cindy's world

It’s insane in here! Apparently I’ve stepped into the midst of a messy murder trial. Defendant allegedly shot and killed his wife during an argument. Lots of exhibits and photos, none of which I’ve studied. Ugh. Anyway, this is just me checking in w/you guys. Will work on Cancun as I have time.

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The ONE freaking day I planned to actually LEAVE the courthouse for lunch and not work thru lunch, and they’re going to inundate us with THIS CRAP.

I had to cancel lunch plans I was CONCEITED enough to make this morning with a DA pal who’d been wanting to take me out before I leave on vacation. Jury complications off the map, constant juggling of disappearing attorneys on 2 cases, jury hung on 1 count and we took the verdict on the other count into lunch, so I had to cancel lunch plans, and then they gave us ANOTHER TRIAL. Non-stop phone calls in the morning so I can’t get ANYTHING done. I wanted to either HAVE a damn lunch or go to the gym for once! I haven’t even been able to leave the freaking courthouse before 7:30p all week (except Thursday when I bailed close to 5:30p). So I may as well work thru lunch to process 7 divorce cases that the Judge had signed for me this morning and to do my trial minute order and to close out the damn trial case now that we’ve reached a verdict. The amount of work for a clerk post-verdict is extensive, anyway. It looks like another LONG evening at work, too.

DAMN IT DAMN IT DAMN IT.

“I don’t necessarily think there’s just one person for everyone. It’s more about finding someone who fits and making it work.” – Tyra Banks

Kinda rare that anything a Hollywood celebrity says inspires me to write a post. But then again, I’d been looking for an excuse to write this post anyway. I didn’t leave work until about 7:45p. It was an unusually complicated day with curveballs thrown at me in my criminal jury trial, criminal court trial and sentencing matters, and in family law wrinkles. Sensing my tenseness, a very welcome and wonderful person came by after work to share some hugs and company with me. After he tried unsuccessfully to work out a tension knot in the middle right side of my lower back, I was ready to call it quits and I shut down the computer at 5:30p in favor of catching a flick at a nearby movie theatre. A quick check of the current features later, however, he suggested I’d be better off getting more family law divorce crap done. Due to the difficulties of the day, I had not been able to get to one family law case today despite working thru lunch. I reluctantly agreed because, after all, he’s right. I do have an imminent (and eminent) deadline.

To my surprise and guilty pleasure, he stayed with me the whole time, chatting w/me and helping me stuff envelopes like he did on Saturday. And I did indeed get rid of a lot of these cursed cases in the time we spent torturing ourselves with their presence. As I got ready to leave, I told him, “I do feel better now that these are done.” He joked, “That’s because I’m a good influence.” He is. He’d said earlier in talking me into staying to do work that he just didn’t want to see me stress any further over these things as I got closer to vacation and my available time got shorter, and he said it helps the time pass by faster if I’m working with someone around and it’s not just me with the janitors.

He also asked me about my transportation arrangements to get to/from the airport for Cancun next week. I hadn’t made any arrangements yet, and he offered himself. That’s so sweet! He had also previously asked what I was going to do about my cat the week I’m gone, and when I said I hadn’t secured that detail yet, he’d also offered himself even tho my house is totally out of the way for him, and he’s allergic to my cat. I was touched at his offers, but I can’t do the cat thing to him. I’d still like to have him around when I get back from vacation, I don’t want to find him convulsing and foaming on my living room floor due to an overdose of Dodo.

I was so grateful to him when we separated at my car. He just blew an evening hanging out with me at work and volunteering himself to do work that isn’t even his. We didn’t do anything social and we couldn’t even go grab a bite because of my diet. He said it wasn’t a wasted evening for him because he got to hang out and chat with me.

Life is really good to me right now, no? And now I get to look forward to seeing his handsome face right before I leave for and immediately upon my return from Cancun. 😀

I just realized that my cell phone is at home. It must’ve been at home since Saturday morning, since I didn’t pick it up to leave yesterday. No wonder it’s been so quiet lately. I think I’m enjoying the fact that no one can get a hold of me right now.

