Why Kids are Afraid of Clowns

A few weekends ago Josh and I participated in a fund-raising walk for food allergies. In the goody-bag the volunteers gave us during registration we found the advertisement shown below. Tell me this isn't one of the creepiest ads ever. It looks like the stuff nightmares are made of. The thing I think is the weirdest is that "Jolly ol' St. Nick" isn't even smiling. If you go to the website shown on the ad, you can see more creepy pics of these characters. Plus, they use catchy slogans such as:

"Kids always love to see a clown!"

"Services: Interacting with children and adults"

Creepy, Creepy, Creepy

Jury Duty

My number was drawn and I had to report to jury duty this week. This wasn't the first time I have been summoned, but it is the first time I actually had to show up. I have to admit, it was nice to see all of the other suckers who had to show up too. I was lucky enough to be picked for the first jury pool of the day. The commissioner lined about 20 of us up and walked us over to another building for a civil case. It kind of felt like I was on a kindergarten field trip since I couldn't ride an elevator or walk across the street without my guardians. However, the walk over to the other building gave me a chance to check out the other people who were chosen to share my potential fate. All I can say is that it is truly amazing how diverse the randomly selected jury pool turned out to be. Here is a short cast of characters who got selected to sit in the jury box with me for questioning:


1. An overly excited twenty-something Hispanic college grad.

2. The super-religious lady decked out in full holy cross jewelry with bible in-hand (she made her own bible cover from multi-colored daisy material)

3. A forty-something white male who I believe to be an undiagnosed schizophrenic

4. A single, African-American, female with two masters degrees

5. A convicted felon who just got out of the slammer 2 months ago after spending 20 years behind bars. He was dressed in the stereotypical convict garb: beat-up black leather jacket, biker boots, old Levis, a white t-shirt, and dirty hair tied back into a neat ponytail (I was lucky enough to get to ride the elevator with him)

6 & 7. Two men who work together at the Purina factory, both high school grads (one white, one Hispanic)

8. A naturalized citizen from Japan in his early-twenties

9. An elderly African-American woman with a cane, diabetes, and asthma (she gave me a full medical history)

10. A thirty-something, white, pregnant woman about to burst

11. An American-Indian in his late forties/early fifties who owns his own construction business

12. Me, juror #12--I'm going to spare myself from too much introspection you can make your own judgement


It was really interesting to see how they widdled the jury down from 20 to 12 to 6. There were a few people who got kicked out immediately. The convicted felon was quick to go. He told the judge he felt dizzy and was seeing things. . . . and that he was a felon. Diabetes/asthma lady was excused quickly too. In the end, I was let go too. The reason: I was asked if I was in the position of an insurance agent, would I need to see evidence that a car was stolen in order to pay out a claim? I said yes and was dismissed shortly after. The case was concerning an individual who sued Farmers Insurance for not paying out a stolen car claim. Although I was excited to be done with my civil duty, I still wonder how the case turned out.

Beers, Music, Water, Music, Paintball, More Music

Well, it has been a while since I have sat down to write anything. It's not that I have really been that busy. . . I think lazy is probably a better descriptor. Over the past few weeks I have been enjoying summer, hanging out with friends, and lots of music. Below you will see the past month in pictures.

My sister came to visit for a little while and we decided to do a mini pub crawl down Tennyson for her pre-birthday. We stopped at Swing Thai (mango mojitos, sake, and mai tais), the Berkeley Inn (good 'ole beers and plenty of second-hand smoke), Elitch Lanes (beers in the shape of bowling pins), Big Hoss (beers and fried jalapenos), Patrick Carroll's (beers and shuffle board), and finally, the new Billy's Bar. This place is about a block and a half from our house. It used to be one of the dirtiest, smokiest dives in Denver, but it has recently undergone a major face lift. Now it is a trendy tequila bar. We decided to make this our last stop and try out the dinner menu. Unfortunately, the crawl took much longer than expected and we missed the dinner hours by ten minutes. It was probably for the best. We lost half of our group to go puke in the alley about 10 minutes after arriving.

Me trying to do Anna's smile and Anna trying to do my smile

The new Billy's Inn. Formerly the creepy Billy's Bar Inn Bar Bar

The next weekend we went to The Knew's CD release party at the Hi Dive. It was a lot of fun and their new CD is great. They are actually part of an online Battle of the Bands right now. The winning band gets the opportunity to play a half hour set on the main stage at Red Rocks during the Monolith Music Festival, which I am also REALLY looking forward to. If you want to go vote for The Knew or see the other bands participating in the "battle," click on this link: Monolith Battle of the Bands. You do have to register to vote, but they won't send you junk unless you want it. It takes about 15 minutes for the confirmation email to be sent to you, so be patient the first time around. I think you can vote for 3 bands every hour--if you are that dedicated. Voting goes until the end of the month.

I went on a water tour for work. It was interesting to see Aurora's system and how it works. It all makes a lot more sense when you see things in person rather than on paper. However, the tour was two full days and I was exhausted when I came home.

Me at Homestake Reservoir

At the Leadville Mining Museum

Instead of resting after the tour, Josh and I decided to go the the Underground Music Showcase. It was two full nights of local bands rocking out in a number of different bars, restaurants, and stores along Broadway. It was a blast, but Saturday night got cut short due to the number of giant PBR cans I consumed. The picture on the right was taken approximately an hour before I self-destructed.

This past weekend, I took Friday off and we went up to my parent's cabin with my sister, Dom, Pete, and Keith. The guys played paintball and I brushed up on my washers skills. Anna, who had never played washers before, managed to beat me twice and get her first bucket.

When we got back to Denver, we went out for Erick's 30th birthday. Nicole set up bottle service at Beta. I've never been there before, but it was pretty nice and the sound system was awesome. They are the first club to unveil the new FUNKTION-ONE Dance Array Four Speaker Stack System. When you stand next to one of these you can feel the sound moving your arm hairs. In addition, the place tries to be totally green and works the feng shui.