WWE Raw in Nashville, 07.05.2010

07.06.2010

February doesn't seem like that long ago for when Matt and I went to our last wrestling show. Maybe it was because that trip was when I finally made it backstage and it's been an almost weekly topic of conversation during Wrestling Night at Matts? Regardless, Jason and the crew were making another trek to Nashville and once again we took advantage of his generosity. We took extra advantage because Westar Joe tagged along for his first wrestling event!

Although just another show, the fun part was teaching Joe how wrestling fans act. From the Nascar shirt wearing women that are bigger than me to a Ric Flair "Woooo" crossing the arena like The Wave, it was all good. Joe seemed to enjoy himself, but Joe's one to enjoy something new like that. Storylines progressed as normal, and we were in a good little group of people who enjoyed a good zinger. The zingers I remember:

• Calling out Alicia Fox as RuPaul after watching a backstage segment where she acted just like him.
• When Darren Young was getting beat down, Matt was crying "Don't beat the Pencil Troll!!!!

The most important part of this show was that Matt and I learned that our favorite cameraman is Marty, not Rico. As such the Rico Fan Club is now the Marty Fan Club, so we have to change all of the stationary. Between the last televised match and the dark match Marty grabbed his camera and was leaving and managed to walk our direction. Since there wasn't yet a massive roar of the crowd for the dark match I yelled out "MARTYYYYYYYYYY" and actually got his attention to follow up with a "You da man Marty!" for which he gave me a thumb up. I believe everyone should have a fan following. Marty gets us.

Once the dark match was over, Matt, Joe, and I went over and chatted with Jason (mostly about motorcycles). Justin Roberts came over for some pictures and we ended up talking about about entrance sets and Canadian accents. I've never talked to anybody with their own Wikipedia page before. I'm currently in negotiations to see if Justin will be the announcer for the Marty Fan Club.

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Rockin The Booty, Doing My Civic Duty

06.26.2010

This past week I had the occasion to serve jury duty. Like most people my first thought was "how do I get out of this", but I decided (for once) to just sit idly by and see what the system would do with me. ?Obviously I've learned my lesson, because the system decided to screw me over.

Monday morning at 8:15 there were roughly 70 of us potential jurors at the Limestone County Courthouse. Initially we all had our turn stating out name, place of employment, spouse's name, and spouse's place of employment for the record. After that the first round of 20 to leave were smart enough to claim a valid reason not to be there - people with hearing problems were the most prevalent. That left us to begin the questioning by the lawyers. This was civil court, with the plaintiff suing a home builder/developer, so there were no "do you believe in the death penalty" questions. No, the first question asked by the plaintiff's lawyer was "does anyone have a bumper sticker on their car". The second question was "does anyone belong to a professional organization besides a church group". The second question had answers from Accounting organizations to the NRA to a Girl Scout troop leader. The plaintiff's lawyer (Mike) then asked certain people individual questions based on their answers to the at-large questions, or to clear up any details on our place of employment. Spiritus doesn't automatically equal programmer to the average joe, so I wondered why he just didn't ask what our job was instead of where we worked. But I'm not a lawyer.

My favorite person to answer was Amber Last-Name-Not-To-Be-Published. Initially she stated her name and her place of employment was "dancer at the Boobie Bungalow". Later on the lawyers asked if anyone had been a defendant in a court case before, and Amber offered that she had been brought to court on an assault case. When asked about the resolution she said that it had gone to the judge 3 times and the other person never showed up, so it was dropped. Later on the lawyers asked if anyone had to testify in a court case. Amber once again spoke up, this time stating that her mother had been brought in on an assault charge, but only because she reached the girl coming after Amber first. When asked about the resolution for that one, oddly enough it too went ot the judge 3 times, although the girl that brought the charges had showed up late the 3rd time, the judge still dropped it. I've met a few dancers in my time, and it seems the vast majority of them have stories like that.

I was only asked about what my job actually was. The accountant sitting next to me wasn't asked anything. I had a feeling this wasn't good. At the end of questioning us the lawyers took turns telling the judge numbers which magically equated to us. Finally they called 13 to take a seat in the jurors box. Me and the accountant got called, along with 4 other males that had engineering backgrounds. Not too hard to see how I got screwed on this one.

For the rest of the week I sat in court and learned more than any average person would ever want about soil erosion, drainage systems for a subdivision, all the different names for a ditch, and looked at 81 plaintiff exhibits and 43 defendant exhibits. Lots of pictures of dirt, mostly. I got a little tickled at people on the stand rambling on when asked a yes/no question by one of the lawyers, or even better giving an answer that had nothing to do with the question.

Finally, after way too many days of looking at pictures, the lawyers stated their cases and the judge told us what the charges were. Our lucky 13th alternate got to go home while the rest of us stayed to deliberate. At that point I saw how screwed up our legal system is as we couldn't have a copy of what the judge had told us the law on which we were supposed to render our judgment was based. Maybe it's the engineer in me, but 12 people halfway listening to a judge talk about the minutia of various legalese will get you 12 different things you're supposed to base your judgment on. Even worse, it wasn't a "guilty/innocent" verdict per count, but only an amount of damages if ruling for the plaintiff on any occasion.

