Jury duty

[figment]

I had jury duty today. Thank goodness it was not last week, when everything was crazy at work; this week is relatively calm. So people only flipped out a minor amount at my day "off".

I got to the courthouse at 8 AM and spent the rest of the day doing... nothing.
I watched a "juror orientation" video which stressed how important my participation was.
I listened to people with last names beginning with A-D get called.
I watched The Net, which was pretty awful as far as computer-hacking plausibility went, especially towards the end, and also fairly awful as far as how-bad-can-things-get-for-the-main-character. I'm sure you all knew that already. Now I know it really, really well, because they showed it to us one and a half times.
At some point in there I listened to people with last names beginning with E-K get called.
I read a substantial chunk of I'm the Teacher, You're the Student. (We'd had the author come to AU for an event last week. I had dinner with him. It was nice, and he was funny; I'm not sure that I agree with his teaching style but his writing is easy and enjoyable, and he's good at leading discussions.)
I went on my lunch break, in which I went to the Teaism on 8th St, so that was enjoyable. I read and replied to some work-related email, and called my assistant to answer one question she'd had.
I went back to jury duty and watched more people get called. I think they got through M. (Every time they would restart at the beginning of the alphabet, because more jurors had showed up.)
I watched the first 2/3 of Divine Secrets of the Ya-ya Sisterhood, which I had loathed the mere sight of in book form due to its unrelenting popularity and the nigh-incessant demands of women who swarmed the bookstore I worked at, asking for "That Ya-Ya Book". The movie seems okay, but I don't know if I'll bother to seek it out to watch the end of it.
Finally, at around 3, they told us all we could go home. I did not bother to stand in the huge line to collect my $4 transportation allowance. I just walked out and enjoyed the weather.
Now I'm at home, enjoying the silence, my cats, the Internet, a cider, and the freedom to wear only my underwear.

Boy, it's exciting to be a part of the judicial system.

Comments

[riotdorrrk.livejournal.com]

>I watched The Net, which was pretty awful as far as computer-hacking plausibility went, especially towards the end, and also fairly awful as far as how-bad-can-things-get-for-the-main-character. I'm sure you all knew that already.

thankfully, i am blissfully unaware.

>The movie seems okay, but I don't know if I'll bother to seek it out to watch the end of it.

it's really not. worth it, i mean. that sort of thing has its intended audience, and you are not it...

when i worked for Henn. Cty. Dist. Ct., jury duty seemed like a pretty low-key thing... don't understand why so many people try to get out of it.

[amblypygid.livejournal.com]

I think there are lots of reasons people try to get out of jury duty. If I were called now, it would be terrible from the child care end, since I spend my days at home with the kids. And when I was teaching, it was really hard, because college teaching isn't really something you can easily get a substitute for. I arranged for jury duty to be over spring break (one week) and then had to cancel the second week of classes.

At least I still got my salary, but some people don't get paid if they don't go to work, and that's a huge problem.

[talkswithwind]

The one time my mom got called for Jury Duty was also the one and only week we were ever in Day Care. It happened during the summer, which was tough. I understand that put a big hole in the budget.