I'll write at some length this weekend - but this was a WEIRD day - Did another woman crack distribution sentencing in Federal Court today, and got such a stunningly good result that it's already on the district's jungle telegraph - and it wasn't me - I'm at home in court, I feel good there, I feel natural there, but I'M NOT THAT GOOD.
I was ruminating about what an "ideal life" for me would be like as I was in the car going between courthouses today - I'll blog about that, too - that concept is definitely a moving target.
Mizpah.
R
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Paladin at heart
The bug passed in the night, so I was fully functional today - ok, functional to the extent that I'm ever functional.
There was an 8:30 hearing in Morgantown on my schedule, so I was there by 8 -- and found that the hearing wasn't until 11 - and the interim to return to No. 3 would consist of 1-1/2 hrs in the car, and 1 hour working. No problem, got a brew at Starbucks, and worked -- did the notes for tomorrow's sentencing, rewrote the notes for a brief, and wrote a bunch of cards to people - I carry them in my clipboard thing for such occasions - The hearing was really rather humorous. It was a Social Security case remanded to the Administrative Law Judge by federal court. ALJ's hate to get reversed. So he was trying to set up the record to deny the claim and prove he was right the first time (including the rare step of calling a medical expert witness) and I was trying to set up circumstances that he couldn't deny the claim this time around. Each of us knew damn well what the other was doing, it was couched in the most pleasant possible language, and watching ourselves and the other spar was just funny. (Nobody else in the room was in on the joke - the case is totally important to the client.) In my petition to the federal court for the remand, I used words like "strange," "inconceivable," and "incomprehensible" in reference to the ALJ's original opinion.
Amy told me today that she's going to be out effectively for 3 months, secondary to her 2 y.o. having something called auditory neuropathy, that will probably need treated someplace like Baltimore. So, whoever said that "things can't get any worse" is an optimistic dumbass.
A client's family, the nicest people imaginable, brought me a xmas gift today - poinsettia (no doubt someone will want to use it) and a large tin of peanut butter fudge. Damn. Then on the other hand, it does illustrate the power of addiction, and the fact that I just can't be around that. (No, didn't imbibe a bite.)
TimSon took a 6 y.o. on a long-distance interhospital transfer Monday night - he was talking to me about the experience, and I'm really glad that he is showing a lot of heart and care, and not acquiring the jaded outlook that EMS creates in some people.
I noticed that I've been putting my name in a whole lot of books lately - not sure why - I always put my name & the date on the flyleaf of my books in the same way. Odd habit, I know.
But then remember Dykstra's Law: Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
Mizpah.
R
There was an 8:30 hearing in Morgantown on my schedule, so I was there by 8 -- and found that the hearing wasn't until 11 - and the interim to return to No. 3 would consist of 1-1/2 hrs in the car, and 1 hour working. No problem, got a brew at Starbucks, and worked -- did the notes for tomorrow's sentencing, rewrote the notes for a brief, and wrote a bunch of cards to people - I carry them in my clipboard thing for such occasions - The hearing was really rather humorous. It was a Social Security case remanded to the Administrative Law Judge by federal court. ALJ's hate to get reversed. So he was trying to set up the record to deny the claim and prove he was right the first time (including the rare step of calling a medical expert witness) and I was trying to set up circumstances that he couldn't deny the claim this time around. Each of us knew damn well what the other was doing, it was couched in the most pleasant possible language, and watching ourselves and the other spar was just funny. (Nobody else in the room was in on the joke - the case is totally important to the client.) In my petition to the federal court for the remand, I used words like "strange," "inconceivable," and "incomprehensible" in reference to the ALJ's original opinion.
Amy told me today that she's going to be out effectively for 3 months, secondary to her 2 y.o. having something called auditory neuropathy, that will probably need treated someplace like Baltimore. So, whoever said that "things can't get any worse" is an optimistic dumbass.
A client's family, the nicest people imaginable, brought me a xmas gift today - poinsettia (no doubt someone will want to use it) and a large tin of peanut butter fudge. Damn. Then on the other hand, it does illustrate the power of addiction, and the fact that I just can't be around that. (No, didn't imbibe a bite.)