I’ll probably snap at people anyway — I was at WORK for four hours yesterday evening. If that won’t make you cranky, then being at work for four hours doing divorce cases will. >=( The only redeeming thing is that I had wonderful company who volunteered to come along and keep me company. As his laptop played several episodes of one of his favorite TV shows on DVD, he helped me do some of my busy work, i.e. stuffing SASEs w/conformed copies of these annoying litigants’ stupid finalized divorce papers. If he weren’t there I probably would’ve taken an extra hour to do what I got done. I didn’t even have to drag him in! He totally volunteered himself and insisted on helping to ease the stress of my workload, since I am SO annoyed about my stupid divorce cases that I’ve been working on them thru lunch and after work. This is because my supervisor threatened to cancel my vacation unless I get thru the 70-some case load. And I’m not even a family law court! I am actually having psychosomatic symptoms from the family law stress. I won’t go into what those symptoms are. Okay, enough complaining.

After leaving work at 10pm, we went to BCD Tofu House and had a good meal. And a good Asian meal is not complete without a stopover for boba. Unfortunately, I opted for something different — Thai iced tea w/pudding — and he didn’t take to it as much as he did the boba. (I got him into eating boba and hummus. Hee hee. Altho this was his first time with Korean soon tofu, he already liked tofu anyway so it was just a cool little experience for him, not a food preference overhaul.)

Mr. Wonderful is cutting up potatoes to make brunch. I should get off the computer to at least keep him company.

I just returned from the district picnic. That’s right, no gym at lunch today, I ate instead. How absurd is that? Eating at lunch. Pshaw. The way I ate can only be described as, I ate things that I had no business eating. I’m probably going to hit a sugar low, food coma soon and be out of commission all afternoon.

I had planned to work thru lunch today to get some more of these divorce nightmares under my belt, but my reporter appeared in the department I was covering (I’m covering 2 courts today, and actually brought more divorce files with me to work on while I was in the other department) with 2 tickets for the picnic in hand. How could I resist free food and great company?

The weather, by the way, is beautiful. It’s nice to get some sun and great laughs with people I work with but don’t see a lot.

Shortly before lunch, I was discussing a problematic divorce case I was processing with my Family Law resource judge. The judge explained some legal things to me, the result of which was the elicitation of the following comment from me: “So the key is, to not get married. This sucks. I’m glad I’m single.”

He, a jovial happily-married man of I don’t know how many decades (still on his 1st wife), said, “Well, marriage is a good thing if you’re with the right person. Being married to the right person is like being on a long date in which neither of you have to go home.”

I really like that characterization. I remember being in love with a boyfriend who had plans to stay over with me after a date. I remember thinking it was like a wonderful slumber party in which after the events are over, there’s more fun to be had because you still have more hang time left. This felt especially true after a party or a social gathering. After everyone leaves is the time when you’re sorta sad that the night is over. But it’s not over when you get to go home with someone you really enjoy spending time with. Especially someone you can curl up with all night and talk to about random things. And when you wake up, more cuddling and connecting. Sometimes there’s even “other stuff” to be “had.”

Yup, marriage should be warm, safe and fuzzy like spooning your cat on a Saturday morning.

My coworker and I have started this little game. Last Tuesday, I entered my courtroom to find a Hawaiian flower resting on my keyboard. I was gonna top it by leaving 2 wallet-sized “modeling” photos of me at age 21 (2 outfits he said were his “favorites” out of the tons of shots I took in that photoshoot and showed him for amusement purposes) in his desk drawer, and then calling him and saying something like, “Hey, I hear you’re a pervert and have photos of little 21 yr old girls in your drawer.” Unfortunately, he was there when I snuck up there so I just handed him the photos. =P Failed topper.

Today, when I walked in, on my desk were two gummy bloodshot EYEBALLS (one green, one blue) with the note “MY SMILIN’ EYES… ONLY THEY ARE TIRED…And different colors. : )” Who puts dismembered EYEBALLS on a desk? I got a good laugh, and vowed to top that one. My wheels in the brain are turning on their rusty axels.

When I lived with my friend Brian for 6 months in 2003, he and I had this “hide-the-alien” game. I have a foot-tall inflatable silver alien that’s positioned to hug things, like a koala bear. He and I had opposite work schedules, so we’d each arrive home and find the alien in a different spot of ours and rehide it in a spot of theirs. He placed the alien so that only his silver head popped up in the midst of my stuffed animals. I put it under his comforter and pillow so that when he pulled it back at nite, an alien squeaked at him. He put it hugging my TV antenna in my bedroom. I put it hugging his jacket arm in his closet. He put it hanging off the caddy in my shower. I deflated it and put it inside his bathroom medicine cabinet. I’d wanted to drain the water from the toilet and place it inside so that when he lifted the lid and the seat (we keep both down because my cat would drink toilet water otherwise), he’d be looking at an alien. But I was afraid he’d use the bathroom in a groggy state in the middle of the night and do something to it that would cause me to throw it away and deal with it nevermore.

