It was Monday.

I had to testify in court yesterday. One of our most contentious attorneys was asserting that his client could not possibly be as bad as I said he was. Before the hearing the lawyer and I had totally agreed on what we thought was best for this guy. In the end the judge agreed too and sent the guy to a year-long lock-up for drug treatment and to have his head examined.

But that didn't stop Mr. Contrary from fighting about it and belaboring every. single. point. It is always a 'trial' to have to be in a court room with him. I guess that's why the DA was a little distracted when he called me to testify. When he tried to call me to the stand, he announced to the court that his first witness would be Rachel Ward.

Yeah. I can see where he would've made a mistake like that.

Can't you?

White Joe will miss him too.

Today was Sonic gossip day. You remember my Sonic guys, right? Trinny reported first and he was bummed. He's losing Cheese. Cheese has defected to the new I-HOP as a cook.

Cheese came in right before lunch. He has indeed traded in the burger grill for the breakfast grill. Did you know there are four grills at I-HOP? One for meat, one for eggs and pancakes, one for other stuff and he doesn't know what the fourth one is for. There has been much weeping and gnashing of teeth at the Sonic since Cheese has announced he is leaving.

Cheese did do the stand-up thing and told the manager, Ray-Ray, that he will stay a couple more weeks and train his replacement to "f*** this grill-shit up tight" just like him. (Cheese and I have had conversations about the need for him to develop a more formal verbal register for daily business and professional interaction.) Ray-Ray has evidently just returned from some sort of Managerial Jeezus Camp. He called Cheese into his office a few days after Cheese announced he was leaving.

"I want you to read this book, Cheese."
"What is it?"
"Its called 'Choices' and it will help you with your Sonic Future."
"I don't have a damn 'sonic future', Ray-Ray! I'm goin' to I-HOP!"

Cheese actually read the book. I asked what it was about. He explained it thusly:

"It was about some runner dude. He was always runnin' all the time - every day. Like he was gonna get in the f***in' Olympics or somethin'. He was always in races but he never won shit. I don't know why he kept doin' it - he was messed up about it, I guess. Then there was some really long race or some shit and he won it because it went on and on and that's all he did."

I'm not really sure what motivational lesson Cheese took from that.

In addition to moving up the corporate ladder, Cheese is going back to school. He's attending classes in the mornings, learning how to flip pancakes in the afternoon and working at Sonic at night. I told him I was impressed. He's attending classes at the alternative education school, which is where his younger brother attends. The younger brother really looks up to Cheese. He wears the same kind of clothes, has the same goatee and now he's doing the same work to get a diploma. They're hoping to graduate together.

I asked Cheese what his brother's name is.


Cheeto.

What I Learned at Work This Week:

I learned from Mindy that you can now get glow-in-the dark ink in your tatoo. Who knew? At first I thought that's gotta be way all unhealthy. But then I decided its not as if you are getting the finest in soy-based, eco-friendly dyes in your average tatoo anyway. (Or are you?)

Mindy learned about this innovation in body decoration from the girl she met with right after lunch. The girl jumped out of the chair and dropped her drawers to show Mindy the smiley-face tatoo on her butt. (This happens more often than you would think. We're pretty quick at intercepting people before they can whip out the surgery scars, new tatoos or orafices emiting drippy stuff, but sometimes they are just too fast.)

Anyway, the glow-in-the-dark thing opens up a whole new realm of new tatoo possibilities - maybe something helpful? Along the lines of "Inset Tab A Into Slot B"?

People Are Funny. Really.

Remember the Only God Can Judge Me guy? Let's call him Roger. Roger's original guilty plea was rejected by the Judge. He tried to renig on his confession and de-implicate his co-defendant. They got all that sorted out and he was back in court on Monday to plead guilty again.

Following his guilty plea and his release from jail, he trudged down to our office for his initial intake. He arrived at 11:45 a.m. I tried to get some personal data from him, and ran into a bit of trouble. He is barely 20. His family are migrant workers and have all returned to the valley. They won't be back here until gin season. He had no idea where he would stay - homeless. No car, no phone, no money and no kinfolk.