TimSon took a 6 y.o. on a long-distance interhospital transfer Monday night - he was talking to me about the experience, and I'm really glad that he is showing a lot of heart and care, and not acquiring the jaded outlook that EMS creates in some people.
I noticed that I've been putting my name in a whole lot of books lately - not sure why - I always put my name & the date on the flyleaf of my books in the same way. Odd habit, I know.
But then remember Dykstra's Law: Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
Mizpah.
R
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Mixed bag
1 - 150 down. That's good.
2 - The f.ing flu shot apparently worked. I got it. It's gotta be gone by 5 AM or I'm in deep shit. However, my body hurts, and that is a good reminder of the physical pain of higher weight. Hey, I gotta find something good in this.
3 - My ignorant sister-in-law just got beat up by her drunken, lazy, criminal husband, but she refuses to call the police. I have a good record helping abused women, but this is one failure of mine, and the whole thing pisses me off.
I'm going to bed.
Pippa passes. Mizpah.
R
2 - The f.ing flu shot apparently worked. I got it. It's gotta be gone by 5 AM or I'm in deep shit. However, my body hurts, and that is a good reminder of the physical pain of higher weight. Hey, I gotta find something good in this.
3 - My ignorant sister-in-law just got beat up by her drunken, lazy, criminal husband, but she refuses to call the police. I have a good record helping abused women, but this is one failure of mine, and the whole thing pisses me off.
I'm going to bed.
Pippa passes. Mizpah.
R
Friday, December 7, 2007
Secrets revealed, circuit breakers trip, a small encounter
Stayed real busy today. Had to do the bill in Tina's case to get my partner off my ass. And then I closed Tina's file. Hell, how many files have I closed in 30 years? This could be the first one that I put the sticky note on and put in the "out" basket with . . . regret? Sadness? Hope? I'm just not sure.
I had an out-of-town appointment today, and my mom wanted to go along for the ride (and to hit B&N after we were done.) She's still stressed by yesterday, and all that I can do is provide what support I can. Another (genetic) brother is clergy-trained and has been stepping in and providing a LOT of advice and support that I'm not able to effectively bring off (for a number of reasons). But the senior (genetic) brother is just so outrageous that I cannot take him seriously and still be effective in lots of realms. So, them's the circuit breakers what tripped.
While I was at the appointment (which was at a health care facility), I came out to the waiting area where my mom was sitting, and there was a young man, 15 or 16 there. Upon closer inspection, I saw that he was wearing handcuffs and shackles. (Shackles go around the ankles, prevent anything but a slow walk.) The deputy with him was a nice fellow, and didn't object when I struck up a conversation with the kid - nothing elaborate, nothing legal, just that he was obviously having a bad day (and he agreed with that) and that he should hang in there. It is probable that he's in this predicament due some lousy parenting and a don't-give-a-shit materialistic MTV society. Yeah, yeah, I hear people saying that there IS such a thing as a bad kid, but that's just WRONG. Some kids take the wrong path, and some don't need as much stupidity to go that way, but they are CHILDREN. This really pisses me off, we as a society are spending pennies on resources for children because (1) they don't vote and (2) neither do many of their parents. The funding mechanisms of government are for sale, and pretty cheaply at that.
Hmmm - got off the track there.
It's a dark night here, but there are still town lights. Have you experienced true darkness outside? You have to be away from all lights, all towns, and it's either a spooky or a cosmic experience. The moonlight can illuminate lots, but when it is only starlight, it's magical. I had an English prof. in college named Sonnenshein, wonderful fellow. He was strictly a city guy, and once confided to me that one of his greatest fears was being in the woods out of sight of any of the works of Man. Funny, I'm rather fearful of walking down the sidewalk in a huge city. To each their own. Oh, when he retired and moved to San Francisco, Sonny wrote me a note, which was nice, but he accused me of forever scarring Epithelamion for him by reciting it in W.C. Fields' verbal style.
