Protocols

The sun is burning through the clouds and the heat is on. I am finding my Mocha friends in many new places as I walk around watering my green buddies. I usually find them be scaring them into flight which in effect startles me a bit. Then, not having moved very far, they look at me and I look at them and realize that the intruder is known to us and not objectionable.

Yesterday I made my way to the Superior Court House of Los Angeles County and submitted my small claims case so I now have a trial date. It was a simple matter really but I was surprised at what I found. The courthouse itself was not in good shape. I remember being around such edifaces as a young woman working in my father’s law office. There is a certain smell to the older offices which I did detect as I walked in this building and got through the weapons check machine. It is a mix of tobacco - maybe a pipe or cigar - one of the richer and darker forms of tobacco with, I don’t know, paper? robes? fear? And, although the hallways and bathrooms were very clean, the building as a whole needed a new paint job and the clerk of the civil court needed a new receipt printer!

All the paperwork was accepted and stamped and stapled. I paid my filing fee and when the clerk went to print out my receipt the little receipt printer just couldn’t shut up. There must’ve been 10’ of receipt paper - that 6 or 7 inch wide paper that some offices use - and it just kept coming out of the printer without a pause. It was filled with matrix like marks and symbols; I could see it as the clerk tried to catch and deal with the ribbon of paper that was winding all around her. It was as if some strange paper monster had unleashed itself on her desk and on her person it was swirling around her head and arms as she tried to scoop it up and contain it. Really impressive. All the time I was trying to think of what I could do with all that paper, such a waste. And then she laughed when the machine stopped, and I said “so that’s my receipt?”

It took another 1/2 hour and 4 clerks to get me a 6X6 inch receipt for my file; something about passcodes that only cetain people in other offices have. We had to wait for one of those people to decide to make her way to the clerk’s office. Waiting there patiently I didn’t say a word; the clerk with the passcode simply said “thanks for waiting” as she rounded the corner to return to her important office somewhere else. But this is what it’s like in State offices I guess. I worked for a year or two in a Federal/State office in Nebraska and it was full of protocols, even there where life is so incredibly different. Every so often it’s good to remind myself of what a good portion of the world puts up with and I myself say, “thank you very much” as I get into my car to return home to my own little world.

I found only one courtroom in action as I left and so I decided to do a little homework and I went in to see what kind of spectacle lay before me. I would’ve preferred to have seen a civil small claims case in action, but I stumbled upon the eviction court where a young-ish couple were trying to get out of a little mess they had created for themselves. While the wife was dutifully standing next to her husband, I got the impression from what I saw that the man was primarily the one who was trying to decrease the number of idiot moves he had made by contesting that he had not been served a notice to appear despite the judge having before her a signed and notarized statement from a server that he was in fact served.

Much of what I witnessed was the testimony of a friend this man had brought to court who was to coorborate the man’s claim that he had not been served by testifying that he had been with him all day; they worked together from 8-5p and went out after work before taking him home (the man has no car either.) But the poor friend was grilled by the judge who was right to suspect he couldn’t offer a believable statement that his friend was not served on a date back in distant past; he didn’t even know what date that was much less demonstrate the ability to discern that day from all the others that went much the same way: working and then going to a bar.

And so it all hinged on the testimony of a friend who dutifully appeared court (he probably had to give them a ride) but was unable to convince the judge that he was with his friend on the day that the server said he served the papers. The judge was too smart. Their issue was not even about the meat of the case which involved late rent and a violation of the landlord’s policy of no dogs.

These two guys thought they could pull a fast one on the judge but the whole cigar tobacco, pristine, clean and waxed hallways, wooden alter for the judge had intimidated them and they were stumbling all over themselves to make simple points. He was trying to claim that he shouldn’t be penalized for not showing up to court because he was never served, never notified. The two guys, who worked together from 8-5 everyday claimed they went out after work on that day. They said they did this maybe twice a week. But they could not offer anything - not rain, not a strange occurance of an accident they witnessed on the way, not an incredible hottie who was visiting the bar on that day - nothing to flag that day from all the others. It was kind of unbelievable, as the judge finally ruled.

I went home happy that I did not go into law. I love the law and find it very interesting, but the sad truth is that it is this kind of case that lawyers and judges wade through most of the time. I was happy to see posted quite a lot of information offering help to people who needed it: small claims court advisors are available, translators for those whose grasp of English is weak, help of all sorts. But the bottom line is don’t get into trouble. If the landlord says no pets, move somewhere else if you must get one.

But I was not finished once I got home, I had to make sure my papers were served properly and, although I do have help with this, I did have to introduce my printer to copying multiple sheets and saving them on a zip drive. My son was able to see this through as I went in search of where I left various important electronic parts like the little dock that enables my computer to use zip drives!

After all this my son left and the sun went down too. I turned on the pool lights and took a little swim in the dark cool water erasing the tension of the day.