God bless mothers who used to be legal secretaries.

At the very least, I have a promising option for a lawyer and a possible avenue for dismissal -- not likely, but possible -- I might be able to do an anger management class in exchange for the charges being dropped. Again, this is not a likely route, but I basically said I'd take it were it offered -- three or four hours of time in a stupid class is better than untold hours in court. Otherwise I at least have some grounds to start moving forward.