hrj: (Default)
hrj ([personal profile] hrj) wrote2006-05-15 11:22 pm
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Tired

As if to thumb her ... um ... paw, at my last post, the cat has been energetic this evening and has ventured away from her kitchen counter perch to make some valiant attempts at lying on the laptop. Then she hopped over to the sewing table and peed all over some mending. I can't take this much longer. I'm getting really tired of mopping up cat urine three times a day. Have I mentioned that the kitchen counter is grouted tile? Have you tried mopping up cat urine from grouted tile? That you plan to prepare food on? (We will leave, for the moment, my opinion of an interior designer who would make a kitchen counter out of grouted tile. These aren't your nice big 4x4" tiles with little tiny strips of grout. No, these are 2.5x2.5" tiles with big wide strips of decorative grout ... that have gradually been eroding over the years.)

Yesterday I spent a couple of hours composing a strongly but diplomatically worded letter to the lawyer who handled the partnership dissolution. I pointed out that his billing statements had a different (higher) hourly rate than the signed contract, hence I was sending him a check for the correct, lower amount. And I questioned the plausibility of him having spent almost twice as much time on my case after the completed documents had been handed over to me than he had spent in researching and preparing those documents in the first place. I then went on to request further explanation of a number of line items on the statement: phone calls on days when my phone log shows no calls, time spent reviewing a memo regarding someone whose name I don't recognize (and this was after he had completed all my paperwork), time spent consulting with his associate (after all the paperwork was complete) when all of the work was being billed at the primary attorney's rate rather than the associate attorney's rate. Things like that. The kicker was the phone call when he asked me, "What was it I'm doing for you again? And could you fax me a copy of the contract -- I can't seem to find my copy." He billed me for that call. I figure that at some later point in the process I'll be sending copies of the correspondence to both the agency who referred me to him and to the bar association.

And then this morning when I was getting cash from the ATM I noticed that my checking account balance was $5000 less than it should have been. Turns out that instead of making a single transfer of $5000 into a CD as requested, they did it twice. (That was what I suspected when I saw the amount of the discrepancy.) So they're working on sorting it out. I'm going to want to spend that money before the 6 month term is up -- got redecorating to do.

Tired. Definitely tired.
madfilkentist: My cat Florestan (gray shorthair) (Default)

[personal profile] madfilkentist 2006-05-16 10:12 am (UTC)(link)
That reminds me of the time a lawyer told me he thought he'd be sanctioned if he attempted to take the case he'd prepared for me to court -- and billed me for the time he spent saying so.
cellio: (demons-of-stupidity)

[personal profile] cellio 2006-05-16 02:57 pm (UTC)(link)
Lawyer: unbelievable. The kicker is billing you for that last call. Yeah, outsiders need to hear about this. :-(

[identity profile] dame-cordelia.livejournal.com 2006-05-16 03:18 pm (UTC)(link)
Good for you that you are pushing back with this attorney. Unfortunately a lot of people get through law school without a shred of ethics.

[identity profile] albionwood.livejournal.com 2006-05-16 03:20 pm (UTC)(link)
I figure that at some later point in the process I'll be sending copies of the correspondence to both the agency who referred me to him and to the bar association.

Do it! Yeah, baby! These dorks do this all the time, because most people are intimidated by them. Forcing accountability is the only way to get it. This time he picked on the wrong girl!