The Fame

Ah the fame. It came quickly and constantly. I was showered with neverending praise and gifts. But I did not let it go to my head. I always remembered my roots, where I came from, and of course you, my (thousands of) followers. I was not going to be a flash in the pan like some other bloggers I could name. I tried to personally respond to as many of your letters as possible, though in all honesty my maid, Consuela, ended up writing most of them (which I imagine would account for the taco sauce over some of the responses.) Naturally a movie and book deal came along almost immediately.

But as the great Franklin Delano Roosevelt said to me once, "A web blog about process serving can only last as long as you're employed as a process server." And sadly, the paraplegic is right. I recently had to quit being a process server, a story that I shan't bore you with seeing how it has already made the rounds on all the gossip blogs (curse you Perez Hilton!)

And I am telling you, I'm not going. There will be more blogs, even though this one's course has run. Please, please, stop your collective sobs. Think of this glorious blog as a shining moment in the world wide web. Think of it not as a blog, but as an epic novella (that's right, an epic short novella) the likes of Breakfast at Tiffany's or The Metamorphoses or Anthem (wait... don't ever think of Anthem.) Yes, think of it as an example of genre and medium bending haute literature.

Yes. Think of that.

If you're mean to me I'll blog about it.

Why on earth would you be rude to someone who has access to your address and a great deal of personal information about you?

This morning I got up and went out serving. But today I thought I'd do something different, today  I let the defendants sleep in.

Normally I get up around 5:30 so I can be at there houses by 6:30 (30 minutes prep time with 30 minutes delivery, I'm like a crappy pizza place.) But today for their sake (and for my own) I decided to give 'em an extra hour where they still live in a world that they haven't been served papers in.

And then I met Mr. Alta Loma. 

First things first you must understand that according to Florida law (I mostly serve interstate documents from Florida) I need the full name of the person I serve. If I don't get the name it doesn't count as a serve. (If they're California documents anything goes, ANYTHING. I throw the documents at your feet and I can say I served John\Jane Doe as I speed away and count my money.)

I get to Mr. Alta Loma's house at 7:35 AM. A decent time I think. Most normal people are up by this time and are getting ready to leave. Is it the best time to deal with being served papers? No, but it's a far cry better than being woken up by a zatfig process server in a Harvard shirt at the crack of dawn.

Mr. Alta Loma claims that the person I've come to serve has left for work already. Mr. Alta Loma is obviously the person I've come to serve. He won't give me his name. All right, I can deal with that, some people are paranoid, it's annoying, but vaguely understandable (for future reference, if a process server asks you for your name, just give it, I'm going to forget it the moment I shoot off the daily e-mail to my fabulous boss.) Vaguely understandable, but Mr. Alta Loma is OBVIOUSLY the person I've come to serve. I ask what time would be better to come by so that I may serve the defendant. Mr. Alta Loma won't give it. This is what they refer to in vulgar parlance as bull crap. MR. ALTA LOMA IS OBVIOUSLY THE PERSON I'VE COME TO SERVE. He's standing two inches in front of me. I could throw the documents at his feet and say that I served the defendant (who is obviously Mr. Alta Loma) but I'm too good of a person for that.

I choke back venom and I'm pissed because I've let Satan's bride (that would be Mr. Alta Loma) see me lose my cool. I plunge into the very depths of my being and pull out a weak, "Thank You." and I die a little inside.

Canyon Lake 2: Electric Boogaloo

I hate to keep harping on Lois but I really have a lot to thank her for. If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't have gotten my documents delivered today.

I drove out to That-Which-Should-Be-Cast-Out-Of-California (also known in obscure circles as Hemet) and after driving around for like thirty minutes, trying to find my target, I realized that the servees lived in those remnants of Stalin's Russia, the gated community. And not just any gated community, a Canyon Lake style gated community that puts medium security federal prisons to shame.

But this time I was cunning as a fox, quick as a cheetah, and as dexterous as a gigantic squid. When the charmingly eastern European security guard wouldn't let me in, I asked for his name, had him spell it out for me, and I drove away and parked. I filled out the form so that I could serve it to him and drove back. I gave him the "If you won't let me in I'm going to have to serve you" spiel, and he raised up his hands and said, "I'm not taking them!" I then proceeded to throw the documents at his feet, as if I were some rich dandy and he were some lowly Ukranian prostitute whom I had just savagely beaten and the documents were the cold comfort of cash.

