Up, up and away!

I finished Jay Lake's Rocket Science a short while ago, and even now, I smile a little when I think about it. A solid, fast read, and a definite ode to the golden age of sci-fi, complete with Communist agents, secret Nazis, and a talking computerized rocketship that requires oil to fly back to Mars. Brilliant!

I do wish that this book had been written in a more "pulpy" style, complete with super-short chapters and the requisite cliff hangers at the end of every one. I think that would have been a nice touch, and another knowing nod to the genre. However, I still really enjoyed this book, and if you are in the mood for some 50s nostalgia mixed with atomic hijinx, I recommend this book.

The tongue bath heard around the flat...

If you read a couple posts down, you will see that our new kitten (as far as a name goes, we're leaning towards Starbuck, since the kitten is pretty frakkin' crazy) has been with us for a week, and we have been slowly integrating her into the household. So far, both cats seem pretty okay with the other, and we've only had a couple episodes where we thought the big cat was playing "a little rough."

Today, I was on the computer, and I realized I hadn't heard them chasing each other in a while, and the eerie silence started to worry me more than the normal noise. I went out to the front room and found this:



Oh my. I backed out quietly, and hung a necktie on the front door. That was a little more kitty love than I was ready to see.

I think they're starting to get along.

Oh Yeah!

I don't want to be confused for a shill for the Gatorade corporation, but if you grew up in the 70s and liked orange Kool-Aid, I highly recommend the new G2 Orange. Just like Mom used to make!

I thought I might be alone in having strong feelings for orange kool-aid, but I was wrong. I don't have quite as many issues about orange Kool-Aid as this guy, but I also had no idea that the term could be used like this. I swear I am just talking about a powdered drink, nothing else.

Introducing...um...

We brought home a new kitten this weekend. She doesn't have a name yet; suggestions are welcome.



The process of adopting a kitten from San Francisco Animal Care and Control is...intense. There were several forms, a short interview, discussions about other pets in the home, and a criminal background check (I made that one up, but it seemed like the next step). And all of that was before we were allowed to touch the cat. Seriously. At one point in the interview, we were asked how many hours, on an average day, we're gone from the home. When we picked "10-12," the interviewer asked who would be watching over the kitten during those hours. I answered honestly, if admittedly like a bit of a smart ass, that this role would fall to "the other cat." The interviewer was not amused.

Overly invasive procedures aside, we're glad to have her home. They suggested we wait up to a week to introduce the two cats. We opened the door, our older cat sniffed her, licked her head, and that was about it. They've been playing all weekend, and with a minimal amount of what I call "poofy tail." If you don't have cats, trust me: that's a good thing.

Justice...is done

Went to jury duty yesterday; this is the second time I have been called since I have lived in California, and the second time that I made it into the jury holding pen, sat around for a couple hours reading a book, and was eventually told that they had as many jurors as they needed for the day, and was sent home. Very anti-climactic.

To be honest, even though it would utterly wreck my current court schedule and make things very difficult on my co-workers, I would LOVE to get on a jury (doesn't say very nice things about me, I guess). The work I do currently is in a juvenile court, and because of the age of the children I represent and the nature of the cases, all hearings, including trials, are closed to the public and confidential. Translation: all of my trials are bench trials, and I have no jury trial experience. I would be very interested in seeing it in action, let alone watching the court process from the other side of the room. Maybe next time.

The most annoying part of the experience, other than the backbreaking hours I have been putting in for the past few weeks getting my cases prepped in case someone else needed to handle them, was watching the Jury Orientation video. Wow, it was soooooo bad. See if you agree by watching it here. Maybe I am a bit jaded (probably), but the phrase, "The verdict is read...justice is done," made me want to laugh out loud. I held it in.