Monday, October 06, 2008

I really should be studying...

I'm gonna have to post in short clips. Sorry.

I took the kids to the first-ever Jordan Lake Music Festival on Saturday, an event to raise money to "clean up Jordan Lake." It was a blast at first. We saw a woman singing and playing guitar atop an old-fashioned fire engine and the woman was a gal I went to undergrad with. We'd bumped into each other at a Whole Foods in Raleigh about 9 months ago and did the whole, "Oh my gosh, it's been so long since I've seen you, you haven't changed much, what have you been doing for the last 14 years, we should get together sometime." Sometime was Saturday, and she nodded in recognition as my kids and I waved and clapped.

The festival was great fun and well worth the money, until I lost a bunch of what I had left to spend. It must've fallen out of my pocket while Johnny and I went on this crazy bike ride that was quite tricky until we landed in the open helicopter field.

Yes, I was bummed about losing about $35 dollars, but I was more disturbed by how an employee of the Chatham County Sheriff's Office lectured me repeatedly about how I should carry money in public places like this, ya know, for the future. I should, according to this guy, walk around at things like this with a fanny pack with my belongings securely zipped in, or even a pouch you wear around your neck that you can wear under your shirt instead of in sight. Gee I wonder how I made it this many years without those very helpful tips from this bored Sheriff's Office employee (who knew good and well the only reason I engaged him in conversation was because he had a uniform on and I'd just lost something).

Speaking of Sheriffs, I spent a couple of hours tooling around in downtown Raleigh today hand-delivering tickets for special seating for tomorrow night's Raleigh Medal of Arts Ceremony, hosted by Tift Merritt!!! Lucy Daniels, for whom I work, is one of this year's recipients, and it's going to be an evening full of celebration, arts, and I actually get to attend and don't think there will be much work involved. So anyway I delivered my second to last ticket and was walking back to my car that was parked by a meter that was pre-paid (yay!) on some street I'm not even familiar with. Next thing I know, there is this sea of black and gray pant suits walking my way, led by a short man with a reddish face, flanked by two women he was holding hands with. My mind raced, "Is this some sort of political statement? Some type of protest?" About 4 journalists were taking pictures of the hand-in-hand lollipop gang that were followed by taller, and grayer men in dark suits. I motioned a young photographer over and said, "What's going on?" She said, "It's the Brunswick County Sheriff. He just got sentenced for embezzlement and stuff like that. He's holding hands with his wife and mother."

Never a dull moment.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

so you work for lucy daniels.

very interesting...

Unknown said...

Go to hear from you. That Sheriff is Sheriff Hewitt. He is a very nice guy who i talked with some when i lived in Wilmington. It's a shame that he did what he did but he is a very charming dude who always listened and gave his time to the news dudes down in Wilmington.