It's funny. All these posts now start with "it's been a long time... geez it's been long..." I was completely inclined to start THIS one the same way. So, almost 6 months since the last post? That's not bad. Ok here goes the update.

Let's talk about the last couple of weeks.

My eyes are about to fall out from transcribing Ms. Min's classroom. Quite amazing conversation from these kids, by the way. We're really learning a lot from just this handful of classrooms. Yay research!

I served jury duty. I was actually pretty interested in getting on a case. The hot prosecuting attorney decided to cut me, however, which ended up being a good thing because it was the end of the day and the court was not meeting until the following Monday, which means the rest of my group had to report back to the courthouse the following week without knowing if they were really on the jury or not. And the way these lawyers were babbling on, I think the case would have dragged on much longer than they originally had told us. Still, I would kill to know exactly why they decided to me off the jury. And did you know that all citizens are on two lists now from which they select jurors? It's based on your voter registration AND your driver's license registration, and these two lists are not in some central database. That means you're pretty much twice as likely to get chosen now than, say, 5 years ago.

I celebrated by 24th birthday. Yeah, 24 years. My poor parents are definitely feeling old. And so am I, with my "let's hang out at the beach then head to dinner and not get totally sloshed and head home and to bed at a reasonable hour." It was nice though, catching up with old friends, enjoying some amazing southern California-ness, eating good food, and drinking badass blueberry mojitos (mine, of course). It was definitely a good birthday year, with my peaceful breakfast at a french bakery sans company but avec book.

We went out for Stacy's birthday last night to good ol' Hermosa beach. A night out with the girls should be required every few weeks for sanity purposes, even if that means rudely demanding meat market shoppers (i.e. guys that go to Sharkeez) to just leave, dammit. And Stacy was Ms. Independent (even if it turned awkward), and Vinita scored a great farm-raised guy, and Dez was part polish. :) And then we see two guys staring at us on the sidewalk (while Dez was being accosted by mr poland) and hear "Angela..." It was Garin Glassy! Mr. best eyes. My first slow dance. PVIS, 7th grade, auditorium. That's right. What a fond memory to re-live. Yet another piece of closure on my adolescence. Too bad I forgot to ask about his band.

So here we are today. Stacy and I climbed this morning and I made it halfway up an 11a. Not bad for a morning after a night out drinking and dancing, huh? Then it was back to transcribing, a nice trip to Trader Joes (where the nice lady thanked me for using reusable grocery bags), transcribing again, a nice rollerblade along the boardwalk, a peaceful sunset off of Ocean Park, and now here, actually blogging.

Tonight it's off to Swingers for a late supper. Mac and Cheese and hummus and pita. And maybe some sauteed quinoa. Mmm.

I feel like I need to leave this with a "the moral of the story is" kind of statement. I think I'm realizing how important it is to have real connections with people. It really can't be faked or forced. That's what makes it hard... but in the end more worthwhile?