Paris in the winter time

Our honeymoon adventure continued in Paris.

London Calling

I had the pleasure of spending almost a week in London with Lisa on our honeymoon.  Here are a few photos from our adventure.

Enjoy! 

Jury Jeopardy

Murdertainment (Copyright/Trademark LennerCo 2015) has become a staple in the television viewing rotation of our household. For those of you not familiar with Murdertainment ©, it refers to shows that focus on real murders for the viewer’s entertainment. HBO’s The Jinx – the story of Robert Durst’s killings/murders/somewhat confession - was the jumping off point for our Murdertainment © obsession. Currently we are in the midst of another Jinx-esque miniseries, Death on a Staircase. This series aired on Sundance Chanel back in 2004 but our thirst for Murdertainment © has taken us back in time. An interesting part of this miniseries is it was filmed in real time, so the viewer watches as the defense team puts their case together and the prosecution jokes about the evidence – funny stuff like the fatal injuries in the death of a woman.

Being allowed into the legal process this way has opened my eyes to parts of the system that I may not have otherwise seen without committing a murder of my own. One thing that really caught my interest was the way the defense attorney cross-examined one of the prosecution’s experts. It was clear the defense attorney had a ton of information that he wanted to share with the jury but he couldn’t just go on some rant spouting off all this contradictory information. Instead, he cleverly played a game of Jury Jeopardy (Copyright/Trademark BVDCo 2015). He proceeded to relay this information in the form of questions. He asked the witness if she was aware of the more than two hundred other fatal beating cases that occurred in the area over the past decade (the prosecution was trying to prove that this case was a homicide by beating). She responded that she was aware of other cases but not the exact number or the evidence of those cases. He was not discouraged by the fact that she had no knowledge of these cases because he didn’t really want her answer, he just wanted to use these “questions” to relay more information to the jury. His follow up question was, “did you know that in all of these other cases the victims had skull fractures and brain trauma, which the victim in this case did not?” Of course the witness didn’t know this. She just stated that she was unfamiliar with the details of the other cases! Next question – he asked if she was familiar with a similar case that was tried in Canada – she was aware of the case but not the details. His follow up to that… “Were you aware that in that case…” NO SHE WAS NOT AWARE, I screamed at the TV. He continued to relay information to the jury in the form of “question” after “question”. It was obvious what he was doing; yet there wasn’t a single objection.

I’m curious to see if the judge refuses to accept the jury’s verdict if it is not in the form of a question - “I’m sorry your honor, what is guilty?”

The Elephant in the Elevator

I recently started a new job with offices located on the 9^th floor.   This requires me to ride the elevator several times a day and these daily rides have brought back to my attention something I’ve noticed over the years. When multiple people get in the elevator together, most times no one acknowledges there are other people in the elevator.  Everyone either pulls out their phone, stares at the electronic display ticking off the floors as we go up or down, or just stare blankly ahead in silence.  I do it too; I know every detail of the scratches in the elevator’s wood paneling at my new place of work. Any other animal gets in this close proximity to another member of its species; it’s growling, barking, sniffing, or trying to establish dominance.  There is never a situation where these two animal strangers just ignore each other.  I’m not suggesting that when entering an elevator you proceed to sniff everyone in there, but how about a simple acknowledgment or friendly hello. Let that animal instinct out. 

Commercial Break - Not In My House

Dikembe Mutombo was know for wagging his finger in opponent's faces after rejecting their shots but Dikembe retired in 2009.  Four years later someone had the genius idea to use him and his finger wag in a commercial and for that I say "thank you". 

Enjoy.

The Return

Sunday marked the return of my face.

Commercial Break – Freaky!

There are a lot of talking baby commercials these days.  This leads me to wonder if there is one ad agency out there that sells all their clients on talking baby commercials.  Maybe it’s the only concept they’ve had success with and not try and convince every client that it is the perfect fit for their product.  This commercial features a talking baby, the rest of the commercial is nothing to write home about, but it is worth seeing the baby say “FREEEEEEAKY”.

Enjoy.