I was electronically tethered to the office sending work emails yesterday.

It started innocuously with a partner asking where a file was. Then a secretary asked me to review a client matter. It got worse when the email came informing me that a trial won’t be able to proceeding as originally scheduled. And the emails, they kept on coming. Things escalated to text messages between me and a senior partner…because someone couldn’t remember how to access the firm server from home.

It’s good to know that work needs me. It’s better to know that I haven’t been replaced. It’s best to know that at 9:30 in the morning I can pour myself a cocktail and head to the pool.

And that’s what I think I shall do.

Every so often, however, you get the person so dumb that she should not be allowed to procreate. But as this is America and instead of trying to break free of their bonds of stupidity, they decide that it would be more prudent to talk to a lawyer without having any idea what they are speaking about:

Caller: Can you set up a structured settlement for me?
Me: I’m sorry?
Caller: I want to set up a structured settlement like the ones I see on TV.
Me: Well… do you have an ongoing claim against someone?
Caller: What?
Me: Are you presently suing someone for personal injuries?
Caller: Oh… no.
Me: Have you been hurt somehow?
Caller: Um. No?
Me: Why are calling again?
Caller: One of my friends told me that a lawyer can set up a structured settlement for me, so I called you.
Me: …
Caller: So, would you be able to help me set up this structured settlement?

If only I could…

The Email: This is the entry level in the anger cycle. It usually is tersely worded with phrases like “Please advise to the status with regard to XYZ” or “You had previously informed my office blah blah blah” These emails indicate frustration with the other side over matters that can be resolved.

The Late Night Fax: This is the passive aggressive approach when the other side really upsets you. Typically best reserved for delivering really bad news for the other side such as “Please find enclosed the motion for attorney sanctions” or “I have included my investigator’s photos of your client having relations with a farm animal. Please disclose the identity of the animal so that we may depose him/her as soon as possible.”

The Delayed Scream: This occurs when one is on the receiving end of a Late Night Fax. Which the attorney will receive the minute he walks into the office. The response is as the name implies: he will spew high volumed profanities at the next person that he encounters. Unfortunately for me, I was the first person to encounter a partner who had a pent up scream waiting to happen. “UNBELIEVABLE! WHAT IN THE MOTHER F*CKING HELL DID HE SEND ME THIS FAX AT 10 PM???” and this went on and on as he threw documents at me for three minutes. Then he stormed off to Court to confront the offending attorney.

The Phone Call (with optional upset voicemail): This stage of the venting process, unfortunately, can be hit or miss as the target of the rage could technically be screening for your call and refusing to pick up. When you get access to the voicemail, you tend to talk fast because if you linger while leaving the message chances of having it played on the internet for years to come increase drastically. If you are successful in getting the intended recipient on the phone, one will ask a pointed question while clenching his or her teeth (the clench is necessary to avoid cursing). Typically the phone call begins with a simple question like “I spoke to my client and he tells me that you contacted him. Care to tell me what happened?” The more words used in the lead up to the question typically indicate the level of frustration with not being able to ask “Hey Shitbag, what the f*ck happened?”

The Court Filing: When the attorney passes the point of no return he or she will file a motion or a brief that is written in the tersest possible prose detailing perceived slights by the offending attorney. If it is a motion to compel, there will be attacks on the opponents character, professionalism and bodily hygiene. If it is a reply brief there will be pronouncements like “counsel apparently has seen fit to ignore the relevant caselaw in a bold attempt to mislead the court” and then go on to list cognitive defects that render opposing counsel unable to hold a law license or live without a colostomy bag.

Now if you’d excuse me, I have to go prepare my late night faxes for a few of my favorite lawyers.

One client has decided to step into the antagonistic zone that had been recently vacated by my most annoying and meddlesome clients.

For storytelling sake, we can call this client by his first name: John. Knowing him from a previous case that I had handled for him, I learned in the process that he is a bit of a phone junkie. To put it another way, his Android phone is surgically attached to his body at all times such that he could have written the Check You Email. Unfortunately, John has a hard time admitting (read: can’t) admit that he may be wrong and ever since he was bitchslapped upside the head by reality on his first case, he has been a little passive-aggressive when it comes to dealing with my office ever since. Thankfully, however, he had been relatively drama free for the last two months and I thought that he had turned a corner to better himself as a human. Then a pressing matter arose on his new case and I needed to get John on the phone immediately to confirm his appearance for a court-ordered deposition. But he didn’t pick up.

And then I tried again. I left a message: “Need you to come to my office Friday. Call back to confirm immediately…”

And again. Still nothing.

And then again. “Hi, you’ve reached John, I cannot come to the phone right now…”

Then I emailed. Three times.

This was over the course of six hours in what was supposed to be a low key workday. I left my office close to six that night having not heard from John and wondering when I was going to hear from him again. The response came several hours later via e-mail and surprisingly, it was rather docile and he agreed to what I was asking him to do. I was stunned. Maybe this client had changed and I was being overly harsh. Twenty minutes later I got another email from John.