But if I hadn't had my little kerfuffle with Lois then I wouldn't know what to do when the long arm of justice was stopped by power hungry rent-a-cops. And for that, I thank her.

I'm hoping to do a big post tomorrow about the events of Friday, in which I got up at 5:30 and drove around San Bernardino county, serving that process.

I'll need to clean away these tumbleweeds...

Sorry for that long intermission. The legal system in California literally stopped. No justice was served for an entire two weeks. There was mass chaos and in all the commotion I think we seceded from the Union three times.

But order is back and I have documents to deliver which will hopefully turn into eventful blog posts! I have some documents for my second favorite place on earth, Hemet! Yes, you know the place. But those will have to wait for Saturday. Tomorrow I'm getting up before Dawn shines her glorious face on the Earth to deliver some documents to Ontario and Chino Hills. Craziness? One can only hope.

Slow week.

Not much serving done this week, finals have kidnapped my life (is it depressing that I just referred to my work as my life?)

I hope to write a marvelous piece about the prison experience tomorrow. 

Prison

I drove out to the middle of the desert today to deliver some documents, and let me tell you, it was easier to get into a Medium Security Federal Prison to deliver documents than it was to get into Canyon Lake.

Canyon Lake Redux

Sadly, in this sequel, Lois does not make an appearance. Nor did I leave a snarky comment or better yet the previous installment with the security guard at the gate. I was afraid to see how Stalinist the chaste, pure community of Canyon Lakes could be.

Upon meeting my servee I was struck at how normal and yet strange she seemed. She didn't seem to be aware of the crazy amount of security that surrounded her community. She had forgotten to call me in, somehow being under the delusion that I could either A) stroll right in to her oppressive mini-state or B) leave them with a guard (a ploy that had worked so well the last time.) Even stranger was that she was under the impression that I knew these rules, as if we all lived in Canyon Lake-like areas.

When I drove up the first thing I noticed was that there was this little three year-old boy playing out in the driveway, right near the street. 

This struck me as strange firstly because my neurotic suburbanite meter is set a few clicks above the normal suburbanite. If I see someone walking out late at night they must be up to dastardly deeds, it's not because they like the night air or that they're a night owl or that they're a creative writing major trying to organize their thoughts for their novel. No, it's because they've just committed murder. 

Secondly, I thought it was strange because his mother wasn't watching him. Or at least, she can't have been very carefully. I understand that there has to be a point where the umbilical cord needs to be cut, but this boy was the very definition of toddler and he was on the divide between his driveway and the street. I'm a reasonably careful driver, but if I were any worse or if I had just been texted and stupidly answered the phone and that boy had fallen.... 

Thirdly, I thought it was strange because the second I got out of the car the boy looked up at me with the strangest face. It was a mixture or fear and curiosity. Like he had never seen anyone get out of their car in front of his house that wasn't his father. It was almost like there was a realization that there was a world outside of Canyon Lake.

The mother came down, she was very much the modern woman, the forty-ish work-at-home mom with a toddler. She was very gracious in accepting the documents, and I think had I been anyone else she may have invited me in. And again I got the impression that she had no idea what a strange community she was living in. 

Maybe that's what Canyon Lake is. It's Stepford. It's a place where the troubles of the world are checked at the gate with the Winkie guards. It's a place where you don't have to worry about letting your child play too close to the street because everyone drives a very attentive twenty-five miles per hour. 

But I do believe there's a price you pay for that. You lose your perspective on things and you become not unlike a character in Alice in Wonderland, completely separated from the world. I can't help but wonder what will happen now that the world has found them in the form of a pair of rather thick documents.

Crazies not crazy?

Not that exciting of a weekend. I called the people out in Canyon Lake and I was talking with the woman to be served and she seemed fairly... sane. Not at all like someone who would live in the oppressive Stepford that is Canyon Lake. Hmmm.... 

Oops.

I could not for the life of me find my wallet this morning and I was almost certain that it had fallen out in Lois's cave of despair.

Luckily, it was in the third place I looked.

Fear and Loathing in Canyon Lake

If the little town I grew up in is like a living replica of Eisenhower's America, then the community of Canyon Lake in the city of Sun City is like Mussolini's Italy.