Then he remembered a friend of his parents who still lives at the Campito (local migrant housing). He might be able to stay with the friend. I quickly read over the terms and conditions of probation with Roger. I felt pretty sure this would be my only chance to do so. I let him leave at 12:00 with strict instructions to return at 2:00 p.m. and to tell me where he would live.

Then the secretaries and I tried to make some wagers on whether or not he would return. It was pretty unsuccessful, as betting goes, since we all bet no.

Two o'clock, and no Roger. At about 2:30, Roger called the front office. He spoke to Sophie, one of our receptionists.

"Hey - this is Roger. Will you tell that lady that I'm going to stay at the Campito - apartment 2B."

"Didn't she tell you to be here at 2:00, Roger?"

"Well, yeah. But I don't have a ride. Tell her I will be here until December."

Sophie quickly convinced him that he needed to report prior to December. She hung up the phone and came to my office to tell me all about it. By the time she finished the story, Roger was in our waiting room. Even though he claimed he had no ride, he managed to make the three mile journey in less than ten minutes.

I went to the front to talk to Roger. I took the information on his new abode. As we spoke I noticed he was chomping wildly on a peppermint. Just as I was explaining how much time he would spend in prison if he didn't follow these rules, I caught a wiff of his breath.

Wheeeew!

"Roger! How many beers have you had?!"

"What?" Roger tried desperately to appear stunned. He managed to look stoned. "I don't know what you mean - I'm not drinking."

"You're lying Roger. Don't lie to me. How much did you drink?"

"Well, ok. I had two beers. But I just got out of jail, you know?"

"You're still lying Roger. How many?" We are nose to nose at that point. He tried to break eye-contact.

"...I had five. Maybe six. But, but, how did you know?" Roger was pretty well wasted.

Not being one to waste a chance for manipulation of a soddenly suspicious mind, I glared at him over my glasses. "Never, never, never believe that you have us fooled Roger. We. always. know." If I'd trusted myself to do it without cracking up, I'd have thrown in a bit of maniacal laughter just for effect.

I have to admit a modicum of grudging respect for Roj. If I had been released from custody with nothing but the clothes on my back, I certainly couldn't have scored a place to live and a ride into town, not to mention a few cold ones in under two hours.



I gotta tell ya this story too. I have a woman on my caseload - about my age. No teeth, almost bald but kind and cheery as can be. But, good grief, she is naive. After ten years of smoking crack with her no-good, abusive husband, she sobered up. She's been clean most of the last three years. He hasn't. A couple of months ago, he beat her up. Again. As usual.

This time, however, she had a job. And co-workers who convinced her he couldn't do that to her any more. She left him and went into the women's shelter. The last straw came when she discovered he'd been smoking crack all the time she thought he was clean. She never suspected that all the time he spent hanging out with his same old druggie friends was time spent doing drugs. I don't know what the hell she thought they were doing!

Today she told me a mutual friend came to visit her at her new digs at the pay-by-the-week motel. At this point, she told me she had to tell me something embarrassing. "Um, ok?" was my brilliant response. She then whispered that she and her husband hadn't done "what married people do" since January of 2005. I think I just blinked stupidly at her. Today, while talking to her friend, she learned a horrible truth. Her husband has been seeing another woman all this time.

She sat back and waited for me to fully grasp the magnitude of this bombshell.

"Well, uh, you knew something was wrong all along, right?" I said. "I mean, you knew he was up to something, even though you didn't know all the details, didn't you?" I stammered.

"Nope. I didn't have any idea. He always told me he just couldn't, you know, do it with me while I was on probation. And I always reminded him that I was gonna be on probation for three years." She paused and I clamped my mouth shut. "He told me he could wait."


Regardless of whatever else happens - political shenanigans, budget crises, and bureaucratic inanity, I love my job.

What's your Sonic name?

I have three guys on my caseload who all work at Sonic Drive-In. They love to unload all the Sonic gossip when they come to see me. I occasionally try to be somewhat sympathetic and use the fact that they hate working fast food as a motivator for them to get their GEDs.

Bleh - they ain't buying it.

