"Maybe He's Just Not That Into You. When the Prosecutor Doesn't Like You"

Ever have a prosecutor or court staff person who seemed to be rude and unreasonable to you? Well, here's an article that may contain some insight for some of you. I saw this so frequently at the courthouses when I practiced. So I strongly suggest you read Maybe He's Just Not That Into You. When the Prosecutor Doesn't Like You. Maybe after you can e-mail this to a lawyer who really needs to read it. (I'll note it wasn't my intention to link to the the Nutmeg Lawyer blog two weeks in a row, but this article addresses a huge issue for too many lawyers.)

Remove the Windows Startup Sound from Your Life

We hear it at many Continuing Legal Education programs. Someone who either arrived late or was visiting with colleagues, boots up their computer and the Windows Startup sound plays while the first speaker is talking. This is not too embarrassing unless it is really loud because you were up late the night before blasting out iTunes or some Internet radio station while finishing that brief. Here's a Law Practice Tip you can accomplish in less than a minute. Turn the Windows Startup sound off. (Even if you have a desktop machine, haven't you really heard it enough by now in your office?) Just go to Control Panel -Sound-Sounds. Then uncheck the Play Windows Startup sound box and click Apply.

Great Ideas for Fun Law Office Decorations

Clever cartoons personalized with the lawyer's or firm name make great office decorations or gifts for lawyers. http://www.yournameherecartoons.com/

Oklahoma City artist Greg Burns has a law office print. He will personalize the lawyer's name on the diploma on the wall and sign the print. http://www.gregburns-fineart.com/print.asp?id=48#mark

Google May Have Quite a Loud Google Voice

There is a lot of buzz about the latest Google offering, Google Voice. I was pretty excited when I heard that it was going to offer free transcription of voicemail into text. How many times are you in a situation where you can't take a call or listen to a voice mail, but you could surreptitiously look at a text message or e-mail on the phone? Maybe you could even text instructions to your staff like "Call Mr. Smith. Calm him down. Tell him I am in depo and get # where he will be at 6 pm for me to call."

But then I read David Pogue's New York Times column, One Number to Ring Them All.  I hadn't subscribed to GrandCentral before Google bought it and closed it off for new sign-ups. Pogue gives us the history of GrandCentral and weaves it together with the features of the new GoogleVoice to make the case that this could be the new phone service "killer app." Not only is there voicemail to text, but it includes free conference calls, cheap international calls and organization and retention of text messages. (More places for lawyers to look for Electronically Stored Information [ESI].) I know there are some tense and serious meetings this week at other companies that are offering service in this space. I also know some privacy advocates won't be happy with this development. But, for me, I'm just waiting for the folks at Google to do final beta tweaking with the Grand Central users and open Google Voice up to the rest of us.

Tech Toys for the Holidays 2008

The now-Annual Tech Toys for the Holidays edition of the Digital Edge podcast is now available. Sharon Nelson and I had a lot of fun with this one and there are a lot of very interesting products covered. Even if you don't have time to listen to the entire podcast, we have included a list of products with links to most of them in our "show notes" section of the podcast. But you should listen to get the full effect.

As many of you know, this podcast is now hosted at the Law Practice Today ezine. There is a new product review section in the ezine and two of the products I mentioned in the podcast are reviewed there. I have to confess to being infatuated with both of these products, even though I don't own either yet. Oklahoma City lawyer Mary Beth Guard reviews the Pulse Smartpen (and Dot Paper) by Livescribe and the Eye-Fi SD card. Mary Beth is a first time contributor to Law Practice Today. I'll bet you enjoy her reviews as much as I did. We hope to have her do this again in the future.

I also direct your attention to the GPSolo 2008 Shopping Guide to Holiday Techno-Gifts by Jeffrey Allen and Alan Pearlman. This is a long article covering many (and I do mean many) products from computers to smart phones to telephone accessories to MP3 players to hand held recorders.The print magazine version is prettier with pictures of the products, but the online version has live links.

Finally, from National Public Radio's Day to Day, Brian Westbrook has his Top Five Gadget Gifts. You can listen or read the brief summaries.

Reid Trautz's 2008 Holiday Gift Guide for Lawyers

My friend, Reid Trautz, has published his 2008 Holiday Gift Guide for Lawyers. Lots of fun and interesting items are included there. This is a good opportunity for the lawyer to drop electronic hints to family members. A November e-mail with "Oh, I was just surfing the Internet and found this cool gadget. Here's the link. Isn't that interesting?" doesn't even really sound like a hint, does it? In mid-December, Sharon Nelson and I will let you hear our "Tech Toys for the Holidays" Digital Edge podcast. There will not be much overlap with Reid's holiday list.

2008 Summer Reading List: Solo by Choice

We are definitely into the 2008 summer reading season now and so I am going to feature some great summer reading materials over the next few weeks--all in the law practice arena.

