cindy's world

So I grabbed my voluminous buffalo chicken wrap off my desk as soon as the jurors were situated in the courtroom, and dodged out into my judge’s chambers and proceeded to stuff my face on his couch. Because of the width and size of this wrap, and how drippy it got toward the end what with the chopped lettuce and red buffalo sauce, I got red stuff all over my face burning my cheeks and lips, and I was aware of the sauce touching my nose, too. And there I was looking like a carnivorous wild animal eating another wild animal, when a horrible thought occured to me.

What if they take one of many sidebar discussions that they’ve been having, right now? I could just imagine the judge, court reporter, and both attorneys walking into chambers for a sidebar argument and stopping short, seeing my hunched over form on his couch with red stuff all over the place, chopped tomatoes and chicken falling from my open mouth. There’s no recovering from that. So I wrapped up the bundle of mess in the wrapper and dodged into the hallway bathroom.

As soon as I entered the second room of the restroom that contained a small table, a chair, the sink and stall, I froze again, and thought, “Oh shit. I’m pulling a Dardy.” I imagined all the poo and pee molecules that came out of coworkers floating in the air around me, adhering onto my chicken wrap.

And I quickly ate it all up and came back in the courtroom.

What sucks is to be starving and not be able to eat the food that’s right in front of you. I had insisted on going to the gym today because I’d missed all my lunchtime workouts this week as our trial keeps running late, but after our workout today my gym trainee and I ran across the street to Tropical Smoothie Cafe where I grabbed a buffalo chicken wrap. Sooo good! Unfortunately, as I expected, when I walked in the courtroom the judge was already on the bench having a hearing, despite the fact that I wasn’t late. So now the wrap sits on my desk, getting cold, as I drool.

I’ve always thought it a form of torture, too, when I’m starving to death and have to drive to pick up a pizza. My parents were always too frugal to pay or tip for delivery so after waiting what felt like forever until the estimated time the pizza would be ready for pick-up, they’d take me along to the pizza place, and of course I wasn’t allowed to eat before dinnertime for fear of ruining my appetite. So we’d pick up our pizza, I’m starving while the cheese and meat aromas circulate around the car, and as a final tease, my job was to hold the hot box on my lap. There was rarely a longer drive than the one back home. As tormenting as these drives were, when I lived on my own I would also occasionally opt to pick up my own pizza rather than have it delivered. I think it’s the Asian thrift gene passed on, but I did make one modification: no later than when I get in the car, I would open the box and grab a slice of pizza, happily proceeding to burn the roof of my mouth off with molten cheese on my drive back home.

*looking at wrap*

MAN I wanna eat. I think I’ll take my wrap out into the back hallway and eat in secret.

Trip out. My godbro’s dad (father of one of the founders of Formula D racing) is one of our JURORS today. I went out in the hall half an hour ago, did my orientation, and as I let the jurors file into the courtroom, he waved at me. Oh my gosh! Suddenly, all the lame jokes I told during orientation flashed before my eyes. I’ve been doing this a long time, but NOW I’m freaking out all self-conscious. Sheesh.

This isn’t even one of our home trials, either. We got the case transferred to us from another courthouse. Some dinky little misdemeanor. The female defendant allegedly stole $400 worth of stuff from a 99c Store. The bailiff and I were laughing about how anyone could steal $400 worth of stuff from a 99c Store. Did she take 400 items out with her inside her coat? Did she have to make many many trips? We’re horrible. This is what happens when you work in a system that’s used to multiple murders and child molestations and they give you a misdemeanor that you know nothing about. =P

Addendum: Isn’t this a koinkidink? Today, I packed for my workout clothes, the T-shirt I’d purchased at my first Formula D event that I wrote about in the post I linked above!

Remember those funny little anecdotes my judge was leaving for me on my desk? I got more today and these are my top 2 favorites:

#2
Q: What’s the difference between a good lawyer and a bad lawyer?
A: A bad lawyer can let a case drag out for several years. A good lawyer can make it last even longer.