The funniest thing about all this is the names of these guys. They are Trinny, Cheese and Slow Joe. Evidently to work at Sonic, you gotta have a special name. Cheese is the most frustrated with the Sonic politics and the most likely to keep me up to date on what's happening. He told me last week that they hired two new guys. Neither of the newbies is working out. I asked him who the new guys were. Cheese did not disappoint and deadpanned the names just like he was reading them off a baptismal certificate: "Old Man and White Joe."

I thought I was going to bust a gut from trying not to laugh. Of course, the moment he left I ran to all my co-workers and let them know the latest additions to the cast of characters at Sonic. We all had a good laugh.

Then we reminisced about the time we all chose our stripper names, in case we decided to make a career change. But that is another story. This time we pondered what our Sonic names would be. I want to be Chili Dog. We decided Mindy's name is gonna be Tots. TH would be Route 44. Rose is Frito Pie.

M2 came down the hallway then and we asked her what her Sonic name would be. She never broke stride and said:

"Do they have a drink called Bitch?"

What's in a name?

M2 was hired as a probation officer six months before me. I've written about her before. Which means she's been here, striking terror into the hearts of evil-doers for 13 and 1/2 years. She's crazy. And I don't mean crazy as in ha-ha-isn't-she-quaint-crazy. I mean eat-your-children-for-breakfast-crazy.

She's really proud of her Hispanic heritage, but doesn't take it too seriously. She and I went out to dinner together one Friday night at a new local restaurant. We were immediately seated and given a couple of menus. We sat there. And we sat there. And we made a pyramid out of the menus and some condiments. And we sat there. Finally she announced in a loud voice: "I don't know what the problem is. I look white!"

The waiter made it right over to our table after that.


She had to go to court this week for revocation hearings. One of her guys, who is also Hispanic, was in court because he'd screwed up his probation. He's much too busy to report, too hedonistic to spend money on fines and court costs, and too popular to be seen doing community service.

His attorney put him on the stand and he talked about how he'd wanted to make a success of the probation. He just couldn't get any help from his officer, Ms. Maldanado. She wouldn't cut him a break. He felt that he couldn't confide in Ms. Maldanado. In fact, several times when he had tried to call Ms. Maldanado to ask for her help, she wouldn't even return his calls. He knew he should have made more of an effort, but he hoped the Court would understand that Ms. Maldanado, rather helping, had been a hindrance to his efforts from the very beginning. He had tried. Ms. Maldanado had not. And that is why he was in trouble.

The Assistant District Attorney stood up and asked one question. "Mr. Garcia, would it surprise you to learn that your officer's name is MEJORADO, not Maldanado?"

He went to jail.

Tim the Tool Man

The best thing about my job is the people. They're insanely interesting. They become almost predictable in their unpredictability. There are little nooks and crannies in each of them that hold the knick knacks of their personality. I love to be able to peer into those places and experience bits and pieces of who they really are.

Tim is one of my people. He is 41. He looks to be about my age or younger. (I’m 35.) Tim has a problem with drinking. He is on probation for Felony DWI. He drinks for a lot of reasons, including loneliness.

Tim has four kids (with a couple of different women), but he is closest to his twin teenage sons. They are about 14 years old. They live in San Antonio, which is 455.64 miles from here. He calls them every single day. He tries his best to father by phone.

He has family here in town, too. I don’t know a lot about Tim’s family, but I know they have no use for Tim. He has brothers and sisters here. His parents live in an even smaller town 15 miles away. His parents never call, never acknowledge him. When he calls, they will talk about the weather and answer Tim’s questions, but never really engage him in conversation.

Everyone in Fake Cow County shops at Wal-Mart. It’s pretty much our only choice most of the time. Tim makes his pilgrimage every Saturday morning. He knows his parents usually shop then, as well as his siblings. He hangs around, hoping to see them and talk for a while. No matter what Tim does, it seems it is never good enough for his parents. He can never measure up. He can’t even get a peek at the yard stick to see how far he has to go.

Tim also has problems with women. He’s a good looking guy and he likes good looking women. For Tim, relationships are all sex, all of the time. We have discussed this. At length. Mindy was his officer previously and diligently tried to teach Tim that women use him and he them and nobody is happy. I’ve had the same conversations with him since I took over his case.

