Lilly's Layin' Eggs

Welcome to the second installment of Pictures & Stuff from our vacation to Florida!!! In today's installment, I'm sharing some pictures of one of the things that I think was the best part of our trip, our visit to Gator Park!!!








When I was 14 years old, my family had visited Florida for a cruise, as well as visits to Disney World & the newly opened Epcot Center. We drove from Florida to Orlando that time (which I'm sure affected my decision to fly instead, but given the expense and time wasted in the airport, not sure I'd do it again that way), and on the way stopped at an airboat ride place. It was fun enough, but I don't recall having seen that much wildlife.



I wanted to bring the family to the Everglades for an airboat ride, and this looked like a pretty decent place. Ended up getting WAY more than I'd bargained for this time!!!



To start with, they had an animal show with birds, skunks, alligators, and even a lemur (not native to the Everglades, in case you didn't know). I've got some video that I may edit & post of that, the guy has a most unique voice. Afterwards, they had a real live alligator you could hold, which all but the youngest did for the photo op.



On to the airboat ride!!! This was the epic part of this event!!! Our boat captain would hold out bits of bread for specific birds at different points of the ride, and they would either land on him, hover by his hand or pick it out of the air as he would toss it to them.



Got out a good distance, and he cranked up the speed and hot dogged about the swamp, over razor grass and shallow waters.



Happened upon a great egret, which I'd spotted on our first pass around a little island, and he came back & tried to get close. He didn't get that close. I managed a decent picture anyway.



My oldest ran the video camera the whole time. We've got around 45 minutes of that.



Oh, and did we see any gators??? Oh yea!!! Like the birds, there were specific areas that the guide knew that certain ones would be at, and he'd call 'em out by name!!! The trick to calling alligators, he says, is to sound like a sick pirate (I'll likely edit some of that portion of video down to share how that would sound) and the gator would swim right out. I think around half a dozen we saw. There are three whose names I remember. Tripod (lost one of his arms in a territory dispute with a bigger gator) and Smiley (who'll swim right up to the boat with his jaws open) and Lilly.



Never did see Lilly, however. Lilly's layin' eggs.

How to get a Free Meal out of a Mouse

So much happened on our vacation to Florida, and I have yet to blog much of it at all!!! I'd say all in all a great vacation, but of course there were a few hitches. Thus, I will get all that out of the way before getting on to all the good stuff!!!

Getting there went smoothly until we'd landed in Miami. At that point, they changed the baggage claim and didn't tell us, so that took a bit. From there to the rental car... well, the rental car places are off site, and there's a shuttle over there. The best priced rental was with Advantage, and their place isn't with all the other rental places, but off from there, so you have to take a shuttle to their shuttle!!! Further complicating things is that it turns out they're only open until midnight, and with the baggage claim and two shuttles, it was VERY close. We got it OK though, and were off to our hotel. Turned out to be a very opulent place (of course, being right on the beach I figured it would be) with the only option being valet parking, and marble stairs leading to a huge crystal chandeliered lobby. Naturally, we were hungry by the time we landed, so we'd stopped by Burger King and showed up looking like a bunch of hillbillies with our take out bags!!! Good times!!! We got checked into our room, and headed up to discover there was only one bed!!! Fortunately the bellman got our problem solved fairly quickly.

Our second flight from Miami to Orlando didn't go quite as smooth, being delayed a couple hours (with the getting to the airport early, delays and finding the Disney express at the airport, it would have been near the same amount of time to drive there!!!) and the gate getting changed a couple of times before being changed back to the original. Not a single complaint about our lodgings at Disney, making it the only one of the three with that distinguishment.

