Proud To Be An American

After arriving at jury duty around 8:15am, like a timely little citizen, I chose my seat carefully. End seat, middle row, back section, prime TV spot. Over an hour later, the world's loudest breather arrived and chose the seat next to me. If I didn't have swine flu last week when I thought I was dying, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna have it now.

Because of the number of us, and the increasingly obvious lack of system in place (don't they do this every day?), it took over two hours just to get checked in. And for me, it didn't help that I was behind the one woman (out of the 179 potential jurors) who came on the wrong day.


To occupy myself after finally checking in and reclaiming my seat, I glanced around the room to find my fake boyfriend for the day. A swing and a miss. The best looking guy here happened to be sitting directly in front of me, but he lost his edge when I noticed that I could see my reflection in his hair. The Aveda salesperson almost came out of me as I fought the urge to say, "I notice you like to add a LOT of shine to your hair...what products are you currently using?"


The man next to me had started to snore and talk in his sleep. The two women behind me, although perfect strangers, did not shut up since they got there. In case you were wondering, because I apparently was, the first one was 38 years old and works in Congress. She also worked for a very long time was an insurance underwriter. The other loud mouth was 68 and on social security after spending her prime years as a business owner. I could go much further into detail but I will spare you, as I wish I could have been spared myself.

11 am...My $15 for lunch is buying me a bottle of wine instead. Or, seriously considering buying this t-shirt.

I also would have liked to have spared myself from the movie they put on. Secondhand Lions, which I've seen on three different New York bus trips before today. There are over 10 million movies in the world (per Wikipedia) and yet I'm officially being stalked by this once mediocre, now unbearable, not-good-enough-to-be-chosen-for-every-public-movie-viewing-opportunity flick.

And no, the start of the movie was not enough reason for the women behind me to shut the hell up.

11:07 am...Correction...the $15 for wine is buying me a (cheap) bottle of vodka.

Lunch break got announced at around 12, advising us that at 1:30, 120 jurors would be called into the court rooms. Because of my sheer lack of option, I tossed aside the bottle of booze for the opportunity to get out of that room and eat.

Deciding not to venture outdoors in the freezing temps, I headed to the Court House Deli (I may have made up the name) just downstairs. I ordered turkey on wheat with lettuce, tomato, and pickles with a small Maryland crab soup instead of chips. $11 gone (not including my drink), I opened up what appeared to be chicken noodle and tuna instead.


On the way back from lunch, I followed a 50-year old man that had taken a liking to me after my shoes had been stopped by security (don't ask), onto an elevator that just happened to be evacuated moments later as it was being surrendered for prisoner transport. Umm?

Before heading back into the holding area, I stopped by the ladies room. Perhaps the best part of my day is when I noticed a Master Lock on the bottom left of the toilet paper dispenser. You know you're in a place frequented by criminals (ahem, alleged criminals) when a fear of TP theft is at hand...

Still laughing, I headed back in just in time for them to announce that the judges were still not ready to begin. 120 jurors would now be called at 2:30pm instead. I began to half read, half watch wretched movie, again, in a time-passing attempt.

My number got called into the court room. A criminal case. Fancy! This part was actually really interesting and hilarious. Interesting because I never really knew what went into a jury selection. Hilarious because people are really, really stupid. At one point, the judge asked if anyone had any type of relation to anyone in the law enforcement industry. One juror actually stood up and said, "What type of relations are you talking about?" And if you could have seen the look on her face, you would have known she was seriously considering "relations" that did not involve being "related" to anyone at all.

The state and defense attorneys finally agreed on a jury. In the end, I was not one of them. However, one of the chatty women AND Mr. McBreathe were both among the chosen 12! If nothing else, that is going to be one extremely noisy jury deliberation room.

5:15 pm correction: The $4 left over is going towards a new prescription to Paxil that I plan on requesting from my doctor first thing tomorrow morning.

Until then, I will resort back to my original plan and drink that bottle (er, glass?) of wine and I will do it knowing that it will be at least 3 years before I have to report back for duty or be forced to watch Secondhand Lions again.