I won 2 tix from FB: https://www.brotherhoodofdoom.com/doomFo...7#pid84917

I like the guild. It's intimate, but fancy...we got there early enough that we could grab a spot right by the stage. Ran in to a couple people I knew and chatted...people watched a bit. 

Right about 8pm, Monkey came out. It was their 30 anniversary. They were tight and lots of fun. Great vocal harmonies, rudimentary choreography, dynamics. Good stuff. Mosh pit started about the 3rd or 4th song in, but didn't last. About that time, an Ed Bagley Jr look-alike in a sharp suit came down to the dance floor, stood right next to me and stated doing the best/most amazing ska dancing. Fully committed. The guy was awesome. He danced for 2 or 3 songs straight, then left. Later, I figured out that he was the DJ that was camped out in the balcony before and between sets. Monkey played for about 30-40min. 

Let's Go Bowling came on after a short intermission. It's their 40th anniversary. They are a bigger band, adding keyboards, second guitar, and trombone. They seemed to have a bigger fan base present. They were ok, but less energy than Monkey, and they had a really long set, almost 2 hours. They covered Shame & Scandal by Madness which was pretty good. They have a great bass player. He sounded great and was just in the groove all night. He was a very large man, bald, in all black, sitting on a stool in the back, next to the drummer, but almost off stage. Occasionally, a stage light would land on him from above and it struck me that he looked like Marlon Brando from Apocalypse Now.  

Fun, unexpected night out. There aren't any sad ska songs. 

--tg

This was fine. Completely what I expected. A very pleasant way to spend two hours. Good voice cast. Mystery was so-so. Lots of good visual puns littered throughout.

No sword fights. Recommended if you are looking for a cozy mystery.

Only 1900 more to go...

--tg

Unlimited nachos and whiskey
Suite life is good

In case you had a hankering for some Siberian music today.

The founder of Arista. 

Bob Weir allegedly changed the lyrics of Jack Straw from 'we used to play for silver, now we play for life' to 'we used to play for acid, now we play for Clive.'

Another limited series based on a Harlen Coben novel. I have probably read the novel.  I can't remember a single plot point in this unfamiliar story. But it has the Halmarks of a Coben novel. Something tragic happened in the past which is now coming back to effect the future. 

David Burroughs went to prison for bludgeoning his five year old son to death. He claims innocence but the evidence shows otherwise. Five years later, Burroughs sister-in-law shows up at the prison with a picture of Burroughs still alive. And off we go. Mistaken assumptions galore propels the story. Everyone seems to be lying for good reasons and bad. It is nice to see a Coben novel in the setting for which it is written so we are traveling up and down the Eastern Seaboard in the quest for clues from Maine to New York with the FBI always just one step behind Burroughs. 

It's enjoyable if implausible. Two episodes in with I think 4 left to go.

Apple is running a special so I signed back up for the year. I knew I was going to be back in when Ted Lasso returns so I purchased the special

Widow Bay is set on a maybe haunted Island where the mayor is desperate to boost tourism despite while one of the locals sounds the alarm bells that terrible things are about to happened as the creature that inhabits the island is about to awaken.

In the first episode, the Mayor wants everything to go smoothly because a travel reporter from the New York Times is coming to maybe do a feature about the island. Naturally, the island starts to have unexplained power outages and one of the local fisherman goes missing.

In Ep02, the mayor has to spend the night in what could be a haunted hotel. The list of things haunting hotel is quite long from the top floor in the Captain's Suite to a claustrophobic crawlspace in the basement. 

The show balances the horror with a strong dose of humor. For instance one of the card games on offer at the hotel is called 'Get Out'. There is a board game called "What happens when Daddy gets home" The whole town is quirky to the max with the mayor at the center struggling to keep it together.

Just about to tuck into my pre-show Xolo chile relleno burrito.

La vida es Bueno

I didn't get picked for the actual jury. I was picked as an alternate. I was told to report on Monday June 15th, showed up on June 16th and was released on June 18th.

The whole thing went really fast. When we were doing orientation in the Jury room of the Madera Superior Court, the judge was already asking for us to come up to his courtroom. We spent the rest of the day doing Voir Dire to impanel the jury. It took forever. While waiting to be seated I played the time honored game of picking who was going to get kicked off the jury. There was one guy who was on trial already and knew the defense attorney. There were a couple of people who very familiar with the circumstances of the defendant. I was picked second to last as the alternate. The final alternate wasn't chosen until Wednesday and then we jumped right into trial.

It was a drunk driving case where no one ever witnessed the defendant driving the vehicle. The Sheriff department rolled up on him as he was changing a flat tire because his car blocked the road. He was arrested and determined to have a blood alcohol level of .2. He claimed he had one 32oz corona about 3 hours before the blood test. Defense and prosecution stipulated to the fact he was drunk. The case hinged on whether he actually drove the car. The defendant claimed his girlfriend was driving the car, not him.

The girlfriend was the first witness. I use the term girlfriend loosely. She barely knew the defendant. According to her they were just hanging out for the first time. They had gone to Reno to a casino and were on their way back to Modesto when they go their flat tire in Madera. At the time the defendant thought they were in Sacramento. Now would be a good time to look at a map. I had tons of questions about their travel but nothing was brought up at trial.

The defendant had the keys to the car in his pocket. The defendant's phone was in the pocket in the driver's side door. When the girlfriend was put in the driver's side seat, she could barely reach the pedals. We saw video footage from the CHP officer's body cam and read transcripts where the defendant said "I pulled the car over" or "I was going to drop my girl home" or "I hit the curb". But the defendant also said multiple times my girlfriend was driving.

And that was the case. Who drove. If it was the defendant, he was drunk driving. If it was the girlfriend, the defendant goes free.

The one time girlfriend didn't seem pleased to be thrown under the bus in this case. She testified her and the defendant were doing at least five shots of Hennesy. The only inconsistency in her testimony was she said the police pulled them over rather than coming up to them after they had stopped to change the tire.

This also happened in 2020, so it's been awhile and I wonder what took so long for this to get to trial.

If I was on the jury, I would have voted to convict. But the jury, in their wisdom, came back undecided. The trial continues without me.


I think I did have one of the best moments in the court, though. No one wants to be there so I think the judge goes out of the way to be personable. He and the Prosecutor both were keen to ask personal questions during Voir Dire. If you mentioned a particular hobby, they did a couple of follow ups. They liked to ask about families and jobs. When they got to me, I got to say I was working on a Qigong martial art that focused on the groin. I was trying to be delicate. I did mention the title was Iron Crotch. And the judge kind of stopped and processed that information and said "I don't know if I want to ask any questions about that". I told him not to be afraid. He moved on to other subjects.

Although, it was over a 100º outside, I could have worn a jacket in the courtroom. It was freezing. My knees were not happy going up the stairs to the courtroom multiple times. On the first day, security confiscated my metal spoon, that I brought to eat my lunchtime yogurt, because utensils are not allowed in the courthouse.