last week, i was called in for jury duty and, most unfortunately, i was picked to serve.

as far as i can tell, jury duty just involves a lot of waiting. we waited for a day for a judge to pick up our case. we waited another day to get in to the courtroom. things never started on time. and, during the trial, the lawyers continually objected loudly to the opposing party's arguments and the jurors were asked to leave the room while the judge sorted it out.

during all those hours of waiting, we discovered that the law is a lot slower in real life than it is in law and order (you find this out just waiting for a doctor to flip through a 75 page document in order to answer a simple yes or no question).

finally, after several days of trial we were released to go deliberate. we requested that certain evidence be brought up to the jury room and we pored over it, trying to do what was just and fair. we even asked for a portion of the testimony to be read back to us. forty minutes later, the judge called us down to the courtroom to hear the transcript. it turns out that the lawyers had gotten nervous about how long we were deliberating and.... wait for it.... they settled.

after five days in court which were mostly spent waiting for the court to be ready for us, i'm not sure if justice was really served here. couldn't they have settled it before? the judge told us at the beginning that many jurors come to see their service as not only necessary but enjoyable.

this pawn of the system just feels used.