Jury Duty, Salmon, & Saints

I'm on jury duty this week and had to report to the criminal courthouse for a morning of waiting  to be put on a jury or released. It was a beautiful spring day in downtown L.A. Blue sky and clouds like cream puffs with only the hint of a threat of more rain.
I figured since I had to step onto Mr. Ex's turf, I might as well jump in with both feet, so I walked up the hill to the Our Lady of the Angels Cathedral cafeteria for lunch. Mr. Ex was (maybe still is despite his transgressions) a practicing Catholic and often went to Mass at the Cathedral during the week. If he's still in the habit, and  I ran into him there, I thought it might give him a jolt, and maybe a miracle would come barreling down from the heavens, and he might be inspired to wrap up our division of joint assets. That didn't happen, but I did enjoy my smoked salmon salad.
Or would have enjoyed my smoked salmon if the cafeteria wasn't laid out like like a circuit box. I hate cafeterias. They all seem to suffer from the same lack of planning. I had to get a tray from the hot food line, traverse the maze of tables to a cooler that held the salads, to another cooler that held the water, then back across the room to pay, then back across the tangle of people waiting in line for the hot food and the line of people waiting for  the cashier in order  to fill the paper cup that the cashier gave me for my coffee. The "silverware" and the napkins were around the corner from the coffee, and then it was necessary to snake back through the people and the chairs and the tables to the door that opened onto the patio. Isn't there some brilliant autistic person who could come up with a universal template for a cafeteria layout and do for frustrated diners what Temple Grandin has done for cows?
And maybe this cafeteria savant could explain that plastic is over and that even recycled paper cups probably put more strain on the environment than reusable ceramic cups.

Visiting the Cathedral made me less cranky. I love its modern vibe and the beautiful art. It strikes me as a more feminine place than most churches. I especially love how "Our Lady" looks like a modern woman. I love the crescent moon at her feet and that when you exit the Cathedral, what you see from the back side of that sculture looks like a full moon--golden and floating above you, but not all that far out of reach.