After 4 hours we finally reached a unanimous decision on what to award - deciding to award something took 10 minutes, but the total amount took a while since everyone had a different opinion of what was fair. The plaintiff's lawyer had told us that they were suing for $41,000 in damages, and if we were to award punitive damages they are normally 1 to 3 times the amount of the damages. Only 2 of us heard that at the beginning of our deliberation voting for $41K and $82K in damages, while everyone else was between $9K (the cost of the land in the dispute) and $25K(just a made-up number). We had no way of figuring out what was fair other than what the plaintiff's lawyer had said, and he was going to get apiece of it so of course he would want us to be high. Finally enough people were tired and hungry that we agreed on a number ($70K total) and that was the end of the trial.

Basically I learned that no matter how much you're supposed to be impartial during a court case, everybody lets their feelings in at the end. One woman wanted to max out the penalty due from the home developer because the same thing was happening to her. One guy who's a contractor thought the penalty amount was too high because the developer needs to keep hiring workers and make a living not just for him but for the people he hires. People make up numbers for the punitive damages because it sounds like a fair amount to them based on their lifestyle. When it comes down to it, I'm not even sure the defendant was really guilty because of what I thought the judge told us the law(s) were, but if I'm the only one that heard it that way I'm not going to argue the point because deep down I just don't care. It's not even that deep, it's pretty close to the surface.

The main thing I learned is to never get sued around here.

Permalink rambling random

Westar Bedone

06.16.2010

3¾ years ago I began working at Westar as a Sr Software Developer, thanks in no small part to Lord Ford (who became the boss of me when I started). While working there I met a great group of guys, learned a little about 3D Modeling, and finally found some confidence as a programmer since I was suddenly the most experienced person around. After roughly a year at Westar, my Spiritus job opened back up and I headed back to the glitz and glamor of missile defense subcontracting. The contract I was working under at Westar had undergone some cuts, and they really didn't need a full time programmer, so I offered to stay on part time.

I had no idea I would stay on part time for over 2 years, but I did. Over that 2 years I worked on a project for the Dept of Corrections, and over the past 2 weeks I delivered the final installation and sent in the final documentation. When I finished filling out my timesheet I saw there was still an hour available on the contract. A single, lone hour. I could have made up something to do for an hour, but I like leaving it out there dangling.

Even though I've wrapped everything up and there's no more money left (for now, not counting that hour) it seems I'm still a part of the Westar family. We had assumed I would be let go once everything got delivered, but the company has an employee status where you're on a kind of stand-by, maybe only working a couple of hours per year. Although I'm ready to be done with this after having it lurk in my free time over the past couple of years, there's also a safety net feeling since they're not quick to boot me out of the door.

So now I can claim to still have 2 jobs, although there's no telling how quick I'm going to forget my Westar email password.

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Pics, yes, PICS!

05.21.2010

I haven't posted any non-Warcraft pictures since February. What a boring blog this must be... I'll have to cram different families of pictures into this post to make up for it.

Pictures Part I: Orange Beach
2 weeks ago I took Gina down to the beach. Here's proof!

Pictures Part II: Kitchen
The big thing waiting for me upon my arrival back home from the above beach was this year's home renovations. Last year was redoing the master bedroom and turning what was then "the junk room" into the spare closet that all the chicks envy. Once again I called Handyman Mike to come do all the work, and since I had the above vacation planned out he decided that would be the best time to do the renovating. I like work being done to the house when I'm gone - it minimizes the mess I have to live through.

In years past I've had some little thing for Mike to fix (last year I think it was something to do with the kitchen ceiling) and then we throw in something for fun. This year nothing was broken, but I made up for it with what all I ended up getting done. The first part, the "must do" item, was to replace the kitchen counter top. The counter top was green, which matched back when there was white and green linoleum in the kitchen and dining area, but that left years ago. It was time to complete my grown-up-ness and update the kitchen. After talking with Mike we added in that this would be the time to replace the appliances if I was going to do it, so that got added in. Mike also likes to play with lighting, so of course we had to redo the lighting!

Pictures Part III: Patio/Landscaping
The patio from 2 years ago also needed some landscaping. I wasn't using it because there was just nothing out there. I had gone by Lowes and picked up some furniture, plus I put together the hammock & stand Gina got me for Christmas last year. I had suggested to Mike that we put in a rock border around the fence - mainly to keep me from tearing up the PVC fence posts with the weed eater.

Obviously we got a little carried away from "rock border". It's a nice spot to go lay in the hammock and read a book though.

Permalink renovation/remodelling road trip

Pics, but not just yet

05.20.2010

I've been trying for a week to post some pics of both the trip to the beach and the renovations of the house, but I can never find the free time when I'm close to the computer.

Maybe this will force me to do it tomorrow....?

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