A couple of weeks ago we had another long discussion about why he should stay away from women until he gets his life together. He can’t attract a sane, stable and independent companion until he is sane, stable and independent himself. He understands that, but wants to make sure I understand that his main criteria is that the woman is good looking. I want to make sure he understands that all women will eventually end up looking like his grandma. Which is ok, because he’s going to end up all stooped and wrinkly and cantankerous like his grandpa. Especially if he keeps drinking.

I have tried. Mindy has tried. I’m sure his minister has tried. Tim understands that women make a sucker out of him every time. All it takes is a little bit of sex and Tim will do whatever they want and give them whatever they ask for. Until he has nothing left to give. Then they kick him and move on. And all that just for sex.

We’ve talked about cold showers. And other things. Sometimes Tim gets embarrassed. That’s usually about the time I’m pounding the desk raving about how “Its just sex, Tim, my God! Its just not all that important, man! You can even do it alone. Stay away from the women, Tim – they’re evil!”

And Tim tries. He really does. He’s been living alone for several months now. That’s a big change for him. Most of the time Tim learns which sexual position a woman prefers before he learns her last name. I’m not kidding. When he talks about his friends, he now anticipates my questions and says things like “She just gives me a ride to work and I give her gas money. I haven’t slept with her.”

He’s also working out. He wants to look good for the ladies. His blood pressure is a little high. He needs to work off some “energy”. Exercise is good for all of that.

And, believe it or not, Tim reads his Bible. Every day. A couple of weeks ago, Tim told me he reads various passages each day, but always tries to read something out of his favorite book - Palms.

Yes, Palms.

I did not laugh. I did not blink. I did not even grin. I told him I thought that was a good book too, and suggested he read the 27th chapter, since it related to what we were talking about. He told me which chapter was his favorite, and I’ve been kicking myself for days because I did not write it down and now I’ve forgotten.

But maybe I can ask him about it next time I see him. In between questions about his fatherhood and his … other problems.

M2's Drinking Problem

On the way back to work after lunch, Mindy made the compulsory turn into Sonic Drive-In for cokes. From the backseat, M2 said "I wonder if I can get a free coke today, too?"

"What are you talking about?" I asked. Mindy started laughing, so I knew I had missed something good.

The day before, Jennifer came to see M2. M2 has been working with her for months. Years, even. Jennifer is a victim of incest. Her father is in prison for raping her. As happens to so many throw away children, the only relief she could find was in drugs.

Jennifer grew up and got into trouble. Eventually she was sentenced to a SAFPF (drug prison). When she got out she was doing good. She finally understood that M2 was her advocate, her confidant and pretty much the only person in her life that thought she was a worthwhile human being.

She tried.

Life was ok for a while, but then pressures started to build. She was back in the same old neighborhood with the same old people. They treated her like an addict and told her that was all she could ever be. She started to believe them and began to act like an addict.

She relapsed.

M2 tried to get her back on track. It worked for a while. But yesterday, Jennifer showed up at the office with pupils the size of dinner plates. She admitted using $400 of crack the night before. M2 asked her how she got the $400 and Jennifer said the drug dealer gave her credit. M2 laughed.

Drug dealers are not known for such altruistic customer service.

M2 asked if she'd had to earn the credit on her back. Jennifer didn't really know - she couldn't remember. She had burns on most of her fingers - some of them severe - from the crack pipe. She admitted she was still so high she couldn't feel the pain. But she knew they would hurt like hell as soon as the high was gone.

M2 took her car keys. Jennifer was in no condition to drive. We are not allowed to transport defendants but Jennifer had not one to call for a ride. M2 took Mindy along as a witness/co-conspirator and they drove Jennifer home. Home, where hopefully she would stay until M2 could get an arrest warrant issued for her.

On the way back to the office, M2 whipped her car into Sonic. She careened into a drive-up space and jammed the speaker button.

"Welcome to Sonic! May I take your order?"

M2 leaned out of her car window and yelled at the disembodied voice, "I need a free Dr. Pepper!"

"Excuse me ma'am?"

"I've had a really terrible day - even though its only 11:00 in the morning - and I NEED A FREE DR. PEPPER!"

"Um...one moment ma'am."

