What I Learned Today

This jury duty thing is very educational. Today I learned quite a bit about the world simply by watching what goes on in a courtroom and even moreso inside a courthouse.

1. Its good to be the judge. The dude gets to make his own schedule. Interrupt whoever, whenever he wants. Crack inappropriate jokes at innapropriate times (more on this later). And everyone still has to call him Your Highness...at least I do (under my breath, of course).

2. Even courtrooms get wrong phone numbers. Today in the middle of the defense's cross examination of a witness, a phone rings. The judge stops everything, and answers HIS phone on speaker phone so all of us could hear. It was some middle eastern guy in California calling for Ahmed. The judge mocked him, cracked jokes (luckily none of them were racial or terrorist oriented) then hung up and let the defense attorny finish as though nothing happened. I bet that ticked the lawyer off.

3. I now understand the inefficiency of government. I was at the courthouse for 8 hours today and spend 4 hours of it on break. Am I weird for not needing to pee that much, or do I simply have work ethic? Another thing I haven't figured out, but I noticed. We sit on our butts, then when we get a break, all but 3 of us go into a break room to sit and rest. I walk around looking at odd-balls...which leads to my next point.

4. I used to wonder why Wal-Mart gets so busy after 5:00pm. I figured, Wal- Mart shoppers don't have jobs, why don't they go any earlier? Now I know. The courthouse closes at 5:00 and they all get kicked out of their day-time hang out...which leads me to todays biggest and most important lesson...

5. If I see one more toothless fat woman in a tube top walking around with her "man" who is 6'3 and weighs $1.35 wearing a FUBU basketball jersey (despite the fact that both are white underneath all that dirt) and a camoflauge, mesh baseball cap that says "Dale Earnhardt, #3 RIP" I am going to start praying for tornadoes. Courthouse crowds scare me.

As far as the case goes, "Law and Order" is much more interesting. More later.