It has been one hell of a week. Not a bad one, but an extremely busy one.
And it’s not over yet. As it happens, I’ve been summoned to jury duty tomorrow. As these things go, most likely I will spend a good part of the day in an uncomfortable chair, actually waiting to be called upon — or not — as a real live jury member. But it threatens to jeopardize my regular Friday whiskey river-inspired post. I’ve worked on it some, but it’s not ready; I might but probably can’t wrap it up tonight or tomorrow morning. We’ll see.
In the meantime, please enjoy the music haunting me from the playlist of the moment: Patty Larkin, “Anyway the Main Thing Is” (lyrics below).
(It’s a shame that this is a static video: if you’ve never witnessed Larkin actually play the guitar, you’re missing the great pleasure of witnessing someone do effortlessly, yet perfectly, something she doesn’t even have to stop and think about.)
Lyrics:
Anyway the Main Thing Is
(by Patty Larkin)I took the train
Just for the view
I took my boyfriend’s last name
For something to do
I took advice
Now I regret it
I took my time
Cause I could get itI shook my head
And it woke me up
I shook a strange hand in my bed
And that was enough
I shook the truth
Out of the tree
It shook my faith up good
But it satisfied meAnyway the main thing is
Regrooving the dream
Regrooving the…Love doesn’t think
Love doesn’t look
Love takes a flying leap off the brink
Love swallows the hook
Love doesn’t sleep
Love is out of control
Love is only human it can swallow you whole
moonrat says
I had jury duty last year. It was AWESOME. I got selected for a criminal trial. It was fascinating and educational from beginning to end, and gave me greater faith in our justice system. I’m kinda sad I’m not eligible again for 6 years.
Full disclosure: Central Booking is in the center of Chinatown, so you can imagine where I spent my lunch hours for three weeks. And also several dinner hours.
Sherri says
I’ve never even been called up. Of course, now that I’ve said so…
Anyway, have fun. :)
DarcKnyt says
Hope it goes as you plan, but I’ve always wanted to sit on a jury for something like a murder or better, a serial murderer. I’d be the one who found that critical piece of evidence overlooked by everyone else, of course, and break the case wide open.
Ah, youth. ;) Have a great weekend, JES.
fg says
I have also had a craazy week which isnt over yet (actually it might not be over till next weekend at this rate). I am taking comfort in getting through so much but being mildly exhausted has given me a cold which is normally a rarity for me.
People complain about jury service but I have always thought that it would be interesting (though maybe a bit scary) My number has not yet come up.
Odd that they want you on the weekend, no?
Anyway enjoy, I only wish you could tell us all about it afterwards!
Nance says
That music haunts on purpose! Oh, to be so successful.
It was the notion of the hard chair at the courthouse that made my sensory imagination miserable. Tell them you write crime novels.
Tessa says
Haunting is right.Love it.
I was called for jury duty only once, and not selected .. much to my chagrin, although I’d rather have stuck needles in my eyes than served through a whole trial. Perverse, eh?
jules says
Oh I love Patty Larkin and haven’t heard this CD in so long.
John says
Thank you for the good wishes, all. As expected, it was a day of waiting, and reading — lots of reading — and near-dozing, and freezing. (I think they must’ve had the thermostat set to around 68° F — for once in recent memory, I was actually drawn outside by 90+-degree weather, during the lunch break and at the end of the day.)
I was sort of looking forward to being selected. The only time I came close before was in the late ’80s, in NJ. It was a criminal case, though — a burglary — and as soon as the defense learned that my then-girlfriend’s place had recently been burglarized I was out of the running.
This time around, unlike Darc I was not hoping for a high-profile violent-criminal case. (Because of The Missus’s work with the Innocence Project, I knew I’d be scratched immediately, this time by the prosecution.) This time, I wanted to get on a complex follow-the-money sort of case, maybe involving political corruption. In my mind’s eye, I kept picturing these conversations long after the trial — perhaps over holiday dinners, with everyone at the table already dopey with satiety (and maybe tryptophan). I’d be recounting loooong complicated chains of transactions, and offshore accounts, and rates of exchange, with perhaps some drug-mule-style smuggling of cash thrown in for extra drama. (“Here, swallow this balloonful of hundred-dollar bills. As soon as the plane lands, get to the bathroom right away…”) And around the table, as I droned on, suddenly unconscious heads would be dropping forward into their plates of leftover mashed potatoes and gravy. I’d have honored my vow of secrecy because no one afterwards would remember a word of what I’d said.
But nope. About 20-30 of us were finally dismissed, at around 3:45. They’d selected five juries during the day, but wouldn’t need us this time around.
Nice people at the courthouse; very appreciative of the work (actual or merely potential, like mine) of jurors. When I left, I still had the self-adhesive “JUROR” badge on my shirt. The deputy at the security checkpoint gave me a little salute and said, “Thank you, sir. Have a nice weekend!”
The Querulous Squirrel says
The thing that bothered me most about waiting all day for jury duty was the blasting of a TV so that I couldn’t concentrate on reading. Next time I’m bringing ear plugs.
John says
Squirrel: They had a TV turned on in the “juror assembly room” down here, too. (It didn’t bother me as much as it might have, one advantage of electronically amplified hearing being the presence of volume and off/on switches.) But I was seriously heartened by how many of us had brought and were reading books, as the advance instructions from the court had suggested. It felt like a study hall at a high-quality high school — which, alas, had to be held in the auditorium during cheerleader tryouts.