The First Rule About Jury Duty

Is “don’t talk about jury duty.” So, I’ll talk about what I can talk about so far.  If your number does not get called in the pre-selection phone call the night before, fear not, you can still show up to jury duty, get out of work, AND fulfill your civic duty. The 8 people in front of me all had not called, each had numbers outside of the group that was called to be present, and rather than the lady just being like “Hey, nimrods, can’t you read the 2 sentences of instructions you got?” she said, “Thank you so much for showing up, if you’d like to stay and fulfill your civic duty please feel free, we appreciate you being here.” Really.

I was entirely too excited to get called for jury duty. Coworkers tried to squash my excitement by telling me how numbingly boring the entire day would be and how I wouldn’t even be selected. The Jury Duty waiting room resembled that of an mva room….chairs and monitors and ugly people. Not sure why every time I do something where I meet new people (school, ce classes, jury duty) that I assume everyone is going to be interesting, attractive, and my age. I did end up sitting right next to my pseudo-aunt which is a little crazy. There was a decent computer lab with pretty unrestricted internet, a collection of decent books and magazines, and 1 or 2 attractive people (1%.) Internet access alone made this potentially boring and disappointing day wonderfully bearable.

I end up getting selected for the first group of 20 or so potential jurors (LUCKY!) for a civil trial (was really hoping for criminal.) The group of jury dutians had lawyers and judges in it which I thought was pretty damn random. During the Voir Dire part (which is where they ask general questions, and if your answer is yes, if it will affect your decision in a trial…yadda yadda) the lady to my left would not stop belching. Seriously. Belching…in a court room. This immediately had me thinking of cucumbers, cuz seriously, who knew: http://cuke.hort.ncsu.edu/cucurbit/wehner/articles/art090.pdf Not sure if she was trying to get out of it, but she got chosen anyway.

Then after the endless Voir Dire, I was the FIRST JUROR SELECTED wooohooo! Only 7 of us got selected out of the batch of 20 something. I could barely contain my excitement. And not only have I been selected without having to wait around all day wanting to stab my eyes out, I got selected for a two day trial. That’s two days paid off work, and a total of $30 extra bucks the court gives.  $30 = a really lovely happy hour.  Thank you, taxpayers.

I’ll give the rest of the details tomorrow to avoid getting put in jail. So far, Jury Duty rocks.