Good Medicine!

No one likes to be sick.  Getting well can mean lots of time trying to rest or at least getting a good night's sleep.   That would be a good thing for someone who likes to read, right?  But I have found that when I am not feeling well, I don't like to read.  I just can't concentrate well enough.  But I have discovered that watching videos really helps a lot, even during the middle of the night when you can't sleep.  For me I have found that old TV series' are the best medicine.   I first discovered this after my surgeries in 2004.   This got me through both of those:

One winter when I was sick, this helped me survive:

And another year it was this one:

Last year it was:

And right now as I am suffering with a bad cold or whatever keeps hanging on, I am using this as my bedtime medicine:

Hoping to be well soon and get back to my reading!

Romantic Couples on Valentine's Day!

When our Family Home Evening group was making their schedule last month, we noticed that February 14th was a Monday.  On most holidays we cancel the group, but everyone said they would still like to meet and how about a pot luck dinner?   In the rotation it turned out that it was our turn to host that night, so we all met for dinner and a fun game!

Our menu included: Pork Tenderloin with Raspberry Mint Sauce; Roasted Asparagus; Potato Casserole; Tossed Green Salad; Homemade Rolls and for dessert, Red Velvet Cake.  It was delicious!

 After dinner we played a fun game with a couples variation.

  24 names of famous couples were in a bowl that was passed around. 

We each contributed the names. 

First round: Describe the couple using as many words as you like

 until they are guessed. 

Second Round: No words.  Each couple acted out their famous couple

This round was hilarious! 

Third Round: One word clue. This round was tough!

Some of the couples included: George and Martha Washington, Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler, Fred and Wilma Flintstone; Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy, Lehi and Sariah, Ronald and Nancy Reagan, Tarzan and Jane, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, Adam and Eve, Terry and Phyllis Lee, Peter Pan and Wendy, Ricky and Lucy Ricardo, Roy Rodgers and Dale Evans, Romeo and Juliet, Sonny and Cher, Superman and Lois Lane, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, Cliff and Claire Huxtable and Cinderella and Prince Charming.  I was laughing so hard I forgot to take pictures until the end!

 We enjoy spending time with our friends! 

This month marks 9 years that we have been meeting together!

Love Is In The Air!

Many years ago when Relief Society had "Mini Classes,"  I was asked to give a class on some "Romantic Ideas for Enriching Your Marriage" at a Homemaking Night.  I researched it out in some library books (no Internet), talked to some friends and came up with a fun presentation.  That was more than 20 years ago.  Then we moved here and someone else who moved here remembered that presentation and asked me to give it in this ward.  Thursday night I gave almost the same thing again for at least the 4th time in this ward!  I have also given it numerous times

in other wards--I've lost count.

Here I am about four years ago giving the presentation:

The person who asked me this time when I hesitated because I had already given it THREE times before in this ward said: We have practically a new ward--there are so many new people; the bishop really wants us to have something like this as some couples are struggling.    I agreed to do it, but I knew that I needed to add some new interest.  I decided to try a Power Point!  So I began the process on my computer:

Then I went for some training and learned how to connect these four cables between the projector and the computer and the wall. 

It also involved some adapters and several of other technical doohickies.  I am so pleased with myself.  I created the presentation on my computer at home, transferred it to a thumb drive, connected that to the laptop and set it all up by myself in the Relief Society room and gave the presentation using about 60 slides that I created.   It was lots of fun!

Thanks to Dan for making the arrangements so I could get trained on how to use the projector. 

Maybe it was a good thing that he was out of town that night, so that I had to do it myself.

But the best part was last night at our ward dinner. Several people came up to me and said that after they went home from the presentation, they spent the rest of the evening sharing everything with their husband.  That's why I did it--to strengthen marriages!

(P.S. For anybody who wants to know the "Top Ten Workout Routines," check out the January 2011 Ensign p. 9 which refers to an article in the December 1983 Ensign: "Twenty Ways to Make a Good Marriage Great."  I condensed the 20 into 10.)

Sunday Evening!

One of the best parts about Sunday: Family!!