The "secrets," as requested by Sarai:
Mizpah is a Hebrew word literally meaning "watchtower," not to be confused with the Jehovah's Witnesses use of that term. It is used metaphorically as the wish that "God watch over you and me until we meet again."
"Pippa passes" is a lot tougher to explain. Rosary is right, it comes from a poem/play by Robert Browning. The most remembered lines from the poem are "God's in His heaven and All's right with the world!" In this poem, there is a nice and even naive character, Pippa. In the midst of all sorts of situations of chaos and debauchery, Pippa appears very briefly, announced by the sentence "Pippa passes." I use it to mean that in the midst of chaos, we just march on.
Mizpah. Pippa passes.
R
I had an out-of-town appointment today, and my mom wanted to go along for the ride (and to hit B&N after we were done.) She's still stressed by yesterday, and all that I can do is provide what support I can. Another (genetic) brother is clergy-trained and has been stepping in and providing a LOT of advice and support that I'm not able to effectively bring off (for a number of reasons). But the senior (genetic) brother is just so outrageous that I cannot take him seriously and still be effective in lots of realms. So, them's the circuit breakers what tripped.
While I was at the appointment (which was at a health care facility), I came out to the waiting area where my mom was sitting, and there was a young man, 15 or 16 there. Upon closer inspection, I saw that he was wearing handcuffs and shackles. (Shackles go around the ankles, prevent anything but a slow walk.) The deputy with him was a nice fellow, and didn't object when I struck up a conversation with the kid - nothing elaborate, nothing legal, just that he was obviously having a bad day (and he agreed with that) and that he should hang in there. It is probable that he's in this predicament due some lousy parenting and a don't-give-a-shit materialistic MTV society. Yeah, yeah, I hear people saying that there IS such a thing as a bad kid, but that's just WRONG. Some kids take the wrong path, and some don't need as much stupidity to go that way, but they are CHILDREN. This really pisses me off, we as a society are spending pennies on resources for children because (1) they don't vote and (2) neither do many of their parents. The funding mechanisms of government are for sale, and pretty cheaply at that.
Hmmm - got off the track there.
It's a dark night here, but there are still town lights. Have you experienced true darkness outside? You have to be away from all lights, all towns, and it's either a spooky or a cosmic experience. The moonlight can illuminate lots, but when it is only starlight, it's magical. I had an English prof. in college named Sonnenshein, wonderful fellow. He was strictly a city guy, and once confided to me that one of his greatest fears was being in the woods out of sight of any of the works of Man. Funny, I'm rather fearful of walking down the sidewalk in a huge city. To each their own. Oh, when he retired and moved to San Francisco, Sonny wrote me a note, which was nice, but he accused me of forever scarring Epithelamion for him by reciting it in W.C. Fields' verbal style.
The "secrets," as requested by Sarai:
Mizpah is a Hebrew word literally meaning "watchtower," not to be confused with the Jehovah's Witnesses use of that term. It is used metaphorically as the wish that "God watch over you and me until we meet again."
"Pippa passes" is a lot tougher to explain. Rosary is right, it comes from a poem/play by Robert Browning. The most remembered lines from the poem are "God's in His heaven and All's right with the world!" In this poem, there is a nice and even naive character, Pippa. In the midst of all sorts of situations of chaos and debauchery, Pippa appears very briefly, announced by the sentence "Pippa passes." I use it to mean that in the midst of chaos, we just march on.
Mizpah. Pippa passes.
R
Thursday, December 6, 2007
Sunrise, sunset
Well, this is certainly a mixed day so far.
Tina the Crack Dealer got sentenced - We got the Title 18 § 3553 "safety valve" which made her eligible for a sentence less than the mandatory 10 years, got bottom of the guideline range there, which is more than I really hoped, and the sentence is 57 months. With time served, time off for intensive drug treatment, good time, get a GED and a stay at a halfway house, she'll be out in 3 years, which is rather miraculous. The judge recommended that she serve her time at Alderson (WV) (where Martha Stewart served her time) which is a fairly low security setting. The Bureau of Prisons looks to the expense necessary to keep people - the more secure, the more expensive - and Tina should be a low security risk. At Alderson, they live dormitory-style, so I guess you could say it's rather like a very low-class summer camp. I'm really pleased, but also concerned what the various safety nets in society will be able to do to support her in a normal life.
