Judgment Day

It's 3:30 a.m. in the morning, and I'm blogging, partly because I've been feeling a little sick the last couple days, and partlyy because today is our court date, and I just found out I'm supposed to have about a 7-minute speech for the judge, and -- oh by the way -- learning a couple of new phrases in Russian would be a good idea.

Now I've always been one to wait until the last minute to cram for a test, but I usually like to know the test is coming a little sooner. I thought I would just have to answer questions from the judge, not deliver an Atticus Finch-type closing argument in a Russian courtroom.

And they want you to memorize what you're going to say, not read it from a script.

I can't memorize 7 minutes. I can't even remember what I had for breakfast yesterday.

So I'm wide awake on Sudafed, Pepsi, and nerves. Our court hearing is at noon here. Our adoption rep is coming at 10:30 a.m. to prep us on the court hearing for an hour. They keep telling me that the court hearing is not that big of a deal and not to worry about it, but if it wasn't such a big deal, why would we need to prep for an hour? OJ's lawyers only prepped him for 45 minutes.

If you read no more blogs after today, you'll know that I botched my Russian phrases and said something to the judge like "Your mother wears Russian combat boots." And if that's not considered an insult in this country, maybe something like "All your clothing has Made In China labels" or "You finished fourth in the last Summer Olympics medal count. Who's your daddy?"