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This is a humorous and sarcastic blog written by a paralegal in a mid-sized law firm in a mid-tier market. The goal is to share some of the pitfalls and foibles encountered in my own day-to-day experiences. Feel free to contact me at aparalegalslife@gmail.com with comments. Complaints, not so much :)

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

And it’s only Wednesday morning

Everyone has pet peeves about working with Lawyers.  Here’s a few of mine from this week…

“Hey, you there” - I have a name, use it.  We’ve worked together for years.  I shouldn’t be impressed when you remember it.  If you don’t appear to care who I am, I won’t really care who you are, or have any desire to do more than a passable job for you. 

Blackberries – OK, I have one, so I know how hard it is to type on those damn things.  But leave the footer on it that says you are e-mailing me from a Blackberry.  I won’t send you PDF’s to look at, and you won’t need to snark back at me that you can’t read it.  The damn thing’s a telephone, too for cryin’ out loud.  And I’ll know if you are in Court.

“I’m in Court…”  Don’t lie to me about where you are.  I will know if you’re in court or not since I schedule and notice your appearances.  If you went out to the bar for the afternoon, I don’t really care.  In fact, it’s a good thing when you aren’t hovering around the office making my life more difficult by interrupting me every 10 seconds.

Vacations – If you’re going to be away for any period of time, please tell me.  I’m required to tell my attorneys well in advance of any scheduled time off, and find coverage.  For some reason, though, attorneys can vamoose to Cancun on a 10-day catamaran snorkeling trip without letting their paralegals know.  Then I’m stuck on the phone with opposing counsel trying to figure out what my sorry non-bar-admitted ass can do about the emergency hearing that was just scheduled. 

Time – learn to tell it.  The rest of us managed this skill by first grade.  Don’t ask me to hand-deliver something to chambers at when the courthouse closes at .  (“Closes” means they lock the doors and we can’t get in until the next morning.)  If you happen to know that the Judge has someone waiting for this item after hours, fill me in on that little tidbit, and give me a phone number. 

1 comment:

Elizabeth said...

the vacations!!!! the mini ones are the worst. "hey by the way, I'm taking off tomorrow to go fishing" - which then sends me scrambling to reschedule the 10+ appointments for the umptiumph time. ugh. tell me about it! Hey, we're halfway throught he week, hang in there!