cindy's world

My gym trainee is on vacation from work all this week. I’ve seized upon the opportunity to work out really, really hard at lunch, supersetting as many things as possible and not stopping in between sets. I’m upset that I can’t lose 5 lbs to get back int0 the 120s again, and in chatting with Vanessa’s boyfriend over the weekend, he suggested that the intensity of my workouts must’ve changed. He’s totally right. I started training my coworker in September, and that was when the weight gain started. I went from being able to fit in 7 exercises (3 sets each) at lunch to 3-4 exercises, because I have to watch her form and work in with her. She’s shown great results; I got mushy. Yesterday I did 6 exercises and today I did 5, amping up the intensity by not taking breaks and doing heavier weights. But I still haven’t returned to jujitsu. Now I’m scared to. I’ll likely get my clock cleaned all over the mat.

Well, on the brighter side of things exercise class-wise, I’m pretty sure yoga ended altho we didn’t attend the last 2 or 3 classes (Mr. W realized that the way the crazy yoga lady forced the poses was killing his back, on top of making me nauseated), and bellydancing is going to begin the day before my birthday on the 28th. I just need to remember to enroll. Haha. Vanessa already mailed in her application and fee. I think taking a whole new exercise class each year right before my birthday is a good thing. Last year it was jujitsu.

All Mr. W wanted for Father’s Day was to get rid of his kids. His son was already at mom’s, and we dropped off his daughter there also, right before he and I went to meet up with my parents and maternal grandmother at Sam Woo Restaurant for Chinese seafood. Mr. W never had Chinese seafood before, so I treated the most exotic stuff they had on the menu. Jellyfish, shark fin soup, sea cucumber, among some of the more normal stuff, Chinese broccoli, pepper beef, clams, steamed fresh whole fish. Mr. W was at first hesitant to try the sea cucumbers (sauteed in baby bok choy and shitake mushrooms), remembering them from when he used to scuba dive, but gave in and enjoyed them after I said, “Oh, come on! You ate a live worm in Peru!” One of my and my parents’ favorite things about Mr. W is his willingness to try new and different stuff. He doesn’t have to like them, but at least this way he knows for sure whether or not he likes something.

As we were drinking our dessert soups, my mom and dad had a conversation in Mandarin about what the first thing is that my dad’s going to do as soon as he gets home. Then they turned to Mr. W and my mom said, “See, after 30 years of marriage, I know him so well that I know what he’s going to do as soon as he gets home, and he only has to say one word and I already know what he’s thinking.” My dad, addressing Mr. W and not my mom, said, “After 30 years of marriage, I’ve learned to just let her think she knows me and that she’s right. It’s easier just to make her happy.” My mom again addressed Mr. W without looking at my dad, “I’m just pretending to be happy to make things easier, so he thinks he’s successful at making me happy.”

My parents are such goofballs.

Saturday night, Mr. W and I had plans to meet up with my cousins Diana and Jennifer plus other friends/coworkers of theirs at the Irvine Spectrum, an outdoors mall/entertainment center for dinner and possibly a movie. Navy Girl Vanessa just happened to call and say that she was planning to be at the Spectrum that night for a movie, too. We agreed to meet up there. Mr. W’s teen daughter had 2 girl friends with her, and the three of them had also planned to go to the Spectrum, so he and I drove the three of them there with us, where we separated.

Mr. W and I met up with my cousins, etc. and had dinner at California Pizza Kitchen, but decided to scrap the movie because of general disinterest in the movie my cousin Jennifer wanted to watch, Jack Black’s Nacho Libre. So after dinner, we all just stood around for a bit, chatting, and the group decided to go their own ways and go home. Just before that happened, we ran into Mr. W’s daughter with her friends, which had grown into a group including 5 or 6 punk rock-looking pierced boys. The kids disappeared pretty readily, with his daughter casting a guilty glance behind her in our direction as she hurried away. All of a sudden, I felt someone’s arm around me from my left, and it was Vanessa and her boyfriend having just come out of the movie theatre we happened to be standing in front of saying goodbye to everyone. Perfect timing! The four of us (me, Vanessa, and our men) wandered around Irvine Spectrum chatting when Mr. W got a phone call from his daughter to meet them at a food court.

When we got to the food court, his daughter said, “We have to go, now, cuz we gotta get one of our friends home.” Turned out the “friend” was some new teenager boy that she’d just met, longish black hair, pierced lip, fur-lined green jacket, jeans so tight that they looked like denim-patterned pantyhose, a studded black belt, and canvas shoes that were frayed around the edges to look like they spread out. The daughter asked if we could take another person, as well. Mr. W said we don’t even have room to take the boy that was coming with us now, because we now have 6 people who are going to cram into a truck. Regretfully, we left Vanessa and her boyfriend and went on our way.

