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October 26, 2012
Lawyers and Depression: It Happens.
Speaking of the Black Dog, a term Winston Churchill gave to his bouts with depression, I've often wondered why the subject of lawyers with booze and drug problems has been out in the open for a fairly long time--at least since I started to practice law--but the discussion of clinical depression in our ranks is much more recent. Given the Type A personality of many (if not most) of us in the profession, you'd expect the discussion to at least keep pace with the one on substance abuse. It hasn't. When the Recession hit lawyers hard about three years ago, I started to notice some changes in more than a few of my friends and colleagues. But I am not an expert. It turns out there's an interesting blog called Lawyers with Depression, and it's a brave and thorough resource. Its author writes especially well. See his October 21 post, "Lawyer Blues or Depression? It begins:
I can spot sadness on lawyer’s face. Like a craggy poker player reads dog-eared cards in a smoke-laden backroom bar, world-weary drooped eyelids, even on young lawyers, which suggests a great weight borne, a solemnity. To others, their expressions may seem like a seasoned lawyer’s humorless, steely resolve. But, I know better. Their faces a subtler shade of grey, the somber hue of a 1L’s textbook on Contracts.
Their humorous repartee amongst each other, if any, can be a deeply cynical and sarcastic. It is a tough life for many in this boat; many dream, sadly, of a different life. “Every man has his secret,” wrote the poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.”
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
October 25, 2012
Getting Paid: Pedestrian Tip No. 2 on Invoicing to Avoid Hating Life.
Make sure the client representative who actually requests or directs your work sees the bill each month or quarter. For long-standing clients, it's not unusual for a company employee who does not routinely deal with outside law firms to be directing the work your firm will do from time to time.
In the case of a client with more than one office or plant--and especially when in-house counsel or the the usual client representative is in just one central location--you may be working for an engagement or two with a client rep in another location who does not normally see the bills from outside firms. An environmental permitting project for one of your clients' plants or terminals in the boonies is a good example. The local person with the company will be in charge. And he or she do not regularly work with the client's lawyers.
Or maybe your client may have just one office or plant--and a sporadic or "new user" of your firm is suddenly calling the shots on what you are doing. They may not even think that much about the lawyer charges they might be ringing up.
In either case, BOTH (1) that local, sporadic or "new user" of your law firm AND (2) the usual rep or in-house counsel who normally approves invoices and pays them need to see the bill whether anyone suggests such a protocol or not. And you, as outside counsel, need to make sure that happens. Obvious reasons: Don't give a blank check to the client's local, sporadic or "new user" to use your law firm without some accountability. Make sure the rep or in-house counsel knows what the local project manager is spending. Those two operatives at the client need to be on the exact same page.
Another creature hating life.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
October 24, 2012
Getting Paid: Pedestrian Tip No. 1 on Invoicing to Avoid Hating Life.
Send the bill to more than one person. Everyone has a back-up these days, including "Opal" in the back rooms of Accounts Payable at your longstanding client down in Mobile. And everyone takes time off, gets sick, travels, has family emergencies and, well, you get the idea. Of course, whoever asks you to do the work you are trying to get paid for should always see your invoices (more on that in another post). But you should always find out right away and before the first bill is sent who Opal's back-up is (her name is often "Nadine") in the administrative section of your client and send your invoices to both Opal and Nadine. Whether it's by regular mail or e-mail, send invoices to both.
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Vengeful animal hating life.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:01 PM | Comments (0)
October 23, 2012
Man, were we wrong: Obama the Aggressor owns Night 3.
It wasn't that the talented Mitt Romney performed poorly last night; he didn't. It was just that Obama was so uncannily good. And he was all over Romney without seeming like a bully. Well done. Night 3 was no "draw" and came close, in my view, to being a rout. My last three serious live tweets (from earliest to latest) sum it up:
Obama dumbing it down: Surrender Mitt. You don't know the world. You screwed up small biz in Massachusetts. It's curtains for ya', kid.
