kapachino

Category: around here

  • Jury Duty

    Today is my day off, and I spent a portion of it going to jury duty. This is my first time that I couldn’t claim an exemption from going, and although I know I could have just skipped it and probably wouldn’t have ever seen the consequences, that’s just not the type of person I am. Also, I thought it would be an experience. My father-in-law sat on a murder trial once – not that I would want to have THAT kind of experience, but still.

    Anyway, I was very impressed with the whole process. I arrived and sat in a comfortable assembly hall and read for a short while before they began announcing the panels. I was in the first one they announced, one of 36 potential jurors. We were herded to a different room and accounted for by the bailiff, then walked three blocks to the new civil courthouse. Our tax money was at work in that building; it is very nice. We were given a number (I was 24) and lined up in order, then entered the courtroom and sat down to face the judge and two attorneys. I was kind of nervous, kind of interested, but still didn’t want to be picked.

    As soon as we sat down, the judge told us that we wouldn’t get to hear the very interesting story the two lawyers had prepared, because they had reached an agreement before our arrival. The good news was, we got to leave. Part of me felt let down, but mostly I was happy because that left more time for me to play Mario Galaxy. (Which is what I had spent my morning doing, and what I will return to doing in just a few minutes!)

    Anyway, including commute the whole ordeal was less than three hours – not bad. I have done my civic duty and am feeling very patriotic, and now I need to collect some stars and try to save the princess.

  • Twilight on Opening Night

    I have to say that my husband is awesome for taking me to see Twilight on opening night, and he only complained a little bit. I did very much enjoy the movie, although I will say it was a little cheesy. I don’t think the hundreds of teenage girls who were there with us thought that, though. They would burst out in squeals at the tiniest thing. David would rub his head, shift in his seat, and say to me, “I just don’t get it! Nothing happened, why are they cheering?” And I would say to him things like, “It’s because Edward is wearing sunglasses now.” Admittedly, it wasn’t the circumstances I prefer to see a movie in either, but I just couldn’t wait.

    As I’ve mentioned before, David doesn’t like fantasy much. But he has somehow seen the Lord of the Rings movies. During the movie, Edward was climbing trees like Spider Man. I whispered to David, “I didn’t realize vampires had sticky hands and feet like that.”

    “Yeah, I didn’t realize they were so much like hobbits.”

    “Hobbits don’t climb trees like that.”

    “They did in the movie…Murkwood Forest and all that!”

    “No David, that was because the trees were alive and they picked the hobbits up.” He was too exasperated to continue the argument.

    On the way home we discussed the movie like any normal couple would do. One thing (among many) that annoyed David was when Bella said, straight from the back cover of the book, “About three things I was absolutely positive. First, Edward was a vampire. Second, there was a part of him – and I didn’t know how dominant that part might be – that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.” It annoyed him because it sounded out of place; Bella didn’t speak like that throughout the rest of the movie.

    This became a jumping off point for him to express all his other thoughts about the movie. I was entertained by statements such as this on the way home (spoken in a very dramatic voice):

    “FIRST, I am in love with Edward’s hair, which is really huge. SECOND, I have very sultry lips. And THIRD, Edward’s dad looks just like Joel Osteen.”

  • Sleeping Habits

    You never really know much about how you sleep until you start sleeping in the same bed with someone for a period of time. Take me, for example. I’ve never been told that I snore, talk in my sleep, sleepwalk, or anything like that. I assumed that I curl up on my side, eventually roll over onto my back, and stay like that without moving for pretty much the whole night.

    I go to sleep much earlier than David does, so he tucks me in at night and then comes to join me a few hours later. Most of the time I don’t even notice when he gets in bed. But the other night I vaguely remember rousing to him shaking me and saying my name.

    “What is it?” I mumbled.

    “Nothing,” he replied. “I thought…you don’t want to know what I thought. I thought you were dead!” And then he gave me a big hug. I was so tired that I drifted off again right away, but I remembered enough of it to ask him about it later.

    He thought I was dead when he came in the room because I was frozen in an unnatural position. He said that my arms were in the air, as if I was trying to climb something. They were just stuck there: not as if I was having a dream about climbing and my arms were moving, but as if I had already undergone rigor mortis in that position. And he shook me at least three times before I finally responded.

    Apparently it’s not the first strange position he’s found me in. Next time, I hope he takes a picture!

  • Friday Night

    This time last week I was sitting at a table in Methodist’s cafeteria, talking to some co-workers and getting ready to head to my hospital room for bed. A hurricane was making a straight shot for us.

    At this time in two weeks I will be married, soon to head to a hotel room at the airport, and then to Kauai from there (with stops in Dallas, LA, and Honolulu).

    But tonight I am lounging on the couch, exhausted after a busy day at work and hours of traffic, wasting the time I should be wedding planning on Geni.com and getting ready to head to my twin bed in my parents’ house to cuddle up with my dog, preparing for another weekend of work.

    Good night, everyone.

  • I Don’t Like Ike

    Not only did I have to cancel my bridal shower for Saturday morning along with other appointments regarding wedding planning (which is kind of a big deal when it’s only three weeks away and I work next weekend), but I will also probably be stuck up at work on Friday night by the looks of it. I’m on the “ride out” team at work, so I have to pack some clothes when I come tomorrow and, if things are bad outside, stay here until someone can come relieve me. The ONLY good thing about this is that I will get paid overtime. Totally NOT WORTH IT.

    Here’s hoping that Ike leaves us alone.