ladies & gentlemen of the jury

thaaaaaat's right.
i get to go back Thursday to sit on the jury of a criminal case.

actually, one of us will be an alternate, but we don't know which of the seven of us it will be.

yesterday was the first time i have ever been summoned for jury duty so i had zero idea what to expect. some thoughts & observations from my day:

1. the process of jury selection is fascinating. some of the questions they ask the potential jurors are enough to make you feel like *you're* the one on trial. also you get a pretty good feel for the direction the two sides will be taking in their arguments.

2. when it takes nine hours to select a seven person jury, you know the trial is going to be something. you guessed it: that's the one i am on.

3. you would think that if they are going to make you sit for nine hours, the least they could do would be to give you something softer to sit on than unpadded benches & hard plastic chairs. my backside is finally recovered from that trauma. thank God i get to sit in the comfy chairs on Thursday.

4. because it took so long & so many panels of people to fill the seven spots, and because once you are chosen, you are required to sit in the court room until the entire jury is selected, let's just say you hear the introduction given by the judge, and the questions from the attorneys so many times, you start to feel a little silly. by the time the final panel of potential jurors entered the court room at ten minutes to five, we had long since been placing bets on which jurors would never make the cut & who would be picked.

i can't say that i am excited about being chosen, but... on the other hand, this should be one interesting, if not potentially disturbing, case.