Upgrade and Jury Duty

Well, we received our stimulus package money from the government, and though we think it was a somewhat silly thing for the government to do, we accepted it, and Kyle was able to get his long awaited computer upgrade:) Friday after he got off school, we drove to Fry's Electronics, and he wandered the isles wide-eyed like a kid in a candy store...Well, okay, so not really, but I'm sure if he had a little less restraint, he would have. If you've seen Kyle's "cookie face" I'm sure you get the idea. Anyhow, he carefully selected a few new computer parts, and...Well, we were on our way to Lancaster, so he anxiously waited all weekend before he was able to put the new parts in his computer. Poor guy, lol. Sunday night when we drove back to LA, he immediately pulled out his computer case and began what seemed like surgically removing computer pieces, lol. I don't know what on earth half of them do, but he knew what he was doing, so I sat back and watched, compressed air can in hand. That was my job...air dusting. In the end, to be honest, I can't tell that the upgrade did anything at all to his computer, but apparently now it can run computer games that it previously would have had some major struggles with. Kyle can see the difference, whatever it is, and he is excited, so I'm glad:) It's a good thing we only have a studio apartment right now, because I'm sure that if he had a computer room, I would never see him again, lol. Okay, not really;) Anyway, that has been the highlight of his week:)
The highlight of my week...or perhaps the low-light, I'm not sure which...was *sigh* jury duty. I've never been summoned for jury duty before, so this was a whole new experience to me. Or so I thought. Driving to the courthouse and finding the place was new. Waiting all day was...well, it was kind of like I imagine going to the dentist for a root canal is...you wait in a stuffy waiting room, waiting for the fateful moment they call your name and send you to your doom...At least that's what everyone there made it seem like at first. I began to wonder if jury duty was run by the devil himself, the way most of the people there talked about it. After awhile though, I actually kind of enjoyed it. Everybody there was "suffering" through the same thing, so people ended up being far more friendly to each other than I imagine they would be if they met, say, on the freeway, or in a crowded grocery store. From about 7:45 a.m. onward, I waited and waited and waited and waited and...well, waited some more. Pretty soon, complete strangers were conversing jovially, many using humor as their means of surviving the day. Around 11:00, they called out names for the first panel of people. My name wasn't called. About 11:45 they called for another panel. My name wasn't called. About noon, they let us go for lunch. The only food nearby that didn't require cash (which I had none of), was Starbucks, so I reluctantly gave them a bit of traitorious (new word?) business, and went back to the jury pooling room. At this point I had probably written about four pages of a letter to my pen-pal. When I got back, I waited and wrote some more...and some more...Around 2:00 they called another panel. My name wasn't called. I waited some more. Around 3:00 they called another panel. My name wasn't called. After calling that panel, there was only me and two other people in the room. I was pretty sure they were not going to call a panel of three...They noticed there were still people waiting and said, "That should have been everyone. If your name has not been called, come to the window, and we'll figure out where you should go." The three of us went to the window. They scanned our juror badges and told us to join the last group. Gee, that was difficult:-p lol. We joined the next group and waited outside the court room. Me and the other lady who hadn't been called to panel ended up talking with a few other ladies while we waited. One of them was hilariously obnoxiously funny, and I wasn't sure if I wanted her to stick around so I could laugh at her, or to leave so I didn't have to listen to her, lol. But the five of us at least passed the time together. Around 3:40, a lady stepped out of the court room and said, "Our case has been settled, so you are not needed. Return to the jury pooling room for further instructions." When we got back to the jury pooling room, they told us we were done for the day, which meant that we were done for the year. I'd started out with mixed feelings about jury duty. Part of me didn't want to be assigned a case, and hoped I would be excused or not wanted, or apparently biased or something. Part of me thought it would at least be interesting, and/or a learning experience to actually be a part of a jury. Part of me wanted to get out of it so that it didn't interfere with our plans for the next weeks. Part of me wanted to do it, so that I had something to do! In the end, I figured it was a win win situation, and I would be fine with whatever happened. So of course, in the end I was fine with not having to come back! It was kind of a bummer to have wasted a day waiting, and it's kind of disappointing to meet neat people and leave knowing I'll probably never see them again...but it was...and interesting boring day, if that makes any sense. In the end, I got an excuse to sit around doing nothing all day, Holly will get a book sized letter, and I drew a rough sketch of a squirrel...I'll claim that it wasn't a complete waste of a day...even though it pretty much was.
Anyhow...here are a few pictures of Kyle and "his baby" as his mom and I call it;)