About Lisa Palmer

Lisa Palmer Articles written 6

Articles written by Lisa Palmer

The Mel Torme of Lawyers

Daniel Klau croons over billable hours

It happened early on a Saturday morning in April. Sitting at his grand piano with a pencil in one hand and a spiral notebook beside him, Daniel Klau wrote the verses and tapped out the tune that had haunted him for years: My life is a time sheet Filled with six-minute slots I know I make good money But my stomach’s tied in knots.   A few hours later, he had finished the song. It was a music-making moment that sparked a sixmonth songwriting obsession. “Words and songs kept popping into my …

The Receiver

Got a credit union crisis? Call Allan Shine

In the middle of a winter night, Allan Shine reached for the small pad of paper and pencil he keeps on his bedside table. He scribbled down ideas that had interrupted his sleep. First on the list was a question: Who wasn’t doing the right thing?  “I thought for a minute, and then started writing down lists and lists of names,” says Shine, 71, a partner at Winograd, Shine & Zacks, a Providence firm specializing in general business law. Shine is recounting a defining moment of the …

The Storyteller

The appeal of a well-told tale inspired Kathryn Conde to become a commercial litigator

Kathryn Conde loves to tell a good story. In fact, she remembers the exact moment that the art of storytelling lured her into the legal world. It was the early 1990s and Conde was on a conference call. As a number-crunching senior analyst for National Economic Research Associates in Washington, D.C., she was listening to lawyers discuss a case with her fellow economists. The attorneys were hung up on one point: “What kind of story do we want to tell at trial?” And just like that, Conde …

Monkey Business

Ellen Epstein Cohen doesn’t clown around when she represents the circus

At first glance, there’s nothing unusual about Ellen Epstein Cohen’s cheery corner office at Adler, Cohen, Harvey, Wakeman & Guekguezian in downtown Boston. Like most law offices, a totem of framed university diplomas and awards line one wall. It’s beautifully decorated. But after settling into a plush armchair and chatting with Cohen for a minute or two, you get the feeling that someone is watching you. Then you notice the painting featuring larger-than-life-sized, music-playing …

Wonder Woman

There is exactly one life sciences patent attorney in the state with a side practice in quantum mechanics: Brenda Herschbach Jarrell

Tucked into the corner of a crowded sushi restaurant, Brenda Herschbach Jarrell, a partner with Choate, Hall & Stewart, sits at a tiny table and scans the menu, even though she knows it by heart. “I’m a sushi junkie,” she says, and then rattles off her order: diet Coke, miso soup, edamame and an alligator roll, the chef’s specialty, which calls for wrapping grilled eel over a long maki roll filled with tempura shrimp and avocado.   With her clear-rimmed glasses, uncombed blond …

Joe Six-Pack

When it’s time to relax,Kerry Callahan heads to his local pub for his second job: reviewing beer

Glasses clink as Hartford attorney Kerry R. Callahan begins his research. It’s Friday evening in his brightly lit kitchen, and Callahan reaches into a cupboard filled with a gleaming arsenal of beer glasses. He pulls out the necessary supplies — a pint glass, a few mugs, a bulbous goblet and a tall, tapered footed glass — and begins his work. One by one he pours a selection of ale, stout, barleywine and Pilsner microbrews into their respective vessels, chosen to complement …

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