#1
From Actual Court Records:
Judge: Please begin.
Counsel: Thank you. (to witness) Miss, while you have, if you do have — you still — oh, you don’t.
Judge: That was a great start, Counsel.

I woke up at 12:30 a.m. so angry, and continued being angry, heart-pounding, mind racing, and seriously considered going to the gym at 3:30 a.m.. But calculating the time it would take for me to go from the gym to the shower to work, I decided to wait it out just a little longer. And finally fell asleep.

This morning, as with every other morning, I left for work with the intention of finally going to the gym at lunch. And this lunchtime, as with every other lunchtime for a week and a half, I had to stay behind and work through lunch. Today it was because lunch hit in the middle of a complicated 4-count criminal sentencing we did this morning that I’d been working on for hours and I couldn’t be interrupted in the middle of my 5-page data entry and typewritten clarifications and explanations and calculations. (Imagine getting a total sentence of ‘9 plus 14 years-to-life’. Eh???) Now, we’re about to dive right back into our 2-week jury trial.

And I’m still pissed.

(This is a ranting post. Expect me to spew. Sensitive viewers need not view. If you’re viewing, you implicitly agree to indulge my freedom of expression and my need for release.)

I’m off to a pretty crappy week. Yesterday morning, I found that my bedroom ceiling was leaking again at both prior spots, and pretty severely, too. A punchbowl was almost completely full, and the continuous drops bounced off the collected water in the bowl, splashing water all around the bowl so that the carpet’s wet all surrounding the bowl. While soaking up the carpet water with paper towels, I had to keep pushing Dodo away from the bowl where he wants to take a taste. That cat’ll drink water from anywhere. I switched the bowl with a deep plastic bucket that shouldn’t splash as much, dumped the bowl’s yellow water into the toilet, locked Dodo out of my bedroom, and took my morning shower. Apparently, during my shower, Dodo decided it’d be really cute if he vomited all over my purse. This I found as I was rushing out the door to work, and had to clean up the purse and carpet before leaving, which made me even later than usual to work. The rain (9 days in a row in LA, news reports said — CA is now out of its drought and has received enough rain to supply the rest of 2008) made a slow drive, and each additional wet day delays repair of my roof/ceiling more. Oh, and there’s now a weird smell in my bedroom. Not the dank wet smell that came when the leak first started weeks ago, this one reminds me of the awful stench in the air for weeks during a summer of consecutive wildfires about 10 years ago, when ashes floated in the air like snowflakes. Maybe I have a partially incinerated dead body hidden in the crawlspace between my ceiling and roof, and now that my ceiling is falling apart, I can smell him.

Today, I was able to get to work without much of a hitch, but then I fell into my emotional dark place. I got into a quibble with Mr. W about his position on his ex situation (by “ex situation” I mean about his ex-wife with her hand so far in his pocket that her hand is actually deeply embedded in his ass, and by “his position” I mean about his willingness to leave her hand in there because he fears the potential financial burden and pain of a forced removal). And then I hated myself because this shouldn’t even be my problem and yet it’s invading my life through him, his anger about his situation, and his financial restrictions because of it. I worked through lunch for the 2nd day in a row (not having hit the gym in a long time) due to some drama involving an Orange County criminal case that was transferred to us, and got an email reminder to pay my upcoming credit card bill. After paying online and seeing how broke I have become very recently, now I’m even more angry.

I keep coming back to picking up a second job as a solution. Remember that bartending fancy? Playing with liquids is something I’ve always enjoyed, and it’ll distract me from my mental stress. The extra money will help out a lot, which will hopefully ease some of my current bitterness. Mr. W, however, is still against my doing it.

…it pours.