Our third hotel was the Nickelodeon Suites for the last two nights. The room they gave us was great, away from the noisy pool and slides play area, on the ground floor with a view of the lagoon. Unfortunately, the air conditioning has some kind of issue, and the floor all around it (central to the lodgings) was completely soaked!!! Once again, it was very late when we checked in, and we were all ready to sleep. A call to the front desk and they assure me they're sending someone over to take care of us. 45 minutes later, and no one has showed. I walk through the labyrinthine complex to the front desk, and they tell me there's no vacancies to move us into, and someone is already at our room dealing with the problem. I get back, and they've sent housekeeping over with half a dozen towels, which are already soaked through. Sigh. The next morning the oldest & I get up to go to Universal (mom & the younger have had enough theme parking and elect to stay there today. Could have saved some $$$ had I known. I tell her to get on the line with the front desk & get us a different room when she gets up). The hotel shuttle never shows up, so we drive over (another $14 for parking). Later that day she calls me up and tells me they've used a wet vac on the swampy area. I tell her I'm not impressed with their half assed attempts and I want a new room. When we get back, the older remembers something he left in the old room and goes over to get it. It's still about the same as far as moisture, and they've set up a couple of fans. Glad we got a new room, and they did give us $20 credit. Still not worth it, if it wasn't for the epic water play area I would discourage anyone from staying there.

One night we went to Sonic. They completely screwed up our order. Did manage to get a huge thing of cheesy tater tots, and an extra slushy. If Sonic didn't have awesome food, I wouldn't ever recommend them, either!!!

My GPS is easily confused by turnpikes. She was constantly recalculating. Last time we were there I had a much better feel for the geography, as I was using actual paper maps.

I think that mostly covers the fails of the trip (with the exception of the day I thought we were checking out and was a day early to the Nickelodeon) with the exception of the final one that this post was to be primarily about, which actually turned into a win for us. See the first picture of Mickey giving himself a facepalm???




The second full day we were in Orlando the oldest & I got up early to go to the extra hour they open the Typhoon Lagoon water park for hotel guests. We got up, put on our trunks & flip flops and caught the shuttle bus over. Good time at that park, short lines for all the cool slides and stuff. After a few hours we go to head back to our room.



The bus pulls up, and as we go to get on, the driver tells us we have to put our shirts back on. Ummm, we've got no shirts with us, what you see is what you get. "Federal law", he tells us, "you have to have a shirt to ride the bus". We turn around and head back to the park entrance and locate guest services. We tell the lady our tale of woe, and she heads off to the back to see what will be done. As we wait, we both notice a lost article form next to the register, lost swim trunks. We both have a laugh, and I purport that the guy who lost those probably wasn't denied entrance to the bus!!! I say if we get shirts and the same bus driver we need to shuck off our trunks and see if he lets us on like that!!!



I'd figured that they would probably find us a pair of Hanna Montana or High School Musical shirts in the lost & found, but instead they made us up a voucher for the park's store for two shirts!!! We head back and find a couple of nice shirts. The one the boy has was my first choice, but the smallest they had was large and I was looking for a medium. Nice fit on him, huh???

And that, my friends, is how to get a free meal (or at least a free couple of shirts) out of a Mouse!!!

Tropical Threat

The dangers that lurk when you vacation in the tropics...

Momentous Updates

Once again, it's been a while since I've updated. Must be something fairly momentous to do so, huh??? Well, here's a few!!!

It's now into the days before we leave on our epic summer vacation. Short enough time that I can look at the weather & hurricane watch & oil slick projections to see with fair certainty how it's gonna be. Right now, it's all looking REAL good!!! Related tech news, I bought myself a wireless interwebs dongle for the trip, so as not to have to rely on or pay for hotel or airport connections. I've more than paid for it if I'd have done either of those, I figure, so MAYBE there will be some updates from on the road. No promises. I have yet to settle on any new digital camera yet, though I've been looking more at point & shoot mega zoom cameras.



But the big news of the day??? We got ourselves a new pet kitty!!! At the local taco & burger joint today, there was a very vocal skinny little stray wandering around. It was kinda spooky, but the boys coaxed her out from under the car she had hid under. Actually fairly tame, but no indication that she belongs to anyone. We brought her home and fed her and gave her some water, which generally will seal the deal for a cat. She enjoys affection, and has no qualms about visiting the inside of our home. Our other cat doesn't seem especially put off by her, but I don't know how much she's got left in her. The new kitty (first name the very original name "Shadow", middle name the Runescape inspired "Shade", with our family surname comes out to S.S.S. for her initials. All our cats seem to get names that start with S) however, tends to growl low, flatten her ears and extend her claws when the two get close. Our good old cat has been looking skinnier that usual these days, and seems like she may have lost much of her sight and possibly hearing. We've enjoyed her company for probably 13 or 14 years, which seems an incredible amount of time for an outdoor cat to live.

