Thoughts from a cell phone bill

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This topic has 82 replies, 8 voices, and was last updated 7 years, 5 months ago by XenopusTex.

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October 15, 2016 at 10:00 pm #118279

XenopusTex
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Peppermint: Spent a good part of the day doing moving and office stuff (still fixing what was left behind), so didn’t get back too quickly. Ideally, I’d like to be out of the office before 6:00 PM. Due to the timing of some drug/alcohol testing programs at the jail, if I don’t get out before about 6:30 or so, best to stay until about 8:30. I am not well liked amongst that set, and have been hassled by a few of them. For the next ~3 months or so, will get dark very early, so no outside light for activities in the evening. Would like to keep work in the 50-55 hour range, and am trying to be more efficient at things.

Have my hunting gear ready to go. Got invited out by my boss’s husband today, but was moving stuff for a mutual acquaintance.
Surprising how expensive that stuff can be, yikes.

October 17, 2016 at 2:22 pm #118372

Peppermint
Participant

Dear XenopusTex,
I wonder how that other guy manages to go earlier. What did he say/do to be able to do that? Could you do something similar?

And how was your hunting trip?

October 17, 2016 at 9:19 pm #118386

XenopusTex
Participant

Peppermint: Didn’t wind up going. Wound up doing paperwork at the office on a call, at least it saved me from the moving … I got out of there before they started working with the piano 🙂 Not sure if next weekend will work or not. I am torn… I enjoy going out in the field, but feel obligated to get things done at work. Especially when folks go into panic mode when they can’t get in touch with me. Of course, season isn’t year round, and there aren’t always decent enough days to go out, or there aren’t always people to go with.

Spent a lot on outdoors type stuff this year, and haven’t found the time to get much use out of it. The office always seems to call.

The other guy winds up not doing a lot of stuff. We’ve had issues with things piling up and not getting done. Now that we have a newer person in the office, the new guy is getting dumped on quite a bit.

Kath: you asked what I wanted out of life. I have been thinking. Professionally, I would like to be respected and valued in my field; something that I probably have issues getting to due to my hard-line nature and general disdain for certain parts of the profession. Relationship wise, I would like to get married, and possibly have a child (assuming the world hasn’t found a way to immolate itself by then).

October 17, 2016 at 10:55 pm #118394

Shipp
Participant

Dear XenopusTex,

Your original title about the cell phone bill caught my attention so I started reading your posts. You’ve opened up to share a lot about yourself and there’s a positive change in the wording of your messages.

From what I understand, your career is both the primary focus of your life right now but also the source of problems for you as well. I too was in the legal field so I understand your references to being called away, working massive hours and the frustration of others not carrying their weight. For me, I felt a strong need to build my credibility among my peers and made the personal sacrifices to ‘get the job done right’. I’ve noticed that you have mentioned sacrifices as well: missing out on hunting, missed lunch dates, missed personal time, etc. Have you considered slightly switching professions? Private practice perhaps? Something in your area of expertise but would also give you more control over your workload and hours put into it.

If this question has already asked and answered, please forgive me (there are a lot of messages and information that I just read through at once).

Best regards,

~Shipp

October 19, 2016 at 1:21 pm #118509
Peppermint
Participant
Dear XenopusTex,

too bad about the trip. I can see how you would want to help if people were panicking (and you really didn’t want to help with the piano). But what would have happened if you had said: “Yes, you are right, this is a serious issue, I will get right on to it on monday morning.”? Or what would they have done if you had forgotten your phone at home? Was this a life or death situation?
- This reply was modified 7 years, 6 months ago by Peppermint.
October 21, 2016 at 11:38 pm #118680

XenopusTex
Participant

My apologies all. Wasn’t intending to ignore. Spent last few days in jury trial. 14ish hour days. Successful, but long, long days, and still wired from the caffeine 😉 When I finally do “crash” it will be ugly.

Shipp, I had thought about private practice. After having done public sector stuff for ~8 years, not sure how well private practice would work for me; don’t do well with the detailed time keeping thing for example. Supposedly, I will be moving to pretty much a docket of complex cases, charging decisions, and appellate work. I work best putting complex stuff together and not handling hordes of things; tend to feel overwhelmed by stacks of multiple different files than same-sized stacks of just one or two files.

Peppermint, back when I lived across the alley from the courthouse, I would periodically forget my phone at the office. Would sometimes wind up with law enforcement knocking on doors/windows/etc. to get in touch. I have done the let’s do it later bit on some requests. Most of the time I get called though, it’s a needs to happen now thing. We just need to get other people who can answer the question that is on fire 🙂

October 22, 2016 at 12:59 am #118683

Shipp
Participant

Dear Xenopus,

Sounds like you will be moving into Senior staff type case load. Hopefully this will allow you to do more planning and preparation on your cases and less being called on to put out the fires that pop up (at all hours). Best of luck!

~Shipp

October 25, 2016 at 9:21 pm #118932

XenopusTex
Participant

Shipp: sorry for the delayed response (appellate work was calling). That is the theory. Right now, some flak from folks about which cases I have, etc.
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