doing my civic doodie

I reported to jury duty this morning like a good citizen. Me and over 500 other people. Oh the slice of Americana that shows up at the courthouse, it gave Walmart a run for its money. After waiting an hour, a judge came to tell us the deal.

He explained how the courts system works. Here's what I remember about what he said - they start around 9:00, they break at 10:15, then they resume until 12:00 when they take lunch until 1:30. Then they take a break around 3:00 and then they quit for the day by 4:30. Oh, and they seat juries the beginning of the week but they don't like to do it towards the end of the week because that could get all confusing. And by "the end of the week" I think he meant anything after Tuesday.

Huh? Oh, and then he spent quite a bit of time lecturing us that making any changes to our judicial system whereby judges are politically appointed would be the death of justice as we know it.

Seriously? I think the fact that by his account they only work four or five hours a day for four days a week is a bigger problem but who am I to say. I'm just a citizen here.

I sat dutifully listening for my name to be called and ended up being dismissed at 3:45. No more jury duty for me until the next time they send me a letter.

I was kind of bummed that I didn't get a chance to answer their questions with inflammatory statements about how I hate all men and I also hate women and I think lawyers are scum and so are police officers and criminals need to rot in jail. I figured the more insane I acted, the less likely they'd be to choose me to sit on some medical malpractice jury. Although, working in the drugs industry might also have been my ticket out of it.

As I was putting Cooper to bed last night he told me a little tale I planned to use in my questioning if it ever came up.

C: What's jury duty?
H: Well, they'll ask me a lot of questions. I have to go to the courthouse and help the judges decide whether a bad guy goes to jail or not.
C: If I asked the questions, I would ask what is your favorite sport.
H: What's your favorite sport?
C: I have five favorite sports [jazz hands]. Karate, skateboarding, snakes, skateboards, and bicycles. Oh, and grandma, and alligators.
H: Cool sports choices. I like those too, especially Grandma, and snakes.
C: Yeah.

- H