We asked the boy where he lived, and he said off Harbor and Adams. We didn’t know where that was, but he said it was just off the freeway. It was now 11pm, 2 hours past Mr. W’s normal bedtime, and Harbor off the 5 freeway was way off course by 15 miles. There were strange traffic jams, and Mr. W made the other girls call home to say they were gonna be an hour later than promised due to his new detour. So we got off on Harbor, and Mr. W asked the boy where to go from there. The boy hesitatingly said to turn left.
Mr. W: Are you sure?
(Silence from the back seat.)
Mr. W’s daughter: No, he’s not sure.
(But we turn left anyway.)
Boy: We don’t usually go from here, so I’m not sure of the area, but I think this is right. It’d be faster if you get back on the freeway.
Mr. W: And get off where?
Boy: On Harbor.
Mr. W: This IS Harbor. You said you live off Harbor and Adams, and there’s no Adams exit, so this is the only place you can get off. (We drive by Disneyland.) You live in Anaheim, right?
Boy: No, I live in Costa Mesa.
(Mutual silent gasp throughout the car. We had gone 15 miles northwest to get from Irvine to Anaheim, and now he was telling us to go 15 miles south from Anaheim to Costa Mesa. Well, he didn’t tell us. It would’ve been easier if he had told us anything at any point when we were going in the wrong direction.)
Mr. W: So you live off the 405 freeway, not the 5 freeway.
Boy: Uh…
Mr. W: We went north on the 5 and got off on Harbor. You live off of Harbor off the 405 freeway, nor Harbor off of the 5 freeway.
Boy: (sounding confused, as if it had never occured to him that there’s more than 1 freeway in California) Yeah. …?
We didn’t get home until way past midnight.

Just came back from watching Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock’s The Lake House, which plotline opens with Sandra Bullock’s character Kate in 2006, touching base with Keanu Reeves’ character Alex in 2004 by putting letters, notes and other goodies for each other in the outside mailbox of a glass house on the lake, built by Alex’s dad. When I first saw the preview snippets, I thought there’s no way it’s a real fantasy movie; the time thing was probably just a metaphor or the way the previews spin a misunderstanding. Nope, the two actually find a time porthole. The plot is nearly the exact opposite of Christopher Reeves/Jane Seymour’s movie Somewhere in Time, another one of my favorites about a love that transcends beyond the boundaries of space/time continuums. The Lake House takes up some Back to the Future elements in the theory of the future affecting the past thereby altering the future. There was an internal plot so predictable from the beginning setup that as I watched the characters develop, it broke my heart. And then they did a twist that redeemed the story! Okay, this is already enough of a spoiler, so I’ll stop here. I’ll only tell of its effects on me, which is that I cried in this movie shamelessly, almost as hard as I did watching the last Keanu Reeves movie I saw, Sweet November. If I were watching The Lake House in the isolated midnight conditions of Sweet November, I would’ve undoubtedly been just as snot- and tear-wracked.

“That was one of my more favorite movies I’ve seen in a long time,” Mr. W just said. I’m definitely getting it when it comes out on DVD, so I can watch all the director’s cuts. “But it IS a chick flick,” he adds.

As the credits rolled, after I’d composed myself enough to be able to stand and walk out of the theatre, I said to Mr. W, “Don’t you go back in time 2 years to meet me.” He laughed and said it’d be a good thing cuz then he’d be younger. I said, remembering our brief brush with potential romance in 2003, “Actually, I wouldn’t have been interested in and did turn you down a few years ago.”

For the past several weeks, I’ve had detailed, horrendous nightmares of Mr. W either really pissing me off or breaking my heart. I don’t remember all the dreams, but upon awakening, I’d tell him about it. More often than not it included themes of betrayal. This morning, for example, I dreamt that he and I were walking down an old-fashioned street (like back in old Ireland) and he told me that within the past week he’d met a girl who was “very very Korean” (I think that’s his way of saying she was fobby) and that there was mutual interest, and they went out once, altho he did tell her he was “married.” He paused, realizing his slip at characterizing our relationship as a marriage, and recovered with, “err, in a relationship.” In the back of my mind, I acknowledged that we were separated or on the rocks or something, but I said, “So you went and had a date with someone else when you’re technically still in this relationship with me?!” He looked solemn and sheepish. I turned away from him and ran down the street. As I ran, I marveled at my courage of being able to just run and leave him behind instead of standing there with him, a blubbering crying mess, begging him to fix things between us, but at the same time, I was also upset that he was letting me run away and not chasing after me.