I've recently come to the conclusion that not only was I a vital part of the application of the fifth amendment, but I was there to provide comfort, not in the way that I sit there and listen to sob stories, but with a nod of my head and a slight smile I give them hope that they can get through whatever bad news they've just received.

And then I met Lois. Lois is your standard overweight Rent-a-Cop. As a writer I feel it's my duty to not reduce people to stereotypes, one of the best ways to do this is to imagine how people start their days. So here it is:

I imagine Lois wakes up every morning and turns on her air conditioner, you see it gets pretty hot in the seventh circle of Hell where Lois lives. She breakfasts on a cereal of dreams deferred and children's tears, feeds her thirteen black cats, and then gets on her broom and flies to work.

I pulled into the fascist community of Canyon Lake after driving for an hour from my little Californian hamlet. I presented my id and was told that I had to present myself at the front office so I could be escorted in because Canyon Lake is a "private community" (a phrase I would grow to despise.)

This is where I met Lois. When I met Lois she must have been coming off of her drug high (Lois freebases the screams of the innocent you see) and she was in quite a mood. She turned her crazed eyes in my direction and said, "We're going to need to see your server ID if you want to serve." I of course don't have my served ID yet because I have not registered, but I am legally allowed to serve a small amount under my fabulous boss's number. 

Lois would hear none of it. Not even my protestations that I had driven an hour to get to this oppressive mini-state that Francisco Franco would disapprove of. I told Lois that I would have to call my boss. I went out to my parking spot outside the office and dialed the boss. Before I could complete my call another Rent-a-Cop came up and told me I wasn't allowed to be parked there and that I would have to move my car across the street, out of the "private community."

Once my dangerous self was moved to the front of a bank across the street of innocent, fragile Canyon Lake, I called my uncle, who recently graduated from Pepperdine Law School. The uncle set his fingers to find  some legal jargon I could yell at them. The jargon came in the form of the court case "Robert Bein vs. Brechtel-Jochim," which says that if a security guard refuses to let you into a gated community, you can serve the security guard.

Armed with this information, I returned to dearest Lois.  I walked up to the office with the documents in tow. I smiled (all of us who have grown up in suburbia know the power of passive aggression, and that sometimes, saying "You're right" annoys people way more than saying "You're wrong.") I informed Lois that if she would not let me into the naive, virginal community of Canyon Lake, I would have to serve her. Lois thought she could outfox me, she said I could serve her but that it wouldn't do any good. I said that would be all right, all I would need was her full name.

This is where we hit a snag. Lois didn't want to give me her name (you see, I wasn't aware of Lois's name up to this point.) And I informed her that she would face fines if she didn't. Lois informed me that she wouldn't and I informed her that indeed she would. 

Lois picked up the phone and dialed the sheriff. Yes, the sheriff. However, in the course of the call, Lois is required to give her name, and that is where I learned it. Lois, L-O-I-S, four glorious letters. And I just sit there smiling. "He's on his way." Lois says with a slight smirk, "Excellent." I reply with my suburban, good-natured, heavens-I-want-to-rip-your-throat-out smile.

The sheriff comes and I explain the situation. He informs me he can't make Lois give me her full name, I inform him that it was not I who called.

The supervisor comes in and I begin to really appreciate the chaos that I am causing. I begin to be treated as if I had came in and defecated all over Lois's desk, when I just wanted to make sure due process of law was carried out. I look at the supervisor and inform him that I can see I'm making no progress, and I will take my leave. (I actually said take my leave, the more pissed off I am the more formal I get because I know it pisses the other people off.)

I 411ed the couple I was supposed to serve and left a message informing them that I had "an altercation with the security of their community and that I would need them to set up a time for me to meet with them."

In the end, I was glad to see the end of the whole ordeal. I was happy to return to my hometown where I feel perfectly safe without security worthy of the Gaza Strip.

And down they went.

Now I'm way too early for class.

Corona people are going down.

Alarm clock is set for five AM. A wake up call has been requested from the resident early bird. Those Corona people won't know what hit'em (And heaven help me if they aren't there.)

Stakeout

I did my first stakeout today. I had always considered doing one, especially three weeks ago when I was stalking this asian guy (I ended up tracking him down at his work.)

I had finally gotten ahold of the people near my school, and even better I had just done a (pretty good) audition for this talent competition. So I was totally geared up to drive out to Corona and deliver four documents to a single household (it would make me feel better about the gas I had wasted on the drive out to Hemet yesterday.) 

