cindy's world

This is my horoscope for today:
You might bring an unrealistic idea into your workplace now and your thoughts may be more grandiose than the problems they are meant to remedy. The good news is that, although you may be stressing over finding the right amount of passion to have on the job, you do have a solid chance to strike the balance you need.
Thursday, July 26, 2007

Do you guys suppose it could apply to this? We were told by our supervisors recently that we’re supposed to be locking up our file stamps, judge’s signature stamps, and other sensitive court materials whenever we leave our desks. Our old furniture used to have a little cubbyhole with a lock, but our new modern desks do not. Instead, there is a keyhole on the side of the desk drawer that will lock up all 3 drawers in the column, so the supervisors suggested we do that. I was trying to get in that habit yesterday, except it’s such a pain in the ass as I’m constantly in and out of the courtroom doing stuff, and every time I come back and need to get white-out, paperclips, envelopes, forms, etc. I’d have to unlock the drawer. And it occurred to me that if I have the keys to the desk with me and it locks up EVERYTHING, then if I were to call in sick one day, the relief clerk can’t access ANYTHING. So I talked to my supervisor about that, and suggested maybe using my separate filing cabinet to lock up the sensitive materials at the end of the day would be better as file cabinet keys are standardized and any other clerk in the building could unlock it. My supervisor thought I was brilliant for thinking of these angles said he’d write a memo to that effect, but as I left the building, I suddenly pictured my coworkers really annoyed at me for suggesting that every time they leave the courtroom, they remove various little stamps and seals and release books from their drawers, and walk them to a separate file cabinet drawer, dump them all in, lock the cabinet, before they can leave. And coming into work would entail them moving all the stuff over from the cabinet to the desk drawers.

And then this morning, I see my supervisor has mass-distributed this via email:
GOOD MORNING,
During the courtroom inspections we were informed that some of the J.A.’s do not have keys to their desks.
We suggest that you lock up the security items in your file cabinet which uses a 3X5 key. The other alternative is your exhibit closet.
That way, if you are out, another J.A. can access whatever is needed out of the cabinet or closet.
We will, however, attempt to find keys for your desks
If you do not have a key to your file cabinet, please let me know.

Oops.

In the afternoon yesterday, I received two emails that informed me of a spontaneous 1pm meeting today (which is during lunch) and on the 25th. Annoyed at the late notice, I decided I wasn’t going to forego my lunchtime workout today for the meeting, so I’m going to hit a 3-mile run before the meeting. But I emailed my gym trainee to let her know I would not be able to go to the gym with her. Today, she returned with a similar forwarded email meeting notice. Her meeting’s tomorrow, with equally late notice. I complained that supervision is trying to keep us from gymming since my meeting’s today, hers is tomorrow, and there’s a special event luncheon on Friday.

Gym Trainee: I thought your meeting was on the 25 of this month.
Me: it’s today AND the 25th.
Trainee: oh that’s crazy. Do you guys have that much to talk about.
Me: I’m just gonna be there as an accessory. People won’t even notice me.
Trainee: that may be a good thing. I won’t be able to do that. Which is why I was told to go.
Me: I’m sure if you ran 3 miles right before the meeting, you could zone out too.
Trainee: Please I have a chair on the beach at club med already reserved for the meeting.
Me: lemme borrow it for today’s meeting and I’ll have it set up for you again for your meeting tomorrow.
Trainee: Ok. It’s the lounge chair with the three long island teas next to it on a tray and a magic wand sitting on in the drink holder in case I need it 🙂
Me: I’ll have to borrow your magic wand at the beach cuz I’m taking mine with me to the meeting.
Trainee: that’s what it’s for while I’m at the meeting. Every time they try to bring me back from club med I’ll just hit them over the head with it.

We’re so into our jobs.

