A little over a year ago, I published “Free Advice: You Get What You Pay For” on this blog.  It’s a nifty list of answers to questions I often receive in my practice as a family law attorney.  As luck would have it, the past year has brought me yet more revelations and I would feel amiss if I did not share with you this year’s new found pearls of wisdom.  These are not about any case in particular, of course.

1. The more motions you file, the more letters you demand be written, the more you involve your attorney, the more you will spend on attorneys’ fees.
2. The more you spend on attorneys’ fees, the less money you will have (and, consequently, the more money your attorney will have, so be sure you like your attorney a whole, awful lot).
3. If you have some IRS skeletons hanging around in your closet, you ought to tread carefully.  The IRS will be very interested to hear about how you financed your divorce and your lifestyle on the measly income you reported on those tiny works of fiction you call tax returns.  And the ramifications for tax evasion can be criminal. (Make sure you save for some soap on a rope!)
4. No judge anywhere will require one spouse to insure the other against market forces such as the stock market decline or the real estate market collapse, absent a showing of negligence.
5. If you lie, be prepared to get caught.  If you then lie to try to cover your original lie, be prepared to look stupid as well as deceitful.  And if you try to lie again, be prepared to have lost all credibility.
6. If your case costs a fortune because you are an unreasonable ass, pay your attorneys when they withdraw.  Going to hearing on a fee petition where they testify before your judge about your unreasonableness just confirms to all involved that you are stupid, deceitful and not credible.
7. Make mountains out of all the molehills you can finance, but don’t complain about the cost of litigation that you caused.
8. Once you have spent more money on attorneys’ fees than your judge has recommended that you receive in a total settlement, you should go back to school and take a remedial math course.  There is no cure for stupidity, unfortunately.
9. Don’t disobey court orders.  It pisses the judge off, and it reminds all involved that you lack credibility.
10. Never make criminal threats to your spouse’s attorney about your spouse.  That just buries the needle on the stupid-o-meter.
11. Yes, your spouse will be aware if you notice motions for presentation on her birthday.  However, she is probably one of those spoiled princesses who is not planning to work that day anyway, so it does not affect her, and you still have to pay your attorney to be there.  She might even feel somewhat touched that in spite of the divorce, you are still spending money on her on her birthday.  😉