The first thing the judge asked was to raise our hand if we were happy to be there -I was- but nobody raised their hand, so I didn’t either, I was not going to be the first one to be kicked out of jury duty.

My summons for jury duty came in the middle of the Summer, when I was in Spain, so I postponed it to Sept. 11^th. Coincidence? We know there is no such thing.

I was surprised that I was on the first call for jurors, I was not expecting that. Another thing I was not expecting were the views from the 11th floor of the West Palm Beach Courthouse. Amazing!

The case in question was a criminal case involving stalking. Obviously neither the prosecution nor the defense wanted a hyper-educated, suit and bow tie wearing old professor on the jury panel. But I still had to wait all day and answer all sorts of questions before getting released in the afternoon with the other 20 people not chosen: the wife of a polo player from Wellington (Polo capital of the world, a neighborhood of Palm Beach), a Louis Vuitton sales advisor, and all other sorts of interesting and not so interesting jobs…

Happy to have done my duty as a citizen. Fortunately, I will not be considered again until next year.