I popped some vitamins on an empty stomach before leaving the house this morning, and I usually have adverse reactions to vitamins taken without food, so I opened a new box of protein bars and unsealed a bar on my drive in to work. It was an “all natural” brand made of “all natural” ingredients like oats and dried fruit, no candy coating. Pushing a bit of the brown cow-poo looking stuff out the top of the package, I took a bite. My mouth was instantly filled with the foul sensation of having put asphalt and black tar on my tongue. I couldn’t bite into the piece, but as I was driving, I couldn’t spit it out, either. I looked at the label. What the hell flavor was this, “Satan’s Ass, Now with Real Dingleberries!”?! It was chocolate raspberry. I sniffed the bar. It seemed fine. I bit into the piece in my mouth carefully. Maybe this bar just tastes like this? As I chewed, I realized that as much as I don’t like the raspberry seeds, it wasn’t THAT bad. I took another bite. It seemed okay. A third bite, and again the nasty tar and black oil smell/taste filled my mouth. At a red light, I looked at the one side of the bar I hadn’t yet examined, the surface in the wrapper that faced away from me. It was covered with white furriness.

Great. Mold. I’m eating mold.

I chugged half a bottle of water that I’d thankfully refilled this morning and put in my workout bag, in the passenger seat. After coming to work, I asked my new bailiff, who’s a mom (and therefore should have above-common-sense knowledge magically infused into her brain), “What would happen to someone for eating moldy bread and stuff like that?”
She said, “Not much. They make penicillin out of bread mold, so it’s not going to hurt you.”
I said, “Oh, so all it’s gonna do is kill the bad bacteria in my body.” I can live with that.

So it’s been 2 hours now and I haven’t had any problems. We’ll see how the rest of the day goes.

My coworker’s mother’s funeral this morning was a very nice Catholic mass service, complete with the counting of the rosary as an opening. Having virtually no Catholic exposure, I was surprised that the rosary went on that long, cuz I’d always thought when priests told sinners to say 3 “Hail Marys” to forgive sins (like in jokes), it was simply “Hail Mary, hail Mary, hail Mary. Yay, I’m forgiven.” Sitting through the very ritualistic practices of mass, I was aware that orthodox Catholics would find it a huge trespass for me to have sinful thoughts or participate in disrespectful behavior, especially while I sat there as a guest in the House of God. And of course, my brain (because it is, after all, MY brain) displayed a most unorthodox image in my head during all the sitting and standing then sitting then standing prayers and responses. When the priest said after a prayer, “You may sit,” and the congregation backed their bodies down onto the wooden bench, I pictured myself sitting on a large phallic protrusion coming out the center of my seat so that it strategically would create a huge sin. As soon as the absurd image entered my mind’s eye, I shoved it out in horror. “What is WRONG with you?!” I chastised my rebellious brain.

After the service was over, I stood with some coworkers and my judge. My judge revealed that as a boy, he’d attended a private Catholic school and the service today took him back to memories of that childhood, when he was always terrified of accidentally having an impure thought while in the church and going straight to hell. So it’s not just me. There’s something about what you’re not allowed to do, that makes human nature just do it. Or at least think about it. Well, if I can’t control my thoughts, at least I can control my actions. I would’ve knocked that phallus away from me, dirty unwanted thing! Yeah.

