Gremlins, Aliens & Wizards

I am still having some technical difficulties. My internet connection keeps dropping and having now carried out all the usual checks, rebooted the router and contacted the ISP I've come to the conclusion it is interference, but I haven't as yet been able to identify the Gremlins.

Anyway I have managed to read some blogs and there are two posts from Lucy Reed at Pink Tape which caught my attention. In the first one, Alien Landing, Lucy expressed some concern about going back to work after being on maternity leave and she said she had received an email from a lawyer friend who felt as though everyone around him was talking in Martian after returning to the courtroom after a prolonged absence.

Perhaps if every lawyer (and judge) had an extended break laypeople might benefit from a little more plain English. An example of gobbledygook I was recently asked to explain was the Scottish phrase a motion reclaiming the Lord Ordinary's Interlocutor (an appeal against a judge's decision to us muggins.)

The second of Lucy's posts, ORDERED: The parties shall live happily ever after or until further order (whichever is the sooner), whilst acknowledging problems with the family justice system in E&W suggests that people have unrealistic expectations of what can be achieved and the law cannot mend all the broken families it has to deal with. His Honour Judge Gandalf's order is well worth a read.