, not one of the best in the city, but not terrible. Certainly would be convenient! And the middle school and high school are much better than the elementary school we're districted in, too, two of the best in the city. So we could always send them to Catholic elementary and put them in public school later on.

This education stuff is hard. I guess we're just lucky to have too many choices. Considering I'm driving out to BFE on Monday to sit in on a meeting with a principal, some teachers and the parent of a kid who was recently diagnosed with diabetes and whose school has failed to make accommodations for her and won't let her attend when the school nurse isn't there to give the insulin shots. (That's a big no-no.) And that's why small town living ain't for me -- lack of opportunity, lack of resources.

On Small Accomplishments

2011-10-11T22:26:00.004-04:00

Pumpkins!

When Cora was born, I was right in the middle of 2L fall finals, husband had finals for his first year of his MSN. We'd planned on getting everything "baby ready" a week later. But since she was a month early, we had absolutely nothing ready. We hadn't even finished painting her room. It wasn't until I lost my job and moved back to Lex, that I even cleared all of the crap out of Cora's closet (that was mostly my stuff) and her room truly became her own. And then earlier in the summer, when Husband and Cora went to Chicago without me, I took the opportunity to thoroughly clean the room and get things organized.

Since then, it's gotten a lot messier, and we've acquired more princess and Dora crap (including artwork that's been added to the walls), but Cora likes her room a lot

Fortunately for Violette, I only procrastinated a little while, and her room is completely hers. It isn't quite done yet, however. Husband has a couple tasks to complete for me (he needs to hang the curtain rod and a put up a few butterflies on the wall), then I need to finish clearing off a bookshelf that's downstairs that will go up in her room. Hopefully we'll get that done by next week. Overall, though, it's functional. We left the queen size bed in there because we don't have anywhere else to put it (I had bought it for the apartment in Ashland), and also, the crib will only stay in there about a year or two, and after that, she can have the queen size bed.

So, small victories. I also cleaned out my closet, got my entire wardrobe drycleaned and mended, and my maternity stuff is packed away. I just need to clean my desk again, because it's gotten piled up. (No surprise there.) And then we have to get the downstairs cleaned before December, because we have family coming in, including two of our nieces staying with us, who will run through the house like a tornado, so stuff really needs to be put away so things don't get scattered/lost/destroyed.

Other things I accomplished on maternity leave:

I finished all of the Sookie Stackhouse books. They're not nearly as good as the show, but it doesn't have nekked photos of Eric, so what can you do. Motivated by actually reading non-law stuff, we've been back doing book club (read The Help last month), and I'm re-reading my favorite crime noir, The Thin Man, and will be reading the rest of the Hammett collection as well.

I'm working on sewing part of my Halloween costume (ha, less complex than it sounds), and I'm crocheting a twin size blanket for Cora's bed, and will then work on one for Violette. I'm also spending a significant amount of time helping Cora practice violin, and trying to practice myself so I suck less. (So far, still sucking.)

Settled out a case. I pushed the other side to a better settlement after throwing a temper tantrum with opposing counsel about his bullshit counteroffer and how he sooo did not want to deal with me if I had to draft a complaint during my last week of maternity leave because he was dicking me around. Result was a good settlement for the client. Not the best we'd hoped for, but better than expected. Now we're bickering about the language in the release. Heh.

Although I still feel rather meh about my career at the moment, I did have a really good day in court on Friday. I was filling in for a friend who was on vacation, and I did some damn good lawyering for her client if I do say so myself. Opposing counsel is a guy who recently pissed me off (he wouldn't return my calls about working out a forcible detainer case, so I hauled my 8-month-pregnant fat ass to court at 8am in the middle of a thunderstorm, just to find out he was dismissing the case, which he'd known since the week before... asshole). So it was that much sweeter.

But overall, paid work has been drying up. No more contract work, and apparently the judge in the county in which I do dependency/neglect/abuse cases is only giving appointments to the local attorneys and is only appointing this one attorney as GAL in every case, which is total crap. Not that it was a significant amount of money or anything, but it was good experience. And I'll never get on the list in my county because there are too many damn lawyers in this town. So, I need to figure out something else to do with myself, and I'm really not motivated to figure it out right now. Too busy being a bum. I made one work phone call today, and sent one email. The rest of the day I snuggled on the couch with the baby and watched several hours of the Moonlight marathon on Syfy. Yeah, working sucks. Staying home with a baby is awesome.

Vee

MILP Roundup #223

2011-10-04T21:24:00.002-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms in the Legal Profession) Roundup is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product, Attorney at Large and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday.

Dinei encounters assholes with mental illness (also known as "clients.")

The GAL encounters other assholes with mental illness (also known as "colleagues.")

Kate encounters trees with cozies (also known as "art").

Googiebaba gets better.

LL owns some litigation.

CP's husband ran into her knife... he ran into her knife 10 times.

But I Do Have a Law Degree has deja vu.

Butterflyfish has a busy angelfish of nine months.

SuzieJD's kid has a magic bookshelf.

Grace has wedding photos.

Momttorney has birthday photos.

RG has pumpkins instead of troubles.

EH has improvement.

Shan has priorities.

-R- has a life.

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

2011-09-17T23:41:00.002-04:00

Is it possible to have postpartum depression after giving birth to a law degree? If so, I swear, I have it.

I look at sweet, snuggly little Violette snoozing beside me in the bassinette, and I think, hey, I did something right. Then I look at the stack of client files I need to work on, and it makes me want to go get a book of matches and some lighter fluid. (A few of the actual clients, and opposing counsel, give me that same warm, squishy feeling as well.) Seriously, I need a change. I miss working at an actual firm, on cases with actual substance. Yet I don't seem to be motivated to put myself out there. I don't want to work a gazillion hours for crap money. (I don't really want to work a gazillion hours for great money either.) I don't want to work for douchebags.

I guess I can't complain too much. I'll have a lot more time at home with Vee than I would if I were working full time and only had a few weeks off for maternity leave. I'll have some long working days (I've got one coming up in November that I'm worried about -- literally all damn day in court, in another county, so I have to figure out what I'm going to do about my bewbs), but I'll have plenty of days where I'm home all day, napping off and on, and that's nice. Or at least I will once I get these last few cases taken care of. Then I'm not taking on anything new for awhile. Going to wait to see what happens with the grant money for the MLP, and if it comes through, I'll be able to shut down my private practice and will be working full time for them in March, which will give me the opportunity to go back to school for free and get a degree that's actually useful this time. In the meantime, I'm hoping to catch up on some reading and hopefully start writing some more. Those are things I'm excited about. Dealing with clients that want to squabble about every damn thing... ugh. Fucking family law.

Blurry

2011-09-16T21:36:00.003-04:00

As we near Week 3 of Violette, it's been kind of a blur. It's not like I ever stopped working, and although I had hoped all of that work would take place at home, it hasn't completely. Two days after getting out of the hospital, I was at the law library doing research. I was at the clinic the next week (although, in my defense, Vee had a doctor's appointment, so it wasn't out of the way). I had a meeting at the clinic this week. Next week I have another meeting. The week after that, I will probably be back working my hours at the clinic. October starts back court appearances. Fun times.

I'm just pretty much unmotivated to do much of anything at this point. Other than sleep and read Sookie Stackhouse books. So, not excited about being any busier. But those student loans won't pay themselves off, will they. If only I were still hawt like I was a decade ago, I'd change professions like this gal. But no one will pay to see my stretchmarks, that's for sure. Lame.

Oh well. Trying to figure what to be for Halloween. I know, it's a little early, but we get really into Halloween. Since we host the party and all.

Breastfeeding sucks (part 2)

2011-09-11T12:39:00.002-04:00

Most awesomely, I managed to end up with mastitis thanks to a baby that has mutilated my nipple in her feeding frenzies, and after a horrible night Friday night, by myself, with a high fever that Tylenol wasn't touching, chills, feeling like I had the flu, and a boob that was absolutely on fire, I finally managed by late afternoon to get out of bed and drive myself to the UTC before they closed. Blubbered at the nurse about having not really slept in over 24 hours because my boob is on fire, in general being a total hot mess. I'm surprised they didn't try to give me any antipsychotic meds. Got an antibiotic and the script for Percocet filled that my OB had written me. Discovered I can't join the rest of the residents of my state in becoming a pill head, because I seem to have a mild allergy to oxycodone. (I start itching.) Oh well, the Benadryl helped me sleep last night, at least. I'm sure it helped Vee sleep too (although she was up at her regularly scheduled times for feeding).

And of course, part of the recommendation to treat mastitis is to pump more! Yeah... this sucks.

"You should call her 'Mummy' not 'Big Milk Thing.'"

2011-09-08T16:49:00.001-04:00

So, week 2 of Violette...

Vee eats, sleeps, and poops. A lot. If she's awake, she's probably eating. If she's asleep, she's probably still pooping. It's a vicious cycle. We're single-handedly killing the environment. (Which is no big deal if you ask Galileo, er, I mean Rick Perry).

Breastfeeding sucks (no pun intended). Anyone who thinks breastfeeding is this magical, beautiful thing is effing crazy. Bonding between mother and child? Bullshit. I like Vee a lot better when she is not trying to rip off my nipples with her jaw of steel. There are feedings that I just have to pump, because I can't stand the pain. Generally, we nurse during the day, and then she takes a bottle (and I pump) at night, because she also takes for-frickin-ever to nurse, but she'll drink down a bottle in under ten minutes and go back to sleep. She likes the bottle better anyway. Quicker access to the ridiculous amounts of milk she drinks. I know Cora is a bad comparison, since she really couldn't breathe well enough to eat for awhile there, but Vee drinks twice as much as Cora did at this age. She also gained an entire pound between Thursday of last week and Tuesday of this week. She eats a lot. But, she's a really good baby. She's snuggly and not fussy. She sleeps well in her crib. She travels well in the car. She just doesn't care. She's mellow.

Overall, I'm still pretty tired though. Trying to get work done has been difficult. It will get better the more we get into a routine, but I'm just pooped most of the time, and it's much harder this time around since Husband had to go back to work after 1 week. I've been rather short-tempered with Cora too. Things that don't usually bother me or annoy me (as they do Husband), have really irritated me lately. I feel bad yelling at her, when I usually don't. I need to be better. The adjustment to having a baby sister is hard enough for her without me being pissy. She's a real trooper though. She's thrilled to be a big sister, and always wants to help with feeding or holding the baby. Even with changing the baby.

Working from home for the month of September, but will probably start back some hours at the clinic here soon once I run out of things to do from home. Shouldn't be too soon though. The article we submitted to be published in this journal has to be rewritten, because they want us to change it for general submission (it was supposed to be for a special issue, but that issue got canceled). So, there's that, there's a couple grant applications to work on, and there are two family law cases I'm handling that will be worked on as well.

In other news, I am actually below my pre-pregnancy weight, only one week postpartum. My cankles are completely gone! My fingers are still a little puffy, but I can wear my wedding rings again. The bad news is, we got our blood test results from our life insurance application (that we did last month). We both have ridiculously high cholesterol. So, apparently cholesterol levels rise during pregnancy, but I kinda doubt they rise this much. It's probably more that I've spent the last 9 months eating whatever the hell I've wanted, because I don't have much of an appetite during pregnancy and I barely gain any weight. Husband thinks the answer is for him to get on medication, because both his parents take cholesterol medication. I think he needs to stop eating so much damn cheese and eat some oatmeal instead. So, I'm seizing control of the household diet. Which is difficult, since our house elf keeps bringing in junk food. For instance, I go to the store yesterday and buy a crapload of fruits and veggies. He buys Pop Tarts. Yes, I would much rather eat Pop Tarts. But I don't want to stroke out in my early thirties. Instead, I'm giving the green smoothie thing a try. (My college roommate is currently doing it and she swears by it.)

MILP Roundup #219

2011-09-05T20:40:00.002-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product, Attorney at Large and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday.

In honor of Labor Day, EH shares a personal history and a song from the western part of my state.

LC considers the adult she has become.

Momttorney is at 30 weeks.

-R- has a night owl.

CP has the same old rants.

But I Do Have a Law Degree dishes on maternity leaves, and LEO takes one. (What's a maternity leave, exactly?)

Dinei has the best parenting suggestion ever.

Dakota has misadventures in real estate. (Hope she's keeping the earnest money.)

Butterflyfish has the scoop on the kids and the blackout.

CM is finished with summer.

LL is a soccer mom (hopefully she will be flipping you off from her mini-van, otherwise there's just no point).

RG is grounded by Lee.

Izzie misses the first steps, but sees the second steps after she gets out of the bathroom.

Googiebaba waits for the Zoloft to do its work.

SuzieJD salvages her vacation.

PT-Lawmom has cause for celebration.

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

Birthin'

2011-09-01T19:24:00.004-04:00

(I think it goes without saying, there will be discussion of lady parts in this blog post.)

The big difference in this pregnancy and my last pregnancy was definitely in prenatal care. Now, obviously, Cora required a lot more prenatal care thanks to a congenital lung defect, sophisticated prenatal surgery, and whatnot. Thankfully, none of that craziness went on this time. I was, in fact, surprised by how not-invasive prenatal care is when you aren't high risk. Like, I only have to go to the doctor once a month? I don't have to pee in a cup each time? No weekly ultrasounds, no weekly non-stress tests? But also I got to go to a private OB/GYN practice, and delivered at the private hospital. No three-hour average waits to be seen, no sitting in the waiting room with the lady prisoners, the crack-moms, and women so rough I'm pretty sure they could kill a bear with their hands. Just waiting about 10 minutes or so with some old ladies and some unremarkable preggos.

But there were definitely differences in delivery. Now, I'm sure if I hadn't been the problem child last pregnancy, they would have sent me home when I went in the night before my insurance final, believing my water was leaking. In fact, if the attending hadn't been there, they would have, but she said she wanted to keep me since they expected I would go early (something they'd failed to mention to me). So, I wasn't real concerned Sunday when I started having irregular, although painful contractions. Not pleased about it (or pleased that the Husband was passed out on the couch instead of paying attention to the fact that I was in pain) but I knew if I went to the hospital, I'd just be wasting my time. Then I started having more intense, regular contractions. I waited until they were 4 minutes apart, 1 minute in length, for an hour, like my instructions said, and we went to the hospital at 1 a.m. (Fortunately, we have a live-in manny, so we didn't have to get anyone out of bed to come stay with Cora, or drag her out of bed to take her with us.)

They took me in and hooked me up in the recovery room, which had three beds separated by curtains, because they were full that night. Although the contractions were now coming 2-3 minutes apartment, I was not dilated any more than I was at the appointment on Friday (when I was told I wouldn't be birthin' any time soon). So, at first they wanted me to go "walk around" and come back later. I'm like, WTF? I'm doubled over in pain from frequent contractions... you want me to do what? I want a damn epidural, is what I want. Then they made the call to hook me up to an IV because they thought I might be dehydrated (I wasn't) because the baby's heart rate was high and dehydration can bring on contractions. Two hours of drug-free contractions later, the baby's heart rate is back down but I'm still contracting at the same rate. They finally give me some drugs, which made me itch. Then they gave me some benadryl, which made me unconscious. Which was good, because they brought in Hillbilly Brigade into one of the beds, waiting for a c-section, and I was getting tired of listening to them. It was like being in labor in family court, holy hell. (I guess it was still better than being at University of Cincinnati, where I thought the screams down the hall was from ladies being in labor, but it turns out they were actually from pregnant women going through heroin withdrawals. Awesome.)

As an aside, the fun thing about being in "the city" is that for certain events, the hillbillies flock in. One of those events is for birthin'. There were several run-ins with the hillbilly kinfolk that day. At one point, Husband watched with amusement as two old biddies tried to figure out the door to maternity. (You have to push the button to have them buzz you in, then you pull on the door.) They buzzed in, but missed the "window" of getting the door open before it locked again, and couldn't figure it out. Finally, after watching one push on the door for awhile in confusement, Husband reached around her to swipe his security badge which unlocked the door. The old biddy apparently missed that and at that moment realized she needed to pull on the door, and pulled really hard at the now unlocked door... and hilarity ensues as said old biddy goes flying backwards with the door. The old biddies were grumbling about the defective doors, still having no clue what just happened.

Finally at 11:00 a.m., they got me into a room of my own. My OB came around about 1pm, and examined me. My contractions had pretty much stopped, but finally, I was dilated to 6cm. She said she didn't want to send me home just to have my contractions start again, so she made the call that it was time, broke my water and ordered Pitocin. I wasn't too concerned they hadn't gotten my epidural in yet, because the last time I had Pitocin it took forever to kick in. Yeah, not this time. It totally sucked. I had horrifically painful contractions for what seemed like an eternity and "slow deep breaths" don't do shit. So, I had plenty of "natural child birth" experience this time, and seriously, fuck that noise. Finally I got my epidural, and was able to get some sleep because I wasn't waking myself up with my own screams.

At about 6pm, the nurse woke me up and asked me if I was feeling that "pressure" that I should push. I was a little bit, but she checked me and I was 8cm. So, she left, and right around shift change, I'm definitely feeling it. Like, I'm clenching, trying to hold stuff in, because I felt like if I didn't, I'd be pushing the catheter out (I kept thinking about this awful med mal case we had where the doc left the catheter in during delivery, and the damn thing came shooting out still inflated, ripping up this lady's urethra... yeah... no way.) And totally awesome, the epidural was starting to wear off, so that was fun. Anyway, finally the nurse comes in and calls for the nurse midwife on call, and they're like, hey, the show's starting. The midwife asked me if I wanted to reach down and feel the head. I'm like, fuck no, I'm going to my happy place now, get this thing the fuck out. With only pushing through three contractions, I popped the baby out. (Fortunately she has a small head.) Then I was like, seriously, get me some damn food and caffeine. A bagel and a Dr. Pepper later, I felt human again.

So, that was my birthin' experience. Definitely a significant amount more pain this time, not pleased about that. These folks were not on the ball with drugging me up. As soon as I got admitted the last time, I got my epidural, and until the Pitocin really kicked in, I never felt a single contraction, and pushing wasn't a big deal either. I was much more exhausted afterwards (probably due to all of the emotional turmoil) and passed out for awhile after they scooted me off and we found out that Cora was pink and not blue. This time, there was a lot of pain. But I think there was more adrenaline this time, from excitement and happiness instead of fear, and I felt great after it was over. Like, hell yeah, the baby's out! Also, there was significantly less damage to my girl parts this time. Cora had to be popped out with forceps there at the end because her heartrate started dropping. At least this time around I don't pee myself whenever I sneeze.

Anyway, we had to wait around to get into a room and they took Violette to the nursery to check her out and suction goop out of her and all that good stuff. The staff were all very nice and friendly, but there were certainly a lot more interruptions this time. Last time, I had a NICU baby, so I guess that might be the difference. But, geez, this time, I swear, there was someone in my room every 20 minutes doing something. Usually a teaching hospital is more intrusive. They're sending in med students, nursing students, residents, fellows, proctors, who knows who else. When Cora was born, there was a whole room full of people, I didn't even know who most of them were. Maybe they were there because of the anticipated medical complications. But when Violette was born, it was me, Husband, the nurse midwife and the nurse. A few other people came in after she was out to do the whole baby warming thing, while the nurse midwife finished me up and did the whole placenta thing. But then postpartem, everybody and their brother is up in my room for something.

Other differences between the university hospital and the private hospital: Food sucks at the private hospital. We have a kick-ass catering company at the university hospital. Like, we have even have sushi in the clinic cafe. The stuff they serve in the patient rooms isn't 5 star or anything, but it's on par with like Applebee's or O'Charley's, and that's significantly better than what the private hospital is serving up. The private hospital calls their department "nutrition." Yeah, it's not. It's pretty gross.

I was a little weirded out by the morning and evening prayers over the intercom. Definitely not used to that. And we were pretty surprised when the lady from billing came in to ask if we wanted to "take care of our bill" that day (and dropped that we'd get a 10% discount if we did). I can't even get our billing lady to return my phone calls at the university hospital when I'm trying to help them get paid.

So, there you go. Overall, I'm happy with the care that I got, and if we decide to go for a third kid, I'd definitely go with the same group and happy with the care in the hospital. However, if I were high-risk, I'd want to go back to the university, I have more confidence in their abilities to manage complex cases, even though it is a horrible inconvenience. We still take Cora to the pediatrician at the clinic (not my department, but the internal medicine/pediatrics department), and we took Violette there today. I don't go to them because they're impossible to get an appointment when you're sick and would like to be seen that day or the next day, not the next week, but for the kids, we have an after-hours pediatrics clinic (which is where my office is) which is like urgent treatment for kids, but with a regular doctor visit copay. So, I'm not too worried about not getting in for a scheduled appointment. Our docs staff that clinic in rotation, so same folks.

Baby out. Birthin' done.

Violette

2011-08-30T16:57:00.004-04:00

Violette

Sisters

(Stories of false labor, hillbillies, and the utter bullshit of pitocin-induced contractions without painkillers, soon to come.)

DIY Labor Inducement

2011-08-29T12:54:00.003-04:00

Apparently, sitting around feeling sorry for oneself works wonders. I'm in the hospital, finally in a private room and away from the redneck brigade I spent hours laboring in the same room as, and will eventually be getting induced because the contractions stopped. Fun times. But within 24 hours, this creature will be out.

Depression

2011-08-26T20:18:00.002-04:00

Had a doctor's appointment this morning, and was told I would not be popping any time soon. The baby is so far up, it clearly thinks its exit strategy is through my throat. I was so depressed, and my body hurt so bad (between the horrific back pain I've been having, the hip pain and now the vag pain after the doc got up close and personal with my lady parts), I just went home and went back to bed. Sigh.

Oh well. The doc could read my dismay and said it was normal to feel like you've gone far beyond full term when you go early the last pregnancy. While you logically know, hey, it's certainly a good thing this one isn't premature, you psychologically gauge your pregnancy as full term based on the length of the last one. My last one was only barely premature, at 36 weeks, so I'm just now feeling that "overdue" feeling, but she said it's really tough on the moms that went very early and never experienced that long third trimester stretch before, and all the fun that comes with it. (Like, oh, for instance, checking one's cervix for dilation. That shit hurts, WTF.) Makes sense. And of course the last pregnancy I spent so much time worrying that I would go very prematurely, and each week the baby stayed in was an accomplishment, not to mention worry about what the health would be like when the baby actually popped out, that I never got to the ohmygodgetitthefuckout stage of pregnancy.

But 37 weeks is plenty. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go google "DIY labor inducement."

Randomness

2011-08-24T11:29:00.004-04:00

So much to do, and zero motivation to do it. You'd think I'd be in a rush to hurry up and get stuff done, considering I will be popping within a month's time. But no. No motivation.

I have a "to do" list for my cases, and just need to sit down and get that stuff done. That will probably be Monday's project. Go to the law library, knock everything out at once. Then get all my files organized and put away since they should be (mostly) dormant during the month of September.

This weekend I need to finish up baby laundry and get the nursery organized. There's crap everywhere. All the important stuff is there, though, so I'm not too worried. I also need to finish writing thank-you cards and mail them. The house needs to be cleaned: the floors cleaned and the bathroom cleaned. I can't wait to put away all of my maternity stuff and bring back out my real clothes. Domesticity -- I fail at it.

The Husband has promised me a day at the spa. I need things trimmed, waxed, colored, etc. I'm a hot mess. I think I'm going to start with a pedicure tomorrow afternoon and plan for a hair day on Saturday. There certainly seems to be a problem with my hair color. There is a considerable amount of it currently without pigmentation! I don't understand. Obviously, this problem needs to be corrected.

Not much else going on. Husband is taking Cora to the circus on Saturday. He's also taking her to her next violin lesson tomorrow morning, since I'll be out of town for a training in the morning, the last thing on my calendar for the month. Hopefully she'll do well without me there. Speaking of the circus, I seem to be the lion-taming parent. She will focus better for me than for Husband. When I was out for True Blood night Monday, he had to help her practice for violin. It apparently didn't go so well. He gets frustrated with her because she won't focus, and then she really won't focus, and it all goes down hill from there. The violin teacher said consistency is important for them, so hopefully me not being at the lesson won't be a problem.