What an odd week. It began with my judge gone (vacation at a dude ranch, seriously) and causing me to float, covering 2-3 courtrooms a day, with a holiday smack in the middle of the week, a par-tay on the rooftop with boyfriend, friends and coworkers to watch fireworks, my judge finally returning today, and ends with a funeral tomorrow. Some other oddities:
– met up with my childhood friend Lily and her husband Arnold for dinner on Monday at Market City Caffe in Brea, one of my favorite Italian joints, and had Crepes Suzette (butter, powdered sugar, orange zest, orange syrup, Grand Marnier, a la mode) at a new crepes joint on the same street for dessert. Spent the $30 giftcard I’ve had for 2-3 years at the annual sale of Bed, Bath & Beyond.
– at the gym on Monday, I was entering my stats on the elliptical trainer as I began my workout, and when it asked for my age, I had to put in 31 for the first time. How official it felt.
– I only worked out Monday and Tuesday since Wednesday was the holiday, didn’t do it Thursday cuz after driving to the gym, parking, and going around the car to get my workout bag, I realized I’d left my shoes and socks at home. The one thing you can’t just buy a quickie replacement for at the gym. Today, Mr. W talked me out of gymming at lunch cuz he didn’t feel like it, so we met up for Lee’s Sandwiches instead. But we did just return from a 3.25 mile run just now. He’s at the pool to cool off and I’m sitting here blogging in sweaty running clothes.
– I have a headache from my ears being so cold from the run, and uterine cramps from PMS.
– I actually sorted and did laundry this week. I didn’t complete The Laundry Project as after presorting, turned out I had 9 piles/loads of clothes to wash, but I did get approximately halfway done. The categories left to wash and dry and put away are handwash delicates, reds, regular lights, rough-and-tumble lights, and regular darks. I’d already done sheets, delicate lights, delicate darks, and rough-and-tumble darks. (What OCD? I really have that many clothes that need washing. Nearly a full load each category! That’s how much I hate and procrastinate on laundry.)
– James came by yesterday as I was working on The Laundry Project and brought my birthday present. He’d complained that I was taking too long retrieving it, as it was taking up too much space on his desk at work. Why was it at work instead of home, you ask? Because he has no room in his house for this, he said. He did indeed hand me a gargantuan wrapped box that should really be housing a 32″ TV from the 80s (i.e., NOT flat screen), and I told him it better not contain a life-size fully animated interactive electronic bust of a mountain gorilla. Mr. W and I had bought that from The Sharper Image for Mr. W’s brother for Christmas, and it was so lifelike it scared the bejezus out of people walking by the kitchen, where it was sitting all disembodied on the counter. It even broke my heart when everyone was playing Guitar Hero in the living room and it was lonely by itself in the kitchen, and would let out these sad elongated coos. But James reassured me that it did not contain any gorilla parts. Instead, I tore into the box to find…a big heavy coil of garden hose! Woohoo! And a new Zaino spray polish product, plus a new Zaino polishing pad. I had to laugh. Both the Accord and IS350 sitting in my garage are filthy, and my singular excuse for not doing something about it had been, “I don’t have a hose, I’ll have to wait till I go to my parents’/Mr. W’s/James’ house to wash cars together.” So much for that. The box is now a nice cat toy for Dodo in the living room.
– James and I had mall food for dinner last nite after he brought over my hose, since I was craving a particular little French cafe in the Brea Mall. I think it’s called the Le Diplomat Cafe. Afterwards, I finally spent the $50 gift certificate to Pottery Barn that college roommie Diana gave me for my bday in 2003. Met the most computer-unsavvy chick I’d seen since the 80s, and she was our age, so no excuse! We had to explain AOL vs. SBC Global DSL Internet Service to her. She was paying for both at $49/mo each. And she didn’t know what we meant by “uninstall AOL.” So she begged James to help her and he nicely gave her a business card, telling her to call if she “really, really can’t find anyone else.” She was cute, too. Too bad she’s married. (For James, I mean.)

So aside from the yet-to-come funeral of my coworker’s mother tomorrow morning, that concludes my irregular week in a (rather oversized) nutshell.

Early this morning, Mr. W sang happy birthday to me. I participated. It went something like this:
Mr. W: Happy birthday to you
Me: [whimper]
Mr. W: Happy birthday to you
Me: [whimper]
Mr. W: Happy birthday dear love
Me: [whimper]
Mr. W: Happy birthday to youuuuu!
Me: [burying head under pillow]
Mr. W: You’re in your 30s now!
Me: [popping head out] I am NOT! Not until like 5:30!

Driving this morning before work, I thought about what’s so special about 31 that has me so bummed out. Because this is where the old life ends, and you get new life by starting a new phase, like adulthood — family and kids — and I don’t have that, my brain thought. I can’t be a caterpillar my whole life, I need to come out of the coccoon and be a butterfly, be the adult insect. And I cried the rest of the drive. As much as I’d been declaring war on birthdays for the past 5 or so years, this is the first one where I’ve actually shed tears.

At work, I got plenty to cheer me up. Lots of presents, coworker friends, song, and this beautiful delicious artisan mocha cake with cinnamon and brown sugar “sand” and white chocolate and edible glitter “seashells”:

The text messages, emails, cards and e-cards were pouring in, and I especially felt better when I read this little text message gem from Mr. W’s daughter:
“HAPPY BIRTHDAY CINDY! YOU ARE STILL SO MUCH YOUNGER THAN MY DAD :] HAHA I LOVE YOU!”

