“Well, I’m back,” he said.

Apologies to those who check in on the blog to see what I’m up to, but it’s been a busy time for me.  When last I wrote, it was mid July.  Since then I engaged in a frantic apt. search, moved into said new apt, continued to keep on working in my new division (despite rumors I would be moving to the Juvenile division).  In addition, there were a bunch of projects I took on, some wise and some un-wise, but not tragically so.  The upshot is that I’m currently very well situated for any possible move to Juvie, that I’m enjoying Miami, and that I’m more or less caught up on lots of stuff which needed catching up on. 

I like the new place.  It’s close to the old place, but is newer, swanker, and more appropriate budget-wise.  It’s a new building that was meant to be condos but which became apartments in our current mortgage-crisis-times.  It’s an “L” shaped studio with 10ft tall ceilings, a brand new stainless steel and granite kitchen, a built for soaking bath tub, and a small and shaded balcony, which nonetheless accommodates my herb garden.  While the apartment as a whole holds all my stuff and has the El Gato Perfecto seal of approval, it’s not quite as visitor-friendly as the prior place, with only the single bathroom, but as long as no one is snoring (and hey, I have earplugs) it can still accommodate guests.  I can still walk to work which is a huge plus.

There’s a price to play in full time+ work, which is that, on a marginal income, one must search for good deals, and that, unfortunately, takes time.  In one sense, if you live in the moment, it’s rather pleasant to spend all your free time cycling about, making calls and looking at places.  It’s also kind of nice to resort one’s stuff into a living space, and to feel that you’ve done the best with what you have, etc.  Unfortunately, such living precludes other activities (like poetry and blogging).  So while the searching/moving process went off with few hitches, it did demand a lot of time, and I’m glad to be through with it.

**

The job’s been good, but taxing.  My new trial partner and I continue to work very well together, although part of me will always miss my old trial partners (I do see them around and occasionally go to trial with them).  I think it’s really the old division I miss – I certainly miss my old judges.  I’ve been exceptionally lucky with all my trial partners, when you get down to it.  I’m tempted to blog about the insane caseloads and so forth, because I’m fascinated by the ways that all the players in the criminal justice system attempt to deal with them.  Unfortunately, that issue is one of two large pieces of litigation that my office is currently involved with, so I think I’ll just not say all that much about it.  There’s been some local and national coverage of this issue here and elsewhere (look down a few posts for the links.)  The basic shape of the thing is that we have too many cases – too many cases to effectively represent all the people who are appointed to us.  The remedy sought would be a reduced caseload – either by getting more attorneys to handle the cases or reducing the flow of new cases for a fixed staff of attorneys.  

Are we overworked?   Well, according to various guidelines, I shouldn’t have more than 400 cases a year.  That makes sense instinctively if you consider it’s to protect the clients. 

Consider a scenario where you are accused of a crime (yes you, dear reader).  Perhaps you didn’t do anything wrong.  Perhaps you did something wrong but you don’t think it was illegal per se.  Perhaps you did something illegal and are willing to accept a fair sentence but don’t want to be railroaded.  Regardless, you’re not an attorney, don’t know a lot about this stuff, can’t afford an expensive private attorney because you can barely make ends meet.  So  you get appointed to an attorney, and you, towards the end of the year, are person number 401 in their yearly caseload. 

Do you think you’d be getting a fair shake if your attorney had 400 other cases that year which demanded his attention?  What about if your attorney had only 200 other cases?  You’d probably feel more comfortable that the time was there to focus on the particular elements of your case.  What about if your attorney had 600 other cases?  What about 1200 other cases?  Starting to feel nervous?  I can tell you that I had (when last I ran the numbers) well over 2000 cases for my first year.   Any way you want to crunch that, easy cases, hard cases, greater or lesser amount of necessary time to spend on each case, it’s still far too many cases.  Hence the chronic exhaustion and the new batch of gray hair. 

