2 moved the hearing by a few weeks to protect the health and safety of our community, including

counsel and this Co urt’s staff .

See

Dckt. No. 19. Waiting a f ew weeks seemed prudent. Plaintiff has not demonstrated that it will suffer an irreparable injury from waiting a few weeks. At wors t, Defendants m ight sell a few more counterf eit products in th e meantime. But Plaintiff m akes no showing about the anticipated loss of sales. One wonders if the fake fantasy products are experiencing brisk sales at the moment. On the flipside, a hearing

–

even a telephonic one

–

would take t ime and consume valuable court resources

, especially given t he girth of Plaintiff’s filings.

See

Dckt. Nos. 1, 6-7, 11-18. And the proposed tem porary restraining order woul d require the attention of innocent third parties, an d create a cascade of obligations. Plaintiff wants to f orce financial instituti ons to lock down accounts, and require domain name registries to shut down websites, for example.

See

Dckt. No. 12. Plaintiff requests an order forcin g innocent third parties

–

such as Amazon, eBay, PayPal, Alibaba, Western Union,

plus social media platforms such as “Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, [and] Tw itter,” plus internet search engines such as “Google, Bing and Yahoo,” among others –

to spring in to action within two or three day s. Either the order woul d be a nullity, or it would distract people who may have bigger problems on their hands right now. In response, Plaintiff Art Ask Agency and its counsel filed a motion for reconsideration.

See

Dckt. No. 20. They ask this Court to re- think its sc heduling order. They want a h earing this week (telephonically if need be).

Plaintiff recognizes that the community is in the midst of a “coronavirus pandemic.”

Id.

at ¶ 3. But Pl aintiff

argues that it will suffer an “irreparable injury” if this Court does not

hold a hearing this week and immediate ly put a stop to the infringing unicorns and t he knock-off elves.

Id.

at ¶ 4. To top it off, Plaintiff n oticed the motion for a hearing on March 19, 2020, a day that

has been blocked off on the Court’s calendar –

as revealed on its webpage

–

for several weeks.

See www.ilnd.uscourts.gov

(last visited March 16, 2020)

(“The Honorable Steven C. Seeger will

not be holding court on

Thursday, March 19, 2020 . . . . ”). Meanwhile, the Clerk’s Office is o perating with “limited staff.”

See

Amended General Order No. 20-0012, at ¶ 5.

“[P]hone conferencing” is available “in emergency

situations and

where resources permit.”

Id.

at ¶ 1. The Court can still hear emergency m otions, but resources are stretched and time is at a premium.

Id.

at ¶ 4. If there’s ever a time when emergency motions should be limited to genuine emergencies, now’s the time.

Thirty minutes ago, this Court learned that P lain tiff filed yet anot her emergency motion. They teed it up in front of the designated emergency judge, and t hus consumed the attention of the Chief Judge.

See

Dckt. No. 23. The filing calls to m ind the sage words of Elihu Root:

“About half of

the practice of a d ecent lawyer is telling would-be clients that they are damned

fools and should stop.”

See Hill v. Norfolk and Western Ra ilway Co.

, 814 F.2d 1192, 1202 (7th Cir. 1987) (quoting 1 Jessup, Elihu Root 133 (1938)). The world i s facing a real emergency. Plaintiff i s not. The m otion to reconsider the scheduling order is denied.