I was juiced about jury duty this morning because I was hoping I’d get Walter, the “snowy-haired clerk of jury room 1121,” whom I’d read so much about in John Hodgman’s blog last year and I did get him (I think maybe he lives in 1121) and he’s just as funny and well-spoken as Mr. Hodgman had opined. Also, Your Turn, the low-budget, 18-minute “so you’ve got jury duty” video we were subjected to, is as great as I’d imagined; narrated by Ed Bradley and Diane Sawyer, it illustrates at one point trial by ordeal with the sinking of an accused witch, conjuring Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
However—and I chalk this up to never before having served on a jury—I was unaware, as Walter put it, that criminal trials take an average of a week and we were required to commit fully to that possibility. Because I didn’t want to gamble with my flight home on Thursday for my Dad’s 60th birthday party, I retreated down Centre Street to the New York County Supreme Court building and got another postponement, this one for April.
Someday, Walter. Someday.