augmentedfourth

Oh lord, I spend too much time on the internet. I hadn't read any episode descriptions before going in, but as soon as I heard the incorrect names of Chad and Stacy, I knew exactly where this was headed and I wasn't wrong. I'm just thankful my mom gave up on the show this season in favor of Grey's Anatomy because I would have had a lot of explaining to do. And I'm perfectly happy with not having to explain incels to my mother. (I remember having to explain the Gamergate episode to her a couple years ago. "But that sounds really dumb." Yes, Mom, it does and it is. And I think there was another internet-y episode last year I had to explain, but I'm drawing a blank.) Anyway! Not a terrible episode, for the reasons already pointed out above - an actual SVU case and minimal personal drama. I agree that the final unnecessary reveal that the guy used the wrong phone number felt a little off. I get that it was supposed to make him seem even more unreasonable/unlikable and the woman more of an innocent victim. But let's say he had left her a message with the right number. If she'd ignored/deleted it, if she turned him down gently, even if she laughed in his face and told the entire school what a loser he was...none of that would have meant she deserved to be raped and her husband murdered. A stronger ending might have been if she'd stared him down and said something like, "I would never have gone to the prom with you...and this is why" as he gets carted off.

Maybe the husband had to work in an effort to keep paying on the other two cars. :P Apparently it's a common promotion for casinos/companies/anything you can think of to give away "free" cruises. The boat's going out regardless of whether or not all the rooms are filled, so it's not a big deal to stick someone in one of the empty crappy rooms. Airfare is rarely, if ever, included. So you can live in Bumblefuck, Idaho, and win this free! cruise, but hey, guess what? It's up to you to get yourself all the way down to Florida to where the boat leaves from. Very basic meals are likely included, as is use of the swimming pool and other basics, but alcohol sure as hell is NOT included. I don't know about the other add-ons, like nightly entertainment. Probably not. I don't want to call it a scam, but whoever gives away the cruise builds up some good PR, while the cruise companies aren't losing out on much at all, while all these people are excited about their free! cruise that they still have to spend money on. Oh well. I'm sure there's something in the fine print that says you can't sell the tickets, either. I was trying to figure out what "handsy" meant. Did their argument just turn physical, or was one of them trying to be more than friends in that cramped little room? I don't know, and I don't really want to know. The babymama car fight or whatever was just sad. The defendant's father was kind of fun, though. The plaintiff actually didn't seem like as much of a complete idiot, so maybe she'll figure out she can do better than that boyfriend. She might even be smart enough to be using birth control. One can hope!

I had ads for the folding straw + case all over my Facebook this summer. Probably because I had just ordered a 4-pack of stainless steel (non-collapsible) straws from Amazon, and nothing is secret on the internet. The pack of straws was definitely less than $20, came with its own brush for cleaning, and the package did not get stolen. :P As soon as the package padlock guy started talking about the delivery guys scanning the package with the padlock scanner and adding extra steps to their process, Mr. Fourth and I both yelled at the TV that that was never going to happen. It's well documented that UPS is up their drivers' butts about speed and efficiency, and I'm sure the other carriers are the same. They're not going to add in that extra step. They're just not.

My local upscale supermarket still carries it. Boar's Head also has a knockoff that has similar ingredients and nutritional value...and is a couple dollars cheaper, so that's what I've been getting. :-\

In my fantasy world, when the plaintiff called 911 and gave his license number, somewhere along the line, either the dispatcher or one of the responding officers thought, "Oh, him again." I have no idea what happened in the dog case other than the plaintiff got bitten and he wasn't the first. The 17-year-old owner said in the hallterview that they sent the dog back to "their country". Great, I guess? I hate when they have videos of parents physically fighting right in front of their kids. It makes me want to swoop in and rescue the poor babies and give them a loving home, even though my own kids keep me plenty busy (and stressed sometimes!).

He didn't even deserve the $10 back for the haircut, since he "ate the steak", as we all love to say. JJ gave him the $10 to make him shut up and go away. Based in the law or not, it was a wise move, and I'd even be willing to reimburse her for the $10 for how good of a decision I found it to be. ;)

The fence case today was awesome. All the plaintiff was missing was the Kate Gosselin "I want to speak with your manager" haircut. She wasn't above performing theatrics while the husband defendant was testifying, as if everything he said was a vicious lie. And even if it was, as JJ said, IT DOESN'T MATTER! Don't build a fence on someone else's property! And agreed, the suing for $1 over the "assault" was amazing. That sent a message loud and clear. Love it. The second case was also a bit more interesting than our usual "it was a loan/it was a gift" fare. So the plaintiff has this amazing medical invention, but still has to sell real estate? And the defendant was going to fly to three different cities that were in different regions of the country to film for this video he was only making $3700 on? Fascinating.