Then, a (genetic) brother dumped some unspeakable shit on our mother, and this afternoon has been filled with dealing with that in an appropriate way (which meant a lot of getting help from outside because I'm too damn close to the situation and too hurt and too angry to trust myself to think totally clearly and be as effective as she needs right now) and generally being sad -- This is a brother that I idolized much of my life - e.g., he is a legitimate war hero, very strong - it's just a great sadness.
The shootings in Nebraska - it is absurdly easy to obtain and modify a military-style weapon - the use of weapons is a spreading sickness - that's what our focus should be on, not petty family shit. Sigh - I can be a bit of a dumbass.
Sarai, darling, most mornings I call my best friend and tell him "All the things of my life are present, and it is a good day to die." To me, that is a very positive statement - it doesn't mean that I want Ol' Thanatos to visit me that particular day, it means that I feel strong and defiant and if I go out today, I'll go out on my feet and not on my knees, with my tomahawk red with the blood of my enemies. (I like martial metaphors, did you notice?)
Pippa passes. Mizpah.
R
Tina the Crack Dealer got sentenced - We got the Title 18 § 3553 "safety valve" which made her eligible for a sentence less than the mandatory 10 years, got bottom of the guideline range there, which is more than I really hoped, and the sentence is 57 months. With time served, time off for intensive drug treatment, good time, get a GED and a stay at a halfway house, she'll be out in 3 years, which is rather miraculous. The judge recommended that she serve her time at Alderson (WV) (where Martha Stewart served her time) which is a fairly low security setting. The Bureau of Prisons looks to the expense necessary to keep people - the more secure, the more expensive - and Tina should be a low security risk. At Alderson, they live dormitory-style, so I guess you could say it's rather like a very low-class summer camp. I'm really pleased, but also concerned what the various safety nets in society will be able to do to support her in a normal life.
Then, a (genetic) brother dumped some unspeakable shit on our mother, and this afternoon has been filled with dealing with that in an appropriate way (which meant a lot of getting help from outside because I'm too damn close to the situation and too hurt and too angry to trust myself to think totally clearly and be as effective as she needs right now) and generally being sad -- This is a brother that I idolized much of my life - e.g., he is a legitimate war hero, very strong - it's just a great sadness.
The shootings in Nebraska - it is absurdly easy to obtain and modify a military-style weapon - the use of weapons is a spreading sickness - that's what our focus should be on, not petty family shit. Sigh - I can be a bit of a dumbass.
Sarai, darling, most mornings I call my best friend and tell him "All the things of my life are present, and it is a good day to die." To me, that is a very positive statement - it doesn't mean that I want Ol' Thanatos to visit me that particular day, it means that I feel strong and defiant and if I go out today, I'll go out on my feet and not on my knees, with my tomahawk red with the blood of my enemies. (I like martial metaphors, did you notice?)
Pippa passes. Mizpah.
R
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Little to say
Tomorrow is the sentencing for Tina-the-Crack-Dealer. By the time we get to court, the judge will pretty much have decided what to do. I'm worried, but it's darn near out of my hands.
Most drivers were relearning the physics associated with ice & snow today. Rather tiresome. It's not like the coefficients of friction or acceleration due to gravity change year by year. At least not by much.
TimSon learned today that betting with Dad isn't gambling, it's paying tuition. He also got called in to work today, because they were getting slammed by weather-related stuff. His company managed to wreck two ambulances today - not a red letter day for ol' Station 20.
I still use a stick on the snow - I don't know if that's because of remaining weight or just sensible or silly caution.
I made a goal last January to read 120 books in 2007 - I'm up to 115, so I think I'll make that. Perhaps that's also silly. Well, it's me. I am the Doubter and the Doubt and I the hymn the Brahmin sings.