The thing that shall remain to be seen, however, is how either of them do while we're out of town. Of course we'll be getting someone to feed them while we're out, but who knows???



While taking some pictures of the newest addition to our family, I came across the pictures from the older boys' 8th grade graduation. They had trophies for all kinds of things, from perfect attendance to a 10k run that his graduating class had done. SO, he got a TON of trophies!!! See 'em all??? Oh yea, he was honor roll, too. Straight A's for the win!!!



And this, I'd wanted to take a picture since she got it last week!!! My wife had her old supervisor at work cut her hair fairly short a couple months back (said supervisor has been a cosmetologist and a registered nurse before settling on her career in the culinary arts) and it was time for a trim up. Of course, being off for the summer, she actually had to go to a salon and get it done. She got the style where it's very short in the back and longer towards the front. Would have been even longer, but that is predicated on having the length to begin with. I told her when she first showed me that it looks "very butch". Of course, I jest, I actually find it quite cute, and she's pleased with it as well.

Random Pics Post

Here's a set of seven pics from here & there. Some comments shall describe, other comments will just share bits of randomness.

The first picture is of my niece & nephew playing catch on the front steps of my house on the older's birthday. A random and rather cool thing... in the top left side you can see one of the window screen frames is tweaked outwards. A couple of birds, sparrows or finches, have constructed a nest on the sill behind the screen, and it's got 5 eggs in it now!!! They don't seem to sit on 'em much. Bet it's gonna be noisy when they hatch!!!



In my last post I commented on Janice's battery having died. I charged it up, and it occurred to me that another problem she'd developed recently was the power antenna wasn't extending & retracting properly. I'd thought nothing of it at the time, but upon recharging the battery, it occurred to me that could be an issue. Before I fully installed the battery, I tried a test light, and sure enough it glowed a dull orange. Yanked the fuse for the antenna (and a half dozen other circuits) and out it went!!! I diagnosed the problem under the fuse box cover, and fixed it under the trunk lid!!!



Next picture is when we went for a hike on Memorial day. Fairly straight up the side of the hill. I was a bit achey the next day. Thought I was in better shape than that!!!


Have you seen the show "Miami Medical"??? One of the characters is named "Dr. Proctor". Every time I hear it, I think he should be a butt doctor.



I've noticed that my work has left off the tradition of the Thursday before payday as being axing day.


Picture #3 is also on the birthday, my sister & mother in our front room. Yes, I do have a giant slide rule in my front room. Try & contain your jealousy.



The stack of pennies was on the younger boy's birthday pictures. I know it wasn't on the same day. I estimate about fifty cents there.


I was battling bronze dragons in Runescape the other night, and after a dozen or so, one of 'em finally killed me. I want my money back for that crappy Ring of Life I was wearing!!!



Next shot is of several of the boys' cars and various other toys. I picked 'em up when I was sweeping the steps & arranged them so. Yes, that is a brachiosaurus in the back right, holding a dismembered arm. Ironically, brachiosaurus literally means "arm lizard", and I didn't even know that until just now when I wiki'ed to find out how to spell brachiosaurus!!!



Next shot is of the younger boy, on the older's birthday, showing off where he got tagged with a loquat during the loquat war. It'll leave a mark!!! If you look close (or click on it to see it enlarged) it looks like he's got a loose string pointing it out!!!

In addition to the giant slide rule, my older boy dragged home an overhead projector. It can double as a search light.



Last shot is of a hawk on the Memorial day hike. 'Ol Olympus still gots it!!!

Semi Random Auto Post

Happy Memorial Day to all!!!





I have a Capri Sun juice at morning break on workdays. I got this one that had the bonus straws!!!





