Big Day Bias

The final day of the Phase II trial is the last opportunity for settlement before the next phase begins. The Phase III trial will involve witness, experts, court reporters, swearing in (finally no lies, at least in theory).

There is tremendous pressure to settle to avoid the formal trial. In the case of my judge, that involves as much as 16 hours of non-stop pressure. But it doesn't start on a clean slate, with the equal balance of justice. It starts where we left off, advantage plaintiff (I'm the defendant), all lies intact, gender bias on full (who needs dad anyway?), etc.

So how does it work, give & take, fairest, best justified position wins? Are you kidding, why start now. It is simply an endurance test, who can hold out longer, who can lie convincingly, who cracks first and calls this for what it is - BullS--t.

Hmm, well all things being equal. What the hell am I saying? Equal? As defendant, underdog, and unneeded gender, I've been going through hell for 2 years. It's all I can do to arrive at court without a suitcase of C4. A top Hollywood acting skill would be insufficient to maintain calm. Maybe I can get an Rx to zone me out, so I don't tell anybody what I think of their piece of shit system, but I still need a sharp mind to make decisions on the settlement terms.

It's gonna be one long shitty day, that's for sure. I can only hope that I can keep it together and come out OK. I say OK, because I've already had to concede to supervised visitation for 3 months and the "shared" parenting plan is slanted as far in her direction as possible. But it was either that or go for a full Phase III trial and start from the beginning.

I'll give you a quick update on how it went next Tue 12/19/06 as soon as I can.

Status: Draft - Last update 1/8 4 am