Friday, June 20, 2003

1. Is your hair naturally curly, wavy, or straight? Long or short?  I used to say straight, but now that it’s longer it’s got a little wave to it if I let it air dry. When it’s short it’s stick straight. As for length, it’s long - just past shoulder length.

2. How has your hair changed over your lifetime?  How hasn’t it changed. I’m not a trendy dresser, but I am a trendy hair-er. I get bored with my hair, so it changes a lot.

3. How do your normally wear your hair?  Depends on the occasion. For work, I wear it down, nicely styled. On the weekend it’s usually in a ponytail or hidden by a baseball cap.

4. If you could change your hair this minute, what would it look like?  I wouldn’t change it. I just got it cut a few weeks ago and I like it. It was all one length, I had some long layers cut in. It took a lot of weight off and gave it some extra body and bounce. I like it.

5. Ever had a hair disaster? What happened?  Um...several. I cried, went back for a new cut to minimize the damage and then just waited for it to grow out. Fortunately, I have never had a bad perm (when I got them) or color disaster (despite being cheapo and doing that myself).

I’ve added a new about me page here (link at right). I moved two posts from the old about me page over. I’m thinking I may try to do a new 100 Things list for my 1 year blogiversary.

In any case, if you’re a newer reader and want to know more about me, go take a look.

Kirby arrived a little after 8pm - WHAT??? But...but...what about The Amazing Race?

That’s what a VCR is for. So I taped last night’s episode and went out for dinner with him. We got home a little after 10pm. He did end up spending the night because of the rain. He’s still sleeping in his room and will probably be here until about 9am, so that changes my plans a bit for the morning, but that’s OK. I’m just happy to have a day off from work.

And the rain is another story. Yesterday, The Weather People™ said we’d have a mostly sunny weekend. Not so, rain today - heavy at times with flash flood warnings until 8pm tonight. High temp of 70. Not that I’m complaining about the temperature - I am happy it’s not in the 80-90 range, which is usually is by this time in June. And we’ll have more rain tomorrow and probably Sunday too.

We’ve been kidding around at the office about building an ark. We’ve each taken on part of the tasks - I’m to gather the lumber. LW is to start rounding up the animals (two by two, of course). The Boss will decide who gets to be on the Ark with us (families are a lock, it’s other folks we’re worried about).

I think that’s all I have to share for now. I need to get a cup of Joe now that’s it’s freshly brewed.

Thursday, June 19, 2003

...Until I leave the office and begin a long weekend.

*pause to answer phone*

Kirby is in the area tonight, so I’ll probably be having dinner with him. That will be fun, as usual. He said he won’t be staying tonight, so I’ll just need to make sure I get home in time for The Amazing Race at 8pm.

Tomorrow I plan to work on the blog a bit in the morning. I want to create my About page and look into adding emoticons to my comments. To my regular readers, do you miss the emoticons from my old blog or not? I do, but if you hate them, feel free to say so and I’ll leave it alone.

I also plan to super clean my apartment - launder my linens, vaccuum under the beds, clean the closet, etc. And I need to stop at a store to complete my sister’s birthday present. If you think about it, tomorrow is her birfday, go say something kind to her.

In the afternoon I’ll be heading to my parents for the Cootie visit. Blogging may be light for the weekend as I’ll be spending lots of time stealing the baby from my mother’s arms.

*I’m on the phone with Kirby again and can’t finish the post*

This week’s This or That Tuesday

June 17: Reading

1. Newspapers or magazines?  Neither. If I had to choose, I guess it would be magazines.

2. Books-on-tape or regular books?  Regular books, although on a long drive audio books are great.

3. Paperback or hardcover?  I like to own the hardcover, but prefer reading paperbacks.

4. Fiction or non-fiction?  Fiction.

5. Sci-Fi/Fantasy or romance novels?  I am a girl - romance.

6. Borrow from library or buy books (either new or used)?  I prefer to own books, but I have no problem borrowing them from the library if I can’t spend the money. The point is to read the book, right?

7. Subscribe to magazines or buy on newsstand?  I used to have subscriptions to a couple magazines. It’s cheaper than the newsstand.

8. Current best-sellers or classic literature?  Current best-sellers. Although I like to read a classic every once in a while.

9. Read books once, or re-read favorites every so often?  I have a few that I like to re-read. But I’m a one-timer for the most part.

10. Here in the U.S., we have two hot best-sellers...former First Lady Hillary Clinton’s memoirs, and the new Harry Potter book (coming out June 21). If you had to read one, which one...Hillary or Harry? Why?  That’s easy - Harry Potter will be read by me. I have no interest in Hillary’s book. I’ve read the previous four HP books and loved them.