Actually the exhaustion has been much better since I’ve been moved to my new division.  Although I still work more than full time, at least I’m no longer pulling down 55 hours on average *slow* weeks.

**

As far as getting out goes, I’ve been doing a lot of bicycling stuff, which has been nice.  I even built up an old 10 speed for a friend.  I’ve also been volunteering at the public library – specifically helping them out with their book sale, the proceeds of which go to pay for all the shows and story tellers and reading programs that get hosted at the library.  After a stressful day, quasi-mindless book sorting with a bunch of sarcastic older women is, oddly, soothing. 

**

I need to work on kicking my Flan addiction.  Miami is the town of Flan.  Between it and the Cuban coffee, I’m pretty much tempted to eat nothing else.  Actually, my diet’s been OK lately – the cycling helps even out any rough edges when I’m craving junk.

**

I have also just returned from vacation.  It’s the first real vacation I’ve taken in ages.  I had tried to do one last winter, but my sticky cases kept getting rolled for trial (my guys were incarcerated, it’s not like I could simply reset a trial date.)  This time around, due to the court scheduling and my super-competent trial partner, I was able to just go and check in by phone. 

I flew up to New England, and spent the first couple of days restoring my father’s old motorcycle – a 1986 Kawasaki Vulcan (vn750).  She had sat in a barn/garage for two years and I was worried she might not actually run.  She was covered in rust and her air filters had disintegrated (they were literally the consistency of tiramisu).  On the plus side, she had a super-full tank of gas, so there was no rust inside the tank.   After a battery change, air filter change, oil/filter change, coolant change, some minor re-wiring, and new tires (the old ones were so worn they were pretty much square, not rounded), she proved to be pretty frisky.  I then started the long process of de-rusting and shining, a process I’m still in the middle of, actually, although she looks much better than she did when I unearthed her from underneath her cover.

Working on the bike was relaxing, riding her was even more so; at the risk of sounding selfish, it was nice not to deal with people for a spell.  After the first few days it looked like she was going to work out (despite a brief carburetor blip which left me panicky – I so did not want to strip out and rebuild the carbs if I didn’t have to, and it turned out I didn’t).  So I switched into travel mode and decided to bring the bike down to Miami.  For a 22 year old bike, she did very well.  After pouring libations to the gods of travel, I named her “Shining Black Bess.”

Whenever I took the bike out, I got a lot of questions about her since Bess is kind of. . .funky looking, compared to the average cruiser;  I think the best write up of the Vulcan 750’s styling was that it looked like a bunch of mid-80s Japanese engineers decided to make what they thought was a cruiser, but loaded up with all kinds of helpful non-Harley things like a liquid cooled engine, a shaft drive, a tachometer, automatic cam tensioners, a rubber mounted engine to cut vibration, failure warning lights, quieter more efficient exhaust, and the like.  There’s really nothing to *add* to the bike – she’s low-maintenance, fully featured, and largely bullet-proof.   But she does sorta look like a Harley, in the sense that she’s a cruiser, but more of a sport-cruiser.  And that trips people up to the extent that they ask you what kind of bike it is, etc.     

The trip down was aprox. 1,500 miles, and, after a few day trips (testing her out) in New England, I drove down to DC.  That was a particularly bad leg.  Bess  developed an oil leak (discovered at 9pm in north Jersey, fixed by 1130pm in north Jersey) and then we ran into torrential rains on an unlit I-95 outside of DC.  I learned a bit though, and ended up very damp, but in one piece, outside of DC at 6 in the morning. 

(I am so kicking myself for not buying one of those 99 emergency ponchos.  I had water-proof gear, which did a good job, but it would have been nice to have ridden off the road, rigged up a poncho/tarp and just waited out the storm away from cars.  I’m certainly going to alter my packing (which was more bicycle touring/hiking packing) for the next trip I do.  On the whole though, it wasn’t bad go of it for a first motorcycle tour.  I went with two saddlebags, a backpack lashed to the passenger’s seat, and an extra helmet (eventually returned to the place from whence it came – long and pointless story).  I’d be able to do a longer tour with less stuff though.)