And a couple of shots of the famous tailpipe that I had fabbed up a few weeks back. Not sure if I ever mentioned, when I got Baby, she always sounded like she had a little exhaust leak. I thought it might be at the manifold area (they told me the engine was rebuilt, but I don't think that ever happened, just didn't look like it's been redone) but when I had her up for an oil change early on I discovered the first muffler was leaking around the ends. It was like a canister with crimped on ends. At the pick your parts, all I found were ones with tapered ends, similar to a glass pack muffler. I hacksawed one off, along with the flange and an extra set of flanges, and welded it in place as best as I was able. Not completely successful, but better than it was. While I had it apart, I tried it with the remains of the rather restrictive pipe to the second muffler disconnected, and it sounded fairly decent, not an insectile buzz but a bit of a throaty growl. Hmmm, a plan hatches...





Truth be told, I'd been thinking that from the time I found the leak, or I wouldn't have gotten the extra flange at the junkyard!!! I envisioned a 45° angle and exiting right in front of the rear wheel. The factory pipe exits the first muffler and does a set of 90° turns, then twists over the back axle before it enters the rather massive second muffler. I found to my dismay that my muffler man had gone out of business. I stopped in to one local guy, and he came up with a price around $175 or something ridiculous. I left. On one of my first Saturdays working I googled for muffler shops by my work, and found a guy. He quoted my more around the price range I'd been thinking, $90. He didn't do it exactly like I'd planned, but in retrospect it probably worked out better as it tucks up better. I had wanted him to add a flange where the old tailpipe goes over the rear axle, but he argued (likely correctly) that there wasn't enough room, but said he'd weld it back together if I wanted to put it back on. Oh, and by paying the last of my cash he reduced my price to $85.





I'm very pleased with the results!!! It's not too terribly loud (unless you really jump on her) and, the main thing I was aiming for, bumped up my MPG by around 2 mile per gallon. It's still in the testing phase for actual averages, of course. In the flange close up photo you may notice that I've stamped it with a "5-12" logo, making it a 5-12 labs piece of speed and economy gear!!! I had the pipe off this Friday to paint it with flat black high temp paint, one of the few things on my to-do list.

One final note on Baby before I move on, she passed her smog check flawlessly, so barring major accidents or other failures, I'm driving her for another 2 years. Of allowable hydrocarbons (66 at 15 MPH, 49 at 25 MPH) she had 30 and 17. Carbon monoxide (allowable .59 & .55) came in at .02 & .01. Oxides of nitrogen (allowable 487 & 774) came 54 and 162. I'd bet that with the factory pipe and mufflers intact it would have come out higher.





I've gotten the medicine cabinet all repainted and tried to get it wired and installed this weekend. I failed miserably in the wiring. In my defense, the schematic is roughly the size of a postage stamp. After it didn't work correctly, I looked up a larger sized one on the interwebs and found the error of my ways.


More of the automotive stuffs, here's some pictures of Janice's old motor mounts. I'm not sure if the balancer was a bit off and it tore the mounts up the rest of the way, or if it was just the motor mounts all along.





Strangely enough, ever since I've gotten the latest starter installed (a week or two back) it hasn't had a bit of trouble, but Sunday her battery was dead. Charged it up, and drove her today with no troubles.


Just a little about work to round out the random. Did I make mention that they'd eliminated the middle shift, then weeks later moved the early to right between when early and middle used to start??? They did, probably at least 6 months ago. Starting tomorrow, they're going back to how it used to be!!! Of course, makes little difference to me, I'm mostly 9:45 for life (one of the guys actually has that imprinted on his tray). Nice thing for me is that they'd moved our last break from 4:00 to 4:30, for a 2 hour 45 minute stretch between lunch and last break. Very few could make that run without dropping at least one cycle to use the restroom!!!

I've been doing the Saturday shift pretty regularly. I seem to get more done around here on Fridays. Either it's the lack of distractions, or just a feeling that I should be getting something done. Either way, it's good. I'd take it for a regular gig if they offered it to me. I don't much like the early start, but being done at 3:30 is nice. Last Saturday I was having a nightmare that I was late for work. Then I woke up, and I was late for work!!! For the first time, I think.

Weekend of Wings

The older boys' birthday celebration was observed this weekend. I like the age he's at now, he just has a few friends over and they play Xbox most of the afternoon!!! His requests for food was a cake similar to the Portal cake and honey BBQ wings. The Pizza Hut wings were a big hit, and didn't last long at all. In retrospect, being barefoot in the kitchen after that wasn't a brilliant move.