Husband seems convinced to go ahead and rejoin the Y a few months after the baby is born, which I'll be happy about if for no other reason than I could pop over, put the baby in the daycare for two hours and go take a nap by the pool. I guess I could work out too. I need to start running again. I think I'll have to start from scratch due to my epic slothdom this pregnancy. Hopefully my hips go back to normal pretty quickly.

Not much else going on. Just organizing things at the clinic today, and waiting for our law student volunteer to come in so he can tell me what my voicemail says. Sigh. I really need to work on my Spanish.

Oh, there is one thing going on... big fat eye roll... my house pet is a glutton for punishment and had to go reconnect with "our ex-boyfriend." When we broke up a decade ago, they were roommates. Then they were no longer roommates when the Ex's parents demanded he move back in with them, because the Ex got busted for a DUI coming back from a bachelor party, and that was somehow his roommate's fault according to his parents (I'm sure it would have been my fault if we'd still been dating at the time... his parents hated me). (And don't even get me started about how he roped me into driving to bumfuck Ohio with him in the middle of the night to bail the idiot out of jail, so he could drive his vehicle back.) Anyway, after the Ex told him "they needed some space," they later rekindled their friendship, but the Ex eventually "broke up" with him, because he said they were too close and he wasn't able to be intimate with women as a result, and that he could never have contact with him again. (Because the Ex is a homo, that's why, and he can't come to terms with it. Seriously, who breaks up with their platonic friends because they're too close? WTF?) Anyway, when we had our party on July 4th, a friend mentioned that the Ex's dad had passed away last year. And that's sad and all, but yeah, we aren't friends. We haven't spoken in almost a decade. I don't think it'd be appropriate to send a Hallmark a year later even if his dad had actually been kind to me, (rather than thinking I was poor trash that wasn't good enough for his son.) But of course, Steven couldn't just leave it alone. He went and texted him and tried calling him, because he can't stand the idea of that wounded puppy out there. I'm like, don't go opening that can of worms, he'll just suck you back in to his emotional turmoil. And with his school schedule, he really doesn't need the drama. Fortunately, the Ex never responded... Until this week. And his response was something like, sorry I took so long to respond, I just needed more time to process before I could contact you. Again, WTF? (See why we refer to him as "our ex-boyfriend"?) So, of course, he's getting together with him. I'm like, do whatever you want to do, you clearly aren't going to take my advice and stay the hell away, but do not bring that crazy bipolar drama to my house. Ugh. I deal with enough crazy people at work, I don't want them at my house too.

So, that's pretty much it. Organization and avoiding other people's drama. Getting my hair did. Waiting to expel a human.

Winning

2011-08-23T12:09:00.003-04:00

My day so far:

1. Got pretty much no sleep last night, thanks to multiple bathroom trips and the difficulties of rolling over in my sleep (during which hip and back pain would wake me up).

2. Realize when getting dressed that I have reached the point where real shoes simply do not fit. Not anywhere close. Chose flip-flops over sneakers. Have not had pedicure in so long, I can't even describe the fail. Hawt!

3. About to leave the house and can't find my keys. Spend 5 minutes frantically looking for keys only to realize the keys are in my purse, the first place I had looked.

4. Actually get to the courthouse on time, and still manage to miss my case being called. (Wasn't listening for it because I didn't realize we had a substitute judge and would actually be running on time). Awesome.

5. Since Mom in that case didn't make it to court on time either, Judge had issued a show cause summons. Recalled the case when Mom shows up 15 minutes later and withdrew the summons, but her attorney hasn't had a chance to talk to her, I haven't had a chance to talk to her, so we pass it again.

6. Waddle out of courtroom a total hot mess; it's horribly hot in the courtroom, even though it's reasonably cool outside. Cannot wear my suit jacket lest I pass out, which combined with the flip-flops makes me even more of a hot mess. Bailiff about has a stroke when he sees me groan and hold my stomach in discomfort while waddling out, because he thinks I'm in labor and he'll have to catch a baby.

7. While waiting to talk to Mom from the first case, another case of mine is called and, again, I don't hear it! (Is deafness a pregnancy symptom? Or maybe it's just pregnancy has made me stupid.) Embarrassed when bailiff has to shout at me to come to the courtroom. Waddle back into courtroom with everyone already up front. Ugh!

8. Manage to get through those two cases despite all of the fail. Have to ask for 60 day reviews instead of 30 day reviews on account of popping in the month of September. County attorney says he wouldn't dream of objecting to my request. Heh. (He doesn't want to catch a baby either.)

9. Bailiffs take pity on me and sit me in front of the fan they've brought in. I open a file and a paper not tacked down goes flying across the courtroom.

10. Realize my client for the 10:15 hasn't shown up yet and it's now 10:30. I call her and she thought it was set for 11:30. She hauls ass to court.

11. Apparently no one on the 10:15 docket managed to show up on time (that's probably because by 10:15, we're usually running at least an hour behind), and there's no one in the waiting room. We take a 15 minute break, and of course, my case with my missing client is the first one called.

12. Client comes rushing in just as we get before the Judge. Whew! She apologizes profusely. At this point, the Judge makes a comment that we clearly must run on a different time zone in this county, so at least my client isn't getting nailed for the screw-up. Our cabinet worker tried to set the 60 day review for September, causing the Judge to comment that we're also apparently on a different calendar there too. (I wasn't the only one having a fail day. There were even two other attorneys who didn't show up at all today. Ugh.)

13. Finish up the case and get the hell out of there before anything else goes wrong.

I mean, seriously, what a crappy morning. Fortunately, that was my last court appearance before birthin'. My next time in court, I hope to be wearing normal clothes and actual shoes. (And not failing so hard.)

Sprinkles

2011-08-22T16:17:00.004-04:00

Two of my law school classmates were kind enough to throw me a baby shower yesterday. I told them I didn't really need anything, but was happy to get some of the girls together and celebrate. So, a few of my law school gal pals were there, as well as a grad school pal, and another friend who hangs out with us regularly on our True Blood nights (who was smart enough to not go to law school).

I got lots of diapers in 1's and 2's, and some other baby necessities, like butt cream and baby shampoo. And some cute toys and clothes for the baby too. Also got a few items for Cora. A "big sister" t-shirt and a stuffed bunny that was wearing princess bling. (As well as a giant bunch of balloons.)

Of course, it's not a contest, but I can't think of a more winning baby gift than this:

Baby geek attire

Also, my friend is the hostess with the mostest. Can you believe she actually made this cake? I wouldn't know what to do with fondant if my life depended on it.

Except eat it.

So, totally awesome that my law school gal pals were kind enough to throw me a party. Lots of awesome food too. Which I'll be eating more of tonight, since it's True Blood night. Woot!

Also, speaking of vampires, we saw 'Fright Night,' last night, and it is awesome. (And not just because David Tennant is half-naked and wearing leather.)

MILP Roundup #217

2011-08-21T20:02:00.001-04:00

EH has it. You want it.

Fall semester

2011-08-19T23:32:00.006-04:00

Fall semester has started on campus. Our semi-permanent house pet started his classes this week. Having him here is definitely nice, because (shhh! don't tell the Parking Nazis!) he's dropping me off at the Clinic in the mornings and then using my employee tag to park the car over where his classes are. Win! Although he's probably going to kill us both at some point by wrecking the car while trying to oogle some strapping young man jogging shirtless on campus. (I have to admit; is my favorite time of year on campus. Especially nice driving by the frat houses and seeing dozens of strapping young man washing their cars, shirtless. Oh, to be young and single again, ordering off the menu instead of watching that dinner tray pass on by...)

Anyway, speaking of being old, married and knocked up, my body is definitely not a fan of the walking around on campus these days. I don't really even have that far to walk. I park in a garage that is about half a block behind the pharmacy building, which I can go into and then take the pedway across to the clinic where my office is. It takes about 10 minutes of waddling. But the hips -- they do not like the exercise. By the time I get home in the evening, I just curl up with my ~~giant vibrator~~ back massager on my hips/ass and try not to cry. The disturbing pelvic popping is still occurring too. All kinds of wrong. And the other day, I totally had thankles. The swelling has since gone down, and I'm back to merely having cankles.

I'm either 36 weeks now, or 37. I was exactly 36 weeks when Cora was born (and other than the birthing during finals, that was perfect timing). I had a helluva week this week, but made it through. Ended the week with a good morning in court (you know you have a good case when, while you're explaining to the Judge the shit Respondant has done, that you hear gasps and murmurs from the peanut gallery that's in awe of such douchbaggery). Motion granted. Judge apparently didn't notice I was ginormously pregnant and tried to set the hearing for next month. Good to know I'm not quite as wide as the podium yet! Then had a business lunch that involved crepes and gelato, which was awesome. We're trying to woo one of the new docs to take over as medical director for our program, so our current director can phase herself out (as she's moving up the food chain and doesn't have much time anymore). She's a native Spanish-speaker too, so we really want her involved. (I told her she could help me not fail at Spanish and sound like a 3rd grader is practicing law.) We also landed a top of the class law student to volunteer for us. He also speaks Spanish, although he is not a native Speaker and is a bit rusty. But certainly he's got to be doing better than me!

Ended the day with a surprise visit from a client who proceeded to tell me I look like I am having triplets, and then ended the conversation complaining about how broke he is and pretty soon the damn foreigners will outnumber "the rest of us." (Yeah, not winning sympathy from me, buddy.) I pointed out that the "foreigners" already do, myself included. My grandparents came off the boat from Italy. My great-grandparents never learned English. My mother never learned Italian. I took enough Italian in college to make an ass of myself in Italy as a stupid American, and sing a handful of lullabies and the occasional aria. America -- it's the goddamn melting pot, and always has been since we stole it from the natives and killed most of them off. We've been bitching about the foreigners since we stole this land. If it isn't the Irish, or Italians, or Japanese, or Mexicans, it'll be somebody else. Maybe someday it'll be real aliens. "Damn outer space aliens, stealing all our jobs!" "Let's ship them damn space aliens back where they come from!" Driving While Green will become cause for a traffic stop. We're just not happy until we're blaming our problems on someone else. Anyway... you can't cure stupid.

In addition to a long week of practicing law and campus coming back to life, Cora started her fall semester of activities. She's back in ballet and she started violin lessons this week. Cora loves her ballet teacher, and has been really excited about ballet. I think it's making a difference in her physical fitness too.

She has been very enthusiastic about violin. Although she was pretty shy and quiet for her teacher, she followed all of her instructions. It's only been one day since her lesson and she's already gotten down all that she was supposed to practice this week, and she's very focused when she's doing it. She's very pleased with herself, and I'm pretty amazed. They really are like little sponges. I hope she continues to be enthusiastic about it and will enjoy it as I did. I really loved playing, and wish I could have continued to play. I'd never have been Itzhak Perlman or anything, but playing with the community orchestra would have been a lot of fun I think. I played for two years in elementary school and then when I started middle school, I eventually quit. The problem was, not surprisingly, The Cult. The violin lessons were acceptable because, in theory, I could go play the [boring ass] music [poorly] composed for The Cult up at Cult Headquarters someday. Oooh. Ahhhh. But then joining the orchestra in middle school required a lot of, gasp!, time with those "worldly" people outside of school. The parents had a cow. You mean, I would be required to go to an orchestra social event?! Yeah, that went over well. So, rather than deal with the conflict, I just quit and sold my violin a couple years later.

As an adult, I purchased another violin and started taking lessons again. I got pretty far. Again, not going to be Itzhak Perlman, but might could audition for the community orchestra someday. Then I quit again. I let life get in the way. Not to mention, the amount of typing I was doing for my job combined with practicing was causing me radiating pain up the tops of my hands into my arms.

I started playing again when I was in Eastern Kentucky, and actually looked for a violin teacher for awhile but didn't find one. That's what got Cora interested in playing. I'd let her play with mine, and last year for her birthday she asked for a "baby violin." So, that's what she got. I'm hoping her enthusiasm will rub off on me and I'll start practicing again myself. Should I ever have the extra cash, I'd love to take lessons again myself. Maybe someday!

Conflicts

2011-08-16T14:13:00.003-04:00

A rather unproductive day full of client management more than work. Whew. Normally I take the attitude with my clients that hey, I've given you advice, if you won't take my advice and you screw up your case, it's on you (and I've got documentation to cover my ass for when your case blows up and you try to file a bar complaint against me because it's all my fault you didn't listen to me). Not today. Today has been Mean Lawyer Day, and I've had to lay the smack down with a few clients. NO. You will not screw up your case, you will do what I say, and you will like it. RAWR.

So, we went last week to look at the new daycare and whatever, it's fine. We both agree it's not as nice as the place Cora currently goes, and I think it's more of a daycare and less of a school, but it is $200/month cheaper. We talked about it and agreed she should go, but I didn't want to switch her until December. She'll be changing rooms at her school then anyway, from preschool to pre-K, and with all the changes going on currently, I just think she needs the stability at school. She's starting violin lessons, she's about to have a baby sister. It's just too much to change schools and leave her friends and her teachers right now. And it's not that I don't think Cora can't handle it, of course she can, but it won't be without behavioral issues during the transition, and *I* can't handle any behavioral issues right now. We're about to try to figure out how to incorporate a new baby into the house. I have to go back to work pretty much right away and be the primary caretaker of the new baby. Husband gets less than 2 weeks of paid time off of work, and his coworker has completely screwed him on the upcoming schedule, so he will pretty much be useless in helping out for 5 day stretches instead of 3. We have a semi-permanent house guest who is starting his first full time semester of classes. We all have to juggle child care of the new baby with all of these other responsibilities. So, the last thing we really need, *I* really need, is a preschooler who is acting out because *everything* in her life just changed at once. So yeah, December is good.

Anyway, Husband talked to the people at the school yesterday and they were pressuring him to put her in now, because there are spots open and they said they can't guarantee spots being open in December. Putting Cora in bumps us up on the wait list for the new baby (sibling priority). But we don't really need daycare for the new baby until late spring, and maybe not even then if I don't end up full time at the University. In the meantime, I'll just need the occasional pinch-hitter should I have an afternoon in court and the Husband works that night, and I have a few people lined up who should be able to help out. I just don't see the need to pay for child care when we don't really need it because I'm spending so much of my time working at home, or until the baby is old enough to give a crap where she is and what's going on around her. (Provided the kid isn't a holy terror. Cora was fine for getting work done. I did a significant amount of my law school work at home, holding the baby. And I can always stick a pissed off baby in the crib and close the door if I have to take a phone call.) But we started Cora in daycare at the point she had started to crawl, and that was a really good time, I think. It gave her time to get acclimated and then once in the toddler room, we could really see the difference in having that socialization. And it is very nice that she rarely gets sick anymore. That first year of daycare funk is rough! (Hopefully we still have some immunities built up!)

But, I thought we had decided that December was the time, and then suddenly the matter is up for discussion again. I'm like, I don't want to move her at all. But if we have to, I definitely don't want to move her right now. So, the Husband's in a huff and called them and told them we wouldn't be moving her in September, and is acting like a martyr because I got my way. Whatever. I think it's a compromise. If I got my way, we wouldn't be changing schools at all and we'd put the new baby in there next fall as well. Definitely not thrilled about it, but it's what we need to do.

Pet Peeves

2011-08-14T23:11:00.004-04:00

I just discovered a new pet peeve with my mother: she tells my kid what to say. That drives me effing crazy.

Cora spent the night with my mom on Friday night. Thursday was my mom's birthday (that she doesn't celebrate, because that would be sinful), so I figured I'd let her have her for the night when she asked. So, Friday night she calls to say goodnight. Well, there's my mother in the background "Tell Mommy that blah blah blah. Tell Mommy blah blah blah." And of course my child dutifully repeats it word for word. How obnoxious is that shit? I mean, she's almost four years old, she already talks way too much, she does not need help talking. Then the next day when she brought her back, she kept doing the same damn thing. I'm like, if you want her to talk about something in particular, you can prompt her to say it, you don't have to say it for her. Jesus. Like "Tell Mommy what you did today." Not "Tell Mommy what you did today, say, 'I want to the park, and I colored...'" Ugh, that's so annoying.

She also likes to make up stuff that I know Cora never said. Yesterday she tried to tell me that Cora had told her that Steven needs to go back to Grandma's house and Grandma needs to live with us. Oh haha, isn't that funny? Yeah, whatthefuckever. She can try to plant that idea all she wants to, but that is soooo not happening. Likely that statement started with "Hey, Cora, say that..." Well, the Cult spends all its time telling you exactly what you should think and say, so why should I expect anything less from my mother? Not that I'm worried too much about my sassy, opinionated child, but seriously, she is a child not a parrot. She can express herself just fine, she doesn't need a script.

Helluva day

2011-08-11T21:57:00.004-04:00

Whew, what a long day.

I made it to the clinic this morning, ready for several appointments. One didn't show, which was fine since the second one came in early. That one ended with what I can only describe as Epic Fail. I am not a mental health professional. I, like, go to court and argue and stuff. And being a not-so-touchy-feely female on top of not being a mental health professional, I just can't handle people's emotional turmoil. Ugh. Awkward. Kudos to those of you out there who can and do. That ain't me.

What is me? Ball-busting. Oh my, am I about to bring the drama. I have a new custody and support case. My client is the baby mama. Baby daddy is a deadbeat that wants nothing to do with the kid and doesn't want to pay child support. Same shit, different day, right? So, I go through the full consult and get the paperwork started and all that... and finally I figure out that the deadbeat dad is a classmate of mine from graduate school. Ugh. Not to mention, his attorney is one of my classmates from law school, the second case I've obtained against a law school classmate in the past month. Needless to say, I'm not thrilled about any of this. Not thrilled about going up against another of my law school classmates, mostly because arguing with them reminds me of the suckdom of law school and tends to give me law school-related nightmares. (Although there is some satisfaction in kicking a law school classmate's ass in the real world.) Also not thrilled about going after one of my grad school classmates, in what is a very tight-knit program (unlike law school, where I hated pretty much everyone), and won't that make the next grad school reunion a bit awkward, heh. (Seriously, I'm probably about to get unfriended by a few people... but hey, I took advantage of my still-existing friendships to pull some photos that will be quite useful to the case. And who says Facebook isn't useful for attorneys?) But especially not thrilled that this classmate turned out to be a deadbeat. The facts of this one are pretty bad. Not that I knew him very well, but I can't like this guy anymore. Normally I give people the benefit of the doubt in conflicts, even personal ones. There's two sides to every story, yada yada. No, not in this. There's no excuse here. Finding out what assholes strangers are, is never a surprise. But finding out what assholes people I know are was not an aspect of the job I expected. It's a small community, I guess I should expect the skeletons to fall out on a frequent basis. But still. Disappointed.

Anyway, the rest of the day I managed a bunch of little fail. I forgot to turn in my timesheet and left the notes from a private client's case on my desk and had to go all the way back to the clinic. Didn't recognize my own kid from behind when I picked her up from school (in my defense, someone had french braided her hair... I have no idea how to do that). Went to dinner with the kid and the husband, and could barely eat anything because I'm too full of baby to eat hardly anything (I didn't even order an entree).

Came home and husband took the kid for a walk and made friends with our new neighbors. I think they moved in 4 months ago or so, but being a curmudgeonly hermit, I've yet to go take over a welcome basket. Husband says they're nice and seemed eager to make friends; they have a daughter about Cora's age, and a 3 month old daughter. So, I guess we have new friends. Meanwhile, I laid in bed and wondered if I was having contractions, because I was having really bad cramping that was taking my breath away. Then it stopped. Braxton Hicks or something I guess. I was relieved, but still, a little disappointed. I'm 35 weeks, but might be a week ahead of that even. The alien is over 5 pounds. It's getting evicted soon, I've had enough. Enough!

MILP Roundup #215

2011-08-09T12:18:00.003-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday (except when I forget and fail, so I do it on Tuesday). Next week, Butterflyfish will have it.

Butterflyfish flies solo.

LC is living the not-so-leisurely beach life.

But I Do Have a Law Degree is no longer a minority.

Momttorney is not rosy.

EH sees ghosts.

Dinei and Izzie are going to kick Mother Nature's butt, while Cristy is helping Mother Nature kick mine.

RG on wedding days.

CM has a 5 month old.

-R- on three random topics.

SuzieJD leaves the legal profession for a career as a hair dresser.

Googiebaba on bad second dates.

LEO is reviewed.

LL spontaneously bursts into flames when returning to Austin.

WNWL is back on the pregnancy roller coaster. (You know, the one that makes you throw up a lot and you feel bruised and battered when you get off of it.)

Shan is going back to school, whether she likes it or not.

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

Careering

2011-08-02T00:10:00.005-04:00

I get together with some law school classmates every Monday night to have dinner and watch whatever TV show we're currently watching. Right now it's True Blood. (And ohmygoodgod, is Alexander Skarsgard the most beautiful man on the planet. Yummy.)

Anyway, one of my friends told me tonight that a guy from her firm [where she is currently doing contract work] is the one who got the job I wanted. She said he had over 5 years experience in insurance defense. Ugh, figures. How can I compete with that? She thought it would make me feel better. I dunno. I guess it's nice to know that it wasn't just that they aren't into me, it's that there was someone much more qualified than me. But really, that doesn't make me feel better. It's almost like it's hopeless then. Short of going crawling back to the mid-size insurance defense firm that pushed me out during my maternity leave, I'm running low on law firm contacts. No one is hiring. And when they actually are, why would they hire me over some guy with 5 years of experience?

My other friend mentioned tonight that her firm plans to hire another associate next year... of course, her firm is over an hour away. She's been commuting and has an apartment in the other city, and if the job works out, they plan to put their house up for sale after the first of the year. I don't know if I can do the commuting thing again. If the job paid enough, we could always move to the state capitol, which would be halfway between cities, but still would be a pain to commute. And I don't really want to put kids in school there. (Or in most of the small towns around here.) I dunno. Something to consider if a position opens, I suppose. It isn't as though I wouldn't have been doing a ton of driving if I'd gotten the insurance defense job, and there are plenty of folks out there that do a much longer commute than a 1-hour drive.

Who knows. I suppose it's pointless to speculate now. We'll find out if we get the grant money sometime in December or January and then I could be a full time employee at the University for five years. In that time, I would probably go back to get some sort of additional degree (since the University would pay for it). Maybe in health administration or something.

And of course, because I'm a glutton for punishment, I'm sending my resume to yet another insurance defense firm that probably won't hire me, but again, will probably give me an interview because I'm just so damn fascinating. They do some med mal too, and hey, I'm all over the med mal. But they want someone with more experience than I actually have. That's the thing, I think. My resume reflects 11 years in the legal profession, most of which was spent in insurance defense. But I've only practiced for 2 years, and thanks to the last year of solo practice, is heavy in family law. While I now have a ton of courtroom experience, it's with family court judges and district court judges. My deposition-taking skills are probably non-existent at this point, and I haven't been to trial in over a year. At this point, I don't know what firm would want me over a new grad who they can pay cheaply and work to death, or an associate with 5 years of experience who they pay a little more and can greatly rely upon. Ugh.

MILP Roundup #214

2011-08-01T10:57:00.001-04:00

Is at PT-Lawmom. Here next time.

Misery

2011-08-01T00:17:00.004-04:00

1. 32 weeks pregnant. Although I'm still holding out hope that I will not still be pregnant at 40 weeks, my OB says there's no reason to believe I will go early like I did last time. She also said that the more pregnancies you go through, the worse the hip pain gets, because, well, shit just don't go back to normal after you pass a human. Sigh. This is why labor doesn't seem so bad after a certain point and the human race continues; by the time you get full term, you don't give a shit if the kid comes out your nose, you just want it the fuck out.

2. I had some sinus funk over the weekend, and spent all day Saturday in bed miserable, unable to take anything that would actually make me feel better. What a crap way to spend the weekend. Especially since Husband is working the next three nights and will be out of town from Wednesday until Sunday for his annual geek orgy.