By this time, Mindy was hunched down into the seat, hoping not to be recognized. All the Sonic employees crowded around the window of the building, trying to see the crazy lady. They were laughing wildly.

Obviously they'd never seen "Falling Down".

A new voice crackled out of the speaker - evidently belonging to the manager. "May I help you, ma'am?"

"Listen - I have had a terrible day. People keep telling me they are getting all their marijuana and cocaine for free, so I ought to at least be able to get a free Dr. Pepper!"

"Well, ma'am, we'd be happy to give you a free medium Dr. Pepper," the manager said brightly.

"Lady, you don't understand how bad my day has been! I gotta have at least have a LARGE Dr. Pepper!"

Mindy told me this story as we waited on our cokes at Sonic. I was laughing so hard I was crying. M2 sat in the back seat, ginning sort of evil-y.

I asked M2 if they gave her the large Dr. Pepper.

"Hell, yeah!" M2 said, then sighed. "But I paid 'em for it anyway."

Joe Sobers Up

Today M2 and Mindy were reminiscing about Joe. Joe had a good attorney and with a terrific bit of luck and managed to get probation for his third felony DWI. Most people go to prison for the second, much less the third. He started out on Mindy's caseload, but soon ended up with M2. He was not happy about that at all. Joe thought M2 had it in for him and was just looking for an excuse to send him to prison.

Within the first month, M2 had evidence that Joe had been drinking again. She confronted him but he refused to admit it. M2 called Mindy into the office and told her, in front of Joe, what she knew. Mindy sat down next to Joe and gave him a soulful look.

"Now Joe, we know you've been drinking - look at me Joe - so why don't you just come clean and fess up?"

Joe gave in and spilled his guts.

Since he admitted what was going on, M2 sent him to in-patient treatment rather than putting him back in jail. M2 had learned about his drinking from his current wife, who was fed up with the situation and Joe's excuses.

Joe got out of treatment on a Friday morning and came in to meet with M2. He requested a travel permit to go to with his mother to visit his sister in Dallas over the weekend. He neglected to mention that his sister was a bar tender. So, of course, if he wanted to spend time with her over the weekend, he was going to have to go to the bar.

Joe, in addition to being married to a woman who was fed up with his alcoholism, had an ex-wife. The ex hated Joe's guts because he was always years behind on child support payments.

On Saturday, in Dallas, Joe - the alcoholic - went to the bar to visit his sister. Guess who else picked that particular gin joint? On that particular evening? In Dallas? His ex-wife, of course.

It didn't take her long to rat Joe out to M2. M2 practically had a warrant waiting for him by the time he got back home. After he sat in jail for a few weeks, all the interested parties showed up for a court hearing. Judge KindlyOldMan heard the case.

Judge Kindly OldMan is retired now. He was an old school gentleman and an elder in the Church of Christ. He was also an excellent punster who never really had anything bad to say about anyone. He was a good man, but also notoriously soft-hearted and frustratingly willing to believe a sob story.

M2 testified that she wanted Joe to go to a SAFPF - a prison-based substance abuse treatment program. The defendant spends 9 months in a special prison doing intensive drug and alcohol treatment, followed by 3 months in a half-way house and a year of after-care treatment. Judge KindlyOldMan announced he would follow M2's recommendation. He asked the cursory question of whether the defendant had anything to say before judgment was pronounced. Joe had something to say.

Joe told the Judge he was tired of dealing with M2. He told the courtroom that he thought M2 was probably a lesbian and was certainly a woman who hated men. When he got out of treatment he wanted another officer!

The Judge turned five kinds of green and ran a hand over his face. When he finally was able to speak he told Joe they would address that problem once he got out of SAFPF, if need be.

So, Joe went away for a while. Much to everyone's surprise Joe really paid attention and worked the program in SAFPF. He came out a new man and did well on probation. He and his wife had a better relationship. They started going to church together. Joe continued to maintain his sobriety. They were both in their mid-40's with grown children. Their second grandchild was born. The two of them worked hard and started to enjoy the empty-nest lifestyle. Joe had always been a hard worker and his wife worked as well as being in the Army reserves, so they lived a comfortable, if not prosperous, life.

