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Day 1242: Road to Recovery
Apr. 10th, 2016 10:17 amI got one week to recover from the last trial and prep for the new one. It was generally a good week, if undercut by the fact that I didn't really sleep well at all till Saturday, when I finally got eight hours, and that was promptly ruined by staying up past 2 on Saturday night, so there you go.
The highlights:
Monday started off as, well, a Monday, because my breakfast smoothie exploded all over the passenger seat of my car (and my case file) so even though I got to court on time, I was late because I had to make some attempt at cleaning my car. My cases that day were all ones going well, where my kids are doing well. I had the CPO, too, which file had smoothie all over it. I didn't shake hands with the respondent on that, but I did shake hands with his lawyer. Everyone agreed to a thirty-day continuance. Respondent's lawyer said she wanted to see how the criminal case shakes out (prosecutor says there's going to be an arrest, and it'll probably be kinda high profile), but what she really wants is for no findings to be made against her client in juvenile court that could bite him in district court. It was my cases that weren't at court that went badly. One of my kids almost OD'd during the weekend, and one of my dads got super drunk at one of city cemeteries around here and had to be taken to the ICU (and I later did not divulge that to his kids when I saw them, because they miss him and are sad when he doesn't visit, and I will not be surprised if he dies in the near future with how he drinks). The best part of Monday (besides coming home and getting a hug from my husband) was taking possession of my new office at the courthouse. Set up my laptop and some files to work on, and it was a graveyard for broken chairs, so I moved them out of the way, but it was my space, and it felt good.
That night I went over to Angela's and we picked out her dance costumes (very quickly) and then just sat around talking and laughing, which was really fun.
Tuesday was a chill day, really. I wrote like a crazy person to get a birthday story finished that morning, and then my home visit was a bust, so I went into the office and had lunch with the girls, and then had a couple of meetings, and then cub scouts. Because it was spring break, only one cub showed up, but we had a karate lesson anyway - kid has a natural sense of angles - and then...then I didn't see my husband much. He's been pulling insane nights at the lab trying to get his crazy research paper and presentation done, and one more than one occasion this week he was going to bed just as I was getting up for work.
Wednesday was also a relatively chill day, appointment-wise, and we had dress rehearsal for dance, so that was fun (what was not fun was getting an email from She Who Must Not Be Named indicating that she thought trial would take more than five days; luckily I have a private office, so I could scream and no one could hear me). Dress rehearsal went well, and I had fun, but I was pretty beat by the end of it.
Thursday was a full day of court (and me procrastinating trial prep). I forgot my lunch that morning (despite being a prepared adult and actually making it) and I called my husband to beg him to bring it to me, but he never got the message. I had a lunchtime mediation because one of the parties was being transported from the prison and we had to do the mediation in the courtroom because security wouldn't let her into the mediation room and during lunch the court is empty, so I was hungry and frustrated, because this is one of my old cases returned, third time around for mom, second time around for dad, and we very nearly ended up with a contested trial, but managed to avoid it. I had a team meeting with a family full of stressed-out kids. Their mother recently killed a child while driving under the influence, and the kids are getting bullied because of it, and the whole situation is awful. Aaaand one of my moms relapsed on MJ. Her excuse? She was withdrawing off of her opiate-based cough syrup and used the weed to help her cope.
...what was she doing with the cough syrup, that she was having withdrawals? If she's behaving like this after a year of drug treatment, something is going wrong. And of course, her own mother was making all kinds of excuses for her (mom was half an hour late to the meeting, and she likely forgot because she got high and overslept, and of course grandma took the blame). So I let mom know, we don't have legal grounds to remove the kids, but the other grandparents have hired an attorney and want to take the kids, and if mom keeps behaving like this, I might stand aside and let the grandparents have at it. Because this is unacceptable. We're back at square one.
Friday was a good day. Got trial prep at the courthouse done. The one not-good part of the day was watching the first hour of a three-hour forensic interview for one of my kids who had been abused by a trusted family friend. I needed to take a shower after what I heard, and after the first hour I had seen enough, enough to make my case to the judge when we next went to court. Had lunch with my parents! (My poor Mum is going round the twist now that Dad's retired and there all the time, and his irritating habits that she could stand in small doses because he was gone for months at a time on business trips are really getting to her.) They brought me a mini-fridge and microwave for the new office (I paid them back like a grown-up, don't worry), and then I went on my last visit of the day. Took my kids out for milkshakes and listened to them tell me all about how their mom has the munchies all the time because she's high, and also how she's likely using heroin and doesn't take them to the doctor when they're sick. (Don't worry, they also told me about fun times with their grandparents and their favorite rapper and their friends.)
