I missed work today because I had to appear at the King County Superior Court. For jury duty. My first time. That’s me, Juror #101052652. The tip from the office was that the courthouse had wireless, so I brought the laptop, and man was that a good idea. Because 75% of us were just sitting there, waiting. My friend, Cathy, was summoned on the same day as me (what are the odds) and she was called pretty early in the morning. From what I can tell, being called consisted of filling out questionnaires; waiting; filling out more questionnaires; waiting some more. Meanwhile, I caught up on email, read through all of my favorite blogs, did some blogging of my own and then was let go for a two-hour lunch. An hour after lunch they let us go early. Poor Cathy had to stay though. She could still be there for all I know.

I did not bring my camera; the husband feared it would be confiscated, but we shouldn’t have been nervous. Yes, I did go through a metal detector and my bag was scanned, but the atmosphere in the Jury Assembly Room was far from strict. The Bailiff, Greg, kept trying to make jokes (the ol’ “Good Morning. (pause to silence). C’mon, you can do better than that! Good Morning (Audience replies in that school-boy drone, “good moooorning”). He tried to make some other cracks and all I could do was giggle because no one even lifted their heads up from their newspaper, books, magazine, laptop, etc.

Back to the 2-hour lunch. I walked a few blocks and stopped at Soup Daddy’s (recommended by the Jury Supervisor) for some clam chowder and a chicken salad sandwich. On the way back I saw a Cow Chip stand and had a calf chip. No pics (see the previous paragraph). I did not know what to expect for lunch (i.e. would they make you eat in a cafeteria? No. Could we do whatever we wanted? Yes, provided you got back at the assigned time). Tomorrow, when I return (for those of you in King County, jury duty is a two-day commitment. Keep that in mind. I didn’t know), I’ll be prepared with ideas for where to eat in Pioneer Square. Any suggestions for someone with an hour to kill? (Salumi is out. I could not fathom going there without the husband). If all else fails, I discovered there is a Jimmy John’s on First & Yesler that will likely be calling my name. I’ll even bring the camera, too.

Anyway, all of this jury duty talk kept reminding me of that movie based on the Grisham novel, “The Runaway Jury” with John Cusack, Gene Hackman and Dustin Hoffman. And all I can think was, what are the odds that you actually land on that jury. You are summoned on the very day the trial of the century is picking jurors? No way. They lost me. I tried to suspend my disbelief, but I cannot.

Heh.