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Well, I was excused from jury duty a couple of hours ago, owing to the fact that I have to be able to pick up The Daughter from the day camp she attends at a time before that at which court itself adjourns for the day, coupled with the fact that The Wife can’t pick up The Daughter from said camp because she works a night schedule while I work a day schedule. This is the outcome I was hoping for. As I noted yesterday, I’d been terribly worried about how executing jury duty would work for me, in theDown the rabbit hole….

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According to ErieJury.com, the website for information pertaining to jury duty in Erie County: TRIAL JURORS FOR THE TERM DATE OF MONDAY, AUGUST 13th, WITH JUROR ID#s 794 TO AND INCLUDING JUROR ID# 939 ARE TO REPORT WEDNESDAY BY 9 AM IN THE JURY ASSEMBLY ROOM LOCATED ON THE GROUND FLOOR OF THE COUNTY COURTHOUSE AT 25 DELAWARE AVE. THANK YOU. My juror number? 877. Sigh. Looks like I’m in downtown Buffalo tomorrow. I’ll be taking several books. I’m considering showing up in overalls, and then when they say that my attire isn’t “proper” for court, I’ll just ask ifDown the rabbit hole….

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Blogging may or may not be interrupted this week, as I may or may not be put in the position of judging someone’s fate. Yes, I’m on call for jury duty. Maybe I can use my long-known racist feelings to get out of the task — but of course, that will only work if the defendant is an Orc. God, I hate the Orcs so much…. Share This PostDown the rabbit hole….

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This week, we’ve started reading Little House in the Big Woods to The Daughter at bedtime. Keeping that in mind, here’s a portion of tonight’s dinner-table conversation: ME: So, are you still reading Little House? THE DAUGHTER: Yup. ME: Ah. Did you get to the attack on the Indian village yet? THE DAUGHTER: What? ME: Yeah, the raid on the Indian village. Did you get to that part yet? THE DAUGHTER: Dad, don’t tell me the end! ME: Oh, but that’s not the end! It’s in the middle of the book…Pa takes a poisoned arrow and nearly dies, though. LaterDown the rabbit hole….

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I’ve seen this walkability test in a number of places, and I finally was able to get my neighborhood’s score: 42 out of 100. Oh well. Of course, this doesn’t imply that there aren’t places to walk. I’ve been walking nearly every day this summer, roughly for an hour at a time, in part of an attempt to start living more healthily. There are plenty of places to walk about. If “walkability” denotes being able to walk to conduct normal errands, then yeah, I don’t live in the most walkable of locales. But walking for the sake of walking? I’veDown the rabbit hole….

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I’ve started experimenting lately with the writing of poetry. I’m not willing — yet — to post any of those efforts here, for two reasons: first, I’m not sure what I’m doing, and thus am not at all sure that I’m not producing total crap; and second, the subjects I am committing poetry about are more personal than I usually get in this space. I’m just noting a bit of conflict in my head about my desire to commit poetry. Part of me is thinking, “Cool, another way to write!”, while another part is thinking, “Isn’t there another way toDown the rabbit hole….

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Kevin Drum on the American unwillingness to take vacations: Of course, I’m hardly one to talk. In theory, I agree with Ezra [Klein, who has a LA Times op-ed about this], and I would have preferred a job that paid 10% less but provided 10% more vacation. In reality, I rarely even used the two weeks of vacation I got. Partly this was because I was caught up in the work ethic feedback loop that’s spiralled almost insanely out of control in America, but also, ironically enough, because I only got two weeks of vacation. So I hoarded it. YouDown the rabbit hole….

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That may be the worst pun I’ve ever used in a blog post title, but anyway, I just happened across a website called Swillparty.com, which turns out to be a Buffalo/WNY site devoted to social wine tasting. Apparently SWILL is an acronym, standing for “Several Wine Imbibers Liking Libations”. They’ve got a wine blog (already bookmarked for the next update of the blogroll), and they’ve even come up with a nifty-looking kit for getting your own wine-tasting parties together, along with several other items of merchandise. So, if you’re local and you’re looking for wine-tasting stuff, keep your money localDown the rabbit hole….