Mizpah.
R
Most drivers were relearning the physics associated with ice & snow today. Rather tiresome. It's not like the coefficients of friction or acceleration due to gravity change year by year. At least not by much.
TimSon learned today that betting with Dad isn't gambling, it's paying tuition. He also got called in to work today, because they were getting slammed by weather-related stuff. His company managed to wreck two ambulances today - not a red letter day for ol' Station 20.
I still use a stick on the snow - I don't know if that's because of remaining weight or just sensible or silly caution.
I made a goal last January to read 120 books in 2007 - I'm up to 115, so I think I'll make that. Perhaps that's also silly. Well, it's me. I am the Doubter and the Doubt and I the hymn the Brahmin sings.
Mizpah.
R
Saturday, December 1, 2007
I am the Doubter and the Doubt; or, Moderation is for Monks
I confess to being in a "screw it" mode today. Not intense, not angry, just screw it.
LaElu, my mom & I went to "the fort" for the Christmas market. This is a reconstructed 18th century fort on the original location, but it was dreadfully dull. When I try to imagine the place 200 years ago, well it takes a lot of imagination. Rather than woods that were old growth, now the hills have been timbered within the last 50 years. Rather than a creek and robust river, we are afflicted with dams. (Mind you, the town across the river would not exist without serious flood control.) Some fellow was outside the fort demonstrating supposedly period firearms, but was using a percussion ignition weapon. Sometimes it's instructive to read period literature to have some clue about what life was really like -- but there are several versions, and I have no way to know what is true. Much of the literature in the 19th century was highly stylized (like Cooper) and just isn't very clear. Hmph - I am reminded that I'm being hypocritical according to the beliefs of Robert A. Heinlein, who found it inconsistent that one would embrace the beavers' dams, but not man's.
Tomorrow, No. 3 will be humming in the afternoon. A new client is coming in who for some very strange reason I've managed to get out on bond. (Were I the prosecutor, I would have gone to the mat on a detention hearing.) He does not yet truly appreciate his predicament. If we do this case incorrectly, we can eat a mandatory life sentence without parole, even though this guy has never killed or directly harmed anyone. (Drugs are harmful as hell, they are just not up close and personal.) (And perhaps it's a bit presumptuous when I say that "we" can eat a particular sentence -- When discussing overall strategy, I always remind the client that if things go South, he can look all around the prison cell, but I won't be there.)
I'm tempted to explain at some length the post about the Muhammad-teddy-bear. But since I would have to answer questions that do not exist in my world, I'll let it lay.
That reminds me - a very smart and tough fellow I knew when I was in college and doing an internship in the Capitol was talking to about 20 of us before we ended the day and headed for the Twenties, which was a favorite and crazy bar. (I was enamored of a young lady friend, and was seriously looking forward to the evening. She died of medical problems a couple of years later, and I often reflect on the unfairness of the Universe.) Anyway, the speaker passed around some sort of stuffed animal, told us to examine it as much as we wanted. Being cocky 20 year olds, we each grasped it with two fingers, held it at arm's-length, and passed it to the next person. It got back to the speaker (Jack Whiting was his name) and he took the stuffed animal, cradled it, petted it and in so doing taught us a remarkable lesson that I have never forgotten. Goodness, I was so darn stiff at that age (when sober). What I wouldn't give to be 20 again, knowing what I know now, of course.
I had a positively delightful breakfast this week with Bro. Dave and Pastor Jim - philosophical and fun. For some reason, the pastor wore a tie. Dave, of course, was on his way to court, and he's a very natty dresser nearly all the time (even to some extent when he's in the woods.)
Am I guilt of literary miserliness? At the Christmas Market, there was a bookstall with several (mostly uninteresting or paperback or poor condition books) with one book that I wanted. However, being a small bookseller, s/he needs to charge fairly high rates, in this case full publisher's retail of $34.95. I can get a pristine copy on Amazon or bookfinder.com for under $15 bucks, so I passed.