In any event, I bummed around DC for a day, eating good food (Cakelove!), continuing to be wet, and eventually met up with my old roommate, The James Bond Watch.  He’s doing well and I crashed out at his place that night.  TJBW and I had sushi at a new place in Chinatown, and went out for drinks and to watch Obama’s acceptance speech.  It felt good to be back in DC, to be plugged in to what was going on.   In the category of random cool, we went with one of his co-workers to see the new Batman film at the Smithsonian’s Imax theatre.  You can’t beat Imax.  Nor Batman. 

The next day I met up with my old friend Thinks Before She Speaks, who may be coming down to Miami.  I also hit up a few places I missed from my time there.  Eastern Market is certainly not the same, in its new temporary space, and my favorite coffee shop has closed down, alas.  I visited with one of my professors from the Criminal Justice Clinic and chatted (for longer actually) with our old secretaries.  TJBW and I hung out, caught up, and went to be relatively early.  I was going to hit the road, and he was headed to the airport to fly out to LA.

So, after two wet days in DC, I left.  That proved to be a good and bad decision.  While I felt I had maxed out my DC time in the sense that I wanted to visit, not let the city engulf me, I still didn’t see everyone I’d have liked to (ahem, Scott) but trust they can always visit me in Miami to escape the cold.  The first day out was gorgeous – I went through Virginia and down the Blue Ridge Parkway.  There was very little rain and I saw deer, a bear, foxes, hawks and REAL TREES.  Mountains are good for the soul.  I camped out that night and was prepared to spend the next day with friends in Columbia or just bum around the town.  Well, the plans evaporated (needlessly it turned out) and I pressed on past the point of going back before I found out I could have just stayed in town and met up with my friends who were returning early.  I caught a lot of rain and wind, gusting at about 20-25 mph, which made for exhausting riding since Bess has only a small fairing.  Thankfully it was during the day so I could see clearly and make smart riding choices.  I could have done a quasi camp thing, but pushed on through and arrived in Miami at about midnight. 

I was a bit shocked at how bad the drivers were in Boca Raton and the outskirts.  The highway was full of guys driving like they were in Grand Theft Auto.  Miami itself (and Jersey) was relatively tame by comparison, and the Carolinas were an absolute delight. 

I met a lot of interesting bikers on the trip, but none in the mid-Atlantic region.  The rest were all funny and cool people. 

I was sort of surprised at how my body held up to 14 hour stretches on the bike.  I expected shoulder and neck problems (cycling), but had none at all.  What I got were hand and foot cramps and saddle discomfort.  I think both were exacerbated by wet coldness.  I had thought of going with a saddle cover for the bike,  but, alas, didn’t think the very broken-in saddle would be a problem.  In retrospect, that and a simple poncho would have made the biggest difference in comfort on the trip.  Nothing proved to be disastrous though.

 

I think I’ll be selling my car.  I never drive it anyway, since I’m always using the bicycles. The fact that my MPG dropped to 42 when I was cruising in the 75-80 mph range is also a good selling point.  When backroading in the 50ish mph range, I got around 50 MPG.  That's pretty sweet (and includes my enormous wind-dragging luggage. 

**

I go back to the grind soon, but with enough time to take care of the final Bess details (such as getting her registered in FL).  Overall it’s been a good couple of months.  I’ll apologize for having not much in terms of poetry or law news up right now.  That may change soon.

Comments

[blm]

Glad to hear you haven't been crushed under the staggering caseload (yet). Drop me a line sometime (at my gmail address, my blog's dead) -- I'd love to chat.

[Edintally]

Welcome back! Nice bike.

[kat]

Thanks for sharing your adventures and pics :)

ps(my dad says " wow, lovely bike" and with a deep sigh added "I'd love to go biking again...")