And then came my mom’s happy birthday email. It was just this portion that got me crashing back down again:
“WELL, CINDY , IT’S ABOUT TIME TO PLAN YOUR FUTURE, YOU DON’T WANT END UP JUST YOURSELF TO THE END, IT’S KIND GOOD THING TO HAVE A FAMILY, CHILDREN, SOMEONE TO SHARE YOUR LIFE. [Mr. W] IS A NICE PERSON, BUT IF [Mr. W] IS NOT THE ONE TO HAVE FAMILY WITH, YOU KNOW I MEANT… ”
She doesn’t know that I torture myself with this on a daily basis, because I’ve made it seem like I nonchalantly disregard any consideration about my future or childbearing, stuff like that. I don’t think I’m ready to have kids right now, but I don’t know that I won’t want them in another few years. All I know is that presently, kids in general annoy me. I want nothing to do with them. I make the occasional exception for the occasionally exceptional kid, but those kids are few and far in between. (By kids I mean ages 4-12.) I watch Mr. W’s daughter patiently play with and talk to other people’s kids, and I shake my head in amazement. I don’t have that in me. But will I ever?

Mr. W said that life isn’t about overhauling phases, it’s one long and gradual process. To him, there’s no such thing as going from child to teen overnight, from teen to young adult overnight, and from young adult to family-producing grownup overnight. I think he feels I’d be shortchanging myself if I force myself into expected traditional roles at expected traditional ages, instead of being as my bailiff was telling me earlier, “true to myself.”

So I emailed my mom back, pensively, with, “I think I deserve to just enjoy being happy with my life right now.” Her response came back after lunch and I was almost too scared to open it. When I did, it said simply, “OKAY, BE HAPPY!”

Maybe this is all really in MY head.

It was a morning like any other. My court reporter happily waved us into her office for some cake she’d made the night before, I poured myself a mug of coffee sweetened with half a teaspoon of sugar and lightened with soy milk, and returned to the courtroom. My new bailiff was unfolding some clothes that some friend or relatives of the defendant had left for the defendant’s use in our murder trial. The defendant’s attorney, a public defender, was setting his trial documents on counsel table while telling me he was going to be in another department for the next 10 minutes. And that was when the morning turned.

From my bailiff’s desk came a crinkle sound. The public defender suddenly froze and turned and looked at my bailiff, who had her hands on the waistband of the defendant’s trousers in her routine clothing search. She slapped on latex gloves and ripped the waistband open. Some conversation ensued that I wasn’t listening to, because at this time my naive self did not realize the magnitude of what had just been uncovered. The public defender was tracing the origin of the clothes aloud; they had come from the defendant’s mother yesterday and were handed to him; he had then placed them on a side table in by the bailiff’s desk. There was a gentleman who had urgently tried to get the public defender’s attention in the afternoon, and he had brought the clothes, and had handed them to the defendant’s mother. “That’s why I usually don’t ask them to bring clothes, cuz then THIS happens,” the public defender was griping.
“WHAT happens?” I asked, finally interested.
“Heroin in the clothes,” my bailiff answered.
“WHAT?! I’ve never seen real heroin before!” I said and leapt out of my desk toward hers. She unraveled the fabric of the inside waistband of the slacks and revealed a flat dark brown smear wrapped inside plastic wrap or cellophane. It resembled a molten piece of coffee candy pounded down. The placement of the piece was right inside a belt loop section of the waist, where you’d expect the fabric to be a bit bulker from the extra fabric stitched in. It was clear that they’d ironed the pants down there to smooth the heroin bulge. There was likely more heroin packs all along the waistband, too. My bailiff packaged the clothing and took it down to her sergeant.

“I really just don’t need this right now,” the public defender shook his head. “Now I’m part of a drug investigation.” A few other bailiffs popped their heads in and asked what’s going on in our department, and whether we needed back-up. I explained my bailiff’s findings. Turned out they’d just covered this issue in their briefing this morning, because as recently as yesterday, another bailiff in the building had found dope hidden in the trousers of HIS criminal trial defendant. The mother who’d brought the clothes for that defendant was taken into custody. “I’ve HEARD of things like this happening like an urban legend, but I’ve never SEEN it,” the public defender was saying.

I’d personally never been that close to real drugs before (that I know of), so it was new to me, too.

This job’s a trip.

The judge took half an hour away from us for lunch to cram in more time for jury selection, so I was unable to go to the gym. Instead, I kept busy with something else…look who got a new little house!