3. The housing situation seems to have fallen through for our extended house guest, and he no longer will be moving out in August. (The roommate that was supposed to move out from my friend's house has decided he isn't moving out in August, but maybe in September, he just doesn't know yet, yada yada... so there's no longer a definite opening.) He's trying to find something else, but it's going to be super expensive to get a place on his own, and I don't think he'll be able to afford it. In the meantime, he's about to start his first full semester of college to try to get into nursing school, and he'll be sharing a house with a grumpy nightshifter who has been displaced from his Man Cave downstairs, a chatterbox preschooler and squalling newborn. And even if he still gets to move in with my friend, he'll be moving in the middle of midterms, probably.

AND my mother had the nerve to bitch tonight, after spending the past three days at her annual cult brainwashing convention (where she had to get a hotel room and eat out for every meal) about how she's broke and only has a few dollars until pay day and just doesn't know what she'll do. Without missing a beat, I just looked at her and said, "Huh, well, it's a shame you don't have a roommate to help you out."

None of my clients paid me in July, my malpractice insurance and my car insurance premium came due, my bar dues are due in a few weeks, I'm about to go on an unpaid maternity leave, and our utility bills were higher last month because we added another person to our household because her fucking cult decided she needed to violate the law and kick him out without notice. So, yeah, my budget is tapped for the next two months. She can go ask her cult friends to feed her until pay day. And when they won't help her out, she can go eat at a soup kitchen run by people in religions that actually give a shit. Fuck all that noise. I'm getting really sick of it.

4. Along the lines of "I fear change," Husband wants to utilize the child care offered at his hospital, which is significantly cheaper than where we currently go. I'm not super excited about it. Cora has done really well where she is, and we really like them. They have never been just a daycare, they're a school. (I know the difference; the place she went to for two days a week in Eastern Kentucky was a daycare.) The TV was on when I dropped her off in the morning, and the TV was on when I picked her back up. They don't have TV's at her school here. They have an actual curriculum. They are teaching her to read and write. They potty trained her. Her teacher in the 2 year old room cried when they moved her to preschool. She has friends there that she's been with since she was a baby, and she's about to move to the Pre-K classroom. But we pay $165/week. And the hospital daycare is $115/week. Considering that we're starting violin lessons ($85/month) and continuing ballet class ($55/month), we could use a tuition break. So, we're at least checking it out. At the very least, we'll probably see about putting the new baby there. $128/week for full time, as opposed to $200+ a week at our current place. Apparently, it's where all the doctors' wives take their kids, so it can't be that bad if rich people are using it. I just hate to think about Cora leaving her school. But she doesn't start kindergarten until fall of 2013, so that's a long time to pay high tuition. I dunno. If the place doesn't impress me, I'll probably fight it. We chose our current place even though it was more expensive than other daycares, because the other places we looked at were... well... like the place in Eastern Kentucky. Considering I'm not working very much these days and most of it is at home, I can turn the TV on at home and ignore my kid for 8 hours a day; I don't need to pay someone else to do it.

5. Home stretch. Trying to get my cases wrapped up and things settled before I pop. I signed a couple new clients, so I rather envision something like going to court and having a hearing the day after I get released from the hospital or some insanity. Oh well. The joys of solo practice. However, I am working on a new pro bono case as a favor for a friend, that has been quite the change of pace from the rest of my miserable case load of epic crazy. Interesting legal issues, and I really think I came up with a great angle that is going to save what I initially thought was a pretty bad case, and I think it is going to make opposing counsel poop himself when he reads my demand letter; I'm certain he is unaware of my little smoking gun. The funny thing about the case is that I didn't see the angle until the client finally gave me all of the papers, and I realized that I was not understanding the depth of what the client was telling me. We'll see how it all shakes out. Once it's over, I'll ask permission to write about the case, because it really is interesting. It's nice to have a breather from the drama of the rest of my practice. Reminds me yet again that I belong in general civil litigation, and far far away from family law. Recently a very well-respected family law attorney left his practice, left the firm and started doing something else, like foreclosure or something. All I could ask is "which client was the last straw?" And wonder, which client will be mine?

Fun with preschoolers

2011-07-28T12:57:00.002-04:00

Last night, we had dinner at our friends' house.

Towards the end of the evening, Cora had an epic meltdown because she had been playing with this little Abby Cadabby doll and her friend J took it from her. I told her she needed to go calm down or we were going home and she wouldn't get to play anymore. That didn't really make any difference and since it was getting late anyway, we made the call to go home. Since we were leaving and J's mom actually thought the toy was Cora's, she made J give it back, which immediately stopped Cora's tantrum. Of course, we took the toy back away from her and made her say her good-byes. She was not happy.

She snuffled all the way home, and while Husband poured her bath, I made her sit down with me in her room and talk about what happened. This seems to be working quite well: reasoning through the behavior and solving the problems without melting down. (Except when she's really tired, of course.)

I told her that I know she was upset that she was playing with the doll and J took it from her without asking her to share it, but that screaming and crying about it wasn't the right thing to do and she had acted very badly. She didn't ask J nicely to give it back to her; she didn't ask an adult for help to get J to share. I asked her what she should have done instead of scream and cry, and she dutifully told me: She should have said "please" to J to share.

Very pleased with my excellent parenting, I ended the conversation with: "See? And crying about it didn't help solve the problem, did it?"

Her response: "Yes, it did. [J's mom] screamed at [J] and made her give it back."

Cora: 1; Mommy: 0.

To breed or not to breed

2011-07-27T11:58:00.005-04:00

I was just talking to a friend this past weekend about the whole having kids thing. She doesn't like kids, she doesn't want kids, so she isn't having kids. Funny thing though? I don't like kids either.

Seriously, I really really don't. Being in places with a high concentration of Other People's Children makes me twitch uncontrollably (Monkey Joe's is my own personal hell). There are many days sitting in the peds clinic, listening to children scream, I wonder why the nurses aren't drugging the little ankle-biters. Even babies don't impress me, and they're usually the cutest and least offensive of the mini-humans. I've never gone googly-eyed over someone else's baby (although I will politely ooh and ahh over the cuteness of others' offspring). Unlike many women, the mere mention of babies doesn't make my ovaries twinge (usually it has the opposite effect). And honestly, if I'd married someone who was like, yeah, I just don't want kids, I would have shrugged and gone on with life blissfully unaware of the miseries of growing a human (as one is currently trying to claw its way out of my uterus and exit through my throat). But I wasn't adverse to the idea of having kids either, in the proper circumstances. So, when I married Mr. Ticking Biological Clock, I gave my vow to "accept children willingly from God." Meaning, eventually I'd stop taking The Pill and try to get knocked up.

And I did. And I had one. And she's awesome. And we're having another one, who I'm sure will be awesome too. I genuinely do like my friends' kids, and I (usually) like my nieces and nephew. But I still just don't like "kids." I could never *really* work with kids. I mean, I guess technically I do now. I sit in a pediatrics clinic 20 hours a week. In my own practice, I'm GAL for kids and have to, like, talk to them and stuff. But I couldn't spend 8+ hours of direct contact with them in a classroom setting. I couldn't be a pediatrician or pediatrics nurse and deal with them directly all day. And from the experience of having done it just part-time, I know I could not be a stay-at-home parent; I just don't have the patience or the creativity or the energy it takes to do it and kudos to those of you who are, and for those of you who are educators (in fact, I have a brother-in-law who's been both). I'm simply too much of a curmudgeon. I think it's important to know your limitations in life, know at what you excel and what you don't, and make no apology for it. I still spend plenty of time with my kid (underemployment is good for something, I guess), and it's quality time that we both enjoy.

Anyway, parenting isn't for everybody. Other than the obvious of the scores of people I see everyday that never should have been allowed to breed... It's okay to say, look, I like my life the way it is and having children will get in the way of that. And it will. Even the parents who don't do a complete 180 and lose their own identities to become "MOM" or "DAD," still experience lifestyle changes to become a parent. You lose sleep, you lose free time. You definitely experience a loss of money. You start watching Dora the Explorer in the evenings instead of The Daily Show. You go through the drive-thru at McDonald's and get your usual Happy Meal, but you ask for the girls' toy that's some Barbie bullshit because the kid will like it more, when you'd really much prefer the boys' toy. (Although on the rare occasions that I pick up a Happy Meal for Cora too, I'll ask for one girls' toy and one boys' toy. Yay for mini light sabers!) So, yeah, lifestyle changes, big and small.

I think it's absolutely possible to be a parent when you don't like kids, or not be a parent at all even though you love kids, and be perfectly happy with either choice. I love being a parent, I'm glad I did it, and while there are many many things I would be willing to undo if I had a time machine, having kids isn't one of them. It was a good decision for us, and hopefully being a parent is something that ultimately I will have been very good at. I won't know until they're all grown up whether I did it right or failed at it in an epic way. So far, I think I'm doing pretty good. The kid is healthy, happy and well-mannered (usually). I look to other parents as examples of what to do... and what not to do (particularly my own). I want to set a good example for my daughters and hope they grow up to be happy, socially-conscious, contributing members of society. I don't want to live vicariously through them, but I want them to have opportunities that I did not. I want to share with them the things I enjoy, and maybe pick up some new things along the way (well, other than Dora the Explorer). But ultimately, I'm still my own person, just like the people who choose not to have children. Someday my children will be grown up, out of my house, and I'll be the same as those people who never nested. (The difference being I'll have people out there who are obligated by familial duty to come visit me in the old folks' home if they want to stay in the will. Heh.)

Although I might be changing my tune when some demanding creature starts waking me up at all hours of the night screaming again. At least on the rare occasion when Cora wakes up in the middle of the night, (two nights ago it was "a bug in my bed!"), she'll just curl up with me and go back to sleep, which is nice. Well, after chattering about the bug for about 10 minutes first, of course. Fun with kids.

Blah

2011-07-26T00:34:00.002-04:00

These days I mostly just feel large, hot and miserable. July has been a bad month for me financially, as in, none of my clients felt it necessary to pay their damn bills. However, I just landed a couple new paying clients (with modest retainers), so that should at least keep me afloat until the others decide to pay me. Hopefully they will pay sometime during the month of August.

I believe once I have a little extra cash (if ever), I will be (much to Husband's chagrin) installing the security camera on the side of the house. Neighborhood Creeper is back, and just broke into our next-door neighbor's car. I have fantasies involving me catching Creeper rummaging through my car, beating him senseless with a baseball bat and calling it "self-defense." (Seriously, who're the cops gonna believe? The creepy car burglar with a mile long rap sheet, or the huge pregnant lawyer? He was totally threatening me with his back to me, I'm sure of it.) Oh well. He's simply topping the list of people I want to intentionally tort with a bat these days. And that list keeps getting longer, particularly the hotter it gets.

Some fun things though... friends had a baby shower for me and another friend (who's due next month). Just nice and low-key, none of that eating baby food or melted chocolate out of a diaper bullshit. We got lots of diapers and wipes, which is pretty much all we need. Not looking forward to diapers again. Or boob-feeding. Or having a creature screaming in the middle of the night about either of those things. But I'm very much looking forward to not being pregnant anymore. I haven't decided 100% about whether this is the last one or not, but I can tell you this bullshit will not happen in summer ever again.

Still feeling rather blah about my career at the moment. Some days I feel pretty good about it. Other days I just think, what the hell am I doing? Book my padded cell already! I dunno. I guess I can't complain too much. After an annoying morning in court, I came back home and took a 4-hour long nap. The pay might suck, but being self-employed is quite bitchin' some days.

MILP #213

2011-07-26T00:33:00.000-04:00

Is at Butterflyfish. Next time at PT-Lawmom!

Terror

2011-07-21T09:52:00.003-04:00

Since it's 10,000 degrees outside, we decided to have "family movie night" indoors, to stay cool and well-hydrated. We got "Despicable Me" in from Netflix (the disc... no more streaming for us), figuring we could watch something Not Dora for once.

All was good until we got to the scene where Gru's weird, toothy dog shows up. Cora flips the hell out, literally screaming like she was being chased by the serial killer in some horror flick. Strangest damn thing, and I've never seen her react that way to anything, ever, especially not something on TV. Considering she watches sci-fi on a regular basis, and has no problem with aliens, sea monsters, etc., and she certainly has no fear of dogs (even yappy, bitey, toothy ones) it was a really weird thing to be terrified of. Fortunately, once the orphan girls tamed the toothy dog, she calmed down, and later said she really liked the movie, and the dog was "funny."

Although I don't think she would have been willing to hug it.

Anyway, Toothy Terror Dog must be making the rounds, because I've heard several blood-curdling screams from small children today at the clinic. The nurses must be in rare form torturing the kiddies.

I'll be leaving early today, and am not looking forward to leaving the clinic to walk to my car. It was insanely hot at 8am. Can't wait to see what fireball awaits me this afternoon.

Optomistically, I only renewed my parking tag up through the end of the month, in hopes I won't be needing a tag in the month of September. I will be super bitter if I do. The day I hit full term, I'm getting a plunger and inducing myself. Gah!

MILP Roundup #212

2011-07-18T22:32:00.003-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week Butterflyfish will have it.

First, Cristy had a shitty day that ended with being assaulted by The Situation.

LEO has a baby name (and can't breathe).

SuzieJD and Butterflyfish are having summer fun.

Someone out there is expecting a Hallmark from EH.

Izzie is back.

But I Do Have a Law Degree deals with the growing up.

LL celebrates with the Batman.

CM is flying solo.

LC has chaos.

Momttorney updates on lady parts.

WNWL works her last day.

RG goes to the zoo.

-R- reveals the source.

PT-Lawmom learns in PJ's.

Googiebaba avoids the 'burbs.

Cowgirl in the City is at a crossroads.

Dinei among the skinny people.

Newlawmom is ready for the bar.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

MILP Roundup #211

2011-07-14T13:08:00.000-04:00

Was at PT-Lawmom. Here next time.

All the things I have to deal with sober...

2011-07-10T20:44:00.003-04:00

1. Meow. One benefit to my 3 year old spending the day crawling around on the ground meowing because she's "a kitty," other than it's kind of adorable, is that she actually isn't talking non-stop. Amazing how the sound of meowing is less exhausting than a preschooler that never ever stops talking ever. Which has been my entire day today. Blah blah blah blah blah. I often tell her, "You know you talk too much, right?" Her response: a cheerful "Yep!"

2. Disappointment. Found out on Friday that a client I had very high hopes for, has spiraled down the drain. We're back in court this week, and it will not be good. Totally sucks, and I'm more than a little depressed about it. I spend a lot of time representing people who couldn't give a crap less about their kids, so when I get one who really cares, who really tries, and then fails... it really sucks.

3. Irritation. Husband's been grumpy the past few days. Probably has at least in part to do with our house guest, and his sleeping displacement. He grouched at me for making too much noise while he was sleeping. WTF ever. Today while he was sleeping, even Cora was quiet. Whenever I'm sleeping though, he's got the TV blasting and is stomping around and making all kinds of noise. He also has an annoying habit of listening to his iPod when he gets home from work, and singing (loudly) along with it. Maybe I should start sleeping downstairs too. Bah.

I, in turn, am irritated with my mother. Today she kept trying to dump more crap into my house. I was like, seriously? I just took in your roommate, I don't have the space for anything else right now! She cleaned out some file cabinet and found a bunch of "my stuff." Which is like sketches from my 8th grade art class and shit. Stuff that moms want to keep but that other people want to pitch. She had two boxes full of stuff she expected to bring over here. I'm like, no! I do not have room for any more crap at the moment! We're trying to get rid of crap, not bring more in. This in addition to the gobs of clothes hangers she recently brought over that we have absolutely no use for, that I told her no and she brought over anyway. We already had more clothes hangers than clothes, and she goes and brings over about 100 more, after I told her no. And of course, again after telling her NO, she still manages to bring over a stack of my old music books and gives them to Cora. Those are music books, she can't read music. Oh, but they have pictures in them. (A couple of them are Disney music books.) So the hell what? She has dozens of books with pictures in them with, you know, words. Doesn't mean I want her to tear up expensive music books that she'll probably want to use in a few years and probably shouldn't ruin now by shoving them into the couch and bending up the pages (which is exactly what she did tonight). And of course, Cora kept saying "Look what Grandma bought me!" Ugh. That on top of the fact that she came over after her fucking cult meeting, just did me in for the day. Like, I can't deal with you.

4. Gross. Had a client (old fat guy) randomly drop by my office on Friday afternoon, and in complaining about all of his medical problems, lifted up his shirt and showed me his chest scar from a past surgery. Um, ew. (And I'm not talking about the scar.) That pretty much summed up my entire week.

MILP #210

2011-07-05T22:29:00.001-04:00

Was at Butterflyfish. Next time at PT-Lawmom. Enjoy!

Fourth of July Fun

2011-07-05T13:34:00.005-04:00

Best Fireworks-related Facebook Status: "I can hear the sounds of entire welfare checks blowing up outside my window."

Action-packed weekend.

Cora's godfather is living with us now, so we're making some small adjustments in how we do things. Husband normally sleeps downstairs in the spare guestroom during the day (he's darkened the room into a sort of bunker) when he has to work that night, and only sleeps in our bed when he isn't working. I'd recently reorganized my files to work at my desk in our bedroom (and by "at my desk," I mean, "in bed with my feet propped up, pulling files off the desk.") But now, our new house pet is sleeping downstairs (we have another spare bed upstairs but in the room that is an absolute disaster because it's going to be the baby's room and there isn't much room in there currently. I had to clear off the bed for Father in Law to spend the night on Saturday). Husband is now sleeping in our bed (which is fairly dark), which means I've been transplanted too (now on the couch). The dog is irritated by this because she usually spends the day lounging lazily on the couch, and every time I get up to get a drink or use the bathroom, she steals my spot. Oh well. It is kinda nice to have a live-in nanny though. Since I'm on my own 3 nights a week, it's not like I can go to the store at 10pm when I realize we're out of dishwasher detergent or whatever. And Cora's thrilled to have him around so much.

As I mentioned, Father-in-Law came in on Saturday and spent the night. Sadly, Mother-in-Law couldn't make it. (Not sadly, that meant her Shih Tzus didn't make it either.) As usual, massive amounts of alcohol were consumed, and Husband endured the perils of drinking way too much vino. Yuck. Although considering all the times I more recently spent praying to the porcelain goddess thanks to "morning" sickness, I didn't have much sympathy. At least he gets to drink!

Last night, we had people over and grilled out. It was a good time. Lots of good food. Husband wanted initially to kick everyone out at 9 so we could go downtown to watch the fireworks. Since we were having a good time, we stuck around and lit sparklers for the kids. And also, since our fireworks laws just changed [to allow any redneck in the state to buy any kind of fireworks, whereas before, if you really wanted big fireworks, you had to drive down to Tennessee to buy them], we had a show in the middle of our street, along with the group of drunk people firing them off until 2 am. We were watching to see if anyone set themselves on fire and/or blew off any appendages, but eventually the cops rolled through and the fun ended.

My former roommate and her husband came out with their brood, which is the first time we've gotten the kids together. She's got three boys, ages 8, 6 and 2 1/2. Three boys is definitely a big contrast to my pretty little princess, who insisted on wearing her Easter dress, her sparkly pink princess shoes and her princess tiara. (She also cried at bedtime when we told her she could not wear her dress to bed.) Of course, they're all just carbon copies of their dad, so they're (mostly) sweet and quiet, and would rather be playing video games. We eventually set the Wii up for the older two, since most of what we have to entertain children in the house involves princesses. Anyway, in the span of an evening, it would appear that we are now in-laws and grandparents. Quite adorably, Cora bonded with the youngest and they spent most of the evening playing together. At one point, Cora pulled out one of her baby dolls, put it in her doll stroller, and informed me that K is the daddy, she's the mommy, and that's their baby. She made him carry the baby bottles and eventually ordered him to push the stroller. Only in Kentucky could I be a grandmother at 31, and also pregnant. Sigh.

Long week

2011-07-01T13:58:00.003-04:00

Unexpected early holiday today, as everything has pretty much wrapped up. Last night was so busy, I didn't even get around to eating dinner. I was regretting that this morning when I had to go do the glucola test. Ugh, orange-flavored ass.

I finished up and submitted the article I co-wrote to this medical journal, hoping it'll be published. It'll be nice to put something on my CV besides "Attended law school, where I mostly spent time on Facebook and trying not to drool on myself when I was asleep in class." Particularly if I want to scoot off down a path of academia someday. Not like teaching law school, of course. I would seriously hate that. (Even though I'll probably be an adjunct law prof in the spring for the clinic course we're supposed to be offering.) But as for standing up in a classroom and socratizing some poor 1Ls on contracts or torts or something? No way. But I would love to teach poly sci or history.

So, today's plan is to start working on the baby's room, starting with pulling all of the clothes off of the bed in there (which I dumped in there after I pulled them out of my closet because they don't fit), because Father-in-Law is coming to stay with us tomorrow, and our guest room downstairs is currently occupied by our temporary tenant.

Other than that, I plan to continue reading my Sookie Stackhouse book and being lazy. And yay for a new season of True Blood! I tell you what, as a general rule, I'm pretty intolerant of the arrogant, pushy male as a love interest, but Eric... oh my goodness, he can randomly show up in my bedroom any time he likes.

MILP Roundup #209

2011-06-28T14:47:00.001-04:00

...is being guest-hosted at Attorney at Large.

Big thanks to EH for picking up duties this week!

More on Bosses

2011-06-26T22:00:00.000-04:00

Since I'm trying to cheer myself up, I figured I'd remind myself of how much crazy bosses suck.

I actually forgot one of my places of non-legal employment, which is silly, since I worked there the longest of any job. That would be the now-defunct Computer Superstore, or as we lovingly referred to it, as CompUSuck.

It wasn't always CompUSuck. When the store first opened, there was a pretty awesome group of managers, who treated us very well. But eventually they all left, and we were left with a group of assholes and idiots to take their places. (Oh, and I should also mention that, from the previous post, when I first got the job there, they had called the county schools for a reference, and apparently Butter Face intercepted the phone call. She gave me a very bad reference, and said some pretty nasty things about me, also claiming she'd fired me for performance reasons. The retail manager told me this later, and laughed about it. Apparently it was so bad and so different from my other references, he called back and talked to the technology director, who gave a completely different story of my job performance. Seriously though, what a hateful old bitch.)

Anyway, the first group of managers was awesome and fun, and the store performed very well. However, that group also had some trouble with the sexual harassment. Strangely enough, the one manager who had never made even any sort of sexual comment to me was the one who actually got fired for sexual harassment. There was a company policy that managers could not date other employees. He started dating the receptionist, who wasn't even his direct employee (she was technically corporate and he was retail), and he got fired for it. They ended up getting married. It was just sort of stupid. Anyway, the rest of the guys there were a raunchy bunch, although none of them ever crossed a line with me and never discriminated against me in any way. I think ultimately I was more of the kid sister they just liked to pick on, as though I would be shocked by their lewd comments and clutch my pearls in horror, and they were amused I could throw down. Anyway, those managers left and then came the replacement group. The new store manager and the new retail manager was a slime ball and a spineless weasel, respectively.

When the store first opened, I worked a short stint in the tech department. As a young female, this was often unpleasant. Not because of management, but because of the customers. And it was mostly female customers who would question my credentials and second-guess my recommendations. I would constantly have to get the tech manager, who barely even knew anything about computer repair, to come out and convince the customer that I knew what I was talking about and that the customer should either authorize the repair or just buy a new machine. Eventually, I got tired of it, and transferred to corporate sales for the store, which had the opportunity for a lot more money. Also, women do a lot better in sales. Especially hawt young women, in short skirts and tight shirts. (Yes, I made many sales with dirty old men staring at my bewbs, and no, I have no shame. Utilize the assets you've got... before they need to be lifted and tucked a decade and two kids later.)

My group (of which I was eventually made supervisor) were hourly sales staff who also earned commission after making a certain amount in sales each month (if we didn't make our quota, we didn't get any commission from our sales). Because we were so good (our profit margins were excellent and we had the highest sales in the region), we individually made very good money, and would easily triple our base pay each month.