Our jury began deliberation minutes before the noon hour, so I was happy that I could make it to the gym for my lunchtime workout. I even called my trainee to tell her I was going to a different gym that was closer so that I could get a longer run in. And then on my walk out of the courthouse, I ran into a bunch of DAs I used to hang out after work with, whom I hadn’t hung out w/in awhile, and it didn’t take much to convince me to have lunch with these 8 very fun DAs.

We went to BJs in Cerritos (I know, I know! It wasn’t my idea. I laughed at the irony myself). The food took 40 minutes to arrive. I was getting a bit nervous, but since my jury’s deliberating, all they’d need me for at 1:30p is to unlock the exhibit closet door so that my bailiff can bring them their exhibits. I called the courtroom. No answer. I called the clerk next door and asked them to help get the exhibits to my bailiff, and they agreed. And then in the car on the way back, a DA in front of me gave his cell phone to the DA next to him, who happens to be our trial DA. I overheard, “Here, take this call. [DA I was hanging w/last nite]’s all upset about having to cover for you on your trial.”
From the back of the minivan: “WHAT?! What ABOUT the trial?!” That’s my shrill voice.
I started calling the courtroom. The phone just kept ringing. Damn it, bailiff not picking up the phone again. The DAs in the minivan were thinking that it’s a prank. We called the office of the DA who’s supposedly covering to see if he’s at his desk and if so, we got them. But no, he wasn’t at his desk.
Another 10 minutes or so go by. My bailiff calls me on my cell from the courtroom. Another judge is borrowing our courtroom to do a convoluted sentencing on a multiple-count child molestation case and they want me to clerk it, “…and everybody’s lookin’ for you!” he concluded. WTF?! The one time I’m this late from lunch (about half an hour as it was), cuz I usually go to the gym or stay in, and some skewball like THIS changes course on a cross-breeze and hits me upside the head like that.
When I walked in, they were all waiting for me. It was the most uncomfortable thing ever, and it was an awful, complicated, difficult sentence to enter/process and it wasn’t even my case!!

But you know what? Lunch was GREAT. I love those people. All the conversation, laughter, mockery, etc. were worth it.

I was outside in the hallway doing rollcall of our 60 prospective jurors. There were a few who had not yet arrived, but they weren’t that late as I had gone out a bit early to call roll. I went into my explanation of why punctuality in jury selection is important, and was interrupted by a young woman in stripey highlighted hair and a tight pink t-shirt that highlighted her fat rolls, who walked right up to my face way into my personal space while I was in mid-sentence, and said she just got here. I asked for her last name to check her off the list. She then pointed to the courtroom doors behind me and asked, “Should I go in?” I was so irked by this idiocy that I said nonchalantly, “No, everyone’s still out here,” gestured briefly around me. Duh. Over 50 other jurors around us, all wearing Juror ID badges. I didn’t pause or use any inflection to make her feel stupid, I just did my notation on my jury list, and I was happy to hear some of the jurors around me chuckle at her.

Okay, that was mean, but I did tone it down, and I have little patience for stupid questions.

I can’t believe it’s past 7:30pm and I’m still at work. The stress involved in cleaning up various unusually complicated criminal, civil and family law cases that need special attention and set-aside time is making my back hurt. It’s almost a white-hot pain. Almost cold. And I’m pretty sure I’m crooked right now due to back muscle strains. *sigh*

My supervisor is going to put a floater clerk in my department tomorrow to babysit my current criminal jury trial so that I can finally tackle all those freaking annoying divorce cases sitting in my basket. It’s too bad I’m not a powerful witch who doesn’t care about consequences, or I’d have a gargantuan bonfire in the woods and dance around naked cursing all the nagging divorcees whose files are feeding my fire, cackling gleefully in the full moon. 🙁

Okay, time to finally do my distribution downstairs in the Clerk’s Office and begin the drive home. At least there’d be no traffic by the time I’m able to leave this joint.