Play Book Tag discussion

It's rainy out - although some have had snow and others are enjoying gardens. It's the day after Tax Day. Seems like the past few weeks have been tough on so many here at PBT. Time for general update!

How is everyone holding up? Any cute or not so cute pet stories to share?

I start jury duty tomorrow. Since it's Passover and Easter Week, I'm not expecting to do more than sit around. I doubt anyone is actually going to be picking a jury in Civil Court (where I am to report -- it's the lowed level county court) this week. Even if the courts have just recently fully opened and is dealing with a massive backlog. Plus being Civil Court, I'm highly unlikely to get put on any jury given my practice.

It snowed here yesterday! Awful awful weather.
It is slowly warming up this week, but more rain unfortunately.
Feels like it's been raining for months.

Theresa, maybe you can get some reading done.

When it rains here it is good news and it has already rained twice this week and we are expecting more on Thursday!

It is quite late in the season for us but we will take it when we can get it.

It is even better if we get substantial snow in the Sierra.

Theresa wrote: "It's rainy out - although some have had snow and others are enjoying gardens. It's the day after Tax Day. Seems like the past few weeks have been tough on so many here at PBT. Time for general upda..."

Yes, I'm sure no lawyer wants another lawyer on a jury. My brother in NYC has been on juries several times. I have been called 3 or 4 times but either sent home after a morning or in the modern era, called in to find I wasn't needed. My daughter in St. Louis says she always wanted to be on a jury but has never been called in the almost 20 years she has lived there. Maybe because she is outside the city proper?

We had fluffy snow yesterday but it didn't last, thank goodness. It looks like there was a sizable amount in Upstate New York, where Theresa and I grew up.

The snow here didn't last either, but it broke my spirit even more for a Monday!

Funny - I just read “The Brass Verdict” by Michael Connelly and there was a lawyer on the jury which seemed very alien to me. As a lawyer in New Zealand, I’m not eligible to be on a jury at all so can’t be called (too much risk of skewing things either directly or indirectly). It would be interesting though, and I’m sorry I’ve never had the chance to do it. I was called twice before I got my practicing certificate but got excused both times; the first time because I was a solo mum of toddlers with no babysitter and the second time because I was booked to speak at a conference in Australia.

The weather is distinctly autumnal here, though the weeds are still growing apace. I spent quite a bit of time over the sunny Easter weekend trying to tidy up the garden, and planting winter vegetables. Little Miss F aged nearly 3 (aka the strawberry queen) still managed to find four strawberries on my miracle plants on the deck, though. Climate change is messing with my lessons on seasonal eating!

Meli wrote: "The snow here didn't last either, but it broke my spirit even more for a Monday!"

With you there Meli-started feeling really depressed and then the doorbell rang-my bff sent me a gorgeous spring bouquet! What a surprise and cheered me right up!

Jury duty update: I have to show up tomorrow -- really early for me. Ugh. It's the Civil Court building at 111 Centre Street - built in 50/60s there is nothing grand about it - looks like a rundown office building. Civil Court is the lowest level of court system and all 'minor' matters are heard there -- cases for less than $50,000.00, landlord tenant proceedings, etc. Many many pro se defendants. Small Claims Court is located there (amounts under $10,000). I have spent quite a bit of time there in my career but I don't think I've ever been called to jury duty there before. Not sure just what the juror waiting rooms will look like and provide.

And wouldn't you know I have 2 new matters needing immediate attention! I did manage to review the documents and shoot out emails full of questions and comments, and hopefully at some point tomorrow I can find time for a conference call with a client before the end of day -- lunch time perhaps.

I actually have never found jury duty conducive to working -- even with workstations to use for your laptop. Too many people around, not particularly comfortable and who wants to schlepp the files, laptop, charger, etc with you? Last time the wifi was weak too.

So I'm taking reading of course. And crossword puzzles.

I'll report back after my adventure.

