I'm not as smart as I give myself credit for: I couldn't get out of jury duty. The excuse I've always used (too busy; my presence is critical to business operations) didn't work this time. Both lawyers in my life (Tim and Evan) said that's whining and the court doesn't care. I should have said that I have "obligations" that jury duty service would cause me to default on. Oh well, I'll use that next time.

So here I am, sitting in the juror assembly room, being indoctrinated about what's going to happen while I'm a juror. The video I'm being subjected to is incredibly condescending and pedantic (and rife with bad acting to boot). The video goes out of its way to explain why we get a juror name tag and they carefully explain if someone doesn't talk to us in the hallways it's not personal or rude, it's just because we're jurors. Who are these thin-skinned people who would complain about not being talked to? It's not like you're hear because you want good bedside manner from the court.

I arrived at about 7:50am, went through security, and walked into the juror assembly room. There was a long line, waiting to check in, but it didn't take long to get processed. The clerk asked for my phone number, gave me my return bus tickets (I guess this means that at some point I get to go home!), and asked me to sit down to wait.

A judge did a little introduction, then they played that video about what it will be like to on a jury. I'm listening to some clerk now talk about how some Judge Gonzalez needs a large panel. So we're all going to get sent to his court, I guess.

The next step was a quick orientation about having to always wear the juror badge and about how parking is epxensive here. The clerk also mentioned that cops will ticket you for jaywalking and the juror badge will not be any good at getting out of that. Only in Seattle!

Since that judge needs a bunch of jurors, we're all getting assigned a random number. I'm number 14.

9:56am: Just sitting around waiting to be told where to go.

11:14am: Back in the jury assembly room. I was excused for hardship: "I am a self-employed catering chef with contracts for wedding catering and cakes that are due during the trial." The judge asked a follow-up question if anyone worked for me who could fulfill the obligations and I said no. The trial was a murder trial and projected to last through May 2. I'll have to make a note of this and track it, to see how it all turns out. The judge was Steven Gonzalez.

11:18am: I met a florist and passed out a bunch of business cards, thus proving the point that you can network anywhere.

11:23am: Dismissed for lunch until 1:30pm. the longest lunch I've had in a long time!

1:17pm: Reported back from lunch. I had a nice break with my friend Thomas and talked about financing and investment. I had a corned beef sandwich. Since I made corned beef recently for a wedding reception, I've been on a corned beef kick, tyring it everywhere I go, just to see other ways of serving it. I can safely say that after having The Brooklyn's sandwich I'm done off corned beef. Their sandwich was disappointing and bland.

2:48pm: Dismissed for the day. I have to be back here at 8:45am tomorrow!

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