I can almost hear some of you chuckling now. Reading about law practice ideas in your summer recreation time probably sounds very unappealing. I'd agree for the most part, but for the solo or small firm lawyer or the lawyer who is seriously contemplating a move in that direction, I will suggest one book that you might consider dropping in the beach bag (next to the trashy novel or thriller, of course!) The book is Solo by Choice by Carolyn Elefant and it may contain more great advice, inspiration and common sense per page than any other book a small firm lawyer can locate. At three hundred pages, you will find that you actually can read it from beginning to end. The $45 price is affordable to even the most cash-strapped beginning lawyer.

In fact, I have to confess that I've been negligent in not mentioning this book, which came out near the first of the year, before now. Many of you should know Carolyn Elefant from her ground-breaking blog, My Shingle, with its numerous resources for small firm lawyers. If you have looked at Carolyn's blog output, you know that she could easily pen a 300, 500 or 1000 page book entirely on her own. But Carolyn made the decision to include many other voices and opinions in the book, from familiar experts to practicing lawyers from across the country. This makes Solo by Choice a very rich and easy-to-read information source indeed.

I could say more. But in the months that this book has been available, it has received detailed reviews from Inspired Solo Sheryl Sisk Schelin,  Scott Greenfield of Simple Justice and, quite recently, from Al Nye the Lawyer Guy. The reviews are all raves. If you are considering a jump to solo practice, buy this book. If you are a solo or small firm lawyer and could use ideas, inspiration or affirmation, buy this book. If you are very thrifty, then buy this book from Amazon instead of the official site linked above. Just buy it. Congratulations, Carolyn. We appreciate the hard work that led to Solo by Choice.

Summertime: Does it bring thoughts of Work/Life Balance?

Well, you should be thinking of Work/Life Balance regularly and not just when the summer weather reminds us of a time when school was out and your schedule was open for a few months. The May, 2008 Oklahoma Bar Journal was devoted to a Work/Life Balance theme.

My contribution to the issue was Technology & Stress: Good Tools or Bad Tools, which was an update of a piece I did several years back. But if you've never before read Calloway's Rules of Technology and Stress, you've missed an important part of your legal education.   J

This is one issue of the Oklahoma Bar Journal that should resonate with most lawyers and provide some food for thought where ever you may live or practice. It begins with Work/Life Balance Initiatives in the Legal Profession by Melanie Jester, chair of the OBA’s Work/Life Balance Committee. Melanie is a very nice person and has been an advocate of this issue for some time. Next we have Behind the Slash By Sarah Glick. The slash is a reference to Marci Alboher’s book One Person/Multiple Careers: A New Model for Work/Life Success (Warner Business: 2007).

Caroline Larsen contributes Sentenced to Life, an article about health and nutrition. Lots of links to healthy information here, even if it did make me crave a Snickers bar. The article What We Have Here is a Failure to Communicate: Cross-Cultural Communication 101 for Lawyers By Teresa Rendon and Michael Duggan contained my favorite question of the month, "If Men Are from Mars and Women Are from Venus, What Planet Are Lawyers from?"

Stress isn't just a health issue as illustrated by Mistakes We Make under Pressure By Dr. Wenona R. Barnes.

The issue includes a substantive treatment of a legal topic with Family Responsibility Discrimination: Recognizing Unlawful Discrimination against Family Caregivers by Leah Avey and Tim Eisel.

Finally we have a set of Work/Life Balance Internet Resources. Congratulations to the OBA Journal editors and staff and the OBA’s Work/Life Balance Committee for a nice collaborative effort.

A Family-Friendly Calendaring Idea

Here's an idea our family is trying this summer. Hopefully it will help us with scheduling and hopefully we will continue after the summer. We are setting up Google Calendars and sharing them so that you view all in one combined view. There are many other options for online calendars, like CalendarHub or 30 Boxes. But we all have GMail accounts, so the choice was easy. It's not like this is a new idea. But we think the time has come to have one place we can check online for the family plans, trips, sports camps, times Dad will be staying out of town for work and Norman, OK events we want to attend.

The setup was simple (as are most things Google) so we will see how it goes. I also think it gives my 6th grade son a little training in a life skill. No matter what career he has, I can't imagine that it won't involve keeping a calendar on a computer, a hand device or perhaps a holographic display. And, of course, it is my favorite price - free.

The ironic thing is that earlier this week I was promoting Erik Mazzone's Law Practice Matters blog and when I visited his blog I noticed that his latest post was this one saying that you must only have one calendar. Well, I'm not saying he is wrong. Maybe this is just the exception to the rule. There will certainly be some duplicate entry required with a few family matters that have to go on the office calendar because they impact it. But I like the idea of keeping business things on the "work" calendar and when I get contacted with some personal invitation I can have the family calendar available in seconds. It beats the present system, which is bothering my spouse with an inquiry.

"16 Things I Wish They Had Taught Me in School"

OK, this one isn't about lawyering or technology. It is about all of life. One of the really great things about the Interactive Web is how other online users can direct your attention to wisdom in places that you would normally have missed. "16 Things I Wish They Had Taught Me in School" is a brief essay full of great observations on life. In fact I predict that you will want to forward the link to someone you know.