Through the World Barefooted -- Gerda's LBS Guide

[Rita]

Well, I had another awful court date today. There was the tiniest amount of progress because they agreed to appraise the house. He was supposed to pay for the appraisal but said he had no money because of me (I said to his L, "Does your client have a job?" and H started spewing...) so I had to agree to split it with him. But the judge basically said she could not enforce the stip (court order) about the house because it was too vague and poorly written. In January, I filed a motion saying that the stip was too vague and thus unenforceable and she screamed at me and refused to hear the motion so I withdrew it and buckled down for the marketing period, which was a nightmare and was supposed to end in June. Now she is saying it's not enforceable, after making me abide by it all this time!!!

June 1 he had to have the house appraised and I had the right to buy him out but it has no timeline for that. So I have been making offers to give him a downpayment now and the rest as soon as our rents return for 6 months so I can refi. And the judge is trying to say that that's too long, even though our entire city shut down and is still quite shut down, no tourists, etc. But none of that is in the stip, and so I am trying to figure out when/if to appeal or if I should just start saying, "I can't agree to that, sorry," and push everything to trial.

We were referred to trial in January but she is basically refusing to let us go. She keeps calling us back for more conferences. My H's L just keeps filing motions and billing and no end in sight, totally dissipating our asset and refusing to pay debts and trying to get me to pay his bill though I have no lawyer!!!!

This is not a vent session but a call to the troops. I do not understand my rights as far as saying no to all this and forcing a trial. I do not want a trial but this is just a never-ending nightmare and we should admit we didn't resolve and must to trial over everything. I also got a very inequitable distribution and only agreed to it because there was an end point and the chance for me to pay him his share over a couple years (at least in my mind, since it wasn't specified in the order). If we are just ignoring the order and making a new arrangement, I feel like I should appeal and try to get this before another judge, or insist on no further conferences and prepare for trial.

Does anyone 'round here know about that? E.g., am I allowed to say that if we don't stick to the order that resolved the property then everything is off the table, nothing is resolved, and it's time for trial?

I was so horrified to have H's face staring out at me on the teleconference that I had to tape a piece of paper over his little square of the meeting. All that I had near me was a paper doll shirt my D made when I forced her to do creative time yesterday instead of the usual TV/phone that dominates Covid life. So that paper doll shirt was what I taped over H's face. That gave me a little laugh amidst all the screaming. He looks so weird and is so angry. He spewed a few times during the conference. The problem is the judge does not know about MLC so I have to constantly produce proof that he is lying and she is also the laziest judge ever, so she openly admitted today that she hadn't really read our papers because she thought it was a settlement conference. I worked so hard on those papers, disproving every single thing he said, even looking up the case law his laywer has used and ripping it to shreds. (He had basically pulled a clip off the internet that was totally irrelevant, which gave me a laugh.) This time I got a court reporter so it's all on the record in case I appeal.