The defendant in the security deposit case was the only litigant today who didn't look like something that had been scraped off the bottom of someone's shoe. The shots of the dog falling asleep in the first case made my day. Thumbs up for that bit of editing.

Somehow, I had a suspicion that Ms. Opse was not quite teaching at an Ivy League institution. You know, that same intuition that makes me think "pit bull!" every time a trashy litigant mentions a dog. Speaking of jumping to conclusions, while JJ sometimes does so erroneously, I thought she was 100% right that the defendant with the escape room/haunted house was full of shit. Because off-duty cops picking up a second job working security are totally jumping at the chance to do what amounts to an unpaid internship in the hopes of being hired full-time the following year. Plus, it made me miss my best friend; our past adventures have involved both escape rooms (right when they first became a "thing", we had to travel down to Manhattan!) and haunted houses (somehow we wound up working at one with a bunch of college kids...as part of the cast). But now we live in different states and I have kids and he's a doctor getting all sorts of impressive credentials and we don't see each other enough. WAH. THANKS, DEFENDANT.

I started with fanfic, in a small, yet dedicated fandom (though not without its drama, because internet), and then moved on to writing my own stories. You can totally do it! I mean, based on your posts here, you're literate, and that's half the battle right there. ;)

Sooooooo...almost seven years ago, I was on my honeymoon and reading trash on my kindle while lounging on the beach, and I thought, "Wow, this is really terrible, I bet I can write something better than this!" And so I embarked on my journey of writing smut and getting people to publish it. Exotic pen name? Check. Shirtless dudes on covers? Check. In my defense, though, the sexy, domineering billionaire genre never really did it for me. I didn't even really write contemporary for a while, preferring sci-fi and fantasy romance. I also don't have a whole lot of say in the covers. I can make suggestions, but it's ultimately up to the publisher. I will, however, post one of my favorites (again, that I did not design). I love it because the woman is completely clothed, like the badass space commander she is, and not only is the shirtless dude a shirtless dude, but he doesn't even get a whole head. It's rare that a man gets the Headless Women of Hollywood treatment, but we should all be about equality, right? ;) (If this violates any guidelines, like I guess this is technically promoting myself, let me know and I'll take it down.)

This comment, combined with her earlier statements about how the defendant's witness should have been thinking about the facts of the case while on the plane from Arkansas to California (the plane ride that her show paid for, of course) made me interpret this comment as her believing that this whole group of friends cooked up this wacky case for the free trip and TV appearance. I haven't made up my mind either way about that, but we all know it wouldn't have been the first time it happened. Actually, as I type this out, I'm leaning toward them *not* scheming for a free trip because, to be perfectly honest, I don't think they're bright enough. Either way, I do think JJ should have given the plaintiff a couple hundred bucks for her phone because the video did indicate damage. Though on the other hand, we all know they get paid to be there, so the plaintiff probably got enough to replace her phone anyway. And now I'm going in circles and getting way too meta for this late at night. Today's cases were kind of fun. Plaintiff landlord, who is about to at least get a month's rent, and clearly thinks he has the upper hand: She never notified me of any problems! Defendant tenant: *whips out text messages clearly notifying him of problems, plus proof she paid someone else to take care of the issues* Probably a good call not awarding either of them money. And then the painting case was entertaining. The plaintiff gives a quote for painting a house, winds up getting MORE money because of a surprise!wallpaper removal, and is then suing because she thinks she should get EVEN MORE money than what was in her original contract. Ha. But the best part, of course, was the hallterview. Both of them screaming about this one being drunk and taking klonopin, that one driving somewhere to get weed ("I WENT TO A BABY SHOWER!!!"), and lots of gesticulating and literal finger wagging. I bet both of them (but especially the defendant) are the type to be irrationally annoyed that they wore similar shirts to each other for their 15 minutes of fame.

My best friend's wife works in a similar firm with similar clients, and after one notable case, their go-to phrase became "But what about the wicker furniture?" We've totally stolen it and use it when our 3-year-olds get fixated on things.