And then...dance times. I ran home, re-pinned one of my costumes, and headed to the theater to get set up. We got into our costumes, and we managed to practice each dance at least once on the stage with the chairs set up, and then...show time! Because I was in two numbers I didn't get to watch much of the show - just from the monitors in the green room so we'd know when to muster on the stage - but what I did see was good. We have a lot of talented dancers around here.
The first dance went pretty well. I was sure I stopped smiling halfway through, but apparently all those years of training kicked in and my mum told me that I had a brilliant smile, so there you go. The tricky thing about the hafla setting is that there's audience on all four sides, so there's no turning to the back and unpinning my smile for a moment like there is in ordinary shows. There was something wrong with the music, though, like we had no treble and bass, so it was a good thing we were zilling, because that was the only way I was able to keep beat.
The second dance went pretty well. There were so many of us and so little space, and then we dissolved the snake at the end too quickly, so we were free-styling for two counts of eight too many, and I kept reaching into my basket at the wrong time, but the audience loved it when we threw the rose petals on the last beat, so that was good. Still haven't gotten any video from my sister yet, which is making me twitchy. It was so, so good to have my whole family there, though. I got hugs from my parents and my adorable little niece, and it was fun times. The professional troupe was amazing, did some really traditional Sayidi cane dances and a beautiful Khaliji dress dance, and then some of their really great funky modern stuff.
Afterwards Angela and I changed and went to dinner with Cody - we went for burgers - and despite having really only done two dances, we were both incredibly tired. It was a good night, over all.
Saturday was beautifully lazy. Laid around. Cleaned a bit. Did a bit of laundry. A spot of cooking. Watching some SGA (for research purposes, obviously). Took forever to do a single prompt fill, but oh well. Hung out with one of Kip's friends when he came by and wanted to see Cody's tool shop. Played music with Cody before he went into the lab.
This morning mum and dad stopped by to show us their new dog they bought (now that dad is retired he agreed to let mum buy a dog) before they headed south.
And me...
I need to kick people out of bed so we can shower and dress for church.
And then today I need to finish the laundry and actually read that trial memo for the dreaded five-day trial that starts tomorrow. Five days. Locked in a room with She Who Must Not Be Named.
...help...
The highlights:
Monday started off as, well, a Monday, because my breakfast smoothie exploded all over the passenger seat of my car (and my case file) so even though I got to court on time, I was late because I had to make some attempt at cleaning my car. My cases that day were all ones going well, where my kids are doing well. I had the CPO, too, which file had smoothie all over it. I didn't shake hands with the respondent on that, but I did shake hands with his lawyer. Everyone agreed to a thirty-day continuance. Respondent's lawyer said she wanted to see how the criminal case shakes out (prosecutor says there's going to be an arrest, and it'll probably be kinda high profile), but what she really wants is for no findings to be made against her client in juvenile court that could bite him in district court. It was my cases that weren't at court that went badly. One of my kids almost OD'd during the weekend, and one of my dads got super drunk at one of city cemeteries around here and had to be taken to the ICU (and I later did not divulge that to his kids when I saw them, because they miss him and are sad when he doesn't visit, and I will not be surprised if he dies in the near future with how he drinks). The best part of Monday (besides coming home and getting a hug from my husband) was taking possession of my new office at the courthouse. Set up my laptop and some files to work on, and it was a graveyard for broken chairs, so I moved them out of the way, but it was my space, and it felt good.
That night I went over to Angela's and we picked out her dance costumes (very quickly) and then just sat around talking and laughing, which was really fun.
Tuesday was a chill day, really. I wrote like a crazy person to get a birthday story finished that morning, and then my home visit was a bust, so I went into the office and had lunch with the girls, and then had a couple of meetings, and then cub scouts. Because it was spring break, only one cub showed up, but we had a karate lesson anyway - kid has a natural sense of angles - and then...then I didn't see my husband much. He's been pulling insane nights at the lab trying to get his crazy research paper and presentation done, and one more than one occasion this week he was going to bed just as I was getting up for work.
Wednesday was also a relatively chill day, appointment-wise, and we had dress rehearsal for dance, so that was fun (what was not fun was getting an email from She Who Must Not Be Named indicating that she thought trial would take more than five days; luckily I have a private office, so I could scream and no one could hear me). Dress rehearsal went well, and I had fun, but I was pretty beat by the end of it.
