Kleptomania and other fun things

I've missed checking out people's blogs lately because I've been having problems with my laptop, or 'labtop,' as Blair used to call them. I know, I'm so rude to make fun of him, but that is seriously funny--who says that? Anyway, you can't tell from reading this, but it is taking me an unnaturally long time to type because my arms and fingers are frozen. Aimee and I just got back from a short 30 minute run, and it was a little colder than I thought on my appendages. But I know how much you all depend on me, so I'm going to tough it out and keep typing even though it took me 5 minutes to type this paragraph.

I've got to say, I love being able to find friends from high school and college that I haven't talked to forever through the blogging world. It's so fun to see what people have been up to and where their lives are at now. Speaking of that, I'll just make a quick mention since Aimee, Nicole, and Brenda have already posted pictures and stuff of Jonah, Dylan and Darci's new baby boy. They had him on Friday, and they are all doing well. I was telling Blair on Saturday that if someone had told me ten years ago that Dylan would be a parent before I would, I would not have believed them. It's funny the way things happen. He is such a cute dad already. It's so fun to see my brothers growing up and becoming adults. I mean, it's also fun to see my sisters growing up and becoming adults, but let's be honest, it's not as big of a change since we're all already so 'mature,' according to Dylan.

On another note, I don't know if everyone gets sick of my rants about court, but I just can't believe the things that go on sometimes. Regarding the title of this post, I decided that I'm going to start documenting the really dumb reasons that people get arrested for felony theft charges and give some type of prize to the person who does the stupidest thing. Just for a little background, in Utah (and probably a lot of other states), if you are convicted of theft twice, then your third time is charged as a felony, regardless of the dollar amount (that was a lot of commas--sorry about that). As it turns out, there are a lot of people who just can't figure it out and stop stealing things. Here are the top three that I have seen so far, just in the last 6 months of working at the court.

Number 3 is probably the guy from a couple weeks ago that got arrested on felony shoplift charges because he really needed to quench his thirst while shopping in Albertson's. So he went ahead and took a beer off the shelf, went into the bathroom, and drank half of it--felony! I mean, seriously, how much does one beer cost, like $2 bucks? So yeah, this guy was charged with a third degree felony, which is punishable by zero to 5 in the state prison, for drinking half a beer in the Albertson's bathroom. Really?? Wow. Runner up is the guy from a couple months ago who got charged with aggravated robbery because he used a knife to rob a guy who was sitting in his truck in a Wal-Mart parking lot. He took a duffle bag from the back seat of the guy's truck, hoping to find some good stuff, I guess. Turns out, it had 'memorabilia' from the guy's relationship with his ex girlfriend--things like pictures, ticket stubs from concerts they had attended together, old pregnancy tests...and I'm not even kidding about that. When the guy said that I almost laughed out loud in court. Dude is sitting in jail on agg robbery charges for stealing some pictures and an old, nasty used pregnancy test. Ew.

But the best has got to be the guy from last week who got sent back to prison (yep, not kidding) for 'forgetting' to pay at IHOP. His excuse was that when he got out of prison, his wife divorced him and he just didn't know what to do. So one day he got really drunk and went to get a meal at IHOP and just totally forgot to pay. Left the waiter a $3 tip, but forgot to pay his tab. Whoops. Theft of services--felony. When he offered up this gem of an excuse to the judge, the judge said, "No, you didn't [forget to pay]. It's not that simple." Then the judge proceeded to read off the guy's criminal history--theft, theft, theft, robbery, theft, theft. "You have left me with no choice but to send you back to prison." And I'm sitting there completely dumbfounded, thinking, "Dude! You're going back to prison for zero to 5 for $20 worth of food! How dumb can you be?" Apparently pretty dumb. So far, my kleptorific award goes to him. But you never know--he'll probably have some pretty stiff competition during our felony calendar tomorrow.