The Story! (Part 2)



After 6 months of harassment and stalking which included threatening phone calls regarding the family, parking in front of their house and blaring music and other intimidating behavior on a regular basis they were able to get a restraining order. Before this the defendant told the man that he knew where his kids went to school.  He followed the wife on occasion.  And the worst was several times he came speeding down their street when a family member was on the sidewalk and drove at them with his car playing "chicken" so to speak.  The wife testified that they never let their son play outside in the front yard anymore or ride his bike up to a friend's house.  The teenage daughters were always afraid, especially when they were leaving the house or coming home.   And she herself had given up her daily jogging around the neighborhood.  Meanwhile the defendant sued them and the water district in civil court. 

I was on the jury in criminal court in which the defendant was charged with one count of  stalking which is a felony and and 4 counts of  "assault with a deadly weapon (car) with the intent to inflict great bodily harm"  which is also a felony. There were also 2 misdemeanor counts related to the threatening and obscene phone calls made to the water district office.

Of course the defense pleaded not guilty and tried to claim that it was not the defendant in the car or that the street was so narrow he had to drive over to the side. We saw numerous photos and maps and drawings where they tried to show this.  They tried to show that the water district had a vague policy, did not accept US coins which is legal tender, and were not fair in turning off the defendant's water.  The defendant claimed he did not purposely park his truck over the water valve and that he accidentally gave the only key to the truck to his father who lives out of town.  It was almost ridiculous the things they claimed and spent hours giving evidence.  The most ridiculous was when the defendant took the stand.   He did not act in the least bit humble or repentant or even worried.  He was very cocky, used foul language and repeatedly tried to interject personal information he thought would make him look innocent--like saying how much he loved his Grandma and telling about the neighborhood parties he hosted and that he loved children.  The jury didn't buy it and the judge actually got super made at him for doing this. The prosecutor caught him in some lies.  She would ask him a question.  He would give his answer.  Then she would bring in a terrified looking neighbor who testified to the exact opposite--not knowing what the defendant had said.  We all felt like laughing if it hadn't been so awful.  The prosecution had only a few witnesses who all looked scared to death and were very believable.  You could tell that none of them wanted to be there.

When we went into deliberate, it was very fun at first, as everyone started saying things about the case.  We were not allowed to talk about it prior to this even though we waited together out in the hall for hours at a time.  So if felt good to finally get some things off our chests so to speak.  We chose a good foreperson and studied the judge's instructions carefully.  Even though no one liked the defendant at all, we were still careful to give him the benefit of the doubt and to use only the evidence.  We were able to come to decisions on all of the counts fairly easily--all except one. We even found him not guilty on one of the counts because we didn't think there was enough evidence. 

One of the counts involving a car was against a friend of the plaintiff's who parked at their home, got out of her car, and this guy came at her.   Can you imagine that happening some morning when you are just stopping by your friend's house.  This woman was able to identify the defendant in a police lineup.   He got that close to her that she could see his face!  But one of our jurors decided early on that she was contradictory in one little piece of her testimony.  We had the court recorder come in numerous times to read this testimony to us.  Finally, we had her come in and read it slowly enough so that one of our jurors could copy it down word for word.  We spent hours debating with this man over these few words.  It was SO frustrating.  He told us that he believed that the defense attorney's job was to try to get to the truth when we told him the defense attorney was only trying to confuse the woman and get her to make contradictory statements.  He did not believe us.  After the case, the defense attorney came out and this man asked him: Is it your job to get to the truth?   What do you think the defense attorney answered?  "It is my job to see to my client's interests."  Hello??? 

In one month the defendant will be sentenced on his two felony charges and two misdemeanor charges.  The day before we read the verdicts and each of us had to say "Yes" on the guilty charges, there was an article in the newspaper about a felon who was stalking people from prison using friends on the outside!  The End.... I hope!