“I think my subconscious doesn’t like you very much,” I told Mr. W.
“I think your subconscious wants drama, and since I’m not giving it to you, you’re making it up,” he said.
“I don’t like drama! I can’t handle it anymore! That’s why I didn’t even want a boyfriend!”
“Well, you’re used to drama.”
Those dreams better not come true.

I think all my prayers are working! I’m finally bleeding, and here’s what my horoscope for today says:

The Bottom Line
Kudos for your attitude — all your perseverance is paying off. Get ready to relax.

In Detail
If you feel like you’ve been through an emotional wringer, take heart — you’re due for a break soon. Your exceptional attitude has made everything go much more smoothly than it could have, so good for you! Tempers are cooling, fortunes are turning and you are set for a traveling opportunity. You will be able to learn more about a culture you’ve always been curious about. Fill today with exploration and feed your curiosity. It will relax your heart and still stimulate your mind.

Today is a very important day for my little avocado plant. My bailiff brought in some potting soil and my gym trainee was just in here a few minutes ago to take the plant, cute pot she got a couple weeks ago, and the soil to do some messy combination of all three. So today, my little plant is going to be weaned off liquid and be fed solids. How exciting! The growth spurt slowed down a lot, so it must not be getting the nutrients it needs from just water in the little plastic cup anymore. Soon (in like 7 years, I hear), my little fledgling will be giving me delicious plump grandchildren to eat!

I don’t care if I sound sick and wrong.

HEY, the little avocado tree just came back! “Just keep it moist, there’s a drainage hole down at the bottom so it’ll keep it from getting too wet, but if you start seeing water in the plate down there you know you gotta stop watering,” my trainee said before she hurried back out to do her work.

Today is Mr. W’s last day at work before his two-week vacation. He’s going to Alaska for a manly-men hiking/touring/kayaking/fishing trip. My dad’s looking forward to the giant salmon and halibut (?) Mr. W will be sending back. I’m looking forward to reuniting with my stinky man in a couple of weeks, cuz the day after he comes back will be my 30th birthday and he made some secret plans for us to spend the day. I predict I’ll be really sick *cough* on my birthday *sneeze*. I predict I won’t be handling *wail* turning 30 *rocking back and forth* very well and will need *hysterical laughing* a mental health day off *hysterical sobbing*.

While Mr. W is fighting off the bears (“…and the seals! The fuzzy white ones!” he said this morning), I’ll be in San Jose with college roommie Diana & pals for a weekend. She made reservations for a nice fondue dinner at The Melting Pot the night I arrive, then hanging out and dinner the next day, and kayaking the following morning before I fly back that night. I’ll get to hang out with Dwaine before I fly there since he’s dropping me off at the airport, and afterwards when he picks me up from the airport. I’m leaving my car at his nice new house over the weekend. Hmm. Maybe I should wash it so I don’t embarrass myself. Dwaine’s pretty clean.

I have the last week of July off. No plans yet, I may just take a couple of days for 2 long weekends and give the middle of the week back, save up vacation days for some long-ass China trip next year that Mr. W wants to take. The Gilroy Garlic Festival is the last weekend of July, and Mr. W gave me the green light yesterday to go, so that’d be fun, as long as I can still find hotel rooms. I’d always wanted to attend the Garlic Festival.

Mr. W’s bday is also coming up, so I’m trying to plan a mini trip for that, if only he’d get back to me on which weekend he’s gonna have free.

And then in late October is our 8-night Hawaii trip with my jujitsu class! Luau banquet, USS Missouri, snorkeling, stick-fighting, here we come! And maybe even swimming with sea turtles or surf lessons!

AND…I’m pretty close to caught up with the stupid family law divorce cases they make me do, so no pre-vacation stress and overtime trying to process those damn things for me this time!

Minutes after our last trial (elder abuse) reached a verdict, we got word that we were being sent another one. Because we were occupied most of the morning with taking the verdict in our earlier case (not guilty), we didn’t get started with picking the jury on our 2nd case until the afternoon. I went out at 1:30p into the front hallway of the courtroom to take roll and do my introductory song and dance. When it was time for these jurors to go into the jury room, 34 jurors filed past me trudging into the courtroom, and the last one, a 30-something bespectacled white male dressed neatly in a short-sleeved blue button-down shirt and khaki pants, met my eyes, smiled, and thanked me for holding the door open.