As I write this, WVU's football team is playing its last regular season game, with an eye to being in the national championship game. They have worked hard for that and I wish them well, but I'm not terribly emotionally invested in this whole thing. The problem with circuses is that they become not simply diverting, but totally distracting.
Great Caesar's Ghost, I'm a censorious bastard tonight, and pontificating like I have some clue what is going on. For some reason, I know that I'll sleep uneasily tonight, I just have one of those feelings that something is amiss in the fabric of the night.
Mizpah.
R
LaElu, my mom & I went to "the fort" for the Christmas market. This is a reconstructed 18th century fort on the original location, but it was dreadfully dull. When I try to imagine the place 200 years ago, well it takes a lot of imagination. Rather than woods that were old growth, now the hills have been timbered within the last 50 years. Rather than a creek and robust river, we are afflicted with dams. (Mind you, the town across the river would not exist without serious flood control.) Some fellow was outside the fort demonstrating supposedly period firearms, but was using a percussion ignition weapon. Sometimes it's instructive to read period literature to have some clue about what life was really like -- but there are several versions, and I have no way to know what is true. Much of the literature in the 19th century was highly stylized (like Cooper) and just isn't very clear. Hmph - I am reminded that I'm being hypocritical according to the beliefs of Robert A. Heinlein, who found it inconsistent that one would embrace the beavers' dams, but not man's.
Tomorrow, No. 3 will be humming in the afternoon. A new client is coming in who for some very strange reason I've managed to get out on bond. (Were I the prosecutor, I would have gone to the mat on a detention hearing.) He does not yet truly appreciate his predicament. If we do this case incorrectly, we can eat a mandatory life sentence without parole, even though this guy has never killed or directly harmed anyone. (Drugs are harmful as hell, they are just not up close and personal.) (And perhaps it's a bit presumptuous when I say that "we" can eat a particular sentence -- When discussing overall strategy, I always remind the client that if things go South, he can look all around the prison cell, but I won't be there.)
I'm tempted to explain at some length the post about the Muhammad-teddy-bear. But since I would have to answer questions that do not exist in my world, I'll let it lay.
That reminds me - a very smart and tough fellow I knew when I was in college and doing an internship in the Capitol was talking to about 20 of us before we ended the day and headed for the Twenties, which was a favorite and crazy bar. (I was enamored of a young lady friend, and was seriously looking forward to the evening. She died of medical problems a couple of years later, and I often reflect on the unfairness of the Universe.) Anyway, the speaker passed around some sort of stuffed animal, told us to examine it as much as we wanted. Being cocky 20 year olds, we each grasped it with two fingers, held it at arm's-length, and passed it to the next person. It got back to the speaker (Jack Whiting was his name) and he took the stuffed animal, cradled it, petted it and in so doing taught us a remarkable lesson that I have never forgotten. Goodness, I was so darn stiff at that age (when sober). What I wouldn't give to be 20 again, knowing what I know now, of course.
I had a positively delightful breakfast this week with Bro. Dave and Pastor Jim - philosophical and fun. For some reason, the pastor wore a tie. Dave, of course, was on his way to court, and he's a very natty dresser nearly all the time (even to some extent when he's in the woods.)
Am I guilt of literary miserliness? At the Christmas Market, there was a bookstall with several (mostly uninteresting or paperback or poor condition books) with one book that I wanted. However, being a small bookseller, s/he needs to charge fairly high rates, in this case full publisher's retail of $34.95. I can get a pristine copy on Amazon or bookfinder.com for under $15 bucks, so I passed.
As I write this, WVU's football team is playing its last regular season game, with an eye to being in the national championship game. They have worked hard for that and I wish them well, but I'm not terribly emotionally invested in this whole thing. The problem with circuses is that they become not simply diverting, but totally distracting.
Great Caesar's Ghost, I'm a censorious bastard tonight, and pontificating like I have some clue what is going on. For some reason, I know that I'll sleep uneasily tonight, I just have one of those feelings that something is amiss in the fabric of the night.
Mizpah.
R
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