This is What a Professional I am

I just listened to a recording of my presentation. First, I hate the sound of my voice. (Not that I don't like hearing myself talk; that's different.) I think it went pretty well, except my partner sounds like he was on speed and I sound like I was on quaaludes. Pretty much the way I talk anyway, I guess. When you do one of these seminar speeches, they always add to the materials a little bio/resume on the presenters. (This is where I am referred to as "Esquire," which I find terribly silly. It reminds me of "Bill S. Preston, Esquire" from Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. By that I mean, I see myself more as a dumbass than any sort of real lawyer.) These bios are always super boring and full of "look-how-smart-and-successful-I-am" crap, and I truly didn't think anyone ever read them, so, smartass that I am, I just couldn't resist the opportunity to see if anyone would actually read mine. I tried doing a straight one first, but it amounted to like 2 short paragraphs and made me look like an idiot, so I took the real one and made it way better. And before I left D.C. on Saturday, at least 4 people said, "LOVED your bio!" Dang. I didn't want anyone to actually READ IT. For your entertainment, and in the interest of giving you even more embarrassing information about me, here it is:

Jill Mitchell earned a B.A. in English from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1988 where she ranked seventh in the Liberal Arts College and first in her major. She then spent a year at the University of Paris (La Sorbonne) where she earned a polite notice that she had failed miserably. She received her J.D. from St. Mary's University School of Law in San Antonio, Texas where she was able to write on to the Law Journal staff and go on to publish, with much fanfare, Reformers' Regress: The 1991 Texas Workers' Compensation Act, 22 St. Mary's L.J. 1111 (1991). She participated in internships with Bexar County Legal Aid and with the Judge Advocate General's Office at Lackland Air Force Base. In 1991, she passed the Texas bar exam on her first try, by one point.

She is a member of the Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims Bar Association, the National Organization of Veterans Advocates, the Texas Bar Association, the Pro Bono College of the State Bar of Texas, the San Antonio Bar Association, and a variety of loosely-organized literary and social groups. She has spent 16 years as a longsuffering military wife, and through her children, she maintains minimal involvement with the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts of America. She has acted as a volunteer with the Texas Equal Justice Access Service Project and University of Detroit Mercy School of Law's Project Salute. She was also a member of the Texas Young Lawyers Association until she got too old.

She is licensed to practice in all courts in the state of Texas, before the U.S. District Court for the Northern and Western Districts of Texas, and before the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims.

She practiced civil trial law in Lubbock, Texas where she handled all phases of litigation in areas including personal injury, product liability, professional malpractice, consumer issues, labor, family, civil rights, and commercial and criminal defense. She also worked in legal publishing, writing for Lawyers Co-op and editing for a legal software company.

Since 2000, aside from occasional wills for friends, her own traffic tickets, and nasty letters to insurance companies, she has limited her practice to veterans' law, and works all alone in a luxurious home office.

In her free time, she enjoys reading one novel per year, nurturing her blog, shopping flea markets, and practicing yoga -- but not simultaneously.