Anonymous Lawyer

Once again it's Wednesday and I want to leave early to play golf, so I'm in the office much earlier than I ought to be. It's not so much that I need to be here so early, but it's a reflex from my days as an associate -- I don't want anyone thinking I'm not committed to my job, and I don't want people talking about how I shouldn't be trying to get a round of golf in every Wednesday. Even though I don't really think anyone would say that, especially not associates because if they did I'd get them fired. (No, obviously that's not true. Instead I'd just give them really crappy work to do, like searching through my client's e-mail archives to find out if he ever mentioned that he was planning on cheating on his taxes, just in case that ever comes up in the completely-unrelated case we're working on.) So at least if I get here early, people acknowledge I'm doing what I can to compensate for the hours I want to miss. The plus for being a partner is that I can make the plans to play golf and be pretty sure, given what's on my plate, that I won't have to cancel. It's a luxury the associates don't always have, although more and more we're trying.

The other thing that made me leap out of bed this morning is that no matter how many years you do this, the last day of the month is always a pleasant day to go to work. I guess it's different now that we have direct deposit, but it's at least nice to get that pay stub and find out how much has been deposited. When I was an associate I developed a payday ritual. $20, on the way home, on something stupid that I don't need. Sometimes more if I get particularly inspired, but usually I try to stick to twenty bucks. Last month it was 10 packages of Silly Putty, for no reason except that Silly Putty is fun. I put all of the Silly Putty together into one big ball, brought it to the office, and have found that bouncing it off the window -- think Toby Ziegler in The West Wing -- is actually a very pleasant stress reliever. I'd bounce it off the wall, but it would bother the guy next door. What was disappointing is that even though Silly Putty does a great job lifting the print off the comics section in the newspaper, it does a terrible job lifting the print off our legal documents.