Corona is one of those cities you find between hills in California, tight tracts of McMansions separated by long expanse of nothing. I found the place easily enough. It was crazy, almost like an island of suburbia, the only place nearby was this shopping center right next to it that was monopolized by Vons. 

I pulled up to the house and I could already feel the burning looks of the neighbors. Maybe it's just me but I swear that I get looks like, "What on Earth are you doing here." Maybe I should wash my car. I'm expecting to be on my way pretty quickly because there's a car in the driveway (granted the car has a cover on it but I figure they're the kind of people who are weirdly anal about stuff like that.) No one comes. I check my phone, it's 7:30, I figure I'll wait and see if anyone shows up. I write down my notes, move my car so that I'm not conspicuous, and I pull out my book.

By the time 8:15 rolls around I've given up. I drive to the Vons monopoly nearby and get a sandwich. I drive back to check one last time. It's 8:45 at night and these people are still not home. And don't give me the "they were hiding" line because no one in suburbia would hide for that long. If it was somewhere like South Gate I'd say you have a point but this was not hiding territory.

And so I drove back to Redlands, tail between my legs, faced with the prospect of having to drive out to Corona all over again. Luckily there was chocolate cake and raspberry jam waiting at home... so maybe the night wasn't a total waste.

Prince Albert Humps

I need to get a digital camera some things are just way too funny. I recently drove out to Chino Hills and there was this gigantic road sign that said, "Humps".

Now I know that it was to denote the succession of speed bumps along the road, but in the 21st century, humps no longer means a slight bump, oh no. And even better, the word humps has it's own theme song, which adds to the hilarity of the word. Is there any question why I had to pull to the side of the road and take a picture with my phone?

Just today, I saw something that eclipsed the humps though. My friend was with me in the car and we were trying to get those people out by UCR who aren't home at reasonable times at night (I'm going to have to start coming at unreasonable times of the night.) I made a turn to get to the house and there it was "Prince Albert Road." If you don't know what a Prince Albert is then Google it.... On second thought don't, you probably want to be able to sleep tonight. I pulled to the side of the road and took a picture with the phone that Beyonce told me to buy.

Until I figure out a way to upload these online, you'll just have to imagine the hilarity.

Who wakes up before seven anyway?

I was going to go try and get those people in Riverside before they left for work today. Didn't happen.

Serving Hemet

So as a few of you may know, I recently got a job serving legal documents. And I love it, don't get me wrong. I started out and I was on top of the world, "Hello my name is Adam, I have some legal documents for you." Professional smile, they claim to have no idea what the documents are about, more professional smiling, I hand over the documents, I get in my car, I'm that much closer to a trip to Europe.

But these last few days I've had a dry spell. Much akin to that episode of Sex and the City. You know the one I mean. 

I've been trying to get these people who live close to UCR. I've been by their house three times already (at varying times of the day\night) and they are never home. I ask you, what kind of people aren't at home at 6:30 on a Monday night? Drug lords that's who.

So I'm at these people's house and I look through my documents, trying to see if there's anyone else close by, and I see these documents I have to go deliver out in Hemet. It's about forty minutes away but I think to myself, "Well I'm out here already." How wrong I was.

I imagine that the person that settled Hemet thought to themselves, "Man, I'd really like to have a town out in the middle of nowhere, I mean WAY out in the middle of nowhere, just a couple of houses, a barn, a Valero gas station, you know, somewhere you could hide a corpse." And they got their wish.

I drive and drive and drive. Hemet is one of those California towns that would be better suited in some place like Arizona or New Mexico. It's like those towns on the outskirts of Los Angeles that only exist to house the Angelinos (well and to house the porn industry but that's a given.) 

I finally get to the guy's house and HE'S NOT THERE and no amount of ringing his doorbell or banging on his screen is going to change that. His neighbor across the street, upon questioning, reveals to me his place of work and I quickly take off to the location. My GPS told me it was 4 miles away but I could swear it was 40. Alas, HE'S NOT THERE. I turn around and drive the 40 miles back to his house just to check one more time. And lo and behold there is a light on in the house. My heart's a flutter, could it possibly be? Could I deliver these documents and get a small net gain when I accounted my gas in? I bang, I ring, and HE'S NOT THERE.

I get in my car, thinking horrible, illegal thoughts. Moral of the story? Hemet needs to be kicked out of the state (or at the very least the county.)