Well, for some reason management always tried to screw with us, I don't know why. The better we performed, the better the store looked. We got all kinds of praise from the regional manager for our department. But, sabotage nonetheless... our group only worked during store hours so we weren't required to stay and stock/clean the store after hours like the retail employees. Part of that is because instead of wearing khakis and polo shirts, we wore business attire (as we met with business clientele), and we had cubicles in the back of the store. And it's a little difficult to climb a ladder and stock merchandise when you're wearing a pair of stilettos. But more importantly, it also cut into our sales time. Unlike the rest of the staff, we were commission-based. If we're losing 7 hours each week to stocking merchandise, that's nearly an entire shift of our group not making sales (and we were not allowed overtime, not to mention, the store liked to try to cut our hours anyway). So, I was pretty aggravated when the store manager told us we had to start stocking merchandise after hours. It reduced all of our sales at least slightly, which reduced our paychecks, and in the first month, it resulted in one of my salesmen (almost) not making his sales quota, which would have cost him his month's commission. He only made his sales quota because I came in on my day off and (illegally) worked off the clock to make sales and rang them under his sales number instead of mine. But I figured that's what a good manager does; a good manager doesn't screw you out of money, he helps you make money. Eventually I won the battle with the store manager on the issue, and he didn't much like me after that.

Also, our direct department manager was definitely not a good manager, either. He was this shady little man with a Napoleon complex, who did asshole things to "keep people in line," like writing me up for clocking in exactly 1 minute late to work. (I am absolutely not a punctual person, so the whole 1 minute late thing is more like 10 minutes early for me.) He would also steal sales from me. I worked this really big deal with a rather prominent local horsey organization that purchased machines, networking services, training, etc., and the final bill of sale ended up being well into the six figures with a very high profit margin (services and warranties really boost those margins). It was the biggest single sale our store had made, and it was my sale. I made first contact with the organization, I prepared the sales quote and designed the pitch to the board of directors, I "second chaired" the sales meeting with the tech manager running the show... and my asshole corporate manager stole the sale from me, taking credit himself, and only gave me something like a $200 commission on the whole thing. I actually made less money that month than I normally would, because I had spent so much time working with that client, including being off-site to schmooze with the horsey people and do a walk-through of the place to "assess" their needs, which only I was qualified to do because of my background in tech/networking. My asshole manager? Couldn't even use his own computer. Stole my sales commission. Asshole. You think the store manager did anything about it? Hell no. Asshole. Stupidly, I didn't make a stink about it and go to the regional manager, because I didn't want to rock the boat. I should have knocked those assholes out of the damn boat. (Yet another example of how I don't stand up for myself.)

Anyway, back to the corporate sales manager... the worst thing about him was that his idea of "client development" was to take potential clients out to the strip club to "wine and dine" them. Gross. He even hired a guy who was still working as a bouncer at the local strip club, so he could get free VIP passes. Against my wishes. And the guy was a crappy salesmen. And he sat at his cubicle across from mine and spit tobacco juice into an empty Pepsi bottle that he left sitting on his desk for me to have to stare at. Really gross. Hated them both.

Finally, another one of the incompetent new "redshirt" managers in the store lost me my biggest regular customer. That manager was one of those obnoxious jerks who loves to be in charge and everyone's boss, regardless of whether you work for him or not... until an actual decision needs to be made, and then suddenly he doesn't have any authority, he can't make that call. He actually wanted to be a police officer, but couldn't pass the physical fitness test. Thank goodness; he would have been the stereotypical bad cop who gets off on pushing people around and violating your civil rights. Anyway, one day he was the "manager on duty," while the other managers were off doing whatever. My customer calls me, who is a big important attorney in the Eastern part of our state, and says she's coming to the store, needs these items, and she'll be in around lunchtime to get it. I pull the order, which is around $7K, I unbox these gigantic workhorse laser printers that she's been buying up (we would unbox them for her because she couldn't fit them all in her car otherwise), and set them up front at the corporate pickup desk ready for payment and ready for one of the big strong boys to put them all into her car. Way ahead of her time, she took her office big into technology, and revamped everything. Including that they printed their own checks. Problem was the firm checks never got approved by Equifax, and a manager always had to sign off on the check to complete the transaction, which wasn't a big deal. Being a partner at a prominent (and wealthy) law firm, we established early on in our business relationship that it was not a problem, and she came in quite regularly with these kinds of large orders. However, when she came to pick up the order, Faux Manager refused to sign off on the check, because he said he didn't have the authority (which was a load of crap), and wouldn't let her take the merchandise because he didn't know if her check was real, so she had to wait until the store manager returned. It wasn't like it was possible for her to come back in an hour when a real manager was there, because she lives/works three hours away (which is why she'd called ahead). When I got back from lunch, one of my guys from the corporate pickup desk calls me to tell me what had just happened and that the customer is furious and she's never coming back. I told him I'll sign off on the damn check myself, but it was too late and she had just left, and I couldn't reach her on her cell. I ripped Faux Manager a new asshole, and then when the store manager returned, he tried calling my customer and begging forgiveness (and a return of her business) and she ripped him a new asshole. She's always been lovely to me though. (Small world, I'm now friends with her son, who went to college with my husband, and he's married to another friend of mine.) Ultimately, couldn't blame her the way she'd been treated by Faux Manager as though she was handing him a fake check (even though several other employees tried to tell him that she was a regular, and very wealthy, customer and her money was good).

Anyway, eventually CompUSuck's managing imbeciles drove the company into the ground. One of the first ways they did this was by shutting down the corporate sales divisions in each store, and instead, opening a "call center" in Dallas. The way we operated was that we had on-site sales staff to cater to the business customer. We could negotiate down prices (to a certain profit margin) as we saw fit, to get their business. Some larger companies would get better deals than that due to the volume they purchased monthly, and paid on net 30 accounts. As anyone knows, corporate bigwigs love to be pampered, have their hands held and feel important. So, even though they could probably have ordered the stuff on-line for the same price and had it shipped, they wanted the special attention, the face-to-face. When the in-store corporate sales divisions were closed, CompUSuck's great idea was to place a big red phone at the corporate pick-up desk, where the bigwig important customers were expected to pick up the phone and talk to someone in Dallas to tell them what products they wanted, so that us recently-demoted corporate desk monkeys could either pull it off the shelf for them if it was there, or take prepayment for it if it needed to be shipped. Yeah... the customer couldn't stand there and tell me what they wanted, they had to pick up the ugly red phone, talk to someone in another state, wait for that person to place an electronic order, for me to fulfill it.

Hmmm... I'm sure you can guess how well that went over. It was rather ugly. I was the only one who didn't take the severance package and bail... I went down with the ship by taking the supervising position at the corporate pickup desk for a massive paycut. Cora's godfather took his severance and unemployment benefits and escaped with his life (that's how we met, we worked together 13 years ago). I should have done the same, but I honestly didn't know what else to do with myself.

As the stream of corporate customers came in to find out their regular salesperson had been let go and they had to face the Big Red Phone, I got yelled at quite a bit. Which I thought was rather rude, like it was my genius idea or something. "I'm sorry, Mr. Corporate Bigwig, that you're inconvenienced by having to place your order on a phone. Here's the number to the corporate headquarters, where you can yell at someone whose name does not peel off their nametag, pinned onto their ugly, frumpy, red polo shirt. Someone whose salary wasn't reduced by 2/3 because she was replaced by a damn ugly red phone and a call center full of imbeciles in Texas hired by another group of imbeciles in Texas determined to run what used to be a profitable company into the ground." I received a record number of customer complaints, as the Big Red Phone didn't even connect to the call center half the time, and when it did, they'd just screw up their order. The Weasel retail manager would kiss the angry customer's ass, and manage to blame whatever the problem was on me, and the customer would leave the store anyway without purchasing anything. Eventually, the Epic Fail of the Big Red Phone became obvious. CompUSuck closed the call center, they closed the corporate pickup desk, and the entire company was either retail or mail-order/online store, no more corporate sales. I think at one point they resurrected the corporate sales department in the stores, but by then they'd lost all their corporate customers, each store had to start from scratch with customer building and a lot of bridges had been burned. The company lasted about another five years before it was no more. The online store still exists in some capacity, I believe it was purchased by another mail-order company, and maybe a couple dozen stores still exist. Ours does not.

After I left the company in 2000, my mom ended up working there in the cash office. She worked for this horrible woman who I had also worked with, but fortunately I was able to avoid most of the time, who was the front end manager. Talk about your sexual harassment. She would tell horrific stories of her sexcapades, including those involving coworkers and other managers. She was a great big fat lady, which made detailed descriptions of her sex life that much more disturbing. She was also a back-stabbing bitch and would try to get people in trouble because she had nothing better to do. Cora's godfather had many unpleasant run-ins with her, since the corporate pick-up desk was in her airspace, even though he'd never actually worked for her. She once tried to write me up for a check being missing (which was in the drawer), and was not pleased when said write-up didn't take. She probably didn't like my mom because she didn't like me. Like that's a great big loss.

That ended my career in retail/sales. Finding myself underemployed the summer of 2000, I went to a temp agency to look for work. I waited tables for a couple months, but just wasn't making enough money. I was a history major, with very little direction in life, and could only afford to go to school part-time, getting absolutely nowhere towards graduation. So, I asked the temp agency if they could place me with a law firm. I thought maybe I'd like to work in a law office, maybe I'd be a lawyer someday.

Oh, the bad choices we make. I should have asked them to place me in a flower shop.

Totally not into me

2011-06-24T14:39:00.002-04:00

Yet again, said insurance defense firm is totally not into me (got the rejection letter today). I really should learn my lesson about interviewing with firms that have already rejected me in the past. Like, what makes me think this time will be any better? I give up.

So, looks like it's me and a bunch of crazy people in family law. Awesome.

Oh well. I'll continue with my "Bosses Who Suck" series of posts and remind myself that it could certainly be worse. At least working for myself, I'm always the biggest bitch in the office. Which these days is my bedroom, working on my laptop, propped up on the body pillow. Life could be worse. So, I'll try not to resent all of you out there with gainful employment, and just be glad I have some small pittance of money rolling in. And who wants to work for some crappy insurance defense firm anyway? Haven't I had enough of my soul sucked out already?

Sucks.

Bosses, Part 1

2011-06-22T17:40:00.001-04:00

During my interview a couple weeks ago (with the awesome firm that was totally into me -- probably until they realized I was about to give birth in the middle of their office), one of the interviewers mentioned a friend of hers had worked for one of my former employers, and told a story about how the guy got a nice briefcase from him as compensation for the boss throwing a lamp at him. I just laughed. I told her that by the time I worked for him, The Boss was no longer allowed to have lamps in his office because he had broken too many (mostly from throwing them at people), and also had a closet full of broken phones too. (He was a bit of a drama queen.) I've had several interviews with people where the interviewer has raised their eyebrows and said, "You worked for [Crazy Boss]? Oh my gosh... I heard that he..." And usually the stories were pretty much right on target. Overall though, he was by far not the worst boss I've ever had. He at least on some level knew he was crazy, and appropriately compensated his employees for putting up with his shenanigans. We were paid very well, and even paid for overtime, which we were encouraged to work. And if you're my Facebook friend, my current profile picture is one my roommate (who also worked for him) recently posted from the office Christmas party, which was super swanky and had an open bar. Ah, the days of feast rather than famine.

Anyway, I'm sure we've all got stories about crazy bosses. There are crazy bosses, asshole bosses, sociopathic bosses, and, of course, some really awesome bosses. I've had a few from each category. I've (mostly) gotten over the really bad bosses, but definitely wish I had the balls to do what that one guy up in New Jersey did (and ultimately lost at), but I don't really want to get sued. Although it's not like you can garnish my non-existent paycheck, ha! Judgment-proof, Baby! (Yeah, that doesn't make me feel much better either.)

But, it just made me think back on the places I've worked, and the crazy people I've worked for.

We'll start with the non-lawyers:

1. Back in high school my senior year, I worked for the county schools doing technology work, and our county was really one of the leaders in implementing technology into education in the state. Our school trained students in networking and computer repair and used us as slave labor during the school day, and paid us a small wage for the work outside of school. It was excellent experience at a really exciting time in technology development. I was only one of two female students who did the work. I had a good mentor there, who was the top tech guy, who would notoriously stick you in a room with a bunch of broken computers and simply tell you "make it work." It was a lot of practice in figuring things out for myself. I did a project with him for the public library in much the same vain. It was very good experience, and I liked working with him and with the group, many of which were my friends.

Unfortunately, they ended up hiring this really awful woman into some sort of coordinator position, and she for some reason hated me. Probably because she spent all of her time flirting with/throwing herself at the men who worked there (some of which weren't much older than me, because they had been classmates who graduated and returned to accept jobs there), and didn't want other females around to witness it. (Not to mention I was totally hawt, of course she was jealous.) It was kinda gross, especially since she was quite a bit older than most of them. She was kinda gross too. Exactly the kind of woman who thinks she is more attractive than she is, with the totally fried "blond" hair that ends up gray and washed out, and while she had a decent figure, she was definitely a "butter face." One of the tech guys actually made complaints that she kept sticking her bewbs in his face every time she came into his office to ask him a question, making an excuse to point to his computer screen while rubbing her bewbs on him. (Pretty bad when a computer geek is complaining about having bewbs near him.)

Eventually, at the direction of Butter Face, I got stuck at a desk at the technology center, which wasn't really a bad thing, because I knew nothing about Macs which was most of the need at the time and wasn't really keen on learning, and also, I got to do some grant-writing, which is what I do a lot of currently, so that was good experience in retrospect. I started schmoozing with the technology director and kinda hoped it would turn into an admin position after graduation, since she seemed to be taking an interest in me. But then one day (while the technology director was on vacation) Butter Face brought me into her office and told me there wasn't enough money to keep paying me, and there wasn't enough work to justify me being there, and I was being let go. I was upset, but I didn't have any reason to doubt her, or her authority to terminate me. So, I didn't come back to work.

Until I happened to speak with the technology director a few months later, who expressed to me that she was really upset that I had quit. I was like, uh, I didn't quit, I was told I didn't have a job by Butter Face. She told me that wasn't true, they had plenty of work for me to do, she liked my work, and she couldn't understand why Butter Face had told me to leave. By then, I already had another job and I was getting ready to graduate and get the hell out of Dodge, so it was too late to do anything about it. Too naive to realize we'd been enemies, it was my first experience with lying, backstabbing bitches in the workplace. I used the technology director as a job reference for a few years.

Butter Face eventually got fired, probably for rubbing her bewbs on someone.

2. I went on to work as a sales clerk for a Christian bookstore in the local mall. I thought it would be a nice place to work -- clean and well-lit, and everyone was always so friendly. I'm pretty sure you go straight to Hell if you're mean to someone in a Christian bookstore, so the customers were always super nice (even if they left the store to go over to Macy's and scream at some poor sales clerk there). It was a "Christian" bookstore, afterall. In my interview, they talked about how it was more than a job, it was a ministry, and leading by example in Christianity. What could possibly go wrong?

Yeah... the franchise was owned by a sociopath who looked exactly like Henry Gibson in The 'Burbs, so we'll call him Dr. Klopek. Dr. Klopek still tops the Worst Boss list, and even manages to trump a few lawyers, so that's a real accomplishment. The man was evil. He'd made every employee there, including the men, cry at least once. I'm pretty sure, like his namesake, he has a trunk full of bones in his car from the people he's made dissolve from his hate. Evil.

How did Dr. Klopek accomplish his evil? I have no idea. I don't know how or why any self-respecting person would work for him, especially for minimum wage, but I stuck it out for nearly 9 months. It was like being in an abusive home, and all you wanted to do was stay under the radar so you didn't get beat up, but there was no certainty to avoiding his wrath. His special insult to me was that I obviously couldn't handle the intellectual rigors of selling religious books, music and crappy gifts, that "this isn't Taco Bell" (I had worked at Taco Bell the year before, and that was obviously degrading.) He loved trying to catch someone in a mistake. For instance, he once spent 20 minutes trying to figure out which of us had rang up a sale and had failed to write down someone's phone number on the check they'd taken. All of us working that day were standing around, full of dread. It didn't matter if we'd even taken a single check that day in our sales, he was going to berate us anyway. The culprit? Turned out to be his wife. He glared at her furiously, and I'm sure she got an earful when they left, because she'd ruined his chance of screaming at all of us (which he still blustered on for a few minutes about what idiots we all were).

Other examples of psycho behavior: Dr. Klopek once took a Saturday off to go to a ball game, leaving one of the assistant managers in charge, who was a very bright and hardworking doctoral student at the local seminary. Under her direction, we made absolutely certain that every "i" was dotted and "t" was crossed in running the store that day, and in cleaning it that night. I was the only one scheduled to work with Dr. Klopek the next day, and I would be the one receiving his wrath should anything be out of place. And, of course... Dr. Klopek went batshit crazy on me, insulting me, berating me, and finally telling me to go home without finishing my shift and not to come back until I could do my job... because, while digging around in the trash, he found that whoever had cleaned the glass case the night before had dared to use three sheets of paper towel to do so, and the sheets looked as though they had barely been used. Which was not me, but it was my fault anyway. Crazy. He had previously made a scene in front of a customer, because he was hovering over me during a sales transaction, and I'd failed to inform the customer that because she was purchasing a Bible, that the "Bible cozies" were 20% off. Even though I already had when I was helping her earlier. He angrily stage-whispered it to me while I was ringing her up. She gave me a wide-eyed look and replied to him, "No, thank you." While she was still in earshot, he continued to berate me for not doing my job and losing him a sale. So, I guess the paper towel wastefulness was just the end of the line for my competency that day.

I continued to put up with the abuse, but the last straw for me came when we were forced to work New Years' Eve (up to and past the ball dropping) in order to "do inventory." Anyone who has ever worked in a retail store knows that when you "do inventory," you are taking inventory of the products. Part of this is to reconcile what you physically have in the store, with what your computer inventory shows you have. The loss of products between what is obtained from the supplier and the point of sale is called shrink. Generally, when you're doing inventory, it's to figure out what you actually have and calculate your shrink. Correcting your inventory is pretty important, especially when your clerks spend a lot of time looking up merchandise for customers to find out if it is in stock. You can waste a lot of time looking for products that don't really exist, when your inventory is incorrect.

On the contrary, Dr. Klopek's interpretation of "inventory" was to simply add up the retail price of all products in the store, I assume, for tax purposes. Fine, whatever, but he failed to mention that to those of us who had never done an inventory for him before, which you think he would have done before giving us pen and paper and saying "go take inventory." So, I'm writing down sku numbers and amounts, as are two other people. When Dr. Klopek realizes this, he completely loses his shit, starts screaming at us, throws a temper tantrum about what idiots we are and how we can't even understand a basic concept like "inventory," and of course for me, that I should just go back and work at Taco Bell, because that's all I'm capable of doing. I handed him the paper and pen and told him he could do it himself, since I wasn't capable of doing it. I expected him to fire me, but his wife intervened and apologized for his behavior, and I ended up staying. But I started looking for a new job.

By the end of the month, I had a new job and left there an agnostic and engaging in a considerable amount of underage drinking to self-medicate. The bookstore is now closed. Hopefully wherever Dr. Klopek works now, he is not in charge of other employees or conducting any sort of "ministry." Dr. Klopek makes the baby Jesus cry.

3. Finally, I worked (very briefly) for a tech company that was incredibly disorganized. I was supposed to be their inventory manager. (Ha, suck it Dr. Klopek). My first day there, I had no computer. The owner sent me to the computer store (my previous employer) to buy parts to build my own computer. I spent the next two days building my own computer. I then spent the next two months asking for other things I needed but never got to do my job, i.e. order materials, etc. The job was (supposed to be) flexible, since I was a student, which meant I generally came in after classes were over and left early when I had another class. So, it was barely a full time job.

My direct manager was completely disinterested in dealing with me, or my requests for information at all. Most of the time when I would try to talk to her, she was either shouting at her ex-husband on the phone, crying to her new boyfriend, or shouting/crying at her lawyer. Then Baby Mama would glare at me and tell me to figure it out myself, she didn't have time to "babysit." Emails to her went completely unanswered. (However, she did have time to research current child custody laws in an attempt to move her children out of state to spite her ex-husband.) Eventually, one of the company's biggest clients, with a big outstanding bill, filed bankruptcy, and the company was not going to be getting anything out of the liquidation. But, with Baby Mama being a total bitch, instead of giving that as the reason for my dismissal, said it was because I was late to work all the time and wasn't doing my job. Which denied me unemployment benefits (again, too naive to understand I could appeal and would have gotten my benefits). The owner, to his credit, was pretty mortified by the situation, and when he found out she'd fired me, gave me several weeks' pay, in cash, and apologized profusely for what was simply a bad situation.

Karma came when, less than six months' later, he fired Baby Mama for, shockingly enough, not doing her job and taking unauthorized time off of work to go vacation with her new boyfriend (probably to spite her ex-husband). As far as I know, he's still in business, although he had a few other employees leave rather disgruntled at the disorganized situation.

* * *

I've had a few other non-law jobs. Working at Taco Bell and waiting tables at Ruby Tuesday was largely uneventful, although food service sucks, and the money is crap (unless you wait tables somewhere swanky). My very first job was working for Great Steak & Potato Company in the mall, which is still open, and it says a lot about the place that I will still eat there. The franchise owner is an awesome guy and while food service sucks and the mall at Christmas time is a nightmare, I enjoyed working for him. We got to have free food on shift, which was awesome. The fries are fantastic, especially when you dip them in cheese sauce. Yum!

I also think it says a lot that I still recognize one of the assistant managers there. If you're willing to keep working for the same person for 15 years, that's a good indicator of a good boss. That's one thing I've learned over the years, is to ask why there's a position open, why have people been leaving. And ask around to find out if it's true, or if the place is a miserable revolving door. My last boss actually told me to call his former associate so I would know what kind of a boss he was. I thought that spoke volumes about him. And he was a damn good boss. Others... not so much.

Part 2 shall be "Lawyers (and Office Managers) Who Suck."

This week

2011-06-20T22:36:00.004-04:00

This week completely unraveled. I was all geared up today for a long night of getting stuff done, and pretty much everything disappeared. Meeting tomorrow morning canceled (yay), so I have another two days to get done what I was going to get done tonight for tomorrow's meeting. And a hearing got canceled for Wednesday (although I haven't notified opposing counsel about that yet... gotta have a chat with them tomorrow), and that situation is such a complete and utter clusterfuck, I can't even wrap my mind around it all yet, seriously. Ugh. Then I was asked to switch days for contract work to avoid awkwardness of newly-dismissed paralegal coming in to clear her stuff out of the office I use tomorrow (long story). Even the baby shower has been canceled for this Sunday. My calendar is quickly emptying, whew. Not complaining too much though. I'm sitting here blogging instead of doing work.

Last week was our bar association convention. I'm way over on my CLE's, so I wasn't going to attend, except that I ended up working a table for the MLP. That was a whole lot of boring, lemme tell you. During CLE sessions, I just read my book (I got through over half of the 1000 pages of "Pillars of the Earth" in those three days). Then during breaks, I got to stamp people's "passports" because if people got stamps from each exhibit table, they could enter a drawing for prizes (we gave away a Kindle). Maybe about 10 people were genuinely interested in what we do, and wanted to volunteer. One person made a donation, and another offhandedly said they intended to do so. We also attended the family law section meeting one evening, instead of getting the free food and booze at the Kick-Off party, to make a pitch for money. (I'm not a member of the family law section, because I can't figure out what exactly that will do for me, and they have the highest dues of any of the sections. After attending the meeting, I'm still not sure what they do. I'll stick to Young Lawyers and our $10 dues, thanks.) Anyway, that was pretty much it. I ditched the table in favor of seeing Erin Brockovich speak on Friday afternoon, which was awesome, and since our work was done, I attended a CLE session after that on Domestic Violence in Affluent Marriages, that was quite excellent (I was reluctant to go, because apparently the session on domestic violence the day before turned into some epic fail... again, long story). Had a night out with former classmates from grad school and a few from law school, as one of my friends who also did both programs was in town from DC for the convention. We went to our old grad school watering hole and had a great time. Reminds me how much I miss my grad school peeps and how grad school only holds great memories (whereas with my law school classmates, we merely bonded over our shared misery).

