Update

So I was very impressed by how calmly I handled the TT issue. I emailed the principal late Wednesday night, informing her in no uncertain terms that this new policy would not apply to my children and that it was inappropriate and unlawful. I was fully prepared to argue to the death if I encountered any resistance.

But the principal called me at 7:15 Thursday and told me that she absolutely agreed with me and that she had already informed the staff that the policy was gone.

Apparently the genius behind the new restroom policy was the new assistant principal who was trying to combat messes in the bathroom. He is young, apparently inexperienced and this is the second of his policies that I have nixed in the last two months.

The other asinine policy involved taking attendance for 6th graders 5 minutes before the morning bell rang. I found out about that one after he reported PS to the state truancy board for multiple absences--when she had never been absent or even late! I laid into him for that one--but I wasn't even going to bother with him on this issue. I went straight to the principal.

I really like our principal, but she really needs to rein in her AP and his idiotic ideas quickly. And frankly, it doesn't speak well of her that she is not paying enough attention to the "policies" her AP is instituting.

In case you were wondering...

Peeing is a fundamental right subject to due process protection. Glaspy v. Malicoat, 134 F. Supp. 2d 890.

Pissed Off Mama Bear

TT had an accident at school today because the teacher wouldn't let her use the restroom when she asked. Now, I was horrified by the thought of this, but thought perhaps TT's account was skewed to her benefit. So I calmly emailed the teacher and asked her if TT's (haha, I just got the pun!) account was accurate. The teacher said yes, the principal just instituted a new policy and children are not allowed to go to the restroom unsupervised--so no kid can go unless the entire class goes.

WTF?? These are third graders! And my kids drink a lot and pee lot. In fact, we encourage it, due to DH's and PS's history of kidney stones. Not to mention that I had teeny-tiny bladder as a child--and even had (unsuccessful) surgery to try to stretch it out--so its not a leap to think my kids also have teeny tiny bladders.

I am so furious that my kid had to suffer the humiliation of having an accident because she wasn't allowed to use the restroom that I think my eyes are glowing red. I already responded to the teacher and told her that I would be requesting a conference with the principal.

I haven't emailed the principal, because I wanted to do a little research (and calm down) first. If there is any law even suggesting that my kid has a right to pee at school I am damn sure gonna find it.

It Sucks to be the Little Fish

Busy day. I had to finish up my off-site doc review and then rush back to the office for a meeting with a new client, followed by a long chat with Big Boss.

Attitudey Judy will not be getting the boot, at least not until after the holidays. It's not my call, or the outcome would have been different. But, having been at my firm a mere 3 months, I'm not really in a position to throw down an ultimatum.

I am a little frustrated by the situation, because I feel like I've done everything I can to work for her, and now I really don't trust her with important tasks. Which just rewards her with less work and punishes me with more.

Big Boss did make clear that they don't think I'm causing this problem--which was a relief. I didn't want be the new kid turned problem child who can't get along with anybody. And when he meets with her for staff reviews he will reiterate that I am the boss, like it or lump it.

I guess all I can hope for is that she finds something else quickly or has a miraculous transformation. Meanwhile, she is ignoring me unless directly spoken to--and then I am rewarded with a grunt.

Well that was interesting

Today I had to do a doc review at the firm that offered me a job before Satan f/k/a Big Boss torpedoed it by refusing to waive a conflict.

The associate working on the case for the other side was actually one of the many, many people with whom I interviewed at that firm. When I reminded him that we had met before, he said "oh, yeah, you're the one from [former firm]. I've heard a lot of bad stuff about that firm."

Later in the day someone else popped into the conference room I was working in and said, "wow, you look really familiar, have we met before?" To which I replied, "yes, you interviewed me for a job here." "Ohh..." she said, as the recognition started fading in.

I may forever be known as "the girl who got screwed out of a job" in my local legal community.

Holding Pattern

Don't know what's going to happen with secretary aka Attitudey Judy (I love that Gillian!) I do not have the authority to fire her. Big Boss is supposed to be handling it, but he is out of town.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Attitudey Judy sent an email late today informing the office that she has a "follow-up doctor's appointment" tomorrow. I am 98% sure that "doctor's appointment" is code for "interview."

In addition to my many other complaints, she is late a lot--like 20 minutes-plus every day and she takes extra-long lunches. I haven't even addressed this with her because it is the least of my concerns, but my firm uses an old-school time clock and the administration has noticed. She has also had quite a few doctor's appointments, car problems and other miscellaneous absences in the 3 months that she has been with my firm. So we've all surmised that she has been interviewing whenever she has a doctor's appointment or car trouble.

Attitudey Judy allegedly came to us to with glowing recommendations. I now understand--I would gladly give her a glowing recommendation to get rid of her and make her somebody else's problem!

I am soooo tempted to send her a response and say that I hope her "doctor's appointment" goes very, very well.

Pirates and Princesses and Rodents, oh my!

Looks like we are all systems go for spending Christmas at Disney. I got the ok from my bosses, sent vacation letters to the courts and made the final payment last week. We're booked for breakfast in Cinderella's castle on Christmas morning, and I just made reservations for pirate makeovers for the girls, thanks to a 50% discount for resort guests.

