Feeling Fat and Happy

I just finished a big turkey sandwich--yum! The sandwiches the day after Thanksgiving are the best all year, IMO.

We had a lovely Thanksgiving. Wonderful food and great company. Along the way we talked with Sam's sisters family in Las Vegas and of course my parents and sister out in Colorado Springs.

After dinner we played games for a while before digging into the pies. By then everyone was too full to move so we settled in to watch a movie.

Everyone is having a leisurely day and tonight we're going to see the new Bond movie, Casino Royal.

Tomorrow the boys will start hanging the Christmas lights outside and I'm going to brave a nearby mall to attend a book signing before having some friends in for the evening for a Star Trek the Animated Series viewing marathon.

Happy Turkey Day

We're ready for the holiday. The turkey has been thawing in the fridge for a couple of days and today I went shopping for the rest and got the pies done. The grocery store was a zoo I'm glad I didn't leave it until later, they were starting to run out of some stuff.

As usual Sam's father and grandmother are joining us for the day and everyone pitches in to help with the cooking, setting the table and the dishes. It's one of the few times each year I get to break out the good china and crystal. Steph arrived home last night.

Birthday Boy

Today was Adam's 15th Birthday!

It was just pure luck that there was no school today for the boys. They had friday off for Veteran's Day and today was a staff development day so no school for students.

We decided to take advantage of the day and what Adam really wanted to do was go to Disneyland. We had the best time! It wasn't crowded at all (love weekdays!) and we were able to ride everything we wanted twice.

I was so pleased that Sam took the day off work to come with us. I was worried about all the walking tiring him too much but we built in lots of breaks and the rides he couldn't go on he was content to sit and wait for us.

All in all a really super day!

Whew!

It has been a very jam packed week so it's nice to have some time to relax today and catch my breath. I managed to get the interview written up as well as two book reviews. Started reading the new Star Trek mini-series, Mere Anarchy which has started out really well.

I also got caught up on things around the house that had been put off. The flower beds in the front are all replanted for the winter and it looks really lovely. I'm so glad that's finally done. It looked so sad and forlorn with big bare patches where things were dug up to replace the sprinkers.

The next project on the agenda is shopping for new carpet for the bedrooms. I'd like to get that taken care of before Thanksgiving so that it's not hanging over my head during all the holiday preparations.

The boys were off school Friday for Veteran's Day so yesterday I finally got them out to buy new shoes, which they've both been needing for a while now. We decided to check out the new mall, which is more than double the size of the previous. We only saw a small portion of it but it seems like most of the stores are very upscale and pricey.

Andrew did the driving yesterday and he is getting more confident all the time. He's getting the hang of parking very quickly.

Later today we'll likely take in a movie and then probably go out for dinner. We all want to see Borat, hopefully it won't be sold out.

Get Out and Vote!

It's pretty much expected that Arnie will be relected as Governor of California today. I'm a registered Democrat but I'll be voting for Arnie because he's the better choice for a number of reasons in my mind.

There are no hotly contested local elections this year but plenty of important state and local ballot initiatives that millions have been spent on opposing by special interest groups.

What happens in the rest of the country is going to interesting. Personally I'm hoping the Democrats do unseat the Republicans.

Catch Up

We finally reached a verdict on Friday afternoon so I'm done with jury duty--yeah!

The past couple of weekends have involved doing all the stuff that I wasn't able to do during the week. Mainly errands but a few small household projects too. Andrew had a small surprise party for his friend Cameron's Birthday at our house Saturday evening. Cameron was certainly surprised and a good time was had by all.

Work has taken a back seat the past two weeks so now I've got a bit of catching up to contend with. My top priority is to finish the Jeff Ayers interview/article about the new Star Trek Fiction Companion, Voyages of Imagination since that is due by Friday. My goal is to get two book reviews written as well.

I had to postpone the last of the landscape work and the installation of the new carpet in the boys bedrooms so on the homefront that's up next but I've also got a bunch of stuff for the LAFSC to get through.

It's a short week for the boys at school, they've got Friday off for Veteran's day.

Ahhhhhh!

We are now in our third day of jury deliberations. The closing arguments concluded just before the lunch break on Tuesday and we started deliberating that afternoon. It's a complicated case but based on the evidence presented I've made up my own mind.

14 hours of deliberating later we are still hung on question #2 of a 12 questions jury form. It's a civil case so only 9 of us have to agree. We're stuck 8 to 4. I'm with the majority. If we can't agree tomorrow morning we're going to have to inform the judge and I guess they declare a mistrail, I'm not sure.

A couple of the other jurors, who've been on civil cases before said the judge would just send us back into the jury room to try some more but at that point we'd have been going around in the same circle for so long and I don't think anyone is inclined to change their mind. At this point I just want it to be over.