This weekend was pretty low key. On Friday, we had friends over for dinner. Saturday, we went to the bookstore (where we bought lots of Dora books), the music store (where I finally bought a replacement A string for my violin, a pitch pipe since mine went MIA, and a new copy of Suzuki book 1 since apparently they changed it and Cora can't use my 22 year old copy) and went to a cookout some friends were having. On Sunday, we hung out at home most of the day while it thunderstormed, then later walked around the Arboretum and followed it up with a trip to the liquor store to buy Husband some father's day gin (and where Cora learned the words "premises liability" after she tripped over a floor mat and fell down... she received a red balloon as compensation). After, we tried a new Mexican restaurant that was rated very highly on Yelp (I snobbishly couldn't believe that a Mexican restaurant outside of Mexington could be all that good, but I have to admit, it was pretty awesome).

Other stuff:

I'm ginormously pregnant and still have 14 weeks to go. I believe both me and the fetus find this to be way the fuck too long, as I think it's trying to dig its way out of my abdomen.

I've heard nothing about the job for which I interviewed. No love for Pregzilla, I'm guessing.

Book club meeting is this weekend for "Pillars of the Earth," which I've nearly finished. Woot for finishing a non-law book.

I'm becoming rather dismayed with my child's unfortunate twang developing in her accent, and am considering sending her off to a Swedish boarding school until it resolves. Things are becoming two-syllable words that are only supposed to have one syllable. Like, "Yea-ah." I am a native of this state, and except when it offers an advantage, do not speak with an accent. I'm snobby that way and have been since childhood, when even my elementary school teacher told me that "pin" and "pen" were homophones. Uh, no. They are also not two-syllable words. "Pee-yen" is not the correct pronunciation of either word. Of course, on occasion, when I'm tired, some twang slips in.

Over all, can't complain too much (other than about being Pregzilla, and such lengthy sobriety).

MILP Roundup #208

2011-06-20T15:29:00.004-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week Butterflyfish will have it.

Here it is:

LEO bakes.

WNWL has a year under her belt.

CM plays games.

Newlawmom will never endure the pain of imagining Epstein in the shower with Sharon Stone.

Dinei on bewb pumping.

Momttorney on Round Two.

LL has pictures.

Butterflyfish has drafts.

Googiebaba really is gay, and in Boston.

SuzieJD experiences Girl Drama.

RG has a one-year-old.

LC and digital camping.

-R- on the inappropriate.

EH versus Old People.

But I Do Have a Law Degree vaguely remembers life before kids.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

The Crazy Cult

2011-06-14T23:55:00.000-04:00

When I was 13, I was forced to have a meeting with the "Elders" of The Crazy Cult, which is like being called into the principal's office, except there are several of them there to scold you. The topic of discussion was the length of my dresses and skirts. I was advised that the length was much too short and, because of it, I was "sending out a sexual message" to the "brothers" of the congregation. That, because of my inappropriate clothing, I would make one of the brothers "stumble," and he would begin to think lewd thoughts about my body.

Wow, those are some pretty scandalous skirts, right? Yeah... My dresses came to the tops of my knees.

I still shudder just thinking about a bunch of closet pervs getting a stiffy every time they saw my 13 year old knees. In The Cult, they actually force the girls and women to wear skirts, we weren't allowed to wear pants. But it's my fault for... having knees, I guess. Kinda like it's the rape victim's fault for wearing a short skirt, because she was obviously asking for it? Gross. I was horrified and humiliated by that meeting, and certainly that's not the only time that sort of thing happened, and definitely not the worst. Thirty-one-year-old me wishes I could hop a ride on a time machine and crash that meeting, so I could punch some dirty old perverts in the dick and tell 13-year-old me not to let dirty old perverts make me feel bad about myself, ever.

That is just one very small example of the sort of perverted, misogynist bullshit I put up with throughout my childhood. Aside from the crap most people know about, like Jehovah's Witnesses not being allowed to celebrate any holidays including birthdays, recite the Pledge of Allegiance, or have a blood transfusion, there is a whole spectrum of brainwashing, manipulation, and control that goes into growing up in The Cult, particularly for women. The brainwashing runs deep, and I don't think most people escape it in a healthy manner. Maybe I didn't either, I don't know. But I'm definitely better off than most, I think. They never broke me.

I'm also lucky in a sense that, because I was never fully initiated, I was able to fade out instead of getting kicked out, or "disfellowshipped." Being disfellowshipped is the worst thing that can possibly happen to you in The Cult. That means you've done something really naughty. Like, maybe you got caught smoking a cigarette. Or getting to second base with your girlfriend. Or celebrating Christmas. Disfellowshipped! That means no one else (who doesn't also want to be disfellowshipped) can talk to you ever again, not even to smile politely or nod should you encounter them in public: you are one big leper. (Unless you jump through all of their hoops and adequately suffer enough humiliation that you are allowed to be "reinstated.") They will actually cross the street to avoid walking by you, because your sin will rub off on them. Frankly, I could give a shit less if any of those self-righteous hypocritical assholes acknowledge my existence ever again, and that's including my mother's two asshole brothers. My status is "inactive," and I slipped through the cracks. People can talk to me, although they are still discouraged from doing so, because I'm "bad association." (Well, they got that right, at least.)

Anyway, The Cult has decided to screw with me again, particularly my family, and now I'm having to restrain myself from punching dirty old men in the dick.

Cora's godfather, as I've mentioned before, has been my best friend for the past 13 years. Over the years, he's gotten to be very close to my mom, he even calls her Mommy. We consider him family. Recently, he started renting a room from her, because he needed an affordable place to live while he's in nursing school, and she needs the extra money. We don't really feel this is inappropriate, considering: 1. He's family; 2. He's gay; and 3. This is not the Stone Age.

However, The Cult found out about it. (Probably from driving by her house to see whose car is parked there. They seriously do that. A lot. But the psycho stalking is another post entirely.) So, of course, Mom ends up in a meeting with the Elders. They told her that him living there is dirty and sinful and "goes against the Bible." She told them that she is doing nothing inappropriate, and he is living there because he is family, and they both need the help. Obviously, they are not having sex. But then dirty closet perverts start going on about how there would still be inappropriate contact, because they would be sharing a shower, and they would see each other in their underwear, or naked even, and they would think about each other in sexual ways (cue dirty old men getting stiffies and needing some private time). Never mind that the setup of her place is two bedrooms on opposite ends of the building, each with its own bathroom. The only shared space is the living room and kitchen. You know, like most roommates. Oh, but what could the neighbors possibly be thinking?! (Uh, for the ones that don't actually mind their own business, she's told them he's her son.)

But, it gets better. Now comes the epically ignorant bigotry. Because, after all, he's gay, so he must have the AIDS! (And, for the record, no, he is not HIV-positive.) They start going on about how she will "catch an infection" from him, because they're sharing a shower (again with the shower fantasy) and they, gasp!, share dishes! Because everyone knows that every gay person has the AIDS and you get the AIDS by eating off of a plate that someone else previously eaten off of and you washed before using. I mean, duh!

Seriously. What kind of sick perverts come up with this stuff? However, when they couldn't convince her of the error of her ways, they played their trump card, which is threatening to disfellowship her if she doesn't have him out of her house in two weeks. Two weeks! That's actually violating state law. My response is, of course, I want to go punch them all in the dick.

Anyway, he's going to move out, not because Mom's making him, but because he told her he didn't want to be the reason she can't talk to her brothers anymore. (Again, I'd find that to be a big bonus.) And The Cult is her only source of socialization, really. She just won't go out and make friends otherwise.

Having extended-stay guests makes Husband irritable (mostly because then he actually has to wear pants around the house, but also because of his weird work/sleep schedule), so I sheepishly asked him if he minded him staying with us for awhile, until he can get something permanent. His answer was simply, "He's family. There's no question about it. Of course he stays with us."

And that's it exactly. He's family. And self-righteous hypocritical closet perverts can go suck a dick (which they probably are, after they've slipped it some roofies, but that's another story entirely). They have no idea what family means, because should one of their family members break the sacred rules of proper behavior, they shun them and never speak to them again. You know, because talking to one of your family members who ate birthday cake at an office party will stumble you. Dick punching... argh!

Fortunately, we think we found him a permanent place this fall. One of my friends from grad school is looking for new roommates. She rents a house nearby and split between three people it's $400/month for everything. That's twice what he's been paying Mom, so he has to talk it over with his parents, who are bankrolling his return to school. He might have to take more out in student loans to cover it, though, because money is tight everywhere. And Mom, of course, suddenly has to make do without the extra money each month, without any notice. Not a great time since my contract work has slowed tremendously, and I'll be off work without pay three months from now, in addition to paying for stuff babies need, so if she needs help, we'll be struggling to help her out. You think any of those dickwads in The Cult will help her out if she needs it? Hell no. It's on us. Her family. You know, the people she's not technically supposed to talk to because we aren't members of The Cult.

So, I've just been on fire the past few days. Shit like this brings up all the trauma I endured from these whackos, and makes me seriously pissed off. I need to channel it into something positive, like start writing a book, but I'm still just too angry, even to file a lawsuit (although the best cause of action I can think of is intentional interference with a business contract, for which a lease agreement doesn't quite fit). I'd rather just punch someone in the dick.

You can lead a horse to water...

2011-06-12T14:53:00.004-04:00

You can't make people make good choices. Working in Family Law is a constant reminder of that. Then again, so is my own family.

I have a (now former) stepsister, thanks to my (now estranged) father's remarriage (and subsequent divorce). I've only met her once, and honestly, can scarcely recall doing so (they live in Minnesota). I am still in contact with my (former) stepmother, but recently my stepsister has been contacting me. Today she called me wanting information about child custody, because her ne'er-do-well baby daddy is threatening to get full custody of their infant daughter and is trying to kick her out of their apartment (because he's sleeping with someone new... and hopefully that chick is smart enough to make him use a condom, because he's currently married to someone else and has children with that woman to whom he isn't paying his child support, in addition to having fathered a child with my stepsister. Winner!)

Of course, I can't really help her (she lives in Missouri, I'm not licensed there), and could only tell her generally speaking that family court judges don't usually award sole custody to deadbeat dads with a (recent and ongoing) criminal record and an ongoing drinking problem, so don't let him bully you, but that she should go visit her local Legal Aid office before things go any further. Also, of course, that she should get rid of this loser as soon as possible, before she ends up on the receiving end of a removal order because she's endangering her child's welfare by keeping this drunken idiot around, and her kid ends up in foster care. Is she going to do so? No, of course not. Last time I talked to her about this, she "loves him." (Cue vomiting noise.) That inspired her to move to Missouri with him in the first place. Now he's threatening to leave her homeless and take their child. Love is not enough.

I don't know what makes women stay with losers like that, or even be with losers like that in the first place. Not that I have a lot of room to talk about making good choices when it comes to men, or about staying in bad relationships way too long, but shit, none of them were *that* bad and besides, once you have a child in the equation, you have to make the tough decisions to do what's best for your kid, not what you want, just because you "love him." Or because you don't want to live with family members who are going to treat you like a child and try to make you live by their household rules. You have to suck it up and do what's best for your kid, and if that means swallowing your pride and living with a grandmother who is a crazy Bible thumper, which is her only choice at this point, I think you go buy a Bible and thump it along with her until you can do better for your kid. Otherwise, when the Cabinet comes and takes your child, you don't have much room to say you aren't guilty of neglect because you didn't leave the drunken idiot when you knew he was a danger to your child.

But I don't have the answers. I don't know why something that seems very simple to me is very difficult for other people. I had a childhood friend who was in the middle of a family court action for neglect (again, thanks to the loser she was keeping around her kids) and was ordered to drug test. Even though she doesn't use drugs (she says), she wasn't making it in to test, because she didn't have a car and no one could give her a ride. She said she couldn't afford the bus fare to get there, and her Cabinet worker had dropped the ball on getting her a bus pass. I'm like, you can afford to buy cigarettes, but you can't afford bus fare? Really? You know, if I were in those court proceedings, and passing my drug screens meant I could get my kid back sooner, I'd effing walk there.

But I continue to struggle with this with my own clients. It's a lot of a failure to just follow through with basic things. For instance, I have one client who I need to get some records for a hearing that is next week. She cannot get me a signed release. I just need her to sign the thing and mail it back to me, and it's been two weeks and numerous emails from me and I just cannot get her to follow through. I can't figure it out. Then again, I can't get certain other clients to pay their damn bills either, so maybe I'm just missing something here.

I don't know what I can possibly do to make other people do what they should be doing, but if anyone has the answer to that, I will give you a cookie.

Interviews and other misadventures

2011-06-07T00:08:00.008-04:00

Had my interview today, and I think it went okay. Hopefully they like me, at least enough for a second interview. I can never figure out how interviews go. The worst interviews I have end up with job offers, and the ones where I think, they love me, they will definitely hire me... I get no love. I at least tried to look my best. I struggled to stuff myself into one of my nicer suits that was too big for me prior to the pregnancy because of the weight I'd lost (in a size 14), but is snug now thanks to the baby bump. I didn't want to go to the interview in one of my usual frumpy maternity suits, that are actually made from washable material (probably good in case my water breaks in the middle of court or something horrific). However, it might have just looked painful, since I was ready to pop a button on my jacket. Ugh, pregzilla. So, we'll see if they're into me in spite of the baby bump. Apparently they aren't interviewing as many people as I initially thought they were, so that's cool.

The interview was a little awkward at times. Like, I totally suck at the "personal" questions. So, in an awesome Sarah Palin-esque word salad, I had to talk about myself, things that will make me stand out. (The word salad might just be it. But at least I wasn't rambling incoherently about events in American history, and failing at it.) They asked what I do in my free time. Obviously, let's not talk about gestating or child-rearing... so what else do I do? Self-aggrandizing blogging? Probably not a good idea. Drinking excessive amounts of alcohol when not gestating? Nope. Liberal politics? Too risky. So, instead I outed myself as an epic nerd and started talking sci-fi. A gamble, but the lady was actually on my wavelength, and we talked Doctor Who. Not bad, I definitely appreciate fellow ladies who appreciate good sci-fi!

Anyway, the job sounds awesome. The billable hour requirement isn't bad (1800 hours a year), and hopefully the salary will be decent too. The last firm I interviewed with (that ultimately hired no one) only had a 1600 hour requirement. (Still disappointed about that one, they are really casual and fun.) The last midsize firm I worked for (that pushed me out during my maternity leave), after initiating an ugly coup against a named partner, started a 2000 hour requirement, which was completely laughable considering they only paid new associates $40K a year and liked to dump the non-billable subros on the unsuspecting newbies. (And they wonder why they're a revolving door for young associates, and why associates will walk out the door with a partners' clients and go to another firm.)

Other than the interview, I also had the follow-up ultrasound this morning. Since it was so early, we took Cora with us. She was pretty excited about seeing pictures of "her baby." (She's already claimed ownership.) She proudly showed off the ultrasound photo the tech gave her. All is normal so far, and there's still no penis. Cora would have been pretty devastated if her little sister turned out to have a penis, so that's good. Got another ultrasound scheduled for 32 weeks. I think we could probably be done with it at this point but, hell, since our insurance is actually covering these ultrasounds, why not.

Swim class is a bust, unfortunately. The Y sucks and wouldn't let us into the class, even though the class turned out to not be full, but they couldn't bother to get back with me even though I kept calling and bugging them about it. We were going to pay the non-member rate for the swim class, since Cora's friend is taking the class. I've kinda had it with the Y anyway, considering they recently jacked up their rates. We canceled our membership because of it, but were considering a summer membership for the pool, but they aren't offering any specials. It would be $400 to join for the summer, which is ridiculous. So much for the Y being for the poor folk. It's now one of the most expensive gyms in town, and definitely is not the nicest. Oh well. We'll look into swim classes somewhere else, maybe.

We did go to the pool yesterday, with our friends. It was nice to float in the water, it was the first time in several weeks that I felt like a normal weight, and not like I'm carrying a ton of bricks. I haven't even gained 10 pounds, but I feel like I've gained 100. Also, since I wasn't very pregnant during the summer the last time, I guess I didn't have the problem of (warning: TMI) not being able to prune my lady garden, because I can no longer even see my lady garden. Ugh! I need to make a salon appointment and get some waxing done, obviously.

Other goings on: Husband is probably going to cut off his limbs with a chainsaw, because he is convinced that is the proper method to dispose of the "junk tree" in our backyard, that he only suddenly cares about because our neighbor the master gardener mentioned it disapprovingly, as it is an "invasive species," whatever that means. (I figure if we leave it there long enough, she'll cut it down herself, kinda like how they edge our lawn for us. They clearly disapprove of us and our lame attempts at yard upkeep, they're just too nice to say so.) I have failed to convince him to hire a service to do it. A friend has convinced him to try a handsaw first, hopefully he'll only cut off a few fingers that way.

In other gardening misadventures, Husband was convinced that his new bird feeder could not be reached by the massively fat squirrels we have, eating everything in sight. The squirrels tore down the last feeder he'd bought and busted the thing open.

So, here was today's exchange:

Me: I thought you said the squirrels couldn't get to your new bird feeder?

Husband: They can't. There's no way.

Me: Funny. Because there's two of them out there making mad love to your feeder as we speak.

Husband: Damnit!!! Those bastards! (Looks out the kitchen window, and sees Big Fat Squirrel hanging upside down, embracing the feeder, and shoving his fat little face into the birdseed, while another is picking up his scraps from the ground underneath; cue Husband running outside in his underwear to shout obscenities at said squirrels while chasing them.)

Fun times.

Happenings

2011-06-02T20:11:00.004-04:00

1. All work and no play. I opted to skip a second trip to Chicago Memorial Day weekend, in order to stay home and get work done. I was very productive, while Husband and Cora had a good time with his family. Husband's grandparents celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary (with seven children and six children-in-laws, 21 grandchildren and 6 (almost 7) grandchildren-in-laws, and 6 (almost 8) great-grandchildren to show for), so they had a big party, including a pig roast.

Sorry to miss it, but I just couldn't take much more travel/time away right now. I used the time to clean our disgusting house and get some things organized, including my files. The only room left to organize is the new baby's room, which is currently filled with clothes that I can't wear right now, clothes Cora has grown out of, and various other things that need to be packed away. Once I get my clothes out, I'm letting Husband deal with the rest. Then we'll have to figure out how to turn it into a nursery, while still keeping the queen size bed in there. (Figure eventually the bed will be the kid's, so might as well leave it in there for now, provided it still fits with the crib in there.) So, now the idea is to start getting Cora to clean up after herself. She does it at school, she needs to start doing it at home. I reorganized her room so that she can get to all of her toys and put them back when she's done. We'll see how that goes.

2. Summertime. Soon, we start back with ballet classes for the summer. We're waitlisted for swim class at the Y, but they think we'll get a spot. And we went yesterday to observe another little girl's violin lesson, so we're thinking of starting violin in the fall. The little girl is 4 and she's playing actual songs on the violin, which I thought was pretty amazing. It'll be awhile before Cora can do that, I'm sure, but after interacting with her, the teacher thought she was ready. Usually she doesn't take students until 4 1/2, and Cora will be almost 4 when she starts lessons in August. Husband's balking at the price, but at $25 a lesson, that's only $5 more than I was paying for lessons a decade ago. Cora's really excited about it too. Maybe it will inspire me to buy a new A string for my violin (which I popped like a year ago) and start playing again. I need to buy new Suzuki books, mine are now 22 years old! (And I have no idea where the CDs are.)

3. Possibilities. That firm that I thought was totally not into me? They're totally into me! At least until they meet me on Monday and see my huge preggo belly. I'm obviously not going to mention the big elephant in the room (being me and my preggo belly), and hope they'll mistake me for just being a fatty. My gut isn't quite out past my bewbs yet (I have ginormous bewbs), so maybe they'll be totally impressed by me, fail to notice I'm pregnant, offer me the job, and then I'll be all, "What, like, really? You didn't notice I'm six months pregnant? Did you just think I'm hugely fat? I'm totally offended! And, yeah, I'll be needing a couple weeks off in September and a private place to pump my bewbs when I get back."

So, trying to not get my hopes up about the job, but I really want the job! I'm not in a position where I'm so desperate for a job that I'm applying to anywhere and everywhere and willing to work at some nightmare revolving-door firm. I'm making do just fine. But this firm has good people working in it, and I would like to work there too.

4. So I can put my car out of its misery and buy one where shit doesn't fall off of it. Money Pit is back in the shop. The check oil light flickered again, and it's low on oil, apparently oil leaking out of it. Mechanic says it's a valve bracket type thingamabob and nothing serious. But another $200 dropped. Awesome.

5. And can afford daycare for two children. We pay $166 a week for preschool for Cora, full time. Full time for infants at our daycare is now a whopping $207/week. For having two kids there, we'll get a 10% discount on Cora's tuition. $356.40/week for child care. Yikes. Still think we should find a part-time nanny and have Husband watch the baby on his days off work until the kid's old enough to give a crap where she is and what she's doing. We didn't put Cora into daycare until she was about 8 months old, fortunately my mom was able to watch her two days a week and we were able to work out the rest.

6. Anniversaries. I was pregnant on our one-year wedding anniversary, and I'm pregnant again on our five-year wedding anniversary, which is tomorrow. Five years. We got married the summer before I started law school, then delayed our honeymoon until the end of summer when I was ready to quit my job, spend two weeks in Europe, and come back to start law school. Five years later, we've got one kid and another on the way, I've been practicing law for two years, and he's been a nurse practitioner for one year. Lots of accomplishments!

MILP Roundup #205

2011-05-29T11:40:00.003-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week Butterflyfish will have it.

Here's what's up with the Moms in the Legal Profession:

Googiebaba on childhood obesity.

PT-Lawmom has big girl panties on.

Newlawmom's kids had fun until she took the video gaming system away. (I guess it's the modern equivalent of the T-Bird.)

RG has an update on Jack's little friend Benny.

-R- is a master stalker, and Shannon is a master spy.

LC needs a challenge.

Cowgirl in the City shows off the dimples.

WNWL has art.

LEO ponders naming etiquette.

LL has a day in the life of two working parents.

SuzieJD needs medical attention.

Momttorney has a photo.

Dakota is fieldtripping.

CM is jetsetting.

Dinei points out how those of us over 30 are really just lucky to have made it to adulthood.

Jenny continues her adventures in the Suck that is family law.

After loss, EH finds cheer in the most random of places.

Butterflyfish considers friendship.

Izzie enjoys summer employment.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

Busy busy

2011-05-26T16:28:00.002-04:00

I've gotten several new cases over the past week, most of which are even paid, hurray! Makes up for my contract work being slow at my friend's office.

I think I'm starting to get the hang of this solo practice stuff. There are certainly benefits to it. For instance, doing my work in my bed propped up with the body pillow. Awesome. Sure, it's not stellar money, but there doesn't seem to be stellar money to be found around here. There was a job posting that I did not apply to, where the starting salary is $35K a year for a job where I'd have to drive 30 miles one way to get to the office (it's in a surrounding county, but it's on the east side, and I live on the west side... also traffic getting there is a nightmare). And it's exactly what I'm doing now, except working for someone else's small firm. That's okay. I'm making about that with what I'm doing now. Also, I can deduct a bunch of expenses, so I'm not paying as much in taxes. And, usually, I don't work that hard. This week I worked very hard, but it was an action-packed week.

Anyway, I worked on my website content and asked a friend to look it over and get some feedback. I want my website to not just be "here's my info and what I practice, call me," but I also wanted it to be informational about the areas of law I practice, particularly concerning domestic relations. Just basic stuff like "what happens in a divorce."

So, check one thing off of my to do list. Only about a billion more to go!

Raptured

2011-05-21T12:26:00.003-04:00

In honor of the end of the world today, I thought I would address the Epic Stupid that is the evangelical, apocalyptic "the world is going to end any minute now!" religious nutbags.

First, if those idiots are right, they can just head on up to heaven or whatever without me, because I don't want to be there. What a snoozefest that would be.

Second, when inevitably your predictions are completely and utterly wrong, what happens to the "faithful" who believed all your bullshit? Well, for instance, they have no retirement fund, because, shit, why would you save for retirement when the world is going to end any minute now? Why would you save for your kids' college? Why would you go to school and get an education so you can get a good job and provide security for your future, because the world's going to end any minute now?! Yeah, when I was a kid, I was told that the world was going to end before I ever reached adulthood, so what am I worrying about the future for? Heh.