I'm excited, I've been wanting to take the girls to Disney for the last 5 years, but something always came up. I wanted them to go while they were still young enough for it to be a magical experience. I have great memories of Disney--DH and I went there on our honeymoon--but I'm a little afraid I will hate it now that I'm old and curmudgeonly. Children running about everywhere and ginormous crowds (this is peak season for Disney) are not my idea of a good time. But I have employed multiple planning resources, so hopefully it will be a pleasant experience for all.

Oh and if you're just tuning in for an update with the secretary situation--well, today sucked. I spoke with the office administrator first think this morning and she told me that I needed to confront secretary and get her side of the story, and then go to Big Boss.

Speaking to secretary did not go well. She was openly hostile and refused to give me a straight answer. She started ranting, and I just said, "We're done now."

Afterward I went to Big Boss. I'm not sure I conveyed how truly dire the situation is, but he said that he would get to the bottom of the current situation. Not really sure what that means.

I am so sick of dealing with her incompetence and hostility. It is exhausting and I really don't trust her to do anything for me anymore--in fact I gave her my receipts from my business, and , of course, she missed one of the receipts and my check was short (yeah, she didn't bring it to me to sign off on either). Argh!

Yep, it's Monday

Learned first thing this morning that the other female association put in her resignation. That will definitely mean more on my plate, and I am pretty darn busy already. And that leaves just me with all the guys.

Also learned that the situation with my secretary was even worse than I thought. A couple of weeks ago she forwarded to a client a citation that she had filed with the court. Yeah, that sounds strange right? The court issues the citation--you file the return of citation with the court. The return of citation includes the process server's statement of the time and place that the petition was served.

So I asked her for an explanation. She assured me that she had in fact filed the return with the court, but that it was on the back of the citation and that she simply hadn't bothered to copy the side with the return--only the front side with the citation.

I explained that I needed copies of the full document in the future so that I could verify that service was properly effected and that the return was in order in cases I needed to prove up a default judgment. I also explained that a savvy client would be wondering why we were filing the citation, just like I had.

The day before I left for my business trip, she brought me a file-stamped copy of the citation with the return attached to the back. The citation had two file stamps with two different dates--one of which had been crossed out by the clerk. This seemed odd, but I was wrapping things up before leaving town, so I simply set it aside.

This morning I took another look at the double-stamped citation and then at the return. The first file-stamp was Oct. 27. The second was Nov. 3. When I turned to the return, it was not sworn to until Oct. 29.

There is absolutely no way that secretary could have filed the return with the citation on the 27th--as she swore she had. The return wasn't sworn until 2 days later. She did exactly what I thought she did and then lied and tried to cover her tracks.

I am furious. Lying and hiding things are not ok. If it were solely up to me I would fire her tomorrow. I understand mistakes--and her original mistake would not have been a big deal if she were a new secretary and fessed up. But she constantly reminds me that she has 20 years' experience and that I should quit questioning her competence. And this went further than a mistake--it was outright lying.

I basically avoided secretary all day for fear of what I might say. Tact isn't one of my virtues, and I wanted to speak with the office administrator before I confronted her on this issue. Unfortunately the office administrator was out today, so it will have to wait until tomorrow. I keep thinking that maybe I am being overly harsh--and then I get smacked int he face with something like this.

Mommy Fail

Last night at dinner I accidentally sent a naughty text intended for DH to PS. Oops. Fortunately I immediately realized my mistake and demanded her phone to delete the message. And it was more innuendo than overt, so hopefully she won't be scarred for life if she manages to pull the deleted message out of the trash can.

Glad crazy week is done, but it has led to a busy weekend. The girls signed up for a fun run Saturday morning, so we had to be out of the house by 7:30. And all three kids have school projects due next week. Since our weeknight time is so limited, we have to do these things on the weekends.

PS has to build an accurate 3-D atom model. And she picked gold, which is heavy and has about a zillion particles. We bought rubber tubing into which she will insert tiny pompoms to make electron orbitals, and she will glue larger pompoms to popsicle-stick base make the nucleus. It will be interesting to see how this turns out.

TT and SS have to disguise turkeys. SS is covering hers in silk flowers and hiding it in a field of grass. TT's turkey is becoming an astronaut. It is covered in aluminum foil, and we went to the dollar store just to buy a vending-machine toy so that we could get the plastic case to use as an astronaut helmet. DH thinks I'm nuts for making a special trip to buy a $.50 toy just to get the plastic shell it comes it. I think my astronaut helmet is genius!

Also have horseback riding lessons for the twins today, need to help PS practice for all-city orchestra auditions, need to work on my pro bono case, and DH needs to work on our fence before it falls into the neighbor's yard. He has replaced 60% of the wooden posts with steel ones, but every time we get a storm the remaining wooden ones start leaning. I keep trying to convince him to pay someone to take care of it, but he is stubborn and his blue-collar roots won't allow him to pay someone to do something he thinks he is capable of (even if it means he will be complaining about his back for the next week.)