Take care of your equipment!

I have tendonitis.  Some days it's worse than others.  Lately, I think I may also be developing CTS.  My pinky was a little numb the other day.  I get a massage every two or three weeks.  I sit appropriately at my chair, with the machine in the right location.  But perhaps it's not enough.

Fortunately for me, I am multi-skilled; I can report in voice.  Of course, in the winter, that could be a difficult thing if one had a cold.  Fortunately, at this moment I don't.  I'm getting ready to go into a two-week trial.  I can't write it.  My arms hurt too much.  I can voice it.

I'll be taking salt baths, downing anti-inflammatories, and getting a massage next weekend.  But right now, all I can say is I'm very glad I made the decision to cross-train.  Otherwise, I might have to take sick time and lose out on a very lucrative civil trial.

Be careful out there.  The equipment you're born with is all you get.  Take care of it.

Blasts from the Past

Having spent the first (almost) decade of my reporting career in the freelance arena, I had the opportunity to work with some wonderful attorneys.  I developed a great rapport with some.  Some others I consider to be "favorites."  I know, like parents, we're not supposed to really have favorites.  But I do.  (I'm NOT a mother, though)


I had a happy circumstance in an out-of-town assignment the other day.  I was in an unfamiliar courtroom, not the best layout, new judge, etc.  But as the courtroom started to fill up, a friendly and familiar face came up before the Bar.  I was delighted to see one of my "favorites" from my deposition practice.  Made me smile.
And it was nice to have a little bit of friendly banter with someone that I knew and could relax around.  It was a good day in court. 

I hope you all have those attorneys who, whenever you see them, make you smile.

Numbers or Words?

Numerology was not something I really delved into, but there's been a lot of this stuff out there.  New Year's Day was 1/1/11, and of course there's today, and then Veteran's Day will be 11/11/11.  Binary numbers, yes?  Wonder what that means?  I wasn't much of a math person either; hence, my chosen field dealing with WORDS.

I love words.  I love learning new words.  I love figuring out how to write words on the silly little steno machine.  I especially love it when friends share their ways of writing words that I hate to write so that I may incorporate that new way of writing.

I love reading.  A lot.  But I find myself a proofreader and it seems to detract from my reading enjoyment.  Have you noticed lately that few editors really care about the possessive apostrophe?  "Its" and "it's" happens incorrectly A LOT in my reading world.  (Not in my transcript production world, trust me.)

Richard Lederer (Conan the Grammarian?) said once that our language continues to evolve.  I suppose that's okay, evolution implying moving forward.  What saddens me is the devolution of people's ability to understand the basic constructs of our language, spelling, and vocabulary.

I guess I'm an old fogey.  And that's why I love my job with the NC Business Court - lawyers arguing using flowery language artfully.  Nobody speaks like that anymore.  I feel sorry for the younger generations that don't have a handle on the beauty that is our language and rely on paltry little words when there are so many beautiful adjectives out there to describe things.

Fortunately, I have many pages to produce where I may listen/read the attorneys' argument and sigh blissfully at the flow of words.

Happy 2011

As you may have noticed, the month of December held NO blog posts from me.  It felt that I was too busy to breathe sometimes.  Transcripts, guests, parties, shopping, you name it.  I found that all of my time was consumed by December and that I had little time to myself.

The upside was that on the night of the total lunar eclipse, since I was up working, I was able to take a few short breaks to watch the eclipse that occurred on the winter solstice; something that won't happen again in my lifetime.  It was beautiful.  Even though I was exhausted, I finally got a little down time to just be quiet and be.

A year ago I posted my resolutions for 2010.  I didn't do all that well with them, although I have managed to eat a bit cleaner and take some classes.  I'm still not realtime certified and I definitely did not stay on the exercise regimen.  Though some of these will stay on my list, I think the real thing I resolve to do is this:  Live for ME.  Do what is best for ME.  To not worry about other people's opinions and instead be guided by my moral and ethical compass at all times and to not become a doormat.  Restraining a giving/helping nature will be hard, but in the end taking care of myself will need to come first.  I think all the rest will follow.

I hope that everyone has a wonderful and insightful and healthy 2011.