Or maybe, just maybe, we all survive. At least for another few billion years until our Sun supernovas, of course.

Lawyerin'

2011-05-19T13:12:00.003-04:00

I have a new divorce client to meet with tomorrow, a referral from the pro bono program. I will definitely get my 40 hours of pro bono in this year, that's for sure! But the volunteering is also good, because we just had some major rule changes in family court (like, we finally have actual family court rules, as opposed to just civil rules), and the pro bono program provides forms. While I'm reasonably certain that I made all the appropriate changes to my forms to comply with the rules, I'm happier to take their forms, since they work with the judges to make sure their forms are compliant. And the law is what the judge says the law is, after all.

Next week, I'll be in court for three days, in three different counties. On Monday for my friend's firm, on Tuesday for myself (to pick up some new court appointments... apparently there are 15 new cases on the docket and we only get court appointments if we're there now), and Wednesday for the non-profit. Hoping to get a good result in the case on Wednesday, it's another moldy house case. In addition to being the queen of insurance defense, I was also the queen of mold. I've worked on enough mold litigation that I can tell you more than you ever wanted to know about mold. I even did my scientific evidence seminar paper, in part, on mold. So, doing landlord-tenant stuff when it involves mold, seems like fate. Not a particularly pleasant fate, but oh well. Mold is gross.

I decided to make a list of goals to meet to help motivate me. Goals for the month of May include:

1. Figuring out what the crap I should put on my website. Submitting crap for website to be approved by advertising section of state bar.

2. Getting my personal injury cases wrapped up. Hate those. Reluctant to take anymore, even if they are easy money.

3. Starting on effort to brush up on Spanish. Thinking 10 minutes a day would be a good start, to slowly increase.

4. Putting together a reading list of practice books for unfamiliar areas of law that would be useful. Then I can start reading those over the summer.

Still Not Into Me

2011-05-18T11:52:00.003-04:00

I applied to yet another insurance defense firm. This one wanted someone with 2-4 years in insurance defense. Okay, so I have 4 years of paralegal work in insurance defense, and (almost) 2 years of lawyerin'. But still. I'm awesome. And... no response.

Seriously. It's starting to hurt my feelings that no one's jumping at giving me an interview. I mean, the last insurance defense firm (that ultimately hired no one) was excited to interview me. Why is it that people who want to give me a job have no openings, and people who have openings don't want me? Blah.

Anyway, I got a tip about a new program where there's some money to pay an hourly fee for some domestic relations work out in boofoo. Not thrilled about traveling to boofoo places to practice family law in an unfamiliar venue, but hey, beggers can't be choosers. And I'm a few months from being able to get on the discount divorce list (our local bar association does reduced-fee referrals for the folks who don't qualify for pro bono, but can't afford to pay full price for a lawyer).

Oh well. I'm just trying to get those credit cards paid off so that I have a little extra wiggle-room to figure out what the hell to do with myself. At some point it's going to become "shit or get off the pot" when it comes to solo practice. A friend offered a year ago to put up a website for me. I've never gotten him the content. There just keeps this part of me that thinks, "Someone will hire me eventually. Prince Charming will swoop in, offer me a big salary, and I'll slave away for the billable hour at a living wage." I think not. And working for the non-profit is fine, but things are not getting better with the individual from the other organization, she's annoying the piss out of me. My responses to her are getting increasingly rude, and at some point the response is just going to be "fuck off." Which probably won't go over well.

So, I can either sit around and bitch about my lot in life, or I can do something about it. I figure the timeline is this: I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing for right now, pop out a baby, and after the new year, seriously start practice-building. Like, advertising for clients, getting office space here in Mexington (where there aren't any law offices), brush up on my Spanish and target my practice to the folks in my neighborhood. That's old people and Latinos. Estate planning, probate, social security, and immigration. So, that's about six months to accomplish that. I've done some estate planning and probate recently, so starting to get the hang of it. But I need to go bug the local immigration clinic about volunteering so I can get my feet wet. I could get a lot of referrals from my neighbor who works at the university in a science department where they hire a lot of international students and employees. She was complaining that her Canadian employee spent thousands of dollars in legal fees to be "legal." I don't see why folks can't give me thousands of dollars in legal fees, right? I just need to know what I'm doing.

That's the problem with being a solo and a young lawyer. During the time where you're just supposed to be learning to actually do your job, you also have to build and run a business. That sucks. I hate the business end of things. But I am more confident that I know what I'm doing, or at least have the tools to find out when I don't. Two years practicing law, over a decade in the profession as a whole. Hasn't killed me yet.

MILP Roundup #203

2011-05-15T21:50:00.001-04:00

...was at Butterflyfish. Next week at PT-Lawmom. Then here.

Being Pissy

2011-05-09T20:08:00.003-04:00

Okay, maybe pissy isn't the right word. Maybe it's "raging bitch." But oh well. I'd like to blame it on pregnancy hormones, but I'm pretty sure it's just a product of my general dissatisfaction with my career, underemployment and lack of income, that makes me more susceptible to being pissed off. Oh well.

Today there was my email snark exchange with a colleague today who constantly bombards me with emails/text messages, because since her actual supervisee is out on medical leave, she has been completely all up in my shit. But she fails to actually read my responses, then gets pissy with me that I never responded. She also, to my great irritation, sends every email to two of my email accounts. Both of which are loaded into my iPhone. Both of which send push notifications of new email, so I get every email nearly instantly, meaning there's no reason to send it to more than one account, it just clogs up my inboxes with duplicate emails. So when she's all "oh, I sent this email last week to BOTH of your email accounts and you never responded," my thought is sothefuckwhat? On this particular occasion, I responded to her email literally three minutes after she sent the email to me (to BOTH of my accounts), which she clearly failed to read. So being a raging bitch today, I forwarded it to her, pointed out that it was sent three minutes after she sent her email, and told her to stop sending every damn email in duplicate, it doesn't make me want to respond to her emails any faster, considering she doesn't read them anyway. I've been brushing it off so far and saying, oh, gosh, there just must be something wrong with the email, since you aren't getting my emails; however, let's be honest, the problem exists between her chair and her keyboard. But apparently her not reading the email is all my fault, because I should have responded not to the email address from which she sent the email, but to her other email address which she copied on said email, because I fucking read minds. You know why I didn't do a "reply all"? Because I didn't want to get another fucking email in my fucking inbox! Not to mention the fact that I'm a part time employee, and on my days not working for the program, I'd like to actually get some of my work done, and not dick around answering pointless fucking emails that can wait until the next day, but if I don't respond, she bombards me with more messages/phone calls, like the day recently she knew I was out for a funeral and she was blowing up my phone. Not pleased at all. If I have to put up with that sort of bullshit from people who aren't even my boss, then I definitely want a real job, with a real paycheck.

Anyway, more raging bitchdom: Apparently I offended my mother yesterday by daring to be upset that she failed to return my child to me (yet again) when I asked her to, and didn't answer my phone calls/texts for 3 hours while I'm trying to figure out where the fuck my kid is. Seriously, if she can't manage to bring her back when I ask her to, then she doesn't need to take her out of the house. Like, maybe I wanted to actually see my kid on Mother's Day, instead of spending the day by myself, sitting around waiting for my kid to get home? Especially since my mother isn't supposed to celebrate Mother's Day, because she's in a crazy cult. Grr. She wanted Cora to spend the night, and I was like, sure, that's fine, just bring her back early in the afternoon. Yeah, she brought her back at 5pm. I was not happy, especially since I suspected she might have brought Cora to her crazy cult meeting, which runs from 2:30 to 4:30. (I can't confirm that. But I figure if she did, Chatterbox would have ratted her out by now.) The last time she did this, Cora spent the night at her house and I told her Husband's parents are coming into town the next day, they will be here at 11, and we are going to lunch when they get here, so make sure she's back in time. Yeah. She doesn't show up until after noon, and she already fed Cora lunch, which meant she was going to be bored and irritating during our lunch. WTF? Anyway, she was apparently whining to Cora's godfather about how she just never gets to see Cora (apparently three times a week isn't enough), and how everyone was picking on her, because we were trying to figure out where the hell she was. Boo hoo. Yeah, you know what? You want to see a kid every day? Adopt one. This one's mine, and I get to decide where she goes, and when. I certainly expect to be able to get in touch with the person who has my kid, because knowing where she is, is my responsibility! GRRRR.

So, clearly the theme of the week is boundaries, and other people not having any.

MILP Roundup #202

2011-05-08T23:28:00.003-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week, Butterflyfish will have it.

Happy Mother's Day to the Moms in the Legal Profession...

First, congrats to the Shameless Domestic Hussy!

Googiebaba speaks on gratitude.

-R- is getting noticed.

Lag Liv comments on working motherhood.

EH hates mother's day.

RG has a tough summer ahead.

LC and Butterflyfish are on the run.

Cristy has been painting.

Momttorney is light.

CM is returning from babyland.

Dinei says good-bye to her classmates.

Izzie has an independent baby.

WNWL is sinking.

SuzieJD needs patience.

Dakota is patronizing art.

LEO is having a girl.

Jenny is trying to make it through the semester alive.

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

They're Still Not That Into Me

2011-05-07T01:20:00.003-04:00

I applied for the insurance defense job a couple weeks ago, the same firm that rejected me 1L year for a clerkship because I'd already worked for two previous insurance defense firms and they "didn't have anything more to offer me." (Oh, and I also remember the guy commenting that because I didn't list my gpa or class rank on my resume that it must be horrible. WTF? Like, it wasn't that bad, but shit, it wasn't anything to write home about. Mediocrity, I has it.) Anyway, I submitted my resume, cover letter and writing sample and... I've heard nothing. Lame. I tried to not get my hopes up, but the idea of a regular paycheck and practicing in a comfortable and familiar area of law (and escaping the insanity of family law) was pretty enticing, even if it is the soul-suck of insurance defense. Oh well. Maybe they'll send me one of those lovely rejection letters where they talk about how impressed they were by my resume, and how (some other firm) will be lucky to have me. I just wish someone would have the balls to write an honest rejection letter. Like...

Dear Proto Attorney:

Thank you for your resume. However, we were definitely not impressed enough to hire you over the managing partner's nephew.

It was really cute that you thought you had a chance of working for our firm. Since you did not put down your GPA, probably because you were lied to and told no one cares what your GPA was after your first job, we assume you graduated with a 0.000023 GPA and spent all of law school wearing a dunce cap and drooling on yourself. You weren't on Journal, even the crappy Journal; you weren't on moot court, and you weren't on the trial team. It's like you just showed up to law school and didn't even bother to try to hide books from your classmates or be an obnoxious gunner. We bet you didn't even tab your text book and color code your highlighting. Instead, you probably spent most of your time on Facebook and updating your self-aggrandizing blog, devoted to discussing your other hobby, which apparently is breeding. Oh, and we don't like people who breed. It interferes with billable hours.

Feel free to reapply when you manage to add "Harvard," "Top 10" and at least one Big Law firm in your employment history on your resume. Or you marry someone with the same last name as one of our partners.

In the meantime, we wish you the best of luck in your continued "practice of law," as you and the rest of your underemployed classmates fight for the scraps from us real lawyers. We're certain you will find working for peanuts from the few clients who occasionally pay you to be extremely rewarding.

Sincerely,

Not Your Future Boss

Now that I could respect. Just be honest and cut the bullshit. Sigh.

Oh well. This weekend is Mother's Day... I got tickets for me, my mom and Cora to go tomorrow afternoon to see a local ballet company perform "Rapunzel." That's pretty much it. Husband's working five shifts in a row. He asked if I wanted any gifts, but I can't think of anything I want, other than the turn signal thingy to not be hanging off the side of the Money Pit. (Yeah, newest development is shit just falls off of my car. Awesome.) Oh, it definitely would have been nice to have a real paycheck -- I could have put the Money Pit out of my misery and gotten a car that isn't a piece of shit. Suck.

Random thoughts on global affairs and domestic stupidity

2011-05-03T12:26:00.000-04:00

So, of course, the big news this week is that Osama bin Laden is dead, killed by U.S. forces in a raid in Pakistan. (Cue singing in the streets of New York and Washington.)

Funny things come of such news.

Funny. (And not meant to be taken seriously. One hopes.)

Unfortunately, there's also this:

"Let's be clear on this: OBAMA did NOT kill Bin Laden. An American soldier, who Obama just a few weeks ago was debating on whether or not to PAY, did. Obama just happened to be the one in office when our soldiers finally found OBL and took him out. This is NOT an Obama victory, but an AMERICAN victory!! REPOST IF YOU AGREE!!!"

Not funny. And this has so much stupid in it, it makes my brain shut down.

There have been many different reactions to the death of bin Laden, from celebration to grave concern, which all have merit. But my pet peeve is when people base their reactions on half-truths, platitudes and blind patriotism, that simply continues our stupidity. So, let's clarify a few things.

1. "Obama did not kill bin Laden." Nope, neither did Bush. In fact, I can't think of the last time a president of the United States ever picked up a deadly weapon and ended someone's life. So, it's kinda stupid to be all "Oh, Obama didn't kill bin Laden, a SOLDIER did." Yes, thank you, Captain Obvious.

But to give all of the credit to the U.S. military for the success of the operation is equally ridiculous. "Soldiers" did not "find" Osama bin Laden. A sophisticated network of U.S. Intelligence Officers pieced together years of gathered intel until they finally had a break, reasonably believed they had located bin Laden and, after a great deal of vetting of the intel, the President sent in a team of Navy SEALs in helicopters to storm the compound in Pakistan. This is what you call a team effort. The CIA couldn't have done it without the intel from the prisoners captured by the military. Neither the CIA nor the military could have done it without support from the Administration in the form of resources and personnel to gather and process the intel. The military wouldn't have done it at all if it wasn't for the order of the President who had to weigh what was purely circumstantial evidence of the target's location. Team effort.

So, sorry to disappoint all you haters out there. The President does deserve a lot of credit here. He had to make the call to go ahead with a mission that was dangerous and could have devastating consequences (a Mogadishu-type of epic fail comes to mind). Not to mention he deserves credit for shifting resources back to the Afghanistan front, as the former president does for initiating the effort. Congress deserves some credit for continuing to fund the efforts in Afghanistan. The CIA, in spite of its less-than-favorable methods of interrogation, had their Jack Bauer moment of awesomeness in a very rare public victory. And the military implemented a successful operation that resulted in the elimination of a dangerous, criminal mastermind without American casualties. This success does come at a high cost of human life over the past decade, and a great deal of mismanagement and bungling by those very same agencies and individuals. So, if you want to get uppity about who gets the proper credit, then you should give the proper credit, not just make blanket statements about the military that are factually misleading and ignore the contributions of others.

2. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that Congress makes the budget, not the executive branch, and both parties were squabbling like whiny little children and almost shut down the government and froze everyone's pay. But what do I know. Let's just blame it all on Obama, it can't be anyone else's fault.

3. More important than who gets credit/blame is the question of what now? The death of bin Laden aside, the mission itself has some significant foreign policy implications. Pakistan... oh my. Although the US certainly stops short of saying so, the Administration clearly believed Pakistan to have (at least enough) ties to bin Laden that notification to the Pakistani government of the impending raid would have jeopardized the mission. That's pretty significant. What's also significant is that bin Laden has apparently been in that elaborate compound for over 5 years, which also happened to be in a military town, down the street from a military college. How embarassing! What could have been a foreign policy nightmare for Washington if the intel proved wrong has instead given the US a great deal of new pull with Pakistan, political leverage that will need to be used wisely.

Will there be retaliation? Probably. Although bin Laden's death is a significant blow to al Qaeda, it is certainly not that large of a blow. It is more of a symbolic gesture. There are others who will take his place. But it may very well escalate the effort on both sides. The US, previously riding a tide of discontent for foreign war, is rejuvenated by this success. The extremists will not view this as a defeat, but as an opportunity.

Cause to celebrate or not, the reality is that bin Laden's death is not the end. It does not undo the damage he and his co-conspirators have caused, the lives they have taken. The September 11 attacks are the big one, but the cockroach had been around for quite awhile before then. Although I wish they could have taken him alive, so that he could be tried and fully answer for his crimes, he certainly had it coming.

Ready to Go

2011-04-26T21:03:00.002-04:00

I got the Money Pit repaired tonight. I had to get up crazy early this morning to drop the beast off at the dealership so Husband could give me a lift back home. Fortunately, the problem was just that Hillbilly Mechanic put a hose on backwards, and everything else checks out fine. So, it cost me another $100, but oh well. Add it to the total I've paid for the piece of crap. Of course, the dealer went through a checklist of things and marked that I have cracks in my drive belts. Like, OMG, I don't even know what those are! They didn't tell me I should replace them, it's just on the sheet of paper. My regular mechanic hasn't mentioned it, nor did the Hillbilly Mechanic. Is the Money Pit going to explode again?! Aargh!! I hate that car!! One incentive for getting a real job is being able to sell the Money Pit (or push it off a cliff) and buy a new one.

Anyway, I just need to do laundry tonight, pack tomorrow, and tie up some loose ends before I head out of town. We're headed up to the Chicago 'burbs for a cousin's wedding, and going to spend a day in Chicago to take Cora to the aquarium and visit some friends. Should be fun. Then when I get back to town I need to really buckle down and get some work done, and start getting "the green room" ready for the new addition. (I hope the kid likes green, because I'm not painting it again until she's old enough to wield a paintbrush.)

Fun with Preschoolers

2011-04-25T23:19:00.003-04:00

This morning I woke to the usual morning sound of Husband and Cora arguing. I had to intervene. He gets impatient with her, she digs in her heels and refuses to do anything he asks, and it all goes downhill from there. Especially when he's worked the night before and he's tired. Part of the problem with their mornings is that he wants to rush her out the door and off to school because he's tired, but she wants to spend time with him because she missed him. They do a lot better when he hasn't worked the night before.

We had a talk about it later, me trying to help him understand why they fight so much: She's my mini me! She doesn't like to be told what to do, she's stubborn and independent. So, if you want her to do something, you have to explain to her that it needs to be done, even while you're being firm. You can't just bark commands at her or she shuts down, and then everybody has a bad morning. Yes, she knows what she's supposed to do in the mornings, but she likes to feel like she has some sort of control over it, starting with the clothes she wears and ending with the place she's going. She wants to be part of the dialog. For instance, instead of grabbing clothes out of the drawer and saying, "Here, get dressed," you have to ask her what she'd like to wear that day. She'll choose a shirt and a pair of pants. She even wants to choose her panties and her socks. You can't say, "Go brush your teeth," you have to say, "Hey, after we brush our teeth, we can go see our friends at school! Let's go brush our teeth!" It's all about the presentation. It's preschool diplomacy. ~~The art of preschool diplomacy is saying "nice doggy" until you find a rock.~~ The art of preschool diplomacy is getting the preschooler to do what you want while making her believe it was something she wanted to do in the first place.

Not to mention, I set firm boundaries with her in advance to mitigate arguments later. Like, I might tell her she can watch one episode of Dora in the evening before bedtime, but tell her that she has to promise there will be no whining after, and then we will have to go to bed. She can watch more Dora tomorrow. There are times she'll still whine or cry if she's really tired or grumpy, but normally she'll comply without argument, and repeat that there was only one Dora and it's now bedtime.

But since I also understand Cora all too well, I know that she needs help in developing control over her emotions. When she gets worked up, I try to get her to calm down and talk through it so that she'll verbalize her emotions, instead of just melting down. And that's every 3 year old, I know, but that was really not something I was good at as a kid, even when older. Part of it is probably because whenever I'd be upset about something, my mother would just yell at me and tell me to stop crying (yeah, that's helpful). To this day, I'm still a crier when I get extremely angry/frustrated and I can't even verbalize the emotions or express them in healthier ways (like punching a retail customer in the face, which was unfortunately frowned upon). So, I want Cora to work on those skills, and that's our job to help her.

Anyway, I think Husband's a little stressed about the upcoming additional female in the house. But we'll work through it. At least until the excrement hits the rotary oscillator.

Hmmm....

2011-04-25T19:06:00.002-04:00

Not that I'm considering myself a shoo-in, but a local insurance defense firm is looking for an associate. Being the former queen of insurance defense, and having experience in all of their practice areas from the plaintiffs' side, surely I can at least land an interview (and at least I'm not showing too much yet, I can still pass for fat... I can drop the pregnancy bomb when I get an offer and let them know I'll need a few weeks off!) Unless some unemployed douchebag from a better school decides to apply. Always a possibility. Anyway, do I really want to go back to slaving away for the billable hour and driving all over the state to attend motion hours in bumblefuck? Well, if it means not practicing family law and having a regular paycheck with a living wage...

Eastering

2011-04-25T00:48:00.005-04:00

Even as a Catholic, I have to include "Happy Zombie Jesus Day!" and piss off all the prudes out there, because it cracks me up. I mean, if ya can't laugh at Jesus rising from the dead after the crucifixion where he died for sins with a hankering for brains, what can you laugh at? I'm pretty sure God has a phenomenal sense of humor.

So, to celebrate the death and resurrection of Our Lord and Savior and the miracle of bunnies crapping out chocolate eggs, the in-laws came to town. While they got settled in, I managed to con my mom into taking Cora to her classmates' birthday party at the bouncy place. (I am epic win!) Although in retrospect, I'm rather bitter because I realized... you know, my mother is willing to take Cora to a birthday party, but shit, I would have been hauled in front of the elders of the Crazy Cult for even fucking acting like I wanted to attend a birthday party as a kid. Don't even get me started that she bought Cora an "Easter dress." Cora will never understand how batshit crazy her grandmother was (still is). Ugh.

With the in-laws, we dyed eggs last night and went clothes shopping for Cora. We went to mass this morning, had lunch, quickly hid the eggs around the house for Cora to find (it's been monsooning all week), and sent the grandparents along their way. My mother-in-law's Shih Tzus came too, one of which (the little shit I had to chase around the neighborhood a few weeks ago) had to be drugged because of the thunderstorms. I've finally convinced Husband that our dog needs to be drugged too, because we haven't been able to sleep the last two nights thanks to the storms and the dog's subsequent freak-outs, which then woke up Cora, and caused her to crawl into bed with us citing "the rain is scary" as the reason. So, calling the vet tomorrow is on the To Do list.

Lots on the To Do list this week. We're leaving on Thursday for Chicago for a family wedding, and spending some extra time up there to take Cora to the aquarium and see friends and such. So, need to get some work done this week to tie things up before I leave. I also need to take the Money Pit to the mechanic to fix why the check engine light came on, two weeks after getting the engine replaced. Ugh.

Speaking of the Money Pit, our neighborhood creeper car thief is back in action. I saw Creeper last Saturday, walking around the block, twice, in the pouring rain, being a creeper and lurking around. Then on Saturday, I found my car trunk popped and my glove compartment opened. Nothing stolen, of course. After Creeper hit my car the first time and stole my iPod (which I got back and his ass got arrested), I've stopped keeping anything in it other than empty fast food containers. So, now I'm really pissed because clearly getting arrested the first time hasn't deterred him from committing the same damn crime, even trying to hit the same victims who are his own neighbors, and if I find Creeper lurking around my car again, that bitch is getting the business end of my baseball bat. But, seriously, crime in my neighborhood is getting to be a problem. In addition to Car Creeper, there are Child Molester Van Creepers, who have been spotted parked on the street in a creepy van with tinted windows, watching certain houses, which ended up getting burgled. So, Husband thinks I've lost my shit, but I want to install a security camera in the front of our house. Because I don't really want to deter the criminals, I just want to catch them in the act and send the assholes to prison. I hate criminals. Hate them. Not only do they break the law, but most of them can't pay a lawyer to defend them, so what the hell use are they other than bogging down an already taxed public defense system? Assholes. Hate them.

Anyway, I should go to sleep, it's after 1 a.m. Really sad to admit it, but another reason why I didn't sleep so good last night is we watched the new Doctor Who episode last night, which was creepy as shit.

Creepy as Shit

Exhausted

2011-04-20T22:34:00.003-04:00

It's only Wednesday, and it feels like the week should have ended days ago. I'm exhausted.

I took a mental health day on Tuesday, and, honestly, think I need another one tomorrow. Tonight was the visitation, tomorrow is the funeral. I'm just worn out.

