Title Intentionally Left Blank

One thing my parents always told me is to be honest with my work – whether it was studies or doing my chores around the house or anything else that I did. This was the first thing which I was told on my first day of my first internship as well by my then mentor. He told me that if I was not honest with my work, it would show and I would be the ultimate loser.

Don’t cut corners so that you can leave ten minutes early. Go the extra mile. Study the file completely. Make your own reference notes. Take a coffee break when you need to but don’t stretch it too long when you have work piled up on your table. Whethere its research or drafting, check it completely before you give it in. Know your file. Be sure of the facts. Know the dates. Don’t hesitate to clarify if your unsure about something. Eat up the client’s head if you need to – that’s what he’s paying you for. Think out of the box but back it up with logic & law. Read up the latest judgements/ noifications/ amendments. When you fail to do this, it reflects on your work. Present you facts clearly. Pay attention to the details. No work is too big or too small. Do things one step at a time – read the facts, do the researcg, check the latest updates, draft, vet it, settle the draft. Be proud of your work.

I learnt this during my internships & later, when I stepped out of college and began my career with the bar. It has always stood me in good stead.  This is something I also tell my juniors. Abd when someone is no honest with their work, I fail to understand why. It shocks me (And I’m not talking about ass-lickers here – just people who’r plain and simple lazy to do their work). Maybe I’m just old-fashioned, because I am informed that this is how it works today. I refuse to accept that – it never worked that way yesterday, and it won’t work like that tomorrow.

On a more pleasant note. I had a good mid-week break (Friday), a working Saturday and a lazy Sunday. Friday, I met Meira. She’d come home for dinner – we had some good girl talk and dinner. And she said i’m an awesome cook & I have a lovely house too – Thanks Meira : )

Saturday was a usual working day, though we did go for a leisurely office lunch.

Sunday night, we did a potluck dinner with friends where thir little soon licked up all the ketchup with his finger and had ketchup all over himself and elsewhere as well

Monday morning – work as usual.

• You own an entire wardrove in black and white and you own at least 5-6 pairs of shoes/ sandals in black
• You think wearing light pink on a weekday is very colourful
• You do a good imitation of Govinda’s fondness for colours on weekends
• You often begin your sentences as ‘I humbly submit….’ or ‘BECAUSE…’ or ‘That it has been conclusively held…’ or ‘My learned friend does not appreciate that…’ or ‘Qua…’ and then wonder why people think it’s odd
• You humbly ‘pray’ before your ‘Ld. Senior’ for leave and state that the said prayer will not adversely affect any other party
• You are often accosted by various autowalas/ strangers on  the road when they see you coming out of court to represent them on their land/ dowry/ divorce/ family dispute matters and they start telling you in agonising detail all about it
• You send your credit card company a detailed letter about the late payment penalty and sign off as Advocate and they reverse the charges (Yup that actually happened to me)
• You don’t get a car loan or any other loan or if you do, you have to pay pretty high interest on it
• You tell your credit card company that you are a consultant
• You promise your dhobi that you will draft a legal notice on his behalf if he promsies to bring your clothes on time
• You demand a statement for charges levied on your account by the Bank and after perusing the same you write to the Bank that the charges levied are in violation of the Apex Court’s judgment and if not reversed within 7 working days, appropriate proceeings shall be instituted in the appropiate forum and they shall be responsible for all costs incurred
• You are told not to be a lawyer (like its a dirty word) when your fighting with the other half
• You get accused of being a lawyer. PERIOD

Hey folks. Been a while. Blame it on work. We poor over-worked, impoverished lawyers.

So Mumbai Diva has tagged me…I have to assign the importance of each of the numbers from 1 – 10.

1 – The class when I started reading – from Noddy to 7′o Clock tales – I devoured them all.

2 – The number of years that Arjun and me have been married (well almost 2 – we complete 2 years this month). Also the number of children I want.

3 – The number of years that I have been out of college and on my own in this big bad world

4 – The number of my closest friends whom I can tell anything and everything

5 – The number of years I spent in Pune and of which I have very fond memories

6 – The month of my birthday

7 – The number of years since I have left home

8 – The number of kilos I aim on losing

9 – My date of birth (Yes I am obsessed about my birthday – Kya karen? Comes only once a year )

10 – The plots I have in my brain for my books

Okie this was fun…I tagArjun, Utopia, Lostie, Ria and Rachita to do it. And anyone else who wants do it. Do it and ping me. I’l come and check out your countdown too.

 Anyway 7:45 on a Saturday evening and yours truly is still slaving in office and making a poor intern slave away too (well they got to earn their 5k don’t they by sacrificing at least one Saturday evening). Hey I’m not a slave driver but deadlines are deadlines. I am not too happy about the fact that I have sacrificed my Saturday as well as my Sunday. Arjun’s in Calcutta (he had the hugest prawns ever last night made for him by his sasuma, aka my mom). My mom’s delighted. I was in Cal last weekend and this weekend Arjun is in Cal. Oh well….I’l go get some TLC from the in-laws

Wahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.