I was of the opinion that the Portal cake has probably been about overdone, and thinking of a way to do a variation on it, came up with "The Cake" style cupcakes. Of course, this leads to all kinds of questions on what can be said about them. "The cupcake is a lie"??? Or would that be, "The cupcakes are lies"??? "The cupcakes: Just a bunch of little white lies"??? "Cupcakes = Fibs"??? "The cupcakes: Not really lies, just fudged a little"??? You see the quandary.



Anyway, in addition to Xbox, they did have a bit of a water fight and loquat war.

Sunday we went to lunch at KFC and had more wings there, too, so it was indeed a weekend of wings!!!

A Strange Creature

Here's a little something I've been wanting to do for a while. I'd shot some video on the Road to Hana in Maui when we were on our vacation there. The clips were a bit on the short side, so along with a bit of narration, I've edited them into a somewhat cohesive little movie. Sorry about the crappy audio, but I think you'll get the idea!!!

Weekend of Win

A brief weekend recap, for a change. It all went rather well, I think.

Firstly, I had a bit of an odd weekend. Swapped with one of the Saturday shift guys, cuz he had something going on. That means I had Friday off.

Last week I'd gone on a technology shopping spree again. I had been telling a co worker, two Fridays back now, as he was perusing the Fry's Electronics ad that I had 3 things on my list:
1. LCD TV for the bedroom. Around 20-25 inches, and since I paid $300 for a 32" for the boys in December, I figure a price around $150-175 is all I should realistically have to pay. Woot had a 22" Vizio for $159 that night. SOLD!!!
2. A HD car radio for the Saturn. Right before I'd gotten the install kit for it, I was seeing them under $100. My dad got one for his garage, and he raves about it. I've been watching, but at that point they were all more, or none with HD. The next day, Fry's has an ad for one at $69. SOLD!!!
3. A good, decently priced DSLR camera & lens set up. They were having decent deals around Christmas, but not so much since. Still waiting on this one. I've been in the wait mode on this one for a couple of years, but that's OK.



Got home Thursday night and the antenna adapter I'd ordered to install the radio had come in the mail, and the TV too!!! Set up the TV (actually had an antenna coaxial cable running right by there, nice) in the bedroom. I'm pleased with it.

Friday I wake up to Mark & Brian doing a webcast where they're having chili made. I'd made a doctor's appointment since I had the day off, and got my prescriptions refilled.

I'm in the process of restoring the vintage 50's art deco looking medicine cabinet from our bathroom. Took it all apart & cleaned it off and worked on the rusty spots. Next I installed the radio. I'm very pleased with it. You can really hear the difference when the HD kicks in. Oh yeah, it also has an MP3 player input jack, as well as the ability to play MP3 & WMA encoded discs.



After work on Saturday (from 6:45 to 3:30, a three hour earlier shift than I'm used to, but nice that I'm out before it gets too late in the day) I met up with my wife & boys at my parent's house. I've been chasing down a nasty vibration at idle in Janis for a couple of months now. I had bought new motor mounts a bit ago, and now I finally got a chance to install them. After having changed out the fuel filters and harmonic balancer, I finally got to the actual cause!!! The passenger side mount was... almost like it had a hinge torn in it. The driver's side was collapsed all the way down!!! Probably a new transmission mount would be in order, too.

Took my wife to the movies that night. she wanted to see the new Nightmare on Elm Street. Not bad, but not really that good, either. The first one was better. I didn't buy any of the actors as being high schoolers.

I know there was more, but I can't remember what all.

Amazing Technology

I get a day off of work, and this is how I spend it so far... watching chili cook on Mark & Brain!!!



That's the completely as advertised Lovely Carly, assisting Gary Finneran making his famous filet mignon chili.



Lets see how long it takes to get a cease and desist from KLOS!!!



Now I'm very hungry...

???

"Dude, there's a Q-tip stuck into your ceiling."



"Yea, I know. I stuck it up in there."

"Don't take it out."

"Don't question it, just let the Q-tip be."

"Alright bud."

Race Day

So this was cool. Sammy calls me up at the beginning of the week and invites me to the opening day of the Toyota Gran Prix of Long Beach. It's right down from where he lives, and we haven't hung out in a while. Of course, it's on a work day, so I'd have to use a personal day. However, it worked out they had a Saturday shift opening, so I was able to swap it out!!!



