Lawyering Through Life

Interns

I am sitting here waiting for Judge to get off the bench so he can finish signing a box of orders so that I can bring said box of orders downstairs and then I can get the hell out of here. This is the first time I’ve been able to sit at my desk and take a deep breath in about two weeks. Hence, the blogging drought.

But, I MUST take this time to tell you all about my interns. Yes, interns. While people who don’t have interns might be thinking, “Wow, it would be great to have an intern…I could give him/her all that crap work that I never want to do….I can send him on the ridiculous errands that [insert your Boss here) makes me do…I can teach him/her things and she/he will look up to me.”, I don’t not even remotely feel that way.

Yes, the idea of “interns” is a great idea. Kudos to the people who came up with the idea of having people work for free and getting them to perform menial tasks all under the guise that they are “learning something.” I do not criticize the system. One of my interns is in law school and is fantastic. Mr. Wendell cranks out the legal memos quickly and accurately. Having Mr. Wendell around actually makes my life a little bit easier. Granted, I still have to review his work before passing it off to Judge, but that does take less time than doing it myself. So, props to Mr. Wendell for improving my quality of life. Even only by a little bit, I will still take it.

So, what is the basis of my rant against interns, you ask? Two words: Cabana Boy. Heis my other intern who is a friend of my judge’s daughter’s boyfriend. Which is problematic for this reason - I can't complain about Judge in front of him. Not that I would, I really don't have many complaints, but I can't say "Yeah, don't ask him that - it will put him in a bad mood." Or "I usually wait till he has had coffee before going in his office." Or "Don't talk while he is reading something. He likes it quiet." What if Cabana Boy says to Judge's daughter that sometimes her dad irritates his law clerk by being a curmedgeon at times? I have to be careful with the griping.

There are many things that bug about Cabana Boy, in addition to the fact that he is not in law school and is of very little use to a judge or a law clerk. Judge didn’t really give me any warning that he was bringing on another intern so early one morning last week, before even eating breakfast, I was called back to chambers and introduced to the new intern. Actually, I was eating my breakfast at the time, which will be an important fact in a moment.

Judge had his “Teacher” cap on and was clearly enjoying the eagerness with which Cabana Boy is approaching his internship. I inwardly rolled my eyes at the enthusiasm while thinking of all the other work-related things I could be doing. I was then instructed to show Cabana Boy around. I brought him back to my office, so I could finish my breakfast. We chatted for a few minutes, he explained he desperately wanted to attend my alma mater for law school and was hoping to boost his resume with a judicial internship. Made sense. He then handed me a two and a half page resume – which seemed extremely long for someone who is only 26 years old and doesn’t have a graduate degree. Is that too judge-y of me? I apologize but my resume is a page and a half, which I felt was pushing it a bit despite seven years work experience and a graduate degree.

After I finished my breakfast, I took Cabana Boy to meet Cool Mom, who supervises the law clerks and the interns. Cool Mom is a former law clerk who patiently answers all my inane work questions. I am calling her Cool Mom because she is just one of those cool moms. Not all moms are cool. But she is. And that’s the best alias I can come up with at the moment. So, Cool Mom read Cabana Boy the rules that apply to interns. One such rule is don’t eat or drink near the computers. As in within 10 feet or something. He looked over at me and just said “Ahem”. I was confused, until I realized that he was actually selling me out to my supervisor about eating oatmeal at my desk. Cool Mom figured out what was going on and clarified that the eating rule does not apply to law clerks. Just interns. “Jersey can do whatever she wants, we trust her!” Thanks, Cool Mom!

After the meeting with Cool Mom, he took off for the day and thankfully didn’t come in again until Thursday. Unfortunately, he started off Thursday by knocking on my door with one of those sing-songy knocks that once someone grates on your nerves and then try to knock you a tune…not a good start. I had come up with some things for him to do and sent him off while I frantically tried to finish preparing the docket. (Side note – Docket prep with Judge is at 2pm. I receive approximately 15-20 files Thursday morning that I need to review and brief by 2pm. Little bit of running around involved with that and I tend to get a little stressed. So, that’s the context).

A half hour passes and Judge calls me back to his office. I had asked Cabana Boy to do something for me and he brought the finished product directly to Judge. Well…that’s not exactly how it works. Judge told me that he considers work from an intern the same as my work. Which means if it is not good, he won’t gripe at the intern, he will gripe at me. I run interference between a somewhat demanding boss and an apparently incompetent intern. AWESOME.

Basically, Cabana Boy (who by the way is here “as long as you want me!”) might very well cause me to dislike a job that I absolutely love. He is just so eager. But not in a good way. In a “I ate my lunch in five minutes so you can give me more work to do even though you told me that you were in the middle of something and would get me work as soon as you could but I insisted on scarfing down my lunch and coming to ask you again if you had work because I am just used to having work and being helpful and could you please just give me something to be helpful?” way. I almost gave him my car keys and told him to get my car inspected but Cool Mom intervened and suggested he go watch court.

And then she looked at me with pity, and said “Yes, Jersey. This really does suck for you.”

A little longwinded, I apologize. I am sure there is more to come on Cabana Boy. Oh, I dubbed him Cabana Boy before I discovered how incredibly annoying he was. Cabana Boy was to give the impression that I was going to now have someone to bring me drinks and snacks. Instead of bringing me drinks, he is actually driving me to drink.

posted by jersey @ 4:02 PM