Obama seems to fairly glow tonight. On his game even more than #2. Telegenic. Confident. He's enjoying Battle. Warrior in Zone.
I was wrong to predict draw tonight. Am calling this for Obama to same degree Mitt triumphed in #1. Obama in Zone at times. He's the Man.
At the Gannett House: Who's the Man now?
Posted by JD Hull at 12:53 AM | Comments (0)
October 22, 2012
Prediction for Obama-Romney Night 3: A Street Fight with Mitt as Aggressor--and a Draw.
Tonight at 9:00 EST President Obama and Governor Romney debate foreign policy--expect lots on China, Libya and Iran--in Boca Raton, Florida with Washington CBS Bob Schieffer mainstay as moderator. As Round 3 is foreign policy, you would expect it to be Obama's night. But you can also expect Romney, once again, to be over-prepared. And Romney will try to launch several attacks that the President is "soft" on China and Iran. He will be planting seeds with voters across the board who are uncomfortable with Obama's internationalist view of the world. Romney, of course, doesn't have any foreign policy experience to attack. So he will be the aggressor. His attacks will neither succeed nor fail; he will just be lobbing them in there. Obama, in turn, will not miss a trick in any of his responses. However, Romney's secret weapon in the debates has been Rob Portman, the junior U.S. Senator from Ohio who's done a great job of getting Romney ready. For the first time ever, Romney will sound like he knows his stuff on world affairs--and he will startle us. Both candidates will hold their own tonight. Our prediction: a street fight and a draw.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:19 PM | Comments (0)
Senator George S. McGovern (1922–2012)
He is the most decent man in the Senate.
--Robert F. Kennedy, 1968
Growing up, professionals born in the 1960s were often likely to have political heroes on the GOP side of things. Ronald Reagan is a good example, and he seemed to excite college kids in a way other Republicans had not since Ike. But if you were born earlier, say in the 1950s, your heroes came in a veritable pantheon that included certain "lefty" U.S. senators: Robert Kennedy, Birch Bayh, Gaylord Nelson, Eugene McCarthy, Tom Eagleton, Ed Muskie, Hubert Humphrey, Abe Ribicoff, Dick Clark. And George McGovern from South Dakota. McGovern, who by his own missteps was beaten by Nixon in 1972, was really heir to Robert Kennedy's ideas and following after Kennedy was shot and killed in 1968.
A lot of people thought this bookish WWII war-hero was a little too liberal, and personally a bit too peaceful and gentle, to be the President of the United States. But those around him--like Gary Hart, Frank Mankiewicz, Warren Beatty and Hunter Thompson--knew better. Senator McGovern was a tough and feisty guy. He just wasn't flashy about it. But once in the fall of 1972, McGovern was mercilessly heckled at a rally by someone very close to the stage. When the rally was over, McGovern stepped down from the stage and gestured for the man to come over to him. The man came. In the middle of a throng of Secret Service agents and admirers, McGovern cupped his hand over his mouth, got real close to the man and whispered in his ear: "I have a secret for you. Kiss my ass."
Posted by JD Hull at 08:39 PM | Comments (0)
October 21, 2012
The Economist: Do Europe's transport corridors help or hurt the EU Single Market?
Trains, boats and planes. You have clients or customers selling within, out of or into Europe? See Charlemagne's "Coming off the Rails". Excerpt:
So a train carrying Volvo cars from Sweden to Italy must change locomotives and crews three or four times. It could be held up in bottlenecks in Germany and Austria. Before entering Italy over the Brenner Pass, the crew must stop to switch the reflective panels at the rear with warning lights.
Thalys high-speed passenger trains may zip between Paris, Amsterdam and Cologne. But on some older sections of track in Germany they slow to a crawl, and they must carry seven boxes of expensive signalling gear.
How is it possible to promote competition and get freight off the roads when new models of rolling stock have to be separately certified in each country?
Graphic: The Economist and Peter Schrank
Posted by JD Hull at 04:43 PM | Comments (0)