I talked to the POC I was dealing with at the PD’s office this morning. I managed to pass the hotel-for-the-kid buck to her.

I’m very happy now.

And today is meatloaf day up at the Big Toe™. YUM.

Oh, and I have tomorrow off, so today is my Friday. Woo Hoo!

One more thing to be happy about...it’s TARsday! Woo Hoo²!!

Wednesday, June 18, 2003

Voice mail message I received after lunch (or the gist of it anyway):

Hi, I’m Joan Public Defender and we need for you to book a room for one of our witnesses that’s flying in today. Or you can give me the billing number to give the hotel and I can book the room. But this needs to be done ASAP.

Lesson #1 - The USMS only does this kind of thing when ordered by the Court. Otherwise it’s the witness/defender responsibility.

Lesson #2 - You’re an idiot if you think I’m going to give you the billing number.

So I do a little research, discover there is a Court Order, and proceed to call hotels. Fourth hotel has a room available for tonight only (the witness will be here indefinitely). I book it anyway.

As I’m on the phone with the hotel, two attorneys come to the window and are helped by MD (who booked the flight at 5:30pm yesterday for the witness to fly today). Turns out said witness is not on the flight that’s due to land in an hour.

The beautiful thing about this. I hang up after getting the confirmation number and I hear them say to MD, “You can tell her to cancel that hotel room for Witness #1. He won’t be coming in until early next week most likely.”

What the ???

The Public Defender’s office is a royal pain in the rear. We do them the favor on this stuff, but they act like supercilious, pompous jerks about the whole thing.

Lawyers… *grumble, grumble*

**Let me say that I have friends who are lawyers. But Shakespeare was absolutely correct when he said to kill them all.**

UPDATE: About 15-20 minutes after cancelling the hotel room, the outer door opens. In walk three PDs on this case, they ask to speak to the Supervisor, or MD. I get the Supervisor (who I love - he said to tell them he’s be out, but he was going to make them wait a bit. Heh). Once he comes out to talk to them, the chat for several minutes.

When he comes back in the office, he comes to MD’s office, where I am as well...new wrinkle - there’s a minor coming in and the kid, who was going to stay with relatives, now needs a hotel room. But they said it could wait until tomorrow. So tomorrow I get to deal with this crap again.

Can you book a hotel room for a minor that’s alone? I’m not sure, but I’m going to find out. Joy…

There are others who have the same issues with terrible drivers. Someone put together a Top Ten list of bad driver pet peeves. I agree with his list 100%.

Especially #4. And #3. Really all of them, but those two drive me bonkers.

[also via jay solo]

Rand Simberg has a brilliant editorial about the First Amendment vs. the Second Amendment based on what the Founding Fathers knew then and what is reality today.

On the First Amendment:

But surely the Founders never intended for every single citizen to be able to exercise such a right--they would have known it would lead to chaos and unfettered thought. They couldn’t possibly have imagined the rapid-fire distribution of dangerous ideas made possible by twenty-first-century technology. Why, some people might have even put forth the absurd notion that free speech is the right of everyone.

Had they actually anticipated the possibility that the cost of publishing could drop so dramatically, they would surely have made the First Amendment a much more explicitly collective right (like the Second), in which people would only have a right to free speech in a well-regulated state newspaper.

Surely the far-fringe First Amendment absolutists are misreading it--there is a hint of a shadow of an umbra of a penumbra in there, easily accessed by referencing the Second Amendment. Bearing this in mind, it is more properly read with the following implicit preface: “A well-regulated press being necessary for the security of the State and self-important talk-show hosts, Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble...”

Clearly, viewed in the light of that implicit purpose clause, these were not intended to be individual rights, any more than they were in the Second Amendment, because obviously, the Founders wouldn’t have meant one thing by the words “the right of the people” in the one case, and a different thing in the other, particularly in two adjacent amendments.

[via jay solo]

Phone rings.

ME: US Marshals Service.

HIM: *on speaker phone, so that’s a strike against him from the git-go...oh, and he’s yelling, not to be heard but because he’s irate - strike two* I need to speak to a supervisor because the Marshals have committed fraud (there were additional accusations that I won’t get into)…

ME: *trying to keep calm because I don’t like to be yelled at when I’ve done nothing to warrant it* Sir, what kind of fraud are you talking about?