The adopted daughter was one of the most "has her shit together" litigants on JJ in a long time. Wonder where she got that from, since it sure as hell didn't seem to be from her "mother". I kind of had to hand it to the baseball uniform defendant for waltzing in there with no defense and giving zero fucks about it. (paraphrasing) "So you delivered some of the hats four weeks later than you said you would." "YUP." ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ "Were the hats supposed to have numbers on them?" "YUP." "Did you put them on?" "NOPE." ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Hallterview: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Yeah, I thought right off the bat that "human trafficking" daughter was getting away from Mom for a reason, and that feeling only intensified as the case went on. Even if she is involved with something shady, she still might prefer that to having to deal with her mother. It's hard to say without seeing the contract itself, but while I don't think JJ was 100% right, I don't think she was totally wrong either. I think the big issue was having the flat fee on one page and the hourly fee on another without a clear explanation. Again, it's impossible to say for sure without actually reading it, but based on my experience, clients blow through retainers SO fast, and I don't think having both on there was necessarily an issue. (Standard I Am Not A Lawyer disclaimer goes here.) So the flat fee said she had to pay $1000 for ABC hearing/process/procedure, which happened, and $2500 for XYZ hearing, which did not. Were I adjudicating this case, I would have ruled that the attorneys keep the $1000 for ABC, and then deduct the hourly rate from the remaining $2500, because even though XYZ didn't happen, the attorneys most likely prepared for it anyway, and then given the plaintiff back the difference. In other words, I do agree with JJ that the plaintiff should have gotten *something* back since XYZ never happened, but I do think she was a little harsh on the attorneys and claiming he was overcharging, or even insinuating that he was scamming. Litigation is expensive. It's a fact of life. And I know things are different everywhere and I do live in an area with a high cost of living, but doesn't $25/hour for someone who went to law school seem a bit low? I, your lowly court reporter, doing a job that only requires a GED and a training program, am guaranteed $85 just for walking out my front door in the morning. Maybe she has an awesome benefits package? One can only hope.

My entire day was spent on an emergency transcript regarding a sexual assault at a well-known institution where you'd think people really should know better (and I still have about a quarter of it to finish up tomorrow), so reading this actually was one of the best things to happen to me today. I regret that I can only click the heart button once. Thank you!

Thanks to my years of watching, somehow I knew -- just KNEW -- that as soon as I heard JJ ask Ms. I'm Addicted to Everything about dog breeds, there was going to be a pitbull involved. I must have a crystal ball. Camera daughter was an insufferably smug little twat. I'd like to think that when she watches her episode, she will realize this, but it's far more likely that she'll just fall in love with herself even more. The thought did cross my mind that perhaps that kid was intentionally bombing chemistry in the hopes of getting more sessions with the pretty young tutor, but after he opened his mouth and spoke a bit, I don't think that was the case. Also, the mother was wrong in her hallterview comparison with the poorly-mowed lawn - hasn't she ever watched JJ before?!? If you hire someone to do something for you and they do a shit job, you pay them what the contract says you owe and never use them again. Or, SHE ATE THE STEAK!!!

I'm not sure what, exactly, was the legal basis behind it (especially since I was only half paying attention), but I loved JJ's arbitrary determination of the value of each chicken so the plaintiff got the full $5000. Did she do that just because the defendant was being obnoxious? Possibly/probably. Do I mind? Not at all. The plaintiff in the security deposit case was one of the few people in recent memory to actually be allowed to explain something that didn't gel with JJ's preconceived notions. Things like only having the puppy on the tile floor and not the carpet (which I'm not 100% sure I buy, but JJ probably would have said that after that long of a time, the carpets in a rental would need replacing regardless), the fixtures for the missing cabinets, and so on. I'm not sure if she quite managed to get through to JJ that she and her friend put some trash on the curb for bulk pickup and the other neighbors went "woo-hoo! dumping party!", but it didn't matter in the long run. I'll admit to some bias here and say that the defendant/landlord just looked like she'd be a pain in the ass to deal with. I also wanted to chime in with hugs, condolences, and shared laughs for anyone who needs them. I'm so far behind on the other TV shows I follow, since it's sweeps time and I don't have enough hours in my day, but I always try to catch up with JJ first because this is my favorite forum here. I don't want to miss out and fall too far behind with the posts!