It’s my big boy! The “little” avocado tree! My dad told me recently that an avocado tree has to be “mated”, male and female, to bear fruit, and asked if I wanted to graft his friend’s avocado tree into mine to take care of that. I told him I already knew that there has to be 2 trees together and that I’d already taken care of that by growing my little avocado tree a wife:

And then I found out from my dad that you can’t tell whether an avocado tree is male or female before it flowers for the first time. What?! It has DESIGNATED gender, like a human? I did not know that. I just figured you put 2 different trees together and they’ll straighten themselves out. So now it’s possible I may be raising a little gay or lesbian avocado couple. But 2 out of 4 courtroom personnel in here agree, the little avocado tree has a definite male presence. And the new seedling in the plastic cup took her sweet time springing out roots and a little stem as everyone waited, so it seems female to me!
For prior photos and a little avocado history, click here.

We’re in the midst of jury selection for a criminal murder trial. About 15 minutes ago at the end of a break, the judge directed me to let our prospective jurors in from the outside hallway; breaktime’s over, and we’re going to dive back into jury selection. I opened the door, announced, “Okay jurors, you know the drill!” and they chuckled and filed into the courtroom. After I entered, the bailiff and I kept counting the jurors over and over and we kept coming up one juror short. So I took roll and discovered the name of the missing juror. One juror sitting in the jury box raised his hand. “Excuse me,” he said, “He might be outside in the hallway sleeping.” What?! I started walking back out toward the courtroom front doors again, passing by a DA who was visiting. The DA said discreetly to me, “Yeah, there’s a dude out there who’s asleep on a bench.”

I walked out, looked down the hall, and sure enough, there’s a youngish guy sitting upright on the bench, leaning his back and head against the wall behind him, eyes closed. All by himself. I walked up to him, my heels clicking loudly on the marble floors and echoing down the hall. He didn’t wake up. I stood over him, touched him lightly on the shoulder, saying, “Sir?” No response. I shook him again, harder. “Sir?” No response. I looked up in bewilderment. Oh crap. What if he had a heart attack or a stroke? Do I take his pulse? Should I shake him harder? Looking around, I saw a coworker who happened to pass through an adjoining hallway. He’d seen me talking to the guy, and I threw up my hands in a shrug with my eyes wide, like, “I don’t know what to do!” I walked up to the coworker and pleaded, “He’s not responding! I’m freaking out. Can you come with me just as a witness?” He kindly walked with me over to the guy, and as I approached again, the juror (thank GOD) groggily opened his eyes. “Are you a juror in our case?” I asked him.
He sat up suddenly. “Oh yes. Oh! I’m SO sorry,” he said.
“That’s okay, come on back in,” I said lightly leading him back down the hallway, thanking my coworker, who left us.
“I’m sooo sorry,” the juror said again, and we came back into the courtroom, he took a seat in the audience, and the judge resumed jury selection as usual.

Nobody knew that I practically wet myself out in the hall earlier, which would not have been a good thing, cuz I was wearing a skirt.

I’m in desperate need of some levity after that last post, so here it is.

While cleaning out my closet with my gym trainee this past weekend, I uncovered two T-shirts so tiny I don’t know what I was thinking when I bought them in New York in 2002. It was after September 11, 2001, so they were patriotic cute white Ts, one depicting a colorful US Air Force seal with a flag and an eagle, and the other showed the New York skyline with an enlarged Twin Towers with “9-11-01” over the picture, and “We Will Never Forget” under it. I brought those two shirts to work with me yesterday and gave them to my coworker, thinking one of her many young children could fit into them.

Today, I had this email exchange with that coworker:

Me: Did the t-shirts fit?
Her: Yes, as a matter of fact, Jack LOVED them and is wearing 1 today and has plans to wear the other either later today or tomorrow!!!!
Me: Yay! I’m so glad to hear that! How old is Jack?
Her: Jack is 4 years old and Loves anything Flag related-even if it just has red,white, and blue on it!!
Me: Wow, that’s quite a fortunate coincidence!
Her: He was undecided this morning and driving me crazy because I was trying to leave for work but I remember your shirts and he snatched them right up and pull the “Air Force” themed one over his head and said, “These are my favorite kinds of shirts.”
I told him that my friend had brought them all the way from New York and he said “WOOOOOOOOW!!! Tell her thanks for the Flag shirts!! I LOVE THEM!!!!!!”
I had lunch with them today and he was still telling us all about his favorite shirts and he was very careful not to get it dirty!!!

HOW cute is that?!