I've got a lot of work to catch up on, but right now I just feel like sleeping.

As an aside, should I lose someone in my immediate family, I really could not endure a visitation, standing in a morose receiving line, like some sort of gauntlet, having to shake everyone's hand, accepting their awkward attempts at condolescences while trying to not collapse into a sobbing ball of hysteria. Short of throwing myself on the funeral pyre, I can't think of a worse thing to endure after the loss of a loved one. Maybe some people find it comforting that an endless line of people came out in support of you and/or someone you loved, and it's lovely that they do, but I just find it quite horrible. In times of mourning and loss, I just like to be left the hell alone. I guess everyone's different. I dunno. I also rather hate flowers, so I might just be a weirdo.

Spiraling

2011-04-19T00:10:00.003-04:00

I feel like dropping my law license in the trash.

Remember that case I had where I was too personally involved? (Here and here.) My client, my friend, took his own life this weekend. His partner called me today to tell me the news.

Needless to say, I'm rather spiraling down a drain at the moment. I know, logically, that there was nothing I could have done to prevent it. I mean, you can't make someone get help if they don't want to get help. Well, unless you're the Court, and you could have sent someone to a mental health facility like their attorney requested, rather than just sending them to jail. (He definitely won't be making any more court appearances, so problem solved. Recidivism statistics improved.)

After I got the news, I left the clinic early and went home to finish up the grant application that was due tonight at midnight, without having to be around other people. Got it submitted. Spoke with a new client about his hearing Wednesday. Manage to pull off the sniffling as allergies. Coordinated with friends for the funeral. Friends keep asking me why. I know exactly why. Privileged. I can't tell them. Just, he had troubles. He needed help. He didn't get it.

How many lawyers have clients that commit suicide, I wonder?

MILP Roundup #199

2011-04-18T23:27:00.002-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week, Butterflyfish will have it.

Here's what's up in MILP-land:

First, Happy Birthday to CM!

Cowgirl in the City gets her a taste a kiddie funk.

Dinei will NOT eat the entire bag of Cadbury eggs. (Although I won't judge her if she does.)

Googiebaba preps for the zombie apocalypse. (And rightfully so!)

Ms. Erb is missing the Mommy Gene. (Soooo right there with you!)

Butterflyfish has had Angelfish for 3 months now.

-R- doesn't judge.

LC is cranky.

Izzie has book reviews.

Shan has next year's schedule.

LL has a Spring Spree. (And I have total closet and wardrobe envy.)

Jenny's all pedicured... and covered in snow.

Shameless Domestic Hussy is the Pregantor.

RG reminisces.

WNWL has decisions.

Cristy says NO.

EH has a report card.

SuzieJD ponders the sisterhood.

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

Growing babies and lawyering

2011-04-14T15:22:00.000-04:00

That's pretty much what's up. I had an eventful week in court. Some good, some bad, some ridiculous. I got a new paying divorce client this week, so that's good. My observations from today's session of domestic violence court (my second appearance in it this week) is that no matter how long someone's been practicing law, they can still be a crappy trial lawyer and fail, hard, at the rules of evidence.

I remember my very first hearing. It was on a property issue in a divorce case. I had documents to introduce as evidence. And I laid my ground work with my witness, and showed the documents to the other attorney, and used them in my witness's testimony... and then forgot to move the court to enter the evidence into the record as an exhibit. Ugh! Fortunately, my judge gently reminded me of this, and my evidence was admitted. But I still felt like a dumbass. It was an amateur mistake. However, that's to be expected. I'd been practicing law for like 10 minutes. Sure haven't made that mistake again, and bet I never will!

When you've been practicing law for, well, probably since "law" was invented, like Grandpa today, you should know, for instance, what hearsay is. Or what's relevant to the proceedings. Or that your client can't print medical information off of WebMD and read it into the record. Or that photographs are admissible if your witness testifies that they are a fair and accurate representation of the subject matter (you don't need the photographer there if you have a witness to lay that groundwork). The other attorney was just as bad. She won, but she was terrible. She never objects to any of the stupid crap the other side is doing. The guy's reading his testimony off of a (lengthy!) document. He's testifying to conversations he had with multiple people out of court, which were very prejudicial and very much not admissible. The judge finally shuts him down on the hearsay and the medical testimony, without objections from the other attorney (probably because she was sick of hearing him talk). And then she has to coach the other attorney into laying her groundwork to get the photographs admitted. Their hearing went on for over an hour. Then, in true Kentucky fashion, they spend about ten minutes arguing about basketball tickets. (We actually have a supreme court case that addresses the issue of season tickets in divorcing spouses. I'm surprised we don't have a statute. It's that important.) It was the worst hearing I've ever seen, and that includes 1L trial advocacy. And the guy was possibly one of the worst witnesses I've ever seen, and that was not just because of his attorney. For such a long hearing, he never managed to say anything helpful, in fact, managed to hurt himself more. He had a decent argument to make in his defense, but he never got there, and they did not have the evidence to support it. Granted, for domestic violence hearings, the standard is a preponderance of the evidence, so he probably would have lost anyway, but I hope the guy gets better counsel for his criminal trial, or he'll definitely have a basis for an appeal when he gets convicted.

Anyway, beyond that, I've had lots to do this week with grant-writing and covering the clinic cases, and my own stuff, ugh. Busy. We had our ultrasound on Monday, and fortunately there is no fetus fail this time. Other than our fetus fails to have a penis. Another girl. Everyone always says "Oh, I don't care what we're having as long as it's healthy." Whatever. I really wanted a son. I know I shouldn't be disappointed and just be extremely grateful that, this time, there's nothing wrong. Whenever I imagined myself as a mother, I always pictured sons, not daughters. Not that there's anything wrong with girls, girls are obviously awesome, but I would have liked a son. Oh well. Clearly the Y chromosome is dying off among our group of friends, who all have girls. Only a couple of my friends have boys. We just did a group picture for Easter, six little girls in little Easter dresses. We've talked about trying again for a third, but that just means we'll have three girls. And then someday we'll have three teenage girls. And then I will have to move into a mental institution, whew. Anyway, hopefully Cora will like having a little sister. The day before the ultrasound, she said she wanted a little sister. Then when we told her it was a girl, she was upset and said she wanted a brother instead. (I think ultimately she'll prefer a little sister.)

MILP Roundup #198

2011-04-13T21:57:00.001-04:00

Is there. Next time, it's here.

Exercise

2011-04-03T17:30:00.004-04:00

Cora and I did the AVOL AIDS Walk today. One of my colleagues/law school classmates is on the AVOL Board, and after being non-committal about doing the walk since getting the Facebook invites/reminders, I decided I could get off my fat ass and walk around downtown this lovely afternoon for a good cause.

Cora graciously agreed to part with the television and join me.

After the walk, which lasted about an hour, we got ice cream. And such is why I'm a fatty; I follow up exercise with ice cream. Oh well, I'm pregnant, I need the dairy. And it dulls the pain of my throbbing pelvis. Ridiculous pain, ugh. I think we'll be getting a summer membership to the Y so I can float my fat ass in the pool like a big fat whale.

Just like this. Except with stretch marks. And a full coverage swimsuit.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.....

2011-04-02T21:50:00.005-04:00

C!!

A!!

T!!

S!!

CATS CATS CATS!!!!

(Yes, we're down by 10 at the half. My head may explode before the end of this game.)

UPDATE: UConn sucks. Go BUTLER!

From Business Trip to Vacation to Failcation

2011-03-29T22:00:00.002-04:00

Last Wednesday, Husband and I dropped Cora off at daycare and hit the road for Baltimore. I attended the MLP conference, and Husband tagged along for a bit of R&R and sight-seeing in DC.

The conference was pretty good. It would appear we have it together a lot more than I thought we did, because a lot of the sessions were very basic in nature, and I was a bit surprised that some of the programs out there that have existed longer than ours was not more advanced. However, ours was set up by members of existing programs, so that's certainly been a benefit to us. I did get the news during the conference that (it would appear) we will be receiving grant money next year that will fund my position full time. We were not awarded the grant money for this year, but the organization says they want to fund us and expect they will do so next year. Which rocks. Of course, it isn't for certain yet, and we won't know for sure until this fall. But it would be totally awesome, and would make me a real employee of the university, with real benefits and stuff. Also, I would get tuition benefits! (Yay for a free PhD in underwater basket weaving!) The grant money would last for five years. And the best part is I could stay the hell out of family court! Woo hoo!

So, that is definitely awesome. Baltimore was fun, I ate a lot of crab. Crab balls, crab cakes, crab legs, crab chowder. Crab everywhere. Husband took the train into DC and did some sight-seeing during the day. I insisted he go on without me, because I knew I was not going to be up for extensive activity over the weekend. My pelvis/back is KILLING ME. Stupid, stupid pregnancy crap. This didn't happen until later in my last pregnancy, and I thought the pain was so bad because I was on bed rest and couldn't exercise/do any prenatal yoga and such. Wrong! Nothing helps the pain, except laying down with a pillow between my legs and moaning. What a load of bullshit. Seriously, who decided primates should breed like this? Marsupials have it going on. In the next life, I want to be a koala. Or a man. Either one.

Anyway, I hobbled my way through DC, but in general just couldn't do a whole lot of walking. About two miles a day was my max. We stayed at the Phoenix Park Hotel on North Capitol, which is right across from Union Station. It was very nice. An especially nice perk was that the hotel staff let us know that the parking lot across the street (for some federal agency) is not patrolled on the weekends, so we got to park for free. (The hotel charges $40 a day for parking.) Awesome. The hotel was nice, European-style (i.e. small rooms), but a nice view and nice bathroom.

Our first evening there, Friday, we walked to the Hoover building so I could stare at it longingly (since it is currently closed for tours). I successfully refrained from going all fan girl on the agents leaving the building. Visiting the building renewed my resolve to get my fat ass to the gym after I'm finished incubating, so I can be a rock star and work there too. And solve mysteries like this one.

We then had dinner at an upscale sushi restaurant called Sei. It was awesome. I had this cucumber soda that was amazing (since I can't have sake), and, in honor of the Cherry Blossom festival, tried a piece of nigiri that was red snapper and had this cherry blossom infused foam on top of it. It was beautiful, elegant and delicious. Amazing sushi and the service was great (I figure the waiter probably has a law degree, which is why he was so well-spoken and knowledgeable). After dinner, we got gelato from a gelateria across the street. Yum! (We are in short supply of available gelato here in the bluegrass.)

Later, we drove to a sports bar to meet up with a friend from grad school/law school. Sadly couldn't get up with all of my grad school peeps, but it was pretty short notice (we honestly planned to just sight-see, not meet up with people, but then felt guilty as we're broadcasting our activities on Facebook and people are like WTF?! Let's get together!). Oh well. But, we got to watch the UK/OSU game at this place called Grevey's where each table has its own TV, so you can watch whatever game you like. There was a sea of blue, but there was also a group of VCU fans. We, of course, knocked out the Buckeyes in the Sweet Sixteen game, which was exciting and really awesome being out of town but surrounded by UK alumni. Then we stuck around and watched the end of the VCU game, since the VCU group was nice enough to watch the last two minutes of our game and cheer for us. Exciting stuff!

On Saturday, we slept in (ahhhhhh!) and had lunch at a french place across from Ford's Theatre called Bistro D'Oc. Pricy. We ate a lot of cheese. It was good. I really wanted some escargot, but I had not eaten anything yet that day, and figured buttery snail is probably not the first thing I should put into my stomach. Oh well. Then we went to the International Spy Museum (to compensate for not being able to tour the FBI). That was fun. (I don't want to be a spy though, I want to be a rock star federal agent who investigates stuff.) When we finished, we got more gelato!

We later went to dinner at an Ethiopian restaurant called Ethiopic. It was very tasty, although I have no clue what I actually ate other than "beef" and "lamb." And some spongy bread substance that didn't have much taste, but was more just an edible delivery vehicle for said meat. The serving of the food was also very interesting. I will have to do my research on Ethiopian food. We don't have a restaurant here, although I think we did briefly at one time, but it disappeared before I could try it. The closest thing we have is a West African restaurant (much different... same continent, wrong side). We're total foodies, so we like to try new things and generally when we vacation/sight-see, we focus a lot on the food.

We finished our trip with a "moonlight" trolley tour of DC, with stops at the Jefferson Memorial, Lincoln Memorial/Vietnam Memorial, and Marine Corp Memorials. The tour was very good, I suspect our tour bus driver Bob has a few useless degrees of his own, as he was extremely knowledgeable about US military history. The only downside to the tour was the obnoxious kid sitting behind us. He was probably about 11, and an obnoxious twat who wouldn't shut the hell up. I probably wouldn't have been so annoyed if his father would have, at least once, told him to shut up. But he never did. And it made me want to slap both of them. Ugh.

On Sunday, we got an early start heading home. The UK/UNC game would start at 5, and we (meaning: I) wanted to get home in time for it. Unfortunately, this is the part where Failcation starts. About 20 miles east of Charleston, West Virginia, my fucking car explodes. Piece of shit, I hate that car. It only has 95,000 miles on it, which is low for a 2002 Toyota, and was supposedly mechanically sound, although the interior is falling apart and the paint job looks like shit. It makes me bitter, because my beloved 1999 Corolla (which was murdered last year by a deer) would never have done such a thing. The oil light came on and then suddenly the car sounds like it's going to explode. So we get off the interstate as quickly as possible, even though we're in the middle of Fucking Nowhere, West Virginia, in a hollow (pronounced "holler"). Check the oil, and there's plenty of it, which is bad bad news: dead oil pump. And from the sounds the car was making, dead engine too.

I call AAA, and they cannot figure out where the hell we are. We can't figure out where the hell we are. We're just lucky we have cell service (I will never complain about AT&T ever again, seriously.) With the help of a nice good ol' boy in a hunting jacket, and some chick who I scared half to death who was getting into her car, we figured out (sorta) where we were. Finally, an hour later, we manage to get a tow. The tow truck driver was very helpful, although weird as shit. He told us a long sordid story about how he used to be a truck driver and came home to find his wife shacking up with his dad. Anyway. He dropped my car off at a mechanic shop and gave us a lift to a Days Inn (all this is significantly closer to Charleston, fortunately). On the bright side, we got to watch UK beat UNC (and make it to the Final Four!!!) On the sucky side, we really wanted to be home and Cora was very upset to find out we wouldn't be home. She apparently had a rough time being away from us for so long. on the really sucky side, the next morning I talked to the mechanic who confirmed (after "tinkering" for two fucking hours) that it was the oil pump (no shit; the chick lawyer already google-diagnosed that one), and "figures" that the noise the car is making that the engine is shot. Figured that one too. He quoted me $2K to put in a "new" engine (used engine). He'd pay me $300 to take the piece of shit off my hands. (I thought about it, seriously. I fucking hate that car.) But after calling my regular mechanic and getting his opinion (I totally owe him some legal services, or a beer or something), who said that was a really good deal for putting in another engine, I decided to do it. If I can get another year out of the piece of shit, then maybe next summer, provided I am employed full time, I can buy a new car. One that isn't falling apart. One that smells pretty. One that's a hybrid. Oh, hybrid, how I covet thee...

We got a rental car and finally got the hell out of bumble fuck West Virginia. Tomorrow, I have to return to bumble fuck to drop off the rental and pick up my piece of shit with its working engine. If it explodes again on the way home, I'm setting it on fire, then pushing it off a cliff, and reporting it to my insurance company as "hooligans stole my car and wrecked it." Piece of shit, I hate it.

Anyway, long day tomorrow and I'm so behind on work, it isn't even funny. I have court on Thursday morning and some interrogatories to draft before a client meeting the same day. And I'm going to waste all of my time tomorrow driving back and forth to West Virginia. Blah. At least I got our tax refund today... which is going, at least in part, towards my piece of shit car.

Lawyerly Advice

2011-03-22T18:44:00.003-04:00

Here's my lawyerly advice to those of you out there who are not attorneys, but have friends or family members who are attorneys and want to ask law questions/discuss your legal issues, OR are new/young attorneys out there just encountering this phenomenon:

1. It might not be my job, but it's still my job. Asking a lawyer for advice, even if that lawyer is your brother or your best friend, is a lot different than asking for advice on, say, how to make my Word document turn into a .pdf, even if it's just as simple and takes just as long. Like, if my computer shuts down and eats my document because someone told me how to do it wrong, there likely won't be a lawsuit or a bar complaint. I'm ethically on the hook for any advice I give you, casual or not. So it's on me to make sure it's sound.

2. Don't pass it around. So, the other night my mother had some random questions about immigration law. She's "curious" because a friend's nephew is apparently wanting to marry a woman who is in the country illegally, and she and her old biddy friends wanted to gossip about it. Mom thought he'd be committing a crime by marrying her and told the group of old biddies as much. Then she asked me. I told her (in basic terms) about immigration law (as much as I actually know). Not intending to be advice for this couple, of course. Then Mom calls up her friend and blabs everything to her, oh, my daughter the lawyer said he should do X Y Z. And of course, knowing that she wouldn't have possibly gotten the X Y Z right (as she proceeded to tell me what she told her friend), I had to then send a FB message to her friend to be like "I have no idea what unsolicited second-hand advice Mom may have given you, but here's the name of the best immigration lawyer in town. Your nephew should go see him immediately." So, my bad in thinking we were just speaking in hypotheticals. Like, I don't have all the facts here, I can't advise them.

3. Don't think just because it's your best friend or your brother, it still won't cause problems. Sometimes the personal relationship is the very reason it causes problems. So, understand that your friend/family member may not be the best person to ask about your legal problems. You're setting up a business and have some questions about Articles of Organization? Cool. You need a Will or Power of Attorney or some other standard form drafted? Cool. You just got arrested and you have a whole sordid criminal history no one else knows about and you want me to keep that a secret? Not cool. (Recently got mixed up in that one. Not fun.) You are divorcing your husband, some guy I barely know, and you have some questions or even want some help? Cool. You are divorcing your husband, and he happens to be a friend of mine? Totally not cool. Know the difference between what is cool and not cool before you ask.

4. There's no such thing as "just a quick question." Respect that an attorney's entire job is giving advice/doing research/drafting documents, so think of it like you would asking a friend to fix your car who's an auto mechanic. It's them, doing their job, extra, on their own time, for you, for free. Even so, I don't have a problem giving out legal advice, even free advice. But I can't devote a significant amount of time to it. In other words, get to the point as quickly as possible!

For instance, and this has happened several times over just this past week, someone calls or leaves a message and wants me to call them back regarding some legal question they have. What then happens is I call them back, and I end up in an hour-long conversation with that someone about it, especially if that person is a friend or a family member. Blah blah blah blah. What could have been a five or ten minute email response just ate an hour of my day. Why call instead of email? Well, because it takes the person asking a lot less time and effort to call and ramble at me than it does to form specific questions and write out the facts I need in order to give an opinion. And that's great if I'm charging you .25 minimum per phone call (and that's a quarter hour, not a quarter of a dollar). If you're getting free legal advice, put the time into helping me out by not eating up my time. Especially if we're at the point that I would actually have to take notes during the conversation in order to keep the facts straight and give an opinion. Just send me an email or Facebook message. That way I can read it while I'm sitting in court for five hours waiting for my case to be called and answer you then. I just cannot call you back. If your story is going to be so long and complex that you can't even fathom writing it out, then you can tell me over dinner (you're buying).

Also, I know this is surprising as I am all-knowing, but I may not even have an answer (or shit, I might have the wrong answer). I may need to think about it. I might even be inclined to look it up. I did a massive brain-purge after the bar exam, and I reserve that space for things like sci-fi trivia and song lyrics. I do not, for instance, recall the order of intestate inheritance. I just don't. It's like kids, parents, then some other people. I don't know. When someone asks me, you know what I do? I google it. "KRS intestate succession." Then I read the statute. Then I immediately forget. Because I really just don't do any probate. I have better uses for those brain cells.

5. Cocktail conversation is fine. To a point. Lawyers are nerds, we like to talk shop. If you have truly hypothetical questions, or you were watching an episode of Law & Order and want to discuss search and seizure, let's do it. If you have a lively story about your crazy neighbor who keeps passing out naked in your bushes, or this asshole who rear-ended you and turns out his insurance was expired, I will probably offer to take legal action on your behalf and, hey, let's get together and chat about this later. However, if you are going to bring down the entire party by telling your sad-sack story involving your sister's neighbor who is being abused by her husband, and then got fired from her job, and then all kinds of other drama.... eh, if your sister's neighbor wants my help, here's my card, have her make an appointment. My retainer is quite reasonable.

I know some lawyers who refuse to give free legal advice, like won't even give free consultations to prospective clients, let alone friends and family. I like to be able to help people, (and it would be really nice to make friends with an auto mechanic and trade services!) But also understand that, just like anything, it takes time, and appreciate that, just like when your friend comes over to remove the virus you got on your computer from downloading all that porn, your lawyer friend took time out of his day to give you advice. Buy him a beer for his trouble!*

* The preggo requests beer rainchecks.

Long Day

2011-03-21T21:32:00.004-04:00

I had a hearing scheduled this morning in a surrounding county at 9:30. My case did not get called until after 2:30. Seriously. I was so hungry, I was about to eat a bailiff. I won't even get into the epic fail that is my client, first, because it's confidential, and second, because I think if I put it into words right now, it would make my head explode, and I have to wait until tomorrow to draft a letter to said client concerning today's review, because otherwise it will include expletive-filled sentences that will probably land me a bar complaint, so I will have to be more diplomatic in such conveyance of epic fail.

Yeah, I don't think I have anything positive to say today. I'm just in a seriously bad mood. That comes from sitting in the courtroom for the arraignments (because the Judge has decided she will only give appointments to attorneys sitting in her courtroom when she needs one), and not getting a new appointment today which, honestly, doesn't hurt my feelings after I waited FIVE FUCKING HOURS to have a 10-minute review. (The other parent's attorney in my case had to leave at 1pm, because he had to drive an hour home to relieve his nanny.) So, in addition to the fail that is my client, I got to sit there and watch all the other people who fail really hard. It's difficult to not hate humanity after that. Like, seriously, there needs to be birth control in the water, these people should not be allowed to breed. They shouldn't even be allowed to own goldfish.

So, when I left the courthouse after 3, and grabbed a quick lunch, I decided that before my 5pm hair appointment, I would go get a manicure. That was a good call. I opted against a pedicure though, because it's going to be too cold for open toed shoes in Baltimore/DC this weekend. Maybe I'll have to go back for one of those next week. It's been a good month for the Proto Attorney Law Office, maybe I can splurge a little. Oh well. The world may suck, but I have pretty nails. There is a little ray of sunshine after all.

Anyway, back to the grind. I've got work to finish up now that the kid is in bed, and need to get done before leaving on Wednesday!

MILP Roundup #195

2011-03-20T18:04:00.002-04:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week, Butterflyfish will have it.

It's 71 and sunny here in the Bluegrass. And... we're on high pollen alert. Awesome. Welcome to Spring!

First, LL is back from Spring Break, and so are LC's kids.

Cristy has a guilty pleasure.

SuzieJD finds laziness trumps the environment.

EH on unsolicited advice.

CM is enjoying maternity leave.

LEO is comparing sizes.

SDH awards the Gravy of Mediocrity.

Gem is in midterm hell.

Googiebaba is pounding the pavement.

Momttorney has friends.

Butterflyfish has a 2 month old Angelfish.

The Erbgarden is ready for Spring and something new.

Dakota is in Hawaii (sooooo jealous!).

WNWL is looking for indoor entertainment.

And, finally, PT-Lawmom is rejoining the ranks of Hell (a/k/a Law School).

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

Weekend Fun

2011-03-19T15:49:00.003-04:00

First, the Tourney: Suck on it, West Virginia!!! On to the Sweet Sixteen!!!

