After a weekend of eating, exploring everything from the mountains to the sea (literally, and walkable to our home) and the big city (a much, much more exciting 15 miles away, instead of the almost 50 miles when I first moved here),
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Monday came crashing down around us.

We went to sleep late, and we arose early with M. beating the trash pickup and getting our barrels to the end of the driveway. Our schedules were off a bit from setting our own pace for a long weekend and because of the new, new home discovery that when the swells are crashing at 18 feet we can lie in the quiet of bed and nighttime and hear the ocean’s roar. As cool as that sounds, in terms of describing it to others, there is a sad, unromantic comparison. The surf coming from the beach and echoing back to the shore from the mountains sounds a bit like living next to a highway. Shuuuuu shuuuu.

For me, the special pain of a Monday at work was interrupted by my having to report around lunch time to the Redwood City Court House for jury duty. In an ideal world it would be like M.’s recent report. He showed up, sat around bored and IM’ing me from is iPhone and heading home, relieved from service. None of that for me. Nope.

Instead, I have to head back in a week or so for voir dire and jury selection. My afternoon involved a 10-plus page questionnaire as the first step in getting to know me and my suitability for systematized judgment. The ultimate goal to suss out whether I’d be useable for a murder trial. The only thing good about that news is at least they started the announcement about the potential for jury selection by saying it was not a DEATH FUCKING PENALTY case (OK, sans the “fucking.”) I forgot I had moved to a state where execution is a possible outcome.

I’m praying that my answers on the questionnaire, much of which seemed to be trying to glean my relationship to the old juris prudence system we got here and whether I have issues with law enforcement personnel, show how unfit I am. The sooner I’m dismissed the sooner I can read everything on the ‘net about the people versus some dude whose case seems very “Law and Order” meets “Cold Case” meets “ripped from the headlines.”

Apparently, they don’t want us doing that at all. Burden enough for a computer junkie.

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