Jury Duty...

After rescheduling 2 times, I had no more mulligans left, so I reported this morning for jury duty. The bad thing about jury duty here is at the courthouse is downtown, and I live 25 miles away. I live in one suburb and work in another. That means I don't have to go downtown and fight traffic. This morning I fought that traffic. I hate traffic.

So, an hour commute to report for jury duty at 8am. I was picked as number 37 in a 48 person panel, of which 12 would be picked. Yippie, a civil deal. One guy suing another for injuries from a car accident. What's worse, the plaintiff is a former cop. He is now a hairdresser. Heh, heh. What a change...

The funny thing about juries is how bad everyone tries to get out of them. One guy did the math and figured out that he was close enough to the front to get picked, so he went for broke. The plaintiff was a quite large guy. This potential juror claimed to have an eating disorder and would find it impossible to be impartial to a guy of that size. Pretty original. He didn't get picked, so I guess it worked.

In the end, I was finally released around 1:00 or so. In Houston, that means walking a couple of blocks from the courthouse to the building that the jury pool assembles to pay for parking. The kicker, jury duty pays $6 per day and parking is $5.50. What's even better? Effective tomorrow, the juror pay is $40 per day. I wonder what they will increase parking to?