Excuses.

So as I promised (because I know that you are all just dying to know) I must fill you in on how my time at court for jury duty went. I must say it was a great experience. Of course things did not get started until 30 minutes after I was supposed to be there. In the previous post I predicted that it would be more like a social event. Well not so much at first. I walked in, you know, the awkward walk in where you want to just stop and look around and take in everyone that is there to see if you know anyone, but you don't want to because it is also at that point that everyone in the room will turn to look at you and see if they know you. Many of you college students know exactly what I am talking about. It's happened at least twice a year for however many years you've been in college. And you know how everyone sits just perfectly spaced out so you're not too close to the people seated around you. And you look around just HOPING that there is a big gap left open so you don't have to awkwardly choose which persons GIANT personal bubble you are going to violate. Luckily there was a gap left for me. So there I was sitting in a court room full of people I did not know (at least as far as I knew). Who knew there were so many people in my county that I did not know. Then began the roll call where I learned that a few people that I do know had skipped out on jury duty and their names would be turned over to the sheriff's office. Ruh roh. (Don't worry I gave them a heads up). Next we were told the list of things that would allow us to be excused from serving. Oh. My. Goodness. The excuses these people had. I was cracking up by the end because it was so ridiculous. So these are the things I could have done to get out of jury duty:

1. There was one point where I could be excused if I had been convicted of a felony. One lady did raise her hand for this one. I almost followed suit.
2. It crossed my mind to stand up and scream while crying "I'm emotionally unstable!!"
3. Am I the primary caregiver to someone? Yes. It's my day to cook lunch.
4. I also wanted to stand up and tell him how "involved" I am in the Casey Anthony trial.
5. There is a rule and I quote I "shall not be a common gambler or habitual drunkard." If this doesn't sound like something off of Andy Griffith I don't know what does. Although I do not qualify for either of those things I still thought it was funny.

I am sure that one of these would have worked. But I persevered and stayed. I took 2 oaths which qualifies me for gas money and a per diem. Not bad for a day at the courthouse. After all of the excuses, my chances for serving increased a lot. They said they were choosing 20 jurors and there were about 50 people left. We were dismissed for a short recess, where I wish I would have stood up and asked where the playground was. Like any recess I've ever been involved in this is where the social gathering began. We then returned to court where we would find out if we had been chosen to serve. I must admit I became a little fearful of serving when they brought in the inmates wearing their nice stripes that were sitting just a few benches up in front of me. One was just hanging out with his fam that had came to support him. It was so cute. 3 members of his family, whether intentionally or not I don't know, were also wearing fat horizontal stripes. How cute. Anyway. I was not a chosen juror randomly selected, but was quite entertained for a few hours. If you ever get the chance to serve please do. It's a great experience.