It has been an interesting week.  Last weekend was pretty normal, right up to Sunday night.  That’s when I remember I was supposed to call a phone number and find out if I had Jury Duty or not.  So I called and I did, in fact, have it.  I had already warned my boss of the possibility, so missing work Monday was not a problem.

 

So I got up bright and early Monday morning.  I had to be at the courthouse by 8:30, which is an hour and a half earlier than I have to be at work on Thursdays, so I was up much earlier than usual.  I figured it would mostly be a hurry-up-and-wait thing, but it wasn’t really that bad.  First, the three-hundred-some of us who made the call and found out we were on Jury Duty gathered in a big room.  When we showed up, we went through a line where we turned in part of our original summons for Duty and got a brief questionnaire in return.  We filled out the little survey and then waited a short time.  One of the judges gave a speech, and then we watched a video about being a juror.  Then they started separating us into groups:  They called names and numbers (everybody got a number in their summons) and those called lined up.  After thirty or forty were lined up, the group would be more-or-less led to their designated courtroom.

 

This is where it got personally interesting.  They called my name and number and I responded–you had to say “here” so they knew they could move on to the next name–and I started to head for the back of the line.  Halfway down the line, I heard my name called again, but with a different number.  Sure enough, there was another Andrew Walker there.  Think of the odds on that:  Andrew Walker is not a rare name, but it’s not terribly common like John Smith, either.  There’s three or four of us in the city, according to the last time I checked the phone listings.  Two of us got called for Jury Duty on the same day and ended up in the same set of potential jurors.

 

We–the other Andy and I–briefly introduced ourselves in line and then chatted when we got up to the courtroom.  When it came time to go into the courtroom, the court clerk called people’s names in a specific order she had and sent us in one by one.  When she called our name, we chorused, “Which one?”  I went in first.  Later, as I like to put it, I went to lunch with myself.  I learned the other Andy and I have a bit in common:  He is less than a year older than I am, has had a more than passing interest in computers (although he’s not nearly as nerdy as I am) and he comes from the midwest.

 

Neither of us got selected in the final process.  We got to leave at about 13:45.  I was in a good mood from the interesting experiences of the day, and then I got to skip work and play at home the rest of the day.  Shaka and crew and my babies all benefited from this.

 

Tuesday and Wednesday we had VIP visitors at work.  Actually, they were there Monday, too, but I was busy not being a juror.  They, along with our regular pair of bosses, barbequed some burgers, hot dogs and beans.  I don’t care for beans, and was not in a mood for hot dogs, but I had a double cheeseburger that was quite tasty.  In the evening, three of the last four employees of the month–myself included–had dinner at a place called the Steaksmith, courtesy of said VIP visitors.  I was permitted a guest, so I took Sam with me.  It was an amazingly excellent meal, enough that I went to bed full several hours later.

 

The one negative thing about having VIP’s visiting is we can’t have our laptops out, so amusing myself between calls becomes a bit more of a challenge.  What I have taken to doing on the last few such visits is working my way through Wikipedia backwards.  Yes, I am really that bored.  Anyway, as I was browsing articles–still in the late Z’s–I got to thinking about Wikipedia.  I thought briefly about their rules.  There’s a bit in there how you can’t include something “you and your friends made up.”  I thought that was kinda sad, however appropriate it may be.  That rule and its phrasing has always amused me, and as I sat there pondering it, I had an inspiration.  What if there was place just for something “you and your friends made up?”

 

In a wink, I had the concept for a new site, Imagipedia.  When the VIP’s left, I had my laptop out and started working on a logo.  Work interfered–dang clients!–and I only had barely started it before it was time to head for dinner.  The amazing dinner with the VIP’s meant I returned to work 3.5 hours later with only forty-five minutes left in my work day.  I managed to get the logo mostly done, but not quite there.  I finished the first draft after they left yesterday and set up the first draft of the site.  I revised the logo several times and am almost happy with it.  The site needs quite a bit of construction, but I am happy to say that Imagipedia, the Encyclopedia of Imaginary Things, is online.  With luck, I will get it into better shape today; I think the VIP visit is over.

 

I have purchased two things of personal interest in the last week or so.  First, I set a pair of bluetooth headphones.  They are, in a word, fantastic.  I can mostly wander the house without losing connectivity.  They are loud enough for my rock-and-roll ears.  And they were easy to set up.  Second, one of my co-workers on Saturday wore a shirt bearing the cover for an anime mini-series called Serial Experiments:  Lain.  One scene from this was the inspiration for the start of the Free Spirit series, although I wrote a good portion of what I have written in that series before I ever actually watched Lain.  Anyway, seeing the shirt reminded me that I wanted to someday get the mini-series, so I did.  I now own four TV series on DVD, although one of them–Star Trek–is not quite complete yet.  Ranma is not technically complete; I have the original series but not the OAVs or the movies.  This means only Lain and Firefly (including the Serenity movie) are complete.  I’ll probably order the third and final Trek season today, though, and thus have only one incomplete set.  I already have all of the Star Trek movies.

 

Way more than enough said for this week.  See you tomorrow.