Balls achingly boring

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.

Tis very quiet round here. I just overheard one of the few non-Maldive bound barristers (many of whom have been quite panicky about the Heathrow fog situation) commenting that the clerks could have waited until the day was done, at least. They have in fact done the sensible thing and cleared out at about 1pm, leaving the barristers helpless and unable to locate basic necessities like photocopier paper or treasury tags. The poor dears are wandering round in a bit of a daze.

Crispin is almost inevitably still here, playing Patience and waiting for some ex-chambers deputy district judge to drop by for a drink.

The title phrase of this post is The Master's, not mine. As yet another warning of the horrors that await potential pupils out there, he had me counting the number of pages in a bundle yesterday. In graduated fee family law cases, the fee depends on the size of the bundle. If it exceeds 176 pages (why on earth 176?), the fee is higher, and if it exceeds 350 pages it is yet higher still.

Today has been much more interesting, however. I've been sifting through the fairly extensive papers for an eight day trial in the New Year picking out various problems, issues and cross examination ideas. Lots of unpleasant allegations of sexual abuse by quite a young child. But I'm done now, and won't be back for two weeks.

Thankfully.

Merry Christmas and all that.