Gotta Love Lawyers (And Natural Selection yay)

I gathered all of my documents in the night,
Going through the list the lawyer supplied,
Collecting, categorising, stapling loose papers, printing—
Just short by 8 sheets…sheets which were wasted in the initial HP Smart app issue…
On a ream which lasted me four and a half years;

Anyway, waited till dawn and got more paper, stapled the last sheets and fell asleep;

Of course after setting my foolproof ‘Dynamite’ alarm I forgot to ‘activate’ it,
And of course as with all such times this happens I neither missed my appointment nor woke up with enough time;
I woke up at 15:45 with 15 mins to spare— just enough to be helplessly aware of impending doom but powerless to change it;

After all of the preparation, blog posts about it, back-and-forth emails…to miss it was gut-wrenching;
I spent the first 5 mins thinking there’s no point because I don’t want to hurt my knees by rushing, even if it may just be physically possible to get dressed and ride the scooter there at full speed…

Five minutes later I was riding full-speed to the appointment;
I went into hyperfocused mode, finding the shortest routes and the racing line…
Taking liberties over bumps covered in autumn leaves,
Going flat out through corners which shouldn’t be flat;

It is not fear that grips him, only restlessness. A heightened sense of things. The seaborn breeze, coolly kissing the sweat at his chest and neck. Gulls cawing, complaining, even as they feast on the thousands of floating dead. The steady breathing of the 300 at his back, ready to die for him without a moment’s pause…

I arrived at 16:06 (But fuck if I hadn’t dithered for that initial 5 mins…I’d have been on time; Yeah familiar story you idiot! Nevermind);

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The solicitor was great, friendly and informal enough and with the type of logical thinking you’d expect from a physicist or mathematician—
Mentally nesting discussion points within larger points,
Before recursing unfailingly back to the top of the stack and proceeding to the next top-level topic;
It’s the way my own mind breaks down problem-solving and it’s so refreshing to be able to have that kind of discussion on an equal footing;
I heard that physicists make good lawyers and this discussion piqued my interest even more;
Still, I can’t be working in an office and my skin was on fire when I got home from contact with long sleeves…

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The discussion boiled down to 2 possibilities for next steps:

1. Wait for court to get back with hearing date (if I’m granted one) and solicitor will help me to defend it.
2. If no hearing is granted, wait for the possession order then speak to the solicitor as we’ll still be able to make a counter-claim. But keep him updated :).

The basis on which he is defending me is a technicality (which the first solicitor I briefly saw made me aware of and which I stated in my defence form) which makes the entire eviction claim defective— some of the documentation provided at the start of the tenancy was out of date (‘How To Rent’ booklet).

This solicitor in fact recently successfully defended a client on exactly the same point! In both cases since they were no-fault possession claims it is the only basis on which you can defend them.

I’ve now phoned the court again for another update and miraculously my case is still with the judge! And it’s already been almost a month since I filed my defence! So at the very least I’ve done myself a great service here with that one form by delaying the worst case scenario a good chunk of time…

If we are successful in defending my case it would mean the landlord has to begin all over again and issue a new eviction notice with 4 months’ notice 😂😂😂. Overall I would gain the same approximately 5 months looool. Crucial time for Launchpad to house me, which he agreed is the crucial course of action to take…(he works with Launchpad too and is all-too-familiar with the predicament which single people with no kids like me find themselves in with being housed…😩); One would think that a child is a passport to life.

I can’t begin to think how satisfying this would be if we are successful. This would be more satisfying than defending a fault-based claim where the landlord was formally accusing me of things I hadn’t done (and the solicitor was in concurrence on the real motivations behind it). To get them on a technicality which was baked in when the tenancy began, all because they gave me a government-issued document which was one version and one month too old (it is now two versions too old as they didn’t issue an updated one when the tenancy auto-renewed!) 😂😂😂.

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Who’s one version short of an up-to-date ‘How To Rent’ booklet…?
Who’s one legal justification short of a successful possession claim…?
Who’s an evolutionary branching late and a braincell short of the genetic heritage of an amoeba…?
You are the weakest link,
Fuck you.

Gotta love lawyers.

🌪