monkeymom's Diaryland Diary
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The land of the free and the home of the drunk.
I hope you all are proud of me, because I went to jury duty today. I worked until 7 a.m. and then reported to the courthouse at 8:45. I was actually a few minutes late, because the fat cop with the bad haircut at the front door checkpoint sent me back to the car to leave my knitting there. Apparently my blunt size 8 circular knitting needles are considered a dangerous weapon. Please. I had BIC PENS in my purse sharper than those needles and they let me carry those into the courtroom unimpeded!
There were about 40 of us waiting for two hours in a room that barely held all of us, and it was getting pretty warm in there! There was some ice water and a large pot of what I was told was very terrible coffee available for us to drink, but there was no Diet Pepsi, so you know I was suffering! I read my book and was grateful I had it, because two hours of waiting? In a hot room full of citizens? OMG. Very unpleasant.
When we finally filed into the courtroom, we found out that they were picking a jury for a DUI case. Okay, a guy is arrested for running a red light under the influence of alchohol and an unspecified "another substance", and he is also charged with having an open container of alchohol in the vehicle, and why does he want to go to court to fight that? I was wondering how he could deny those charges, since there is most likely going to be medical evidence and there were two cops who were going to be testifying as witnesses. Is he going to say they are lying because they don't like him?
So the questioning of potential jurors began and you would be surprised to know how many people know someone with a DUI conviction. Of course they all said it wouldn't influence their thinking on this case. One woman's brother had been killed by a drunk driver, one man said that two of his kids had been in accidents where alchohol was a factor and one of them almost died! I was wondering how they would find anyone to be on that jury. It took all day! I didn't get out of there until after 3, and I was went straight home to bed.
This is how tired I was - when you first get to the room where you check in, you fill out a form that asks, among other things, if you have any family members or close friends who are cops, and I thought for a minute, and kind of felt like there was someone I knew, maybe some of these part-time security guards at work? I'm not really close friends with any of them that I could think of, so I checked 'No' but it was nagging at me, and two hours later when I was in the courtroom I suddenly remembered that my husbands brother and his wife are both retired from the police force! I felt a bit stupid, but I was tired! You should have seen the look Rich gave me later when I told him I checked 'No' on that one!
After I was not chosen for the jury, the judge thanked all of us profusely and reminded us that it is a privilege that we as American citizens have, to be able to serve on a jury, and I hummed a little of "Oh Say Can You See" to the woman sitting next to me as we happily gathered our bags and coats to leave.
When I got home I slept for about 4 hours and then went to the grocery store with Kim so I would have something to eat at work tonight, and now I am back at work. Four hours sleep is not enough, so I am still tired, and looking forward to going home to bed in the morning!
11:33 p.m. - 2006-12-19
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