Qualifying day, and it's not too crowded... when we got there!!! It filled up some as the day progressed.



We came upon the red car behind one of the businesses along the shoreline. There was NO ONE around, and there's a little stairway going up to it's platform. They MUST want people to go up and get in it!!! I jumped up in for a photo op, then took a couple of him. As we wrapped up, a group of old guys came along to get their own pictures. I mention to Sammy that in a couple of hours they'll probably have a line and be charging $5 a head to get your picture taken in it!!! A half a minute later, Sammy laughs and says we should set up and start collecting the money!!!



I like the juxtaposition of the picture of the cars doing 100+ right next to the 40 MPH sign.



They were doing LeMans qualifying when we first showed up. The Corvettes sounded the most awesomest.



The celebrity race qualifying was later on. Don't know how he did, but one of my favorites, Patrick Warburton, is involved. Keanu Reeves, Tony Hawk, and Patrick Dempsy will all be involved, too.

Bonus Weekend

Here's something cool Runescape did, to my knowledge for the first time this weekend. Instead of the normal experience earning levels, they were doing a bonus weekend.



It started at 2.7x the normal rate, and diminishes on a curve for the next 10 hours. Of that, I only logged 7:41 hours, but that's OK.



I primarily worked on skills that I usually don't train, or don't train much. I upped my construction skill from my previous 28 all the way to 31. Woop. Summoning I took from probably around 22 or so (I didn't get a baseline before I started in) up to a respectable 33.



The one I really worked on though, was the hunter skill. It was probably around 31 or so to start with, and it's now all the way to 46!!! Nice gain!!! Speaking of gain, when I first started doing screen prints to use on tonight's post, I had 5937xp gained. I'm not sure if that was just for this session, or for the whole weekend, but by the last one (1 hour 11 minutes later) I was all the way up to 13298xp!!! Again, nice gain!!!

I also leveled my fire making and herblore skills a bit. All in all, a great promotion!!!

The Pre Oscar Post

Hey, has it been a while since I've posted here or what??? Always doing something else these days, it seems.

Here's an idea I had for a post around the beginning of the year, and being the day before Oscar, thought it'd be a good time to finally do it!!! I don't see a whole lot of movies in theaters, so I thought I'd do a recap of what I'd seen in the past year. I think I've got them all here.



I put the images in in random order, and The Box came at the top. It actually happened that I was thinking about this movie the other day, and couldn't remember what it was (or even what the MacGuffin was), then happened to look at the top DVD rentals for the last week and there it was!!! One of the top five I saw all year (actually, one of the top three, I really liked all top three about equal), very clever. I also liked that it was set in 1976. I suppose it could work fairly well in just about any modern day, but '76 it was. The premise is that a box is delivered to a couple. If they open it and press the button, they get a million dollars, but somewhere a complete stranger dies. The fact that I completely forgot about that plot device underscores the layers to this film.



Jennifer's Body wouldn't have been my first choice, but my wife and I were going for our anniversary evening, and this was her choice. She enjoys a good horror movie. I don't know that this was a good one, and it comes out at the bottom of my list. I think a lot of the trouble with it is it couldn't make up its mind which way it was going to go. It has a bit of scary, a bit of funny, and it seemed like it was trying a bit too hard to be hip. Too soon after the Great White Station fire??? I think so. I liked the visual effect of Devil's Kettle. I also liked the apropos naming of the co lead actress' character, Needy. Some hot girl on girl action is always nice, and this had a bit but could have used a bit more. From the title, it could have used more of Jennifer's body. It made a great explanation of the success of boy bands, and I did like the ending.



The older boy and I went to Inglorious Basterds. Quentin Taranteno never fails to deliver, and this is no exception. From the trailers, I was expecting a lot more Nazi killin'. That's not to say that there weren't many killed and good action, but I was surprised by how many and how much time of the move was spent in non action sequences. Not to say I was falling asleep during these portions, quite the contrary!!! These scenes were so tension filled that I was figuratively on the edge of my seat for almost the whole movie!!! Well done!!!



