I'm generally not one to listen to my own advice - my famous last words would probably be, "I thought it was the other pit that was filled with spikes and acid," or "told you that musket was loaded." So it served as no surprise that after I had warned my co-workers to never tell his spouse whether he would work overtime or not until he left the building, I broke the same rule and emailed my wife that I was, indeed, off work tomorrow. They mentioned we weren't needed, and there was no work. So I told my wife, no work. Within 20 minutes, while I'm still on lunch, my lead asks me to go to the warehouse in Bothell, and to do work there tomorrow as needed. Now this wasn't so much a punishment than a compliment, so I said, sure. I needed to pad my measley 32 hour week anyway.

I carpooled with Sergey, an Armenian guy that I work with quite frequently. He's a nice enough guy, although sometimes he's quick to frustration because of misunderstandings. But an okay guy. We drove in his car and although it was a short drive, we did get lost and I was about to hurl by the time we got there because I was getting carsick. It was right after lunch and Sergey kept turning around, making quick jolts with his wheel, and I was a shade of green by the time we got there.

While there, we just looked at some numbers over and over again, checking lot codes and making notations. Nothing exciting really.

But when it came time to go home, we got lost again, I don't really know how, and I was always late getting home for the changing of the guard with the kids.

So there you go. Lesson of the day, never ignore your own advice, and never be a passenger in a car. And stay away from pits reeking of acid.

After today's Fourth, I could apply to be the entertainment director of a cruise liner. This is the only slow moment of the day, just us sitting on a bench outside the mall watching the park traffic empty out slowly. The streets are still clogged, with cars trickling out of the mall.

We started out relatively early, left the house at around 3 and came for the mall. We took care of purchasing movie tickets first, then walked over to the California Pizza Kitchen, had a Thai Chicken and a Garlic Chicken pizza, then headed down to the park where the kids found some inflatable goodness to enjoy. After gawking at some juggling fools and getting some weird swag, we went to see Star Trek.

The movie was pretty good, and I was actually a little miffed at a few of the comments heard on Filmspotting, about how they thought the story was servicable and that the villian was a throwaway. I thought the story not only bridged the old and new fans relatively well, but also managed to pay tribute to the old Trek while ushering in the new. How all the crew members get promoted into their roles seemed a little goofy, with a lot of off-screen folks buying it, but overall it was a fun ride.

Right after the movie we hustled down to the park, even though we probably didn't have to. We found a spot and gambled on it, and worked out perfectly. People were extremely pushy and inconsiderate but we enjoyed ourselves. We waited for the traffic for about an hour before heading out.