“Changed my mind. I don’t want to do this.”

I refilled my wineglass and walked back to the bedroom to let the significant other know why she may hear me laughing from the computer for a little while. I felt the need to respond in my best legalese just to shut John up for the night. This took longer than expected solely because I kept beginning my draft email “Dear F*cktard…”

The genius behind this working off-day is that the other side let me pick the place and time for when this momentus questioning was to occur. The end result is that I picked a location and hour that ensured I would be able to say in good faith “As I’ve got to be on the road so early, I really don’t think it makes much sense for me to come into the office today…” And my partner agreed with me. As I don’t have to spend much time prepping for this exercise in billable futility, I am able to run a few errands, see my family and drink way too much coffee. Unfortunately, the downside to my genius plan is that it then requires me to return home during the height of rush hour.

I don’t know about you, but sitting in 90 minutes of bumper to bumper traffic is totally worth a day away from the office.

Well, I should say that it usually works:

Partner: I was in court on the Doe v. Acme Corporation case and I heard a case get called that sounded familiar “Smith v. Jones”. Does that sound like a case that you are working on?
Me: Yes. It is.
Partner: Is it one of yours?
Me: I’m working on it with one of the other partners.
Partner: Hmmm…I guess I didn’t know if it was one of our cases.
Me: Did you check the court call sheet or talk to the clerk about the case?
Partner: No.
Me: Did you stand up on it?
Partner: No?
Me: Did anyone stand up on the case?
Partner: I don’t remember…I wasn’t paying attention.
Me: …

About two hours later…

Partner: Maybe I should have stood up on the case when it was called.

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is why I drink.

There were a plethora of moments from today’s jaunt to the Courthouse that could be considered highlights of the absurd whether it was seeing one of my law school classmates look like a homeless puppy wandering aloof in the middle of the hallway or watching a judge take a cellphone call on the bench. Mid-hearing. But neither of these moments could prepare me for what happened when no judge was present.

I tend to be rather friendly with the clerks that work for the judges. As these are the very people that can save your ass when you are in a bind, I try to be as familiar as possible with them because I never know when I am going to have to beg for a favor. This typically entails conversing with them in a wide arrange of small talk while the paperwork is being processed or if I see them away from the courtroom. This is exactly what I was doing with one clerk today when we were discussing her current level of cranky:

”I want to go back to bed. I woke up so cranky…So…what color should my tampon be today? Purple?

There really is no proper response that I can think of to this question.

Also, I may need to rethink my policy on chatting up the judicial staff around these parts.

I know that you are my boss. You dictate what work I do, the hours that I am needed and pretty much run my life. You authorize my hours and make sure that I am paid (most of the time). I go to court when you say I need to get chewed out by a judge for you, I fall on the grenade that is a screaming client when you can’t be bothered and I let you blame me when you need a scapegoat for your inaction when negotiating with opposing counsel.

You determine which files I do substantive work on and which files I clean up your mistakes on. Actually, that’s a misstatement, I make sure that our files are as mistake free as possible. Unless I am throwing a passive aggressive pity party when I do not really care if you’ve produced work product that a high school moot court participant wouldn’t sign her name to. After all, my name goes out on our cases right next to yours.

But now, you’ve gone too far.

I humbly request that the next time you feel the need to engage in activities that are deemed to be clerical in nature that you do said menial tasks in your own office. Specifically, I ask that you refrain from walking the eighty feet from your office to (1) use my staple remover, (2) at my desk, (3) leaving the removed staples all over my workspace, (4) when I am away. Nothing says you appreciate you like finding a pile of removed staples and torn paper splayed all my keyboard.

I’m glad we had this talk.

Very truly yours,

Nambs

I am also able to smell bullsh*t from potential clients:

Caller: I am in the hospital and the doctors will not give me the drugs that I think will cure me.
Me: What drug do you want to the doctors to give you?
Caller: I want penicillin! My body reacts really well to penicillin and these doctors are refusing to give it to me.
Me: And what disease do you have?
Caller: MRSA.
Me: You want penicillin for MRSA???
Caller: Yeah…
Me: MRSA is resistant to penicillin.
Caller: Oh. Does that mean that they aren’t going to give it to me?

A note to would be litigants: please do not call me from the hospital bed. I could care less if you don’t like your doctor, if you are in pain or if you could have died. Please only call if you are, in fact, dead.

Potential Client: I didn’t sign your attorney contract because I thought you were getting too big of a fee.
Me: You handled the case on your own, didn’t you?
Potential Client: Well, I thought I could settle it myself. My neighbor did this and she got plenty of money.
Me: How’s it working out for you so far?
Potential Client: They don’t wanna pay me no money!
Me: Being your own lawyer didn’t work so well for you did it now?
Potential Client: I got over $20,000 in unpaid medical bills! They have to be paid!!!
Me: I remember from when we talked. Does that mean you want a lawyer now?
Potential Client: Yeah.
Me: You want me as your lawyer?
Potential Client: Yeah!

What if I don’t want you as my client?