Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals

It's no big surprise that Friday is my favorite work day, something that I'm sure I have in common with many legal professionals.  Even though I work as a legal assistant, the tasks typically aligned with the term "Gal Friday" describe many of my own personality traits (efficient, organized, and faithful) and the variety of assignments that I am expected to complete on any given day at a moments notice.  Now, by today's standards, this reference may tend to be condescending or sexist, but it seems to me that most of my Fridays are quite interesting for one reason or another, and more often than not, it is because my bosses want to meet a filing deadline before the weekend begins.  Hence, the title of my blog: Legal Gal's Friday.  So let's begin with one of my more interesting Fridays...

Just last week on June 3, 2011, I had the pleasure of attending the NALS Region 8 Conference in Rohnert Park, California.  The group of attendees boarded a luxury bus with a very personable bus driver and we began our trek to San Francisco to tour the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. This courthouse is distinctive and rivals many of the famous buildings in our nation's capitol and it has an extremely interesting history relating to the preservation and restoration after the courthouse was damaged in the San Francisco earthquake in 1906.  The picture above was taken with my iPhone by a visiting law student, who was also on the tour with the NALS attendees, in one of the most impressive courtrooms at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.  It was also our distinct privilege to have an audience (or you might say "special session") with Judge Michael Daly Hawkins discussing the Ninth Circuit's history and answering our questions concerning procedural tips we could with our attorneys (hopefully to win their arguments). Judge Hawkins was so personable and he took the time to shake hands with all of us.  This may sound corny to some people, but after working in the legal field for 30 years, this was a highlight for me and my career.  And, by the way, did you know that the library in the courthouse has several bobblehead dolls of several U.S. Supreme Court justices (my favorite is Sandra Day O'Connor).

I want to send special thanks to Kathy Sieckman, PP, PLS, CLA, the NALS Region 8 Director, for Thinking Big and planning all the details of this wonderful adventure.  It's a Friday this Legal Gal will never forget!