Yeah, That Would Be Me

I am so stressed out about the possibility of five weeks of jury duty that it’s making my chronic insomnia even worse than usual. I woke up yesterday at 4:45 a.m. On the plus side, I got to work at 8. I would have gotten in even earlier if it hadn’t been for my reluctance to walk to work in the dark. (Walking to work as the sun came up was weird, since it was only a few years ago that I occasionally was coming home as the sun rose (totally vampire style).)

There’s a part of me that’s hoping I’ll suddenly be stricken with nasty boils or something like that, so I can show off my horrid boils to the judge and point out that I’m not someone they want on their jury.

I keep thinking about what jury duty could be like. I read this little gem on Wonkette: One juror was kicked off the Scooter Libby trial during deliberations. She was also the only juror who didn’t dress up in a heart t-shirt on Valentine’s Day. The rest of the jury wore matching t-shirts, and the foreman actually gave a little speech thanking the marshals and the judge and wishing everyone a happy Valentine’s Day. Clearly, too many weeks on that jury has wiped away any common sense these people once had.

I can just imagine what the other jurors thought of the t-shirt-abstaining woman:

“What is her problem?... Thinks she’s so much better than us… Why won’t she just wear the shirt? It’s FESTIVE!... What a bitch…”

And you know what? I would totally be the bitch who refuses to wear the t-shirt. I fucking hate dressing like everyone else, and I’m not so good with the whole group thing. The last time I was on jury duty, the best part of it for me was that there was a lot of sitting around time (we were stuck in the jury room for more time than we were in the courtroom), and I spent that time reading, something I never have enough time to do in my daily life. This mystified the other jurors, who said things like, “You sure do read a lot” in a slightly incredulous tone, as if saying “You sure do seem to enjoy picking your nose.” I guess I’m basically an introvert, and I have no desire to share my life story with a bunch of people I’m never going to see again. I’d just as soon read a book.