Yesterday, I performed my civic duty and went to Worcester for jury duty. I even got impanelled on a jury and didn't have to sit around all day and try to amuse myself. Although, some of my fellow jurors helped provide entertainment for the brief hour or so that I was sitting in the holding pen...

So the trial. A passenger in a VW was injured when a snowplow broadsided the car after running a red light. Fairly cut and dry case. The defendent's lawyer sounded like Elmer Fudd which made openning and closing arguments amusing, but not terribly inspiring. The plaintiff clearly was looking for the settlement as a way of getting out of working. She did deserve some compensation, but not millions of dollars (which is what I think she was hoping for). It was kind of wierd putting a dollar value on Pain and Suffering, though.

The best part of the day was actually when I arrived. Shortly after finding a seat at a table in the holding pen, this guy comes in and plops down next to me. He was *the* quintessential nerd in terms of look -- older guy with a comb-over, Sears-brand plaid shirt, hiked up pants, etc, etc. He brought a pillow with him to help him get comfortable - blue with little kitties all over it. Then he pulled out his reading material: Cryptography for Dummies. Along with two highlighters (yellow and blue) and a pencil. The book was clearly brand new, so he started reading from Page 1. And he started highlighting and making notes in the margin from Page 1. (Which if you've ever read a Dummies book, you know this is the Introduction that explains how a Dummies book works...)

Then the coffee cart came buy which he jumped at. He returned with one of those Little Debby poundcake thingies and a bottle of Poland Spring Water. His bottle of water was the only Poland Spring bottle of the six of us sitting at the table. And yet, he had to mark it so it wouldn't be mistaken for someone else's. First, he tried to write on the cap with his pencil, but it didn't really show all that well. Then he took his yellow highlighter and colored in the S of Spring on one side of the bottle. Apparently, this still wasn't satisfactory, because then he ripped a small chunk out of the label. Shortly after the water bottle marking incident, my number was called and off I went to my trial. I bet if he was impanelled, his fellow jurors probably wanted to kill him.

Overall, entertaining day. And I ended up being done by 3pm. Yay!