Update: Jury Duty

Well, something happened this week that led me to contact the court hall to require for a postponement for my jury-duty service.
What is it?
I got a job ! I got to work on Monday which is the same day for my jury duty service. So I got into this mad rush to figure out how I can evade the service... I was supposed to mail in a form with written explanation... It will take an envelope to arrive to the city hall in 3 days and my jury duty was in 3 days too. so, FORGET IT.
I emailed to this person who coordinates the grants of waivers/postponement.
No reply. Go figure. I doubt the city-hall know they DO have the email system. So I presauded C to call for me because I didn't have time and I wanted the damn postponement.
He was hesistant because he didn't think they would do it just because somebody else than me is asking for the postponement... but they just did. "oh, you are calling for that Deaf woman that emailed me...? Sure. No problem. She is waivered."
What's the difference between the waiver and postponement? Well if the postponement is granted, I have to serve my jury duty within next 30-days. but with the waiver-- nada until they summon me again.
... I am relieved. :-) I was not looking forward to sit all day waiting for nothing.



At least I don't have to look like THIS ^ on Monday!

The Cuckoo and Jury Duty

"The Cuckoo"- my first English-subtitled foreign movie that included a Finnish character. "A very simple happenstance movie about a frustrated Russian soldier, a reluctant Finn soldier and a pastoral Sami woman" quoted a reviewer. The movie is quirky and amusing because you see three cultures (Lapi, Finnish, and Russian) clashing with language barriers and cultural norms that leads to misunderstandings. There was some funny scenese. But then it is possible because I understand the clash.
I will recommend this to anybody who is already a fan of foreign films.

Busy month for me--
I have three-days workshop to attend for a teaching position at UCSD for American Sign Language but it seems that I won't get a job due to conflict in schedule but I am still obligated to attend just to vie my appeal for next quarter. The week after that, I have a summons that mandates me to show up for jury-duty. Lovely. No longer I can escape by stating that I do have classes to attend to. They already got an interpreter for me. Hopefully it is somebody I like so I can talk while waiting. I have been avoided the summons by dodging and postponing for two years now. Now I am nabbed. Hopefully I will only go in for ONE day only... how-how? By portraying myself as the worst juror. I better start to figure out the strategies... Any suggestions??
Does anybody here (Deaf) have any jury-duty experience where they actually got assigned to a trial?
Many Deaf friends of mine said they always got passed over because the court was worried about the costs of sign-language interpreters and the myth that most lawyers have that Deaf people are "low-functional" and incomptent to make a judgement.
Not that I am enthaustic about partaking in a trial, but I got classes and grades to worry about.

I got my diet down, now I gotta get my exercise...

I just signed up the "Kaiser Permanente Get Fit San Diego" program hosted by 24Fitness. 8 weeks of membership for 16$. Not bad. I am starting regularly on Thursdays and Mondays with C and/or my friend "K". To factor in my surfing class which will be a vigrousous workout, I am on my way to being healthy!
For my surfing class, I found a Deaf buddy to join up with me! He's from London. He has this top 10 things he has to do whilst in California and surfing was one of them-- and I got the bait for him to hook on. ;-)
I do notice that I do prefer to have a buddy whenever I want to go out on an activity. Am I clingy? No. I do shopping all by myself so it is not all about loneliness. I think I just want to have somebody to CHAT with while having fun (surfing, working-out, whatever).
Is it because of my Deafness or just my personality? You may think: "Ok Kirsi's getting weird here with a such personal thought..." well it just so happened that I have noticed that people are curious about the close-knited Deaf commmunity such as why Deaf people likes to hug, why do they tell their lifestory at first meeting, why they take forever to leave? The book "Journey into Deaf World" said it is a norm that becomes permanment when Deaf people used to cherish every moment of Deaf social contact due to lack of technology-- well today that should change a lot BUT Deaf people STILL talk, linger around longer, hug each-other at greetings and farewells as usual, despite the fact that we do have video-phones, pagers, TTY and computers. Technology cannot diminish the way of Deaf people. It just give us more ways of keeping in touch!
So with that mystery of my preference for a buddy system being dismissed, I am VERY happy that I have friends to go out with for surfing or workouts! If you want to sign up for same offers in San Diego, you can go to the link I posted above and as for surfing-- check out Mission Bay Aquatic Center for list of sports they teach!