The Story! (Part 1)

There is a man, the defendant.  He is a single, white male in his mid 40's. He owns several businesses and is well off financially.   He thinks he is above the law.   He drives with an expired driver's license and has no plates on his car, a silver BMW.  He drives fast and recklessly in his neighborhood, blares his music loudly from his car and his backyard.  We know this because numerous neighbors have complained, even to the police.  Many neighbors were willing to talk to the prosecutor about this, but when asked if they would be willing to testify in court, most of them said they didn't want to get involved.  I think they feared for their family's safety.   He owns several guns and has two Dobermans.   Seven different times he was responsible for flooding one neighbor's backyard.  She called in complaints to the water district.  Finally, they sent him a warning--their normal policy when something like this happens.  He stopped paying his water bill.  They continued issuing warnings. He ignored them.  After several months of this, they sent him a notice of intention to shut off his water for not paying his bill and ignoring the warnings of their water conservation policy.  He showed up one day in the water district office with a bag of coins to pay the bill and fine.  The front office said they could not take that many coins unless they were rolled.  He got angry, used some obscene words and made some obscene gestures and threw the coins all over the office floor.  Over the next weeks he threatened at different times to sue everyone in the office.  He got his lawyer involved.  He made threatening and obscene phone calls to different staff members.   The water district continued it's policy of issuing warnings and finally sent him a certified letter that his water would be shut off in 48 hours.  He made more threatening phone calls to the water district office, one time 30 in one afternoon. The water district tried to work with him.  Finally, the field staff went to his home with the intention of shutting off his water.  He had parked his truck over the valve opening on his driveway.  The staff contacted the sheriff's department to see if they could move the truck, but when they arrived the sherriff's deputy said  they couldn't move a vehicle off of private property.  The field staff came back the next day and dug a hole in the street to be able to reach his valve, shut off his water and sent him the bill for this work.  He became more angry and now vindictive.  He decided to take it out on the man who is head of the water district and his family who lived two blocks away. 

TO BE CONTINUED!

Random Top Ten!

Random Things I Learned While Serving On A Jury

1.  Go early so you can park in the free Jury parking lot. 

You can pick a good spot as you will spend time in your car each day.

2.  Stalking is a felony.

3. Be prepared to wait A LOT while you serve on a jury. 

But you will never find out why things are constantly delayed. 

 (Thank you, Dan, for my Ipod so I could read, play games

and check email while I waited)

4.  Legally a car is considered a deadly weapon.

5. A small cooler is nice for bringing your lunch. 

The cafeteria food is not very good and there are never any seats.  

6. It's hard for each person to define what  they think is

"beyond a reasonable doubt."  

7. If you don't drink coffee or alcohol and don't regularly watch TV or go to movies, you will not have a lot to

talk about with your fellow jurors during the breaks.



8. There are a lot of people who do their grocery shopping at 6:30 p.m.

9. It is very hard to follow the judge's instructions day after day after day: Do not talk about this case with anyone.  Do not google or search online for anything about this case.  Do not drive anywhere near where the crimes were purported to have taken place.

10. As hard as it was to sacrifice my time to serve on a jury, I was happy to learn that there are many good people in this world who take jury service seriously and believe in being good citizens.

Tomorrow: The Story begins!

Juror Status Update!

We're done!

This is the first in a series of posts about my recent jury service.

If I had been able to put a status on facebook each day of my service on the jury, here is what I might have put:

Day 1: I am actually on a real jury!   I am  juror #5.  There are 9 women and 3 men.  I think I might be the oldest.  It is a criminal case.

Weekend break:  I have so much to get done to be able to be gone all next week.  Made soup and enchiladas.  Made a hospital visit, had Stake Temple Day--were in the temple from 12:45 p.m. to 10:30 p.m., taught Sunbeams, had the Perrys for dinner, made visits with Dan.

Day 2:  We are sworn in.  Opening statements.  I like the Prosecutor's style: No nonsense; gets to the point.  It feels like the Defense Attorney is trying talk down to us and he talks a LOT.  We heard 4 witnesses testify and they were each cross examined.  I keep trying to remember that the defendant is innocent until proven guilty. 

But he is a rich, foul-mouthed jerk and that's what his own attorney says!

Day 3: More witnesses and lots of emotion on the stand. One girl doesn't make any sense at all--she's almost hysterical.  This is just like you see on TV!  There are objections and over rulings and photos and charts and things entered as exhibits.  One of the witnesses had to be subpoenaed as he didn't want to testify.  I felt sorry for him as he looked scared.