Second, my father-in-law is visiting. That's fun, except he brought a Shit (properly called a Shih Tzu, but "Shit" describes it better). Said Shit escaped out the front door a little while ago, and effing bolted, requiring me to chase the little fucker three blocks at full speed, with me darting in front of cars to make sure they didn't flatten my mother-in-law's stupid little dog. My in-laws live in the country, and don't have their dogs tagged and collared either, ugh. Fortunately, one of my nice neighbors avoided hitting the stupid little dog with his car, pulled over, and chased her into another neighbor's car port and under a trailer. (If she'd made it any farther, she would definitely have been flattened on what is a very busy road.) Of course, then I couldn't get to her, and when I tried to reach her, she growled at me. But at least she was out of the damn road. So, I had to wait for my father-in-law to get there to retrieve the dog (he was at the store with Husband and Cora). After the excursion of my post-lunch sprint, which I would estimate is about a quarter mile, I managed to lose said lunch in the neighbor's yard, a lovely addition to their spring flowers. (Me and exercise are not mixing well this pregnancy. It just makes me nauseous.) And to top it all off, once we get back to the house, said Shit wants to then snuggle with me on the couch! I was like, oh HELLS no! Don't act like you know me! We are not friends! Seriously, I hate Shih Tzus. (My ex-boyfriend's sister had one, and every time it saw me, it got so excited it peed everywhere. I hated that damn dog.) For all my complaints about Bernie, at least she isn't stupid enough to bolt into traffic, and she has excellent bladder control. (She might need doggy Xanax when it storms, but oh well.)

I guess that's my positive thing of the day: I love our dog, even in spite of her annoying habits. She puts up with (a lot) of abuse from the kid, she growls only at strangers walking by the house and not at our guests, and she has never run away/peed on me. Also, I frequently find her in our bed with her butt on Husband's pillow, which amuses me greatly. And she's not a Shih Tzu.

2011-03-17T15:38:00.002-04:00

Positive thing for the day: Sleeping until Noon.

That's right, I slept til noon. And it was fabulous. And yesterday? I slept until noon.

Since I'm logging more than 40 hours next week on the trip to Baltimore for the conference, I figure, why the crap am I going to spend 20 hours in the clinic this week? I'm not getting paid any extra. In fact, I'm footing the bill for gas and food to go to the conference. So, I earned some sleeping in. I still went to the clinic and worked on the cases I've got that needed some attention, but other than that, ptpppthhh. Earned time off!

Then we dropped Husband's car off for (yet another) trip to the mechanic, and went to lunch. He dropped me at the clinic and went grocery shopping while I finish some stuff up. Now just waiting for him to pick me up. Looking forward to hearing all about Cora's St. Patrick's Day party at school.

Tonight, I have work to get done that I've been putting off. I also plan on busting my butt on Sunday getting stuff done, since I've got two court appearances next week, then I'll be out for the conference. We're going to head into DC for a couple days after the conference. What sucks is that the FBI headquarters is still closed for tours! Sadness. I guess I'll just loiter outside of the building and gaze at it dreamily. Sigh.

A Mother's Love

2011-03-15T22:33:00.003-04:00

I'm not sure if anyone frequents Jezebel and saw this today. Eek. I don't yet have two kids, but I really hope I would never think it would be "not so bad" to lose one of them, so long as I didn't lose the other, even in my "darkest" moments. I don't know how it is to have two kids, and how exactly you love two kids "equally" but "differently." But, whew, I'm pretty confident I'll figure it out without all that noise. Damnation, sounds like ol' girl needs to get out of the house and away from the kiddies for awhile and get some perspective.

Honestly, I don't think I was treated particularly well by either of my parents as a kid, so maybe it's possible to not be the favorite child even when you're the only child. I dunno. I'm sure parents probably have more of a connection with one child, just as children usually have more of a connection with one parent. But even if I completely butt heads with the second kid (much like Husband does with Cora), I don't think that's about loving a child less, I think that's about the frustrations of parenthood and interacting with other human beings. You always love your family, just some days it takes restraint to not throttle them, some family members more than others. Oh well. Hopefully neither of my kids will be talking to their therapists some day about how I didn't love them enough.

Anyway, I love that my kid is a stubborn, sassy little bossy boots. Not to mention, I totally *get* her. Even when we're having a battle of the wills and she's being infuriating, I generally know how to deal with her, because... she is my mini me. Even when she's being irrational about something, I usually understand it and understand her, whereas she drives Husband completely nuts (as do I, apparently). I've always heard parents not getting along with their kids because they're too much like them. I don't really understand that. Sure, we'll have battles of the wills, but ultimately, I respect that. I want my kid to be strong-willed and independent, even when that means defying me. Because I was that kid, opinionated and willful, and I wanted to be respected for it instead of reprimanded for being my own person with my own mind. I only insist that my child be respectful and polite, and follow the rules that are not negotiable.

So, on to today's positive thing: my bossy little bunny and her musical talent. We've been lazy about the violin lately, but she really loves playing the thing. She's done very well in learning to respect the instrument, and even with right-handed bowing. Mostly though, she loves to sing. Okay, so she's still rather tone deaf. But she's improving greatly, she's even working on some vibrato. She loves to sing, she always has. Her two favorite songs are "Once Upon a Dream" from Sleeping Beauty and "Castle on a Cloud" from Les Miz, and she knows all the words. She is obsessed with Disney Princesses, and she wants me to sing to her at night from Disney movies, which has forced me to learn new songs and strain to remember the old ones. (Thingamabobs? I've got 20.) We'll be working on a series of Italian Arias next...

I know you, I walked with you once upon a dream...

Lenten stuff

2011-03-15T00:41:00.011-04:00

During Ash Wednesday services, el Padre mentioned during his homily that we don't have to necessarily give up something, we can also *do* something positive, like develop good habits and whatnot. Since all I can really think to give up on a regular basis for the next 40 days is my dinner when it comes back up, I figured I'd give the "doing something positive" thing a try. Being a sarcastic snot of a person, and generally curmudgeonly and pissy, it'll be a challenge. So, positivity. That's me. Always chipper! (Ugh, I think I upchucked a little bit just typing that. Balls.)

Anyway, I thought instead of trying to completely reprogram my snarky, bitchy personality into someone, well... nice... I'd take baby steps and try publishing one nice, happy positive thing each day. I know, I'm a little behind. Lent started without me even figuring out what I was going to do until today.

So, happy thoughts.

Here we go.

Uh huh.

Anyone?

*

*

*

Oh, okay, here's one! I'm really proud of Cora's godfather for deciding to go back to school. He only finished one year of college, back 17 years ago when he graduated high school. He's gonna start this summer and work on becoming a murse. (Likely, the naughty kind. Heh.)

Of course, I'm very glad he is going to take his nurse's aid course first and get a hospital job, to make sure he really likes it before he jumps into something he might hate. (I'm pretty sure I would hate nursing. Being a curmudgeon, I hate people. Oops, that's the negativity slipping in.)

He chatted with a friend who's going to nursing school now where he's going to apply to get more details on the program, and he hung out at my house tonight and filled out his application and his FAFSA. He's going to start taking his prereqs over the summer.

So, hopefully in two years, he'll have earned one of these:

And a diploma too

So, that's my first positive thing for the Lenten season: I'm proud of my friend for going back to school and changing his life. And I'm proud of my other friends who are currently in school, doing the same, (one of which I had dinner with tonight.) Good for them for grabbing life by the balls and not just resigning themselves to the suckdom of their current careers. Making positive changes = awesome.

Whew, that was exhausting. Going to bed now!

Workin' it

2011-03-10T14:21:00.003-05:00

I spent 12 hours on campus yesterday, in heels, I feel done for the week. There was much excitement: a conference call, a promotional photo shoot (that I was not supposed to be a part of, but then ended up in a picture -- my hair was a hot mess and I was not wearing "real" make-up), and finally, a board meeting with the MLP. I left the hospital at 7:30, in time to go eat the dinner my friends' saved for me. Exhaustion.

But I did get complimented for my work in crafting the law school externship. It's sad, but I really dig compliments and pats on the head these days. I swear, law school completely destroyed my extremely healthy self-esteem and turned me into this needy creature that craves acceptance. So, getting complimented was nice. And it looks like the externship will be a go. (Helps that one of the professors on the curriculum committee serves on our board.) But it will be pretty cool to get that going. It's not much money for the program, and it's more work for me, but the benefit to the program is that we'll have two students a semester to work for us for free. And I'll get to add a little blip onto my resume: adjunct law professor! Hahahaha, oh the hilarity of it all.

Tornado drills, oh my

2011-03-08T19:46:00.002-05:00

We had a state-wide tornado drill. It was retarded. Seriously, making grownups walk down a flight of stairs because a siren is going off is retarded. We were already behind on the docket in family court this morning, then we had to recess so we could walk down a flight of stairs and stand around with the smelly people packed into the hallway, and then finally my case was called. Therefore, I missed the meeting on campus with one of the law school deans about setting up an externship for the MLP. Not that it was a big deal for me to not be there. But I did draft the proposed syllabus, and I wanted to be there. Suck. Oh well.

Made the husband discuss finances with me. Again, it's still all, oh, let's cancel the cable, instead of like, hey, let's eat out one less night a month and not order three beers with dinner. Bah. But I think he realizes that, barring unexpected expenses, he should have the monthly expendable income to pick up my excess expenses for a few months after the baby is born. And that it's only fair, considering I'm the one growing a damn human.

Still bitter about that one. Wish I would have been born a lesbian. Then I could have married someone able to grow humans. Stupid men, not having uteruses. Useless.

MILP #192

2011-03-06T19:29:00.000-05:00

Is at Butterflyfish. PT-Lawmom has it next week. Then back here.

Dinero

2011-03-05T15:39:00.007-05:00

The worst part of losing my job last year was definitely going from being able to pay my bills to... not. I've had to put my government loans into deferment, which just means they're sitting there, racking up interest. I'm still paying on the Sallie Mae loans, and of course, I've got an absurd amount of credit card debt still to pay down.

Right now, I bring in just enough to pay my bills. I get just under $1400 a month from the Hospital, and then anywhere between $1000 and $1500 from my contract work and personal cases (before taxes). My monthly expenses come to about $1800 a month. That's paying all of our home utilities (gas, electric, water, cable and phones), as well as the Sallie Mae loans and credit cards. I usually pay my own car insurance and such, although Husband picked it up this past time.

Husband, on the other hand, pays our mortgage and Cora's daycare (about $1700). He usually picks up the expenses of food, although when he's working I pay for the food for Cora and I, and for my lunches. I also occasionally pick up dinner for him. He'll pay for other stuff too, and pays our health insurance. So, he probably pays around $2200 a month by the end of it. And that's fine, except he makes more than twice what I do.

So, it's been one of those issues bubbling under the surface for me, that whenever I suggest us budgeting our money (and it is *our* money), he balks. And whenever the conversation of childcare comes up, it seems to be me making the sacrifices, and him not having to pay anything. For instance, if we put the new baby in daycare, it will cost us about $800 a month for full time care. Part time care, unfortunately, doesn't cost much less. (About $600 /month). However, if I only work part time, and Husband watches the baby the two days I'm working, then we won't need daycare at all. But that means I will be losing about $1000 a month in income, for him to save $800. Which means that I can't make my credit card payments (credit cards that were only maxed out in the first place because I had to charge all of my stupid medical bills to them from the last pregnancy, and from me paying for Cora's daycare while I was in law school, which I had to charge to the credit card). The credit card payments are about $400 a month. So, I said, that's fine, I can just work part time, but you're going to have to make the monthly payments on the credit cards. He, of course, balked.

If I were smart, I would have had this shit settled, in writing, before ever conceiving. Because it's pissing me off. And let's be honest, if we joined our money and stuck with a budget, we could have the credit cards paid off and go back to making payments on the student loans. But, of course, that's all "my" debt, so why should he pay it, right?

So, yeah, I'm thinking I don't have a problem with the baby going to daycare full time right away, him paying for it, and me continuing to chip away at the credit card debt by keeping doing what I'm doing. I'm hoping to have it paid off by the end of 2012, that way I can start paying on my student loans again, even if I don't have a full time job by then.

Randomness

2011-03-02T20:36:00.002-05:00

Still chugging along. Still feelin' like crap. I had my first proper migraine headache in forever last week, equipped with visual floaties and everything. It sucked. It sucked even worse because all I can really take is Tylenol, and that doesn't even work for me for regular headaches. Oh well. Hopefully that won't be an ongoing thing. Migraines oddly enough aren't the most painful kinds of headaches for me, but the visual disturbances pretty much render me useless. Ugh.

This weekend was Husband's birthday. He got highly intoxicated, fell down a lot, danced around the house, then decided to do his usual "walking it off" by supposedly walking around the neighborhood, then took off and walked about a mile up the road to an all-night sandwich shop. I managed to stay up until 3:30 waiting for his dumb ass to wander back home, wondering if I'd have to go pick him up from the drunk tank. Fun fact about the Husband: he refuses to get into a car when he's very drunk. Like, not even as the passenger. The movement will make him sick. So he does dumb shit instead, like tries to walk home from the bar, even if it's like 8 miles away. It works, I guess. He felt fine the next day, better than those who were drinking with him. (One of my law school friends, in fact, projectile vomited in a restaurant while at lunch with her Granny the next day. Awesome.) Anyway, Husband's parents came into town for lunch, and he was up and moving before I was. We also went to the bookstore and the electronics store (to buy a new remote control since he somehow broke ours during his drunkenness.) Then I passed out when we got home and slept for like 4 hours while he hung out with the kid and made dinner. Sad that pregnancy is worse than a hangover.

Other fun times on Saturday was going to a 4 year old's birthday party. One of Cora's friends from preschool had her birthday at the bouncy place. Cora had a great time. I, in general, wanted to cut myself, as hoards of screaming children tends to bring out in me. Anyway, at one point, Cora climbed to the top of this one inflatable slide that she wouldn't go down by herself, and no one else was around, so I had to haul my old, fat ass through an inflatable obstacle course to go down the inflatable slide with her. Awesome. My kid is decidedly not brave or adventurous. Oh well. Neither was I, I guess. I was terrified of the diving board as a kid, I think Cora will be the same way. I'm more adventurous now, but just incredibly lazy. (For instance, rappelling off a cliff is awesome. Climbing back up the mountain to do it again? Not so much. Lazy.)

So, other than birthday parties and cleaning up after birthday parties, I spent the rest of the weekend getting caught up on the third series of Being Human (the UK version). Smokin' hawt Irish vampire guy? Hell yeah. Although a sci-fi geek, I've never been that into vampires, unless it's just good writing. Or there are really hot guys. Or both. (Obviously, I also love True Blood. Eric? Yum.) At some point, I'll completely out myself as the epic geek fangirl I am, but I'll just leave it at that for right now.

MILP Roundup #192

2011-03-01T11:49:00.002-05:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week Butterflyfish will have it.

First, congrats to CM who popped out a baby today!

Other Pisces include LL who is the birthday girl.

PT-Lawmom is mean.

Dakota is reflecting on the year.

-R- has baby anger.

EH has random bits.

Cristy has baby reviews.

Butterflyfish has wants.

The WNWLitigator is re-evaluating.

RG pontificates on the perceptions we offer of ourselves.

Dinei is up to plenty (and up plenty).

LC is superior.

Izzie is chugging along.

SuzieJD has furbabies.

LEO gets favors.

Momttorney is on the road again.

Shameless Domestic Hussy has preggo insanity. (I'm so there.)

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

Stuff

2011-02-24T14:41:00.000-05:00

Pregnancy still sucks. Most days I feel like I have mono and just want to crawl into bed and sleep for the next decade. I haven't had horrible morning sickness like the last time, just an overall unsettled stomach and a general gagging sensation whenever I exert myself, like walking up a flight of stairs. Awesome. The Husband, convinced such fatigue is not natural, insisted I ask the doctor at my first appointment. The answer, as I suspected, was "welcome to the first trimester." I told Husband if he has any further problems with me sleeping all day, per medical advice, he can suck on it.

I'm working on winding up some stuff, and getting things in order so I can be more focused on the tasks at hand. I've also enlisted the help of Cora's godfather, who is currently unemployed, to do some secretarial work for me. There are just certain things about practicing law I don't like, and one of them is talking to the same fucking person fourteen times in one day. I need a barrier between me and the rest of the world, and that's what a good secretary is. If I ever get my ass in gear and get enough of a practice built to have secretarial support, I would totally hire him full time. We've always worked well together, and he has a gift for gab and bullshit that I often times cannot muster. Especially when the person is particularly annoying. I have one client that annoys the piss out of me. And I'm about at the point where I will have to say, "Look, I can't represent you, because talking to you makes me want to commit battery." I also tend to be angry when pregnant apparently, so that doesn't help my client management skills.

Anyway, I had my first OB appointment and ultrasound. All is good so far, and I absolutely love having real insurance and going to a clinic that is not in a public hospital. The care I got at our university's hospital was excellent, but being a public hospital, they aren't all that into customer service. Frankly, they don't give a shit that your appointment was three hours ago and you're still in the waiting room. It's not like you're gonna go anywhere else when you don't have insurance/are on Medicaid (or in my case, required to go there by crappy student health insurance). And I also got to sit in the waiting room with a population of women of which most of my DNA docket is now comprised. So, I'm glad to be sitting in the waiting room with a bunch of old ladies knitting, rather than white trash pillhead skanks complaining that it's none of the social worker's damn business what drugs she does. (Sure, Granny might be making meth in her basement while snorting her Oxycontin too, but at least she has the sense to STFU about it. And not be pregnant while doing it. Hell, with the old people I've encountered lately, it totally would not surprise me for Granny to be a drug lord. Anyway.)

So, that's what's up in general. Husband's birthday is this weekend, so we're having a party. Someone else is going to have to make sure his dumb ass doesn't wake up naked in the neighbor's yard the next day, because I will probably pussy out at like 10pm. Lame. Also lame is being sober. What's the quote? "I am disturbingly lucid!" Indeed.

Taking a Sick Day

2011-02-09T12:52:00.002-05:00

I'm taking a sick day today. Not that I don't have to make it up, but oh well. I just can't make myself get out of bed. I feel like ass. Growing a human sucks.

What's weird is that I felt good yesterday. Had to get up extra early to get to court, and picked up a friend who lives nearby who is considering practicing in that court, doing the family law stuff. So, we scooted off to our northern neighboring county, leaving early in case traffic was bad due to road conditions. Then I dropped her back home, went to my friend's office and worked, and cleaned up the house since we had friends over for dinner.

Yesterday was a good day in court. We have a substitute judge who is very efficient and we were out of there in 30 minutes. We were going to stay and watch some other cases, but he was already ahead of schedule, and we didn't know if the next case was docketed any time soon. I had a small victory for one client, and the client is doing great and on track to being reuinted with the kiddies. Theirs is one of the few Cabinet success stories, a case where the system works the way it's supposed to and everyone does what they're supposed to. It's nice to have one of those cases every once in awhile. Unfortunately, I have several I think of as the "Cinderella" clients, the clients I repeatedly assure that they can get their kids back if they get all their chores done. They always seem really happy to hear that. Then they don't show up for their drug screens. Then they don't show up for court. Then they don't have a job, or a home or whatever else they needed to do to get their lives on track to be reunited with their kids. So, it's nice to have clients I can actually help.

Anyway, I guess I expended all my energy yesterday because today I feel like ass. I probably, in addition to stupid first trimester suckiness, am a little anemic. I should be proactive and go get some iron supplements. The prenatal vitamins didn't cut it for me the last time, so it wouldn't surprise me if that's the problem. But I just feel like crap. I slept all day Saturday, literally. I didn't make it out of bed for good until dinner. And then Sunday I was at the grocery store and nearly passed out in the check-out line, and had to go throw up in the bathroom. (The bagger lady was nice enough to carry my bags out to the car for me.) But since then, I'd felt better. And now we're back to today. Sucks. I can't deal with this for another two months. I hate pregnancy, pregnancy sucks.

MILP Roundup #189

2011-02-06T13:14:00.003-05:00

The Weekly MILP (Moms In the Legal Profession) Roundup** is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom, Attorney Work Product and Butterflyfish blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday. Next week Butterflyfish will have it.

Happy Super Bowl! This is not Super Bowl themed. I wouldn't even begin to know what goes with a Super Bowl other than nachos, commercials, and Janet Jackson's boob. I don't think any of those things are present here. But here's what the MILPs are up to:

LEO has a bookworm.

The Cowgirl and her wee Buckeroo.

LL and Shan answer the question "Should I Go to Law School?"

-R- is tired.

Cristy has a new 'do.

Wild Northwest Litigator is taking a tax hit.

Butterflyfish is too happy to whine, so she'll stay silent.

Momttorney has a photoshoot.

SuzieJD has an anniversary.

Shameless Domestic Hussy has snacks.

Dinei has cabin fever.

LC shares the circle of life.

CM is picking names.

RG has good employment news.

PT-Lawmom is trying to schedule sexytimes.

Izzie has finished her paper.

EH is having a low moment.

If you would like to have your blog added to the MILP blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Thanks, But No Thanks

Awkward!

2011-01-31T19:14:00.004-05:00

My friend (we'll call her L), for whom I do part-time work, just hired a new temporary secretary for her office. When L told me who her candidates were, I told her I knew both of them. The first one I used to work with at a previous office. The second one I knew only by name -- I used to "date" her husband (we'll leave it at that). As far as I know, she doesn't know what my past relationship was with her husband. But still. Awkward! And of course, guess which one L picked? (I swear she picked her at least in part to amuse herself.)

Actually, she's great. She's bright and cheerful, and eager to do work and learn new stuff, which is exactly what L needed. (The regular secretary is incredibly old and currently out on medical leave, and L's hoping she'll just retire. She actually has pictures she snapped with her phone of the old lady sleeping at her desk. And that's apparently when she's being her most productive. But she's been there forever and L's dad won't get rid of her, much to her chagrin.)

Anyway, I had an awkward conversation with the new secretary today since L had mentioned that I know her husband and his siblings, as we went to school together. It was so awkward that I had been holding up a stack of papers I was reading in front of the monitor (I suspect I need bifocals, I was doing the old lady squinting thing), when the secretary walked in to give me something and was like, oh hey, I heard you grew up in Smallville, you know my husband... I realized half-way through the conversation (as I was stammering through, like, oh yeah, I was totally friends with his brother, I barely knew him, how's his family, haven't seen them in forever...) that I was weirdly still holding up the papers. Like, oh man, I'm such a dweeb. However, she asked if my maiden name was something different, belonging to another girl who I know also "dated" her husband (we have the same first name). So even if she thought I was that girl, I'd say she definitely thought I'd been cavorting with her husband. And possibly even during their marriage, which would definitely be super awkward, because I know they were separated for awhile, and that other girl was around him at that time, so who knows. (That ain't me. The last time I saw him was before they were together, back in 1999. I don't do married guys. Other than the one I married, and he's lucky if he's gettin' any these days. Heh.) Anyway, it's all kinds of awkward. I'm like, oh lord. I'm about a decade separated from this kind of silly drama, how does it still follow me around?

I don't know why it's so awkward though. Hell, my college roommate ended up marrying a guy I previously "dated," they've got three kids, and we're all friends. I'm good friends with two of Husband's exes. One was holding my hand when I was in labor (while Husband was off having bloody marys in a basement bar with his father and my mother), and the other was one of my attendants in our wedding. Husband is friends with both their husbands, one of which was one of his attendants. I guess it's just the uncertainty of whether this chick would care. I get the impression that a lot of women are incredibly jealous when it comes to other women having dated/slept with/getting anywhere near their men. That's not me, and I totally hate jealous guys (and girls). So, I'm always afraid other women are going to be all jealous and crazy about their men and I tend to proceed with caution. Like, it took a little while to be friends with Husband's most recent ex (they had just broken up a few months before we started dating). I think we were both feeling each other out. Like, do you hate me? No? Okay, I don't hate you, so that's cool. Hey, I like you, you're fun, let's be friends!

It's just funny. And awkward, very very awkward. Of course, L told the rest of the office too, so they're just all watching me squirm. Sigh. I'm such a dweeb. And if I've slept with any of your husbands, a decade ago, I do apologize. It was just a momentary thing, a fling, it meant nothing, I barely remember it, I was probably drunk, I bet I thought he was someone else, actually, maybe he was someone else. Yeah, we'll go with that...

Roundup #188

2011-01-31T19:14:00.001-05:00

Is at PT-Lawmom. Back here next time.