Appropriately, the final movie on here was the must see of the year, Avatar. The day after Christmas I took the family to see this at Universal Citywalk's IMAX theater in 3D. We took the train out there, as usual for visiting the Universal area. Just outside the train station was a hot dog vendor with giant dogs at reasonable prices, and we dined sumptuously before heading up the hill. We made it to the theater a very short time before the showing, and thus there was limited seating, and we ended up fairly close to the front.

As has already been widely reported, the effects were amazing, total eye candy. The story line is nothing you haven't seen before, but it was played out quite well, and overall made for a great movie going experience. The 3D gimmickry was pretty good, I'm not sure if the total package of that and IMAX justified the price tag for the whole day, but oh well. I liked the way the subtitles were rendered in 3D. One of my favorite moments came a few weeks after, when I read in the paper that Republicans don't like the movie because it stands for everything they're opposed to.

I don't follow awards shows, but I would be surprised if Avatar takes the top prize, the story just wasn't that original. Inglorious Basterds maybe, but I haven't seen much of the nominees. I did see Up on DVD, and it's another I'd be surprised if it took a top award, also. From what I've heard of a few of the other contenders, probably none of what I've seen.

Justice Takes A Vacation

Jury duty is finished for this year. All week I've been calling in to see if I'll be required to show up, and Thursday night I hit the jackpot!!! This is a departure from the way things went the time before last, instead of everybody showing up for a cattle call on Monday, they just have you call in every night for a week. A MUCH better system, and it made for a much easier time getting through the security on the way in.



The title to this post doesn't specifically refer to anything of my actual experience (well, it was actually something of a vacation for me, one day off work, a shorter, quicker commute, plenty of time to read my paper, lots of photo ops, etc) but rather the first shot here. When I saw it, I immediately thought that would be the title of that shot.



Shot number two is of an old metal lunch box, fully tagged out. It was on the very corner of a vacant lot with a huge hole in it, next to a traffic cone. Behind an eight foot chain link fence with barbed wire. If any panhandlers rolled up on me, I was going to give them the location of this box, and tell them if they retrieved it for me, there would be a five in it (well, not IN it, but in it.... aw, crap, that clarified nothing... here's hoping you're able to figure it out on your own) for them, make that ten if there's something extremely interesting within it!!! I'd have done it, I swear I woulda.



When I got called to be on a case, I started out as juror (alternate) #15. After the preliminary questioning by the judge and both counselors, they started picking who they liked for dismissal. #1 & #6 were removed, and replaced by alt 19 and 20 (because of seating arrangement, I think). Then they got the juror #9. Dismissed, and #13 takes her place. No sooner than he sits down than he's removed and replaced by #14. #14 doesn't even get seated before he's dismissed. I'm called to replace him. I got up, gathered my bag and bottle and waited to see if I was going to be dismissed at this point. Everyone laughs a little as this is going on. I make my way to the #9 seat and sit down. I'd say around 45 seconds later I was dismissed. Everyone laughs even more at this. Seat #9 was a tough fill today!!!



I had to return to the jury assembly room to await more call ups or or the all clear for the day. If you can make it through the day without getting permanently placed on a trial, you are done for the year. Not long after returning, they started calling for more. They announced the room, and it was the one I had come back from. I knew they were going to run out of alternates!!!



The free WiFi at the courthouse was cool, but the filter on it sucked and didn't make much sense. No access to Runescape where I could have entertained myself for hours or Twitter where I could make a little comment in 140 characters or less, but I could access Blogger where I could put ALL kinds of content, and YouTube where I could actually clandestinely shoot and post a video!!! Oh well, I wasn't there that much longer, and I won't be back for a year!!!



Oh, and another sweet deal, jurors get free admission to MOCA, the Museum of Contemporary Art. Of course, by the time I made my way there, taking shots all the while, there was less than 15 minutes left that they were open!!! I rather enjoyed some of what I saw, and thought that I could do as well or better than some. I'd love to go back when I have more time. They gave me a little sticker that says "MOCA member". I stuck it on my John's Incredible Pizza card for maximum juxtaposition.

Oh, I finally located where Angel's Flight is!!! They have a notice that it should be open in the first part of this year. I've been hearing that for years.