Thursday was a full day of court (and me procrastinating trial prep). I forgot my lunch that morning (despite being a prepared adult and actually making it) and I called my husband to beg him to bring it to me, but he never got the message. I had a lunchtime mediation because one of the parties was being transported from the prison and we had to do the mediation in the courtroom because security wouldn't let her into the mediation room and during lunch the court is empty, so I was hungry and frustrated, because this is one of my old cases returned, third time around for mom, second time around for dad, and we very nearly ended up with a contested trial, but managed to avoid it. I had a team meeting with a family full of stressed-out kids. Their mother recently killed a child while driving under the influence, and the kids are getting bullied because of it, and the whole situation is awful. Aaaand one of my moms relapsed on MJ. Her excuse? She was withdrawing off of her opiate-based cough syrup and used the weed to help her cope.
...what was she doing with the cough syrup, that she was having withdrawals? If she's behaving like this after a year of drug treatment, something is going wrong. And of course, her own mother was making all kinds of excuses for her (mom was half an hour late to the meeting, and she likely forgot because she got high and overslept, and of course grandma took the blame). So I let mom know, we don't have legal grounds to remove the kids, but the other grandparents have hired an attorney and want to take the kids, and if mom keeps behaving like this, I might stand aside and let the grandparents have at it. Because this is unacceptable. We're back at square one.
Friday was a good day. Got trial prep at the courthouse done. The one not-good part of the day was watching the first hour of a three-hour forensic interview for one of my kids who had been abused by a trusted family friend. I needed to take a shower after what I heard, and after the first hour I had seen enough, enough to make my case to the judge when we next went to court. Had lunch with my parents! (My poor Mum is going round the twist now that Dad's retired and there all the time, and his irritating habits that she could stand in small doses because he was gone for months at a time on business trips are really getting to her.) They brought me a mini-fridge and microwave for the new office (I paid them back like a grown-up, don't worry), and then I went on my last visit of the day. Took my kids out for milkshakes and listened to them tell me all about how their mom has the munchies all the time because she's high, and also how she's likely using heroin and doesn't take them to the doctor when they're sick. (Don't worry, they also told me about fun times with their grandparents and their favorite rapper and their friends.)
And then...dance times. I ran home, re-pinned one of my costumes, and headed to the theater to get set up. We got into our costumes, and we managed to practice each dance at least once on the stage with the chairs set up, and then...show time! Because I was in two numbers I didn't get to watch much of the show - just from the monitors in the green room so we'd know when to muster on the stage - but what I did see was good. We have a lot of talented dancers around here.
The first dance went pretty well. I was sure I stopped smiling halfway through, but apparently all those years of training kicked in and my mum told me that I had a brilliant smile, so there you go. The tricky thing about the hafla setting is that there's audience on all four sides, so there's no turning to the back and unpinning my smile for a moment like there is in ordinary shows. There was something wrong with the music, though, like we had no treble and bass, so it was a good thing we were zilling, because that was the only way I was able to keep beat.
The second dance went pretty well. There were so many of us and so little space, and then we dissolved the snake at the end too quickly, so we were free-styling for two counts of eight too many, and I kept reaching into my basket at the wrong time, but the audience loved it when we threw the rose petals on the last beat, so that was good. Still haven't gotten any video from my sister yet, which is making me twitchy. It was so, so good to have my whole family there, though. I got hugs from my parents and my adorable little niece, and it was fun times. The professional troupe was amazing, did some really traditional Sayidi cane dances and a beautiful Khaliji dress dance, and then some of their really great funky modern stuff.
Afterwards Angela and I changed and went to dinner with Cody - we went for burgers - and despite having really only done two dances, we were both incredibly tired. It was a good night, over all.
Saturday was beautifully lazy. Laid around. Cleaned a bit. Did a bit of laundry. A spot of cooking. Watching some SGA (for research purposes, obviously). Took forever to do a single prompt fill, but oh well. Hung out with one of Kip's friends when he came by and wanted to see Cody's tool shop. Played music with Cody before he went into the lab.
This morning mum and dad stopped by to show us their new dog they bought (now that dad is retired he agreed to let mum buy a dog) before they headed south.
And me...
I need to kick people out of bed so we can shower and dress for church.
And then today I need to finish the laundry and actually read that trial memo for the dreaded five-day trial that starts tomorrow. Five days. Locked in a room with She Who Must Not Be Named.
...help...