HIM: *did I mention that he has a heavy foreign accent? He’s of Middle Eastern extraction based on that accent and his name, which I will change for his privacy later, as much as it pains me* I have a case in court and I had summons to be served by the US Marshals and the judge is saying they were not served and [a large insurance company he’s suing, now known as ALICHS™ for my story] are saying they never received the summons, but I have a copy from the US Marshals that says the summons was served… *he rambled on for a little bit more before I finally cut him off*

ME: Sir, hold on a second. Before you accuse us of shenanigans *yes he used that word* and fraud, let me get a few more details. I’m the civil clerk and I think I can help you. (or words to that effect) And would you mind picking up your phone, I’m having a hard time hearing you on the speaker? (I could hear him fine since he was yelling, but I hate speaker phones and didn’t want to deal with it.)

The next 10 minutes were relatively civil (heh) as I was able to figure out which case it was (Hussein v ALICHS™), check my process logbook to see what I had on record. Turns out he had six summonses for his case. Two of them needed to be forwarded to another district to be served, the “missing” one was one of those.

ME: Sir, from my log it looks like the process was served on October 9 and I returned it to the Clerks Office on October 15. Did you get the yellow copy?

HIM: Yes, I have it in my hand.

ME: *heavy internal sigh - then what on earth is the problem, I’m thinking* Well, if you have the yellow copy then you can see that it was served, a deputy signed and dated it, and the office date stamped it. Right?

HIM: Yes, but Judge Smith is saying that it wasn’t served. The Clerks Office is saying they don’t have a copy. So someone in the US Marshals is playing shenanigans…

ME: No, sir. You have the proof in your hand that the summons was served. There’s no fraud or shenanigans going on. A piece of paper got misplaced between my office and the Clerks Office…

HIM: Yes, and that’s shenanigans *I can’t believe I’m having an argument about what shenanigans are with this guy* is it not?

ME: Not really, stuff gets lost in the shuffle all the time. I can make a copy of my copy and take it to the Clerks Office.

Immediately I could sense the calm come over him.

HIM: Will you call Judge Smith to tell him it was served?

ME: I don’t need to call the judge, the Clerks Office will notify his office.

ARGH. Four people who overheard me said I handled it well. So that’s nice to know. I was cursing him in my head.

Then LW said, “Whe didn’t you pass him on to a supervisor? You don’t get paid enough to handle irate callers.”

“Because I had the answer he was looking for, I just needed for him to calm down long enough to listen to it.”

And now I feel better. *sigh*

LATER: Before I could post this I was checking my files and I see that he’s a serial sue-er. We have a few of them in the district. Every once in a while I’ll get a huge pile of civil process (usually summonses) that are for one case. Last time it was 24 summonses.

Unrelated to the above, we have about 12 young interns from HQ over for a visit with The Marshal. I think he should lock them in the cellblock for a minute or two.

Tuesday, June 17, 2003

Plenty of bloggers have posted their tips on blogging for newer bloggers that may happen upon them. Add Kevin’s to the list. He’s got some good advice and insight.

I love those guys at Thinklings blog. Good, thoughtful writing about faith, politics, Gatorade, The Simpsons, and now…

The Thinklings Celebrity Awards. Why?

It’s still safe to make fun of celebrities, right?
I read somewhere that there are more entertainment-related awards ceremonies each year than there are days in a year. But I’m suffering from award ceremony withdrawal (The Tonys?—Yech), so I’ve created my own awards based on some pet peeves (and a few personal favorites).

My favorite category:

THE OLIVE OYL AWARD (FOR BEST PRESENTATION OF “ANOREXIA CHIC")
Calista Flockhart (will someone please give this chick a Big Mac?)
Lara Flynn Boyle (when traveling together, does Nicholson just stow her in the overhead compartment?)

So I was watching the news when they mentioned that President Bush was at a Northern Virginia community college. I looked up to see “Annandale, VA” on the screen and I realized he was at the main NoVA campus (which is what the locals call Northern Virginia Community College - original, I know). There are several campuses around the area.

I took an Accounting class there about 12 years ago. At that campus.

Freaky.

“So Jen, what are you doing on Friday night?”

My normal answer is, “I have worship band practice at church.”

This week’s answer is, “I’m babysitting my niece.”

Talked with Marmie today and we will be CootieGirl-sitting on Friday night so Mr. and Mrs. Cootiehog can go out for dinner and a movie - a date night. I hated babysitting as a teenager and quit that as soon as I could (and got a real job in a store). But I am very excited to have this chance to torment my niece. Woo hoo!

You’ll get tired of my traffic rants. Or maybe you already are. But it gives you a little local flavor, right?

From this morning:

Number of ounces of Coffeemate spilled in my car - 1
Number of landscape trucks on Rt 50 - 5,387,291 (not really, it was about 40-45)
Number of near accidents in my vicinity, yet not involving me - 3
Number of minutes it took me to get to the office - 94
Traffic in the Washington DC area - priceless