Interoffice Memo
To: BPRL
Re: Things paralegals are definitely not supposed to do

Please be advised that paralegals at The Firm will not:

*listen to extremely obscene rap music in their offices without benefit of headphones
*sing along with said rap songs, especially the parts about slapping hos and making money
*wear tie-dye skirts and shirts with racing stripes that don't cover tattoos to the office
*yell "Oh, fuck it," and stomp out to have a cigarette
*keep deer bones on their desks
*check their personal voice mail every fifteen minutes
*give computers belonging to their employers the finger

Any behavior such as this is to cease immediately. This means you.

Thank you,
BPRL

If you can guess how many of those things I've done in the last hour, you get a cookie. (Actually, I think the only thing in the office is a stale biscotti. But you're welcome to that.)

Behavior like this is why I am, and will probably remain Barely ParaLegal. I can fake it relatively well, but that doesn't mean that I have the professional temperament that keeps me from calling bullshit "bullshit", keeps me from openly swearing out people and machinery that inspire my ire, keeps me from wanting to rock out to whatever the hell I feel like when I'm drafting documents. Probably the only reason I get away with it is that I'll probably inherit this place someday. Well, that, and the fact that it's Saturday and the office is deserted. I don't try to get away with that shit during banker's hours, except giving the finger. I do that a lot.

My finals for my first semester of Paralegal Studies are next week, and since most of them are take-home, I'm chained to my computer, writing a lot of nonsense tangentially related to probate and appellate procedure while cursing, smoking, cursing, cursing along with Ludacris, cursing over IM to my friend the Kemetic Wonder, deleting curse words from the text of my take-home finals, and occasionally looking at questions like "Define incidents of ownership and identify their effect on a decedent's taxable estate" and yelling "Are you fucking kidding me? Do I look like a fucking tax attorney? Do I even look like I'm fucking a tax attorney?" while fumbling for my coat and preparing to Brenda-stomp out the front door and into the arms of my sweet, sweet cigarette. This is not to say I don't like my job, or my schooling. But a soundproofed office I could smoke in would not come amiss.

If any of the attorneys walk in to do some Saturday-night research, I'm fucked. That, or I'll find out that these besuited Republicans actually like to bump to some Luda when no one's looking. I don't know which would be more disturbing.