I just said duty

Ladies and gentlemen, today is a beautiful day. But Peter, isn't every day beautiful in its own way? Good question, Peter. But today is especially beautiful for one rather significant reason: I've successfully completed my jury duty and don't have to return today.

I received the summons in the mail, and unlike some of you out there who know who you are, I didn't just toss it in the trash can. It had been a while since I'd been called upon to do my civic duty, so I didn't feel like this was too out of line. As long as I was either dismissed or on a very short trial, I thought, it might even be fun to get to be a part of the legal system.

My previous juror history was in Santa Barbara, and roughly 100% different from this one. I can sum up the SB experience in a few short sentences. I arrived early (as I have to by Peter law) and parked on one of the nearby city streets. I sat in the jury selection room with a bunch of people, several of whom I knew from working on campus. We watched a video on the importance of being a juror, then a large group of us was ushered into the courtroom. A handful of potential jurors was called up and asked questions, some were dismissed, others were called, and then they had their jury. I wasn't called up at all, and I was excused with the rest of the folks shortly before lunch.

Foolishly, I thought this might be a similar experience. My first indication that I was way off was when I noticed that I was to drive 20-something miles to the downtown courthouse instead of the Van Nuys one a few miles away. I called to see about moving it, and I was told quite clearly that unless I only took public transportation and this was an extreme hardship for me, my request was unlikely to be granted. No problem, I said, and I got up earlier to beat some of the traffic before the 7:45 meeting time. If you're unfamiliar with LA traffic, that means I left at 6:15.

I was instructed to park about half a mile away, then led past a wrong courthouse before getting to the right one. I went through metal detectors and found my way to the jury selection room with a large group of unhappy-looking folks. We waited around until close to 8:15 when a woman came out and yelled out instructions. She explained that those of us with the beige form should be in this line, and those with the pink and white form should be in that one. She must have said "beige" fifty times over the next ten minutes, and I'm sure she does that every morning of every workday. It therefore surprises me that no one's corrected her on her pronunciation of the color. She somehow had both a hard and soft g in there, so instead of sounding like "bayzh," it was more of a "baygzh." I didn't point this out to her, so I suppose I'm equally a part of the problem.

We were then informed that under the new rules, we should expect to be there until 4 or 5pm. The woman told us that if we got called as a potential juror but excused, we were to report back there to that room to try again before the day was over. Uh oh, Toto, we're not in Santa Barbara anymore.

And then we waited. And waited. At around 10:15, they showed us a video that told us all about places to eat in downtown LA. I jotted some notes down because being horrible with directions, I wanted to make sure that I was going to find sustenance somewhere. Then we waited some more. I noticed an interesting thing about sitting in the jury selection room. The social interactions were very similar to those on an airplane. Eerily similar, in fact. Everyone was silent except for a couple of strangers talking too loudly to people who were being more polite than they should. A man sat down next to me and we nodded at each other in a way that said, "We're going to be next to each other for a few hours, we may as well be friendly." I got up and navigated through the seats to the bathroom, and coming back, people looked up at me in the same exact way I've seen multiple times on planes. Throughout the room, people stared off into space, read the paper, did crossword puzzles, and listened to iPods. It was a stationary airplane cabin, and I assure you, that's the worst kind.

Since I'm not really allowed to discuss the trial that I eventually was not chosen for (despite sitting around bored out of my mind for two entire days instead of attending to the literal piles of work on my desk), I will leave you with some quick hits of other things that happened in the jury selection room.

1. I saw at least three people asleep during the orientation part at the very beginning of the day. Only one of the three was nodding in an attempt to stave off the sleepiness. The other two owned it completely.

2. A man two rows in front of me was reading a book called "Getting The Love You Want." He at least could've taken the jacket off of it to save himself a little embarrassment. (Please note, it's not embarrassing at all for someone to get the love that he or she wants, but I believe there is some in illustrating that desire to hundreds of strangers throughout the courthouse.)

3. When a man helping people fill out the form said, "If you have no emergency contact, just write None," I first pictured "nun," which made me smile to myself.

4. I could've selected a sandwich from the little shop called the "Tuna Salad Super Triangle." I also could've died from said selection.

5. While filling out our forms, I noticed that the man next to me had a blood stain on his pants. I followed it up and saw fresh blood on his forearm. "Are you ok?" I immediately asked. "Oh yeah, I just bleed when I write," he said matter-of-factly. Uh, what the fuck does that mean? And why did I nod like I understood his statement instead of pressing him for further details? It's times like these I almost wish I were back there in that room.

Ok, I'll stop there. I think you might get the point. It was a very long two days that I will never get back, but at least I didn't die from Super Triangle Poisoning. Have a great Sorry Honey It's Thursday, and I'll see you back here tomorrow for another Follow Up Friday. Shaloha.