THERE WAS NO BEN! BEN DID NOT EXIST! Sorry, apparently I'm still blown away a day later. The very basic facts were the defendant took the plaintiff's car while the plaintiff was sleeping at his house (despite not having a license, because no one does on this show), and got escorted back by the cops. Plaintiff said there was damage to the car that wasn't there before the defendant took it out for an early morning joy ride, but the defendant claimed he didn't do it. However, since he MADE UP BEN, his credibility was kinda shot. There was also a whole lot of JJ feeling around in an effort to find out if anyone was drunk or using drugs, but it didn't really get anywhere.

I think that's what pushed me over the edge and made me want to go rescue that poor baby, the smirk on that smug bitch's face. It's all a game to her, and "HER" BABY doesn't matter one whit. The defendant already has custody of his other kids; maybe he should go for custody of this one, too. Even if he goes out drinking with his buddies sometimes, he came across as the better option. (Which, I know, isn't saying much.) On to today! In the case of the high-strung lesbians, the plaintiff was right - she did have a much better lipstick game than the defendant. I'm always on the lookout for a good red, and I still haven't quite found the perfect one for me yet. I, too, wasn't crazy about JJ's pooh-poohing of online education, since it's becoming more and more popular these days, but I'm also not sure if I bought the "family emergency" story. Either way, I'm glad the plaintiff got her money back. The pitbull owners were nasty pieces of work. Maybe I just have a thing against people who smirk. (See above.) In the last case, each lie the defendant told was stupider than the one before it. "I wanted to practice parallel parking at 5:00 a.m.!" was bad enough, but then he INVENTED A PERSON and claimed they were all partying at this fictional dude's house, and didn't think JJ would catch on? Oy.

Okay, good, I wasn't just imagining things. Appearance-wise, yesterday was quite the interesting day. I barely even remember the cases. There was that woman with the hidden neck tattoos. In the case of the two art students, the plaintiff spoke as if she were channeling William Shatner, and the defendant was mimicking every single mannerism of Stefon from Saturday Night Live. The defendant in the nanny case had front teeth that looked like Chiclets - much bigger and brighter than the rest of her teeth. She said she was a bartender, so I wonder if she wound up on the wrong end of a bar fight at some point. Then in the dog case, I'm fairly convinced the defendant was/used to be a man, but she was wearing waaaaay too much makeup. Hopefully the cases were filmed close together and she ran into Ms. Stefon in the hotel or something, who advised her that a subtler look would work in her favor. (That's how I'm going to pretend it happened in my mind, anyway.)

I KNOW! I could see maybe, just maybe, a 12-year-old thinking something like "I want [shiny new game console or whatever], maybe I'll just take out the amount to buy it and hope no one notices" (which would still be stupid, but maybe not as...is malicious the right word?), but going back week after week, taking a thousand dollars each time? Damn. How many clothes could they buy, really? And what 12-year-old boy cares that much about fancy clothes? No comments yet on the other case, with the videotape of the utter trash fighting over their almost 1-year-old at 11:00 at night? I wanted to reach through the screen and rescue that poor baby, and I already have enough kids of my own.

Lesson of the day: Never work at Buffalo Wild Wings. I get that they have to cover their own ass, but it sounded like they did nothing to help that poor girl defend herself against Captain Redbeard (and his guns, plural), and may have even hindered her case. At a quick, first glance, both of them seemed reasonable enough, especially considering some of the litigants we've seen on this show, but it didn't take very long for the plaintiff to ping every alarm I have. If I were the defendant, I'd still be sleeping with one eye open, and would definitely consider moving far away.

This is where I come down. I honestly didn't even really mind JJ's dressing down of the plaintiff because it just seemed so petty. Sometimes you can be right, but the optics are terrible.* And anyone who's ever been involved in any sort of school drop off/pick up can tell you there's PLENTY of shitty driving going on. *Last year, I did a case with a Teenage Pedestrian vs. Driver. Teenage Pedestrian was fooling around with her friends, as teenagers do, and I believe there were multiple eyewitnesses that said she jumped out into the street between parked cars, and obviously not at a crosswalk. I did the deposition of the driver, a middle-aged woman, and it came out during the course of her testimony that 1) she had her two unrestrained dogs with her in the car, 2) she has MS and takes a lot of medications for it, and 3) she'd had cataract surgery within the year before the accident. Even I was thinking, "Oh. Oh, honey. Be thankful that the vast majority of these settle before trial."