Things were going good when Joe's wife was called to active duty. She was sent to Fort Hood for three weeks of training prior to being shipped off to Kuwait. Joe came to see M2 sometime after his wife left. He told M2 that his wife had a weekend of leave time right before she was scheduled to leave the country. She couldn't come up here, he would have to travel down there if he was to see her. He explained that it was a 7 hour trip and he didn't think the time and expense was justified for no more than one weekend together. He wasn't going to go.

M2 threw a fit. She lectured him about his wife going off to war. She could likely be killed and how would Joe handle that? Did he really want to face that guilt? Didn't he want to spend time with her? How was his wife going to feel if he didn't come see her one last time before she shipped out? M2 told Joe that he was going to Fort Hood and she would except no excuses. She gave him a travel permit. Don't be cheap, she told him, go visit your wife! He dutifully went to visit his wife.

All went well.

Joe's wife got to Kuwait and was ok at first, but soon began to have problems. She didn't feel well. She was sick, but could still work. She worked hard. She worked out hard. She expected the problems to get better. They didn't, so she finally went to a doctor. After she explained her symptoms, the doctor immediately gave her a pregnancy test. She was five months pregnant.

Five months earlier, M2 had all but forced Joe to go visit his wife one last time before she went off to war.

M2 ought to be paying child support.

Joe's wife came back home and had a beautiful, healthy baby girl - a baby girl who is two years younger than their youngest grandchild. Joe finished his probation and continues to live a sober and productive life. Now he sees M2 every week at the grocery store instead of the probation office.

And M2's love-child is growing like a weed.

Bling Bringers and Buckle Bunnies

Ever spend the whole week thinking "Wow! I can blog that!" but never doing it? This week has been the culmination of a very stressful month. I have stress leaking out my ears and its making my nose run. But, today is Saturday and I am kicking back, ready to slap and cuss anyone who asks me to do anything. I just don't care. Not even a little. BWAAHAAAHAHAHA!

So There.

One thing that always ads to the stress level is teaching a class for drug offenders in the evening. It is only a 15 hour class, once a quarter, but it robs me of the evenings. I am a tyrant about my evenings. I like the extra money and I even enjoy the class - sometimes - but it makes for a tough couple of weeks.

So what am I doing about that? Going back to Austin next week for a week's worth of training so I can help teach a class for Felony DWI offenders. But drunks are always more fun than addicts, right?

Not always.

Last week I kicked a guy out of my drug class. He is on my caseload. His name is Joe. Joe is/was a drug dealer. A drug dealer of the volume business variety that makes the front page of the newspaper when the business plan fails.

And he is absolutely huge. I didn't realize how huge until I was staring at the underside of his chin, letting him know his presence was no longer required in our little class. When we took a break halfway through the class, he came back with glassy, bloodshot eyes. And the giggles. Joe does not normally giggle.

Yesterday I had an appointment with Joe. We started with the standard denials and assertions. Following that portion of the program, I asked Joe what he was doing with his free time.

He looked a little sheepish and said he was buying and selling cattle.

"You're doing what!?"
"Buying cattle. My uncle has 30 acres north of town and I keep them there where they free range until I am ready to sell them. I keep them long enough to make a profit - which doesn't take long because of the price per pound," Joe said and started to grin.

Joe went on to explain how he spends his Saturday mornings making the rounds of all the area small-town livestock auctions, doing his buying and selling. At this point I was laughing out loud.

Joe admitted the thing he enjoyed most about selling drugs was making deals - the thrill watching his money grow, based on his skill as a deal maker. He has recaptured a part of that thrill as a cattle broker. He's also branching out and has started studying agricultural stocks in the Wall Street Journal!

I was laughing so hard, I was almost crying. I asked Joe what they thought of him when he showed up at the livestock auction. He shifted in his chair, which caused the bling around his neck to slide across his chest and the huge chain sparkled in the fluorescent lighting. He fingered the hem of his Starter jersey which drew attention to his fancy wristwatch and audacious rings. He looked up at me from under the edge of his brimless cap.

"You know I'm the only one there who's not a cowboy, right?" he with a huge grin. "I don't really fit in, but I don't mind. And one of these days, I'm gonna get me one of those huge belt buckles!"

I could've hugged him.