I had an appointment this afternoon for a 2nd roof appraiser (one recommended by my Association treasurer) to come out and look at my roof, but it’s POURING RAIN so hard that he called me to cancel, saying it’s raining too hard to get to where he needs to get to and see on the roof. It’s supposed to be pouring ALL WEEK so we’re gonna reschedule when we see the rain die down. :'( All the cups, bowls, and buckets are back up inside my bedrooms under the original leaks. Yes, I live in Southern California. Land of surfers and sunshine.

On the emotional issues front, I’m trying really hard to not be affected by Mr. W’s stressors. I’m trying to see his current upheaval with his ex (kids’ mom) as nothing more than an irksome dog barking away outside my home, angry but not really involving me or putting me in direct danger. Even with that, I wasn’t able to fall asleep very readily last nite.

Oh, and I haven’t worked out in 4 days. Because today, at lunch, I chose to have lunch with my new courtroom assistant and my floating court reporter (my regular court reporter is off surfing in Costa Rica) at a Japanese restaurant in Cerritos called “Kabuki”. I had 6 pieces of sushi, 6 pieces of spicy tuna roll, miso soup, and way too much unfiltered Nigori sake.

My judge has been in the recent habit of leaving amusing anecdotes and stuff on my chair so that I see it when I come to my desk in the mornings. The latest was this printed note:

The judge was finishing his oral charge to a jury. Being a judge who keeps up with the times, he pointed out in the verdict from where the “foreperson” should sign the verdict.
When the verdict was delivered later to the coutroom deputy, four persons had signed their names to the form.
He now uses the old-fashioned word “foreman”.

At the end of the above printed anecdote, my judge had written underneath:

Why not forecreature?

I thought it was hilarious, and showed the paper to Mr. W. After reading it, his expression did not change. “I don’t get it. I read it again and I still don’t get it,” he said. Oh, that reminds me. I was supposed to explain it to him yesterday.

*** Addendum, 1:15p ***
I just got back from the gym. On my chair, there’s another printed thingie from my judge. This one reads:
Q: What do you call a lawyer with an IQ of 70?
A: Your Honor.
– Jonathan Willier

Our current trial had opening statements yesterday. It’s all about an apartment’s roofing damage, mold/mildew causing health problems and the repair/destruction of “popcorn” ceilings leading to asbestos issues with the tenants. My court reporter looked over at me pointedly. If I hadn’t just cut my fingernails really short, I’d have been gnawing on them right then.

The highly-recommended roofer came by my house yesterday. I wasn’t there for the inspection as I was stuck at work with this trial, but Mr. W left work early and went to my house to meet the roofer. (Awww.) Turns out the entire flat upper of the roof needs to be replaced, AND since my central A/C and heating unit is up on the roof, a crane has to be rented to lift it for the roof demolition. Crane rentals are like $360, I think he said. The primary reason for the leaks is that due to lack of maintenance on the roof (the Homeowner Association’s responsibility), both drain pipes were completely clogged. There are (still) two deep pools of water in front of both drain pipes, which led to the internal leakage. The roof was originally constructed to purposely angle toward the drainholes, but the undrained pools of water over time have softened the material underneath and created a sag, so that the roof is no longer angled toward the drain hole. All things the association, had they done their job of regular roof maintenance, could have prevented or repaired before I got internal damage.

I get the roof job estimate on Monday. Everyone’s telling me to make the association pay for the internal damage as well.

Oh, I asked the roofer (who was very nice and seemed to really know his shit) about the asbestos. He asked when my house was built, and then promptly said that they stopped building with asbestos at least 5 years prior, so I’m fine. Besides, he explained, asbestos is only bad when it’s airborne, like when you tear into the construction, and not when it’s merely used as a construction material. Whew!

Yesterday, a printed quote by Ulysses S. Grant appeared on my desk in my absence.

I know no method to secure the repeal of bad or obnoxious laws so effective as their stringent execution.

I chuckled. And then I realized how true it is. Then I felt a little sad. Cuz it’s not just bad things that get taken away when people use them a lot…