During initial background interview of these jurors, that man answered the usual questions (area of residence; occupation; marital status; occupation of spouse if married and of children if adults; prior jury experience) like this:

THE COURT: Juror number 12, if you could please answer the questions, sir.
PROSPECTIVE JUROR NO. 12: Yes, Your Honor.
I live in Long Beach.
I am a force and budget manager.
I am wonderfully married.
My wife is a children’s pastor.
My daughter is a minor.
And I have two little Foster boys, too.
THE COURT: All right.
PROSPECTIVE JUROR NO. 12: Prior jury experience, last one was in Long Beach. No. It was in o — sorry. It was in — I can’t think of it. It starts with a C.
THE COURT: Compton.
PROSPECTIVE JUROR NO. 12: Compton. Thank you.
THE COURT: All right.
PROSPECTIVE JUROR NO. 12: In Compton. It was a criminal case and a verdict was reached.
THE COURT: Do you remember what the charges were in that case?
PROSPECTIVE JUROR NO. 12: Yeah. It was — it was — I don’t know what you would call it. Stopping for prostitution.

Who can’t remember Compton? People not in this state or country have heard of Compton, the infamous capital of gang warfare, police scandals and racial violence. And “wonderfully married,” surrounded by his kids and foster kids, skipping and holding hands in a circle surrounding Juror 12 singing “For he’s a jolly good daddy” while his wife brings out freshly made pie that everyone can enjoy when she reads them bible stories by the fireplace. This guy has a great life.

Ya know, you can always tell when someone has a good home life. This guy glows, as with my family law reference judge down the hall, who once told me in his very comfortably decorated chambers surrounded by photos of grinning spouse and children that being married to the right person is wonderful — it’s like a great date that doesn’t have to end.

I decided this afternoon that what I needed was a massage. Without much hope, I called Glen Ivy Day Spa and asked if they had any open appointments left for today. The last time I tried to do an impromptu appointment with them on a weeknight, all they had open was a 20 minute slot, which is the equivalent to giving a starving person a kernal of corn, or to a badly PMSing woman a chocolate chip. Mr. W offered his personal massage service if I can’t book an appointment, but then the clouds parted and a magical sunlit hand reached through the opening to hand me an 80-minute slot at 5pm, then reached over and plucked Mr. W up from where the back of his shirt was hanging from a hook, gently setting him down in front of his computer where I see he’s active, but he is ignoring my IMs. Back to my story. The receptionist’s voice asked me over the phone whether it’s okay that only a male massage therapist is available at that time. Of course it’s okay! I would’ve taken a penguin if he were certified. And then it was booked. I did a quick calculation. $145 massage, a 20% tip would be $29. Mr. W, who was on the phone with me at the time, said that 20% is overtipping. I asked my substitute court reporter (my regular one is surfing in Costa Rica) and substitute bailiff (my regular one is off somewhere paying his new property taxes), who frequent massage places, how much they tip. They both said 15%. I thought back to all the times I’ve tipped at least 20%. Mr. W pointed out that it’s not like these masseuses remember me, since I don’t go that regularly to the same places and I don’t go back to the same person. So I don’t benefit from overtipping.

Well, it turned out a good thing I overtipped last time in April with Diana, cuz I got the same guy. I recognized him first; he said apologetically that he sees a lot of people. It wasn’t until I was naked that he recognized me. “You’re the one who told me you were like 30% bodyfat, right?” “Yeah, that’s me.” He laughed, and said he still doesn’t believe that measurement is accurate. I said 2 separate tests told me that. He said then both tests are unreliable. “Hey, how’s that soda thing going?” I asked him. He said, “Great! I still haven’t drank any soda! I don’t even drink diet anymore.” “Oh, since I told you about the chemicals thing?” “Yeah!” That’s me, getting people to quit fast food and sodas everywhere I go.

Got my 80 minute massage, for the first time got a stomach massage. I’d told my therapist my court reporter today said, “I hate it when they massage my stomach.” I didn’t know before then that people got stomach massages. I’d been told that you’re not supposed to massage the stomach area because if you do it wrong, people could have their intestines messed up and get constipated. My therapist confirmed that massaging in the wrong direction can indeed cause blockage, and asked if I wanted to try it. I decided to trust him. It was weird, I felt like my face would swell every time he pushed down. He said it was all the fluid moving around from the massage, and to drink a lot of water over the next couple of days to flush out the toxins released from the rubbing. He said they don’t automatically do stomachs anymore unless someone requests it, because most people don’t like it. Others like it because it clears up their constipation and they go to the bathroom right after the massage. You learn something new every day.