Day 4: More prosecution witnesses, including the main one.  He was not what I expected or at least what the defense made him out to be.   I can't wait to drive over to the area where this took place and see for myself what we have seen diagrammed so much.

Weekend break:  Do visiting teaching, wedding reception, vacuum, dust, iron, temple session, teach Sunbeams, attend fireside.  I wonder if there are cases where a defendant retaliates against his jury?  I worry about that over the weekend.  Now with the Internet, I bet he could find me.

Day 5: It was a long, long day.  The wife testified.  It must be hard to face cross examination--they are trying to poke holes in every little thing you have said.  They try to confuse you and will cut you off. 

The Prosecution rested and the Defense began.

Day 6: The defendant testified.   I see him every day in the courtroom but was interesting to hear him talk.  He is even creepier and ickier than I had originally thought. He tries to act cool.  The judge keeps getting mad at him because he doesn't just answer the questions.  He adds stuff like about how much he loves his Grandma. He gets a final warning from the judge.  The Prosecutor catches him in some out and out lies when she brings in some rebuttal witnesses.  Are jurors allowed to laugh?   (Innocent until proven guilty, innocent until proven guilty!)

Day 7: Left home at 6:45 a.m. so I could get a parking spot.  Reported to the courtroom at 9 a.m.  They told us to come back at 11 a.m.  Reported back and they said come back at 1:30.   Reported back and they finally took us into the courtroom at 2 p.m.

Closing Arguments.   One uses an easy-to-follow Power Point presentation.  The other uses flip charts which he writes on while making us turn our heads at an awkward angle. 

Hmmm.....I will try not to let that influence me.

Day 8: The Prosecutor was allowed to give a Closing Argument rebuttal since she has the burden of proof.  The judge read the instructions.   We started deliberating at 11:00 a.m.   It felt good to finally be able to talk about this with the people I have been spending so much time with and yet we have been talking about everything else but this. We have a lot of vocal jurors but there are two very quiet ones. I am pretty quiet but not one of the two who aren't saying anything.  I am happy to note that everyone on the jury is taking this very seriously.  It is not a slam dunk.

Day 9:  We deliberated all day long!   There are two holdouts on one of the counts.  It is the two who were quieter earlier on. We call the court recorder in to reread testimony.  We call her in again.  I feel frustrated, drained and very tired.  We go into the courtroom at 4:00 p.m. to give our verdicts and say we are hung on the one count.  The judge asks us to keep trying.  Back to the courtroom until we are dismissed for the weekend.

Weekend break:  Grocery shopping, wash, cleaning, stake conference dinner and stake conference Saturday evening session, Sunday morning broadcast from Salt Lake, Perrys for dinner, phone calls and webcam.  I keep thinking about the trial all weekend.

Day 10: The holdouts refused to budge even with some really good arguments from some of the jurors. We just aren't on the same wave length.   We report to the judge that we are hopelessly deadlocked on one of the counts.  We report to the courtroom at 11:00 a.m. and the verdicts are read.   Count 1 Felony: Guilty.  Count 2 Felony:  Guilty.  Count 3 Felony: Mistrial.  Count 4 Felony:  Not Guilty.  Count 5 Misdemeanor: Guilty. Count 6 Misdemeanor: Guilty.   We are thanked and dismissed but most of us wait outside the courtroom for the attorneys to come out.  They will answer questions.  It was a very, very interesting experience and I finally get to talk about it!

Stay tuned.

Protect the Best and the Brightest!

I read an article in the recent BYU Magazine (Winter 2011). 

Four words caught my attention. 

It begins with this paragraph:

"The digital world has long been a dangerous place for children....In recent years, that danger has increased... and too few parents are fully grasping it. The destructive features have become not just a pernicious danger but a vortex, sucking in even the best and the brightest."

 At the end it stated:  "...parents and grandparents have a responsibility to understand the backdrop against which your kids and grandkids are living out their probation.  For the sake of the rising generation, that means understanding technology, especially the Internet." 

It is a wonderful article that I recommend to all parents and grandparents of the best and the brightest grandkids!!!

You can read the entire article here!