#40 Serve on a jury
For the first time, when I got my most recent jury summons I wasn't able to check the 'not a citizen' box since I'm full on 'Murican now. So I sucked it up and headed to the court house to do my civic duty. Unlike everyone else, I was hoping I'd get picked so I could check something off
. Scenes from Law & Order, Legally Blond and A Few Good Men were playing in my head- I was ready for some drama and excitement!
I had high hopes for a cool looking courthouse (I helped on one a few years ago and look how much better that one
) but what a disaster of a building- in major need of an overhaul! Anyways, I came well prepared with a book, water and lunch...however they were not messing around and I managed to just finish eating when they called my name.
We went into courtroom 25 and then I began the 4 most boring hours of my life. I wasn't picked to sit up at the front as a potential witness right away so I had to sit and listen to all the reason why everyone couldn't be a juror in this case- for example: 'Well my neighbor was a cop and I thought he was really nice so yea I wouldn't be able to treat a police officer testimony the same as everyone else- I would give it more weight cuz of my neighbor who's just like totally nice'. ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?! I made sure to stare down all the people who left with stupid excuses making the rest of us sit through their boring questioning. The first two hours went by REAL slow as I adhered to the 'no cell phones' and 'no reading' and 'no sleeping' signs. After a quick break I realized that the people in the back had the right idea and sat back there to finish up my book and catch up on Facebook.
With only 5 minutes to go they dismissed 7 people and had to fill their seats- guess who's name was the last picked? Thats right, this girl got the number 22 seat. They dismissed us for the day without picking a jury (for the most boring case ever that revolved around if paperwork was filed or not <-- ugh Law & Order makes it look way more exciting) and so I showed up on Monday morning like a good American just to be dismissed since the defendants lawyer was sick- awesome!
So yes considering I got to sit up at the front I'm counting this as checked off because that was possibly the most boring item on my list of American things and I'm so happy I don't need to go through that for at least another year. Yay American judicial system- you're really working well <--lies.