@Robin - actually sometimes they want lawyers on the jury -- frankly, I could serve on a Personal Injury or Medical Malpractice or even a criminal case with no more added knowledge or influence than anyone else. In all the times I've been called I've only been impanelled a few times:

In Supreme Court (one step up from Civil Court - bigger value and more involved cases)
-on a contract case where I knew one of the firms involved -- the judge could not wait to get me out of the room
- on a compensation case against the MTA (subway) -- they didn't want lawyers on that one at all and they didn't want me because I made myself clearly a ring leader leading those in the back of the court to rowdiness to aleviate the boredom of the all day voir dire poorly handled by the attorneys.

Criminal Court - an incest abuse case -- did not have the stomach for it.

Federal Court -- a drug case that was going to take 3 to 5 months. Judge almost didn't let me out of that one! No way could I have served on a jury that long.

@Kate - here Federal Court always incluided lawyers as qualified jurors. State/Local courts gave an automatic exemption to lawyers unless they wanted to serve. However, about 20 years or so ago they eliminated the automatic exemptions and now everyone has to show up.

I personally have always thought that all lawyers should be required to have served on a jury at one time or another, even if they are not litigators. I think it would be good experience. That said, it's not actually serving that I have a problem with, it's the uncertainty of how long the trial would last. My practice isn't that flexible to allow spending a day in court on a jury.

Theresa wrote: "...Seems like the past few weeks have been tough on so many here at PBT. Time for general update..."

Rough times here. My mom has been in the hospital for a week now with fluid on her heart and lungs. They are trying to get her transferred to a bigger hospital, but are waiting on all the red tape.
Also found out today that my daughter's kitty (who was my/our kitty for half kitty's life) has kidney failure and will probably have to be put down.

Oh Kim-big hugs to you. Watching your mom suffer is hard, I know the same thing happened with my mom. I wish her well and hope the red tape gets pulled apart! It is ridiculous sometimes what you have to go through to get the care you need.

@Theresa - I always find jury duty interesting in theory but rarely want to go through with it when I get called. Never been actually seated, though. The closest I got was a civil case where a family was suing a big pharma company for allegedly causing their son to get some horrific condition after giving him pediatric cold medicine. The big question was basically "could you side with with the company if you decide they're not at fault?" and I was sitting there thinking, "I dunno, even if they aren't I'm sure they could probably part with some cash for this kid's medical care." They filled the jury before they got to me so I never had to fully commit to a side of that moral quandary.

I am doing okay this week, just SUPER tired. I'm told it's a common reaction when it comes to grieving. I'm reading Cloud Atlas for my trim read this month and it's super interesting, but man aside from that and everyday activities I'm pretty exhausted without doing very much. At least the book is good.

Kim, I am sorry to here about your Mom and the red tape you have to go through.

Heather, grieving is a long process and not a straight forward one. Sleep and rest is one of our bodies reactions to trauma.

~*Kim*~ wrote: " Rough times here. My mom has been in the hospital for a week now with fluid on ..."

I hope they are able to get your mom transferred and hopefully get the treatment she needs without too much delay.

Kitty with kidney disease - is there nothing they can do? My boy has had kidney disease for 3 years. He was in hospital for a few days where it got worse. Continued to get worse for a bit after coming home, but with lots of meds, he made huge improvement. Daily fluids + more meds to help him feel better, and he's doing so well. <3 We now think he had acute kidney failure on top of chronic at the time he was hospitalized, which is why his numbers were so high at the time.

He is my third with kidney disease, and they don't all improve as much, though. My first only lasted a week after being diagnosed (we were still learning how to do the sub-q fluids at home). My second did well for about 10 months after his diagnosis. My guy now - I can't believe it's been 3 years!

Jury duty - like Robin's daughter, I've long wanted to serve on a jury. I got a notice once, but when I called the day before, they didn't need me after all.

Well, how often, even if, you are called does depend a lot in the size of the available jury pool vs. number of jury trials conducted. NYC of course has a huge court system, and trials, and also Federal Courts. Need a lot of potential jurors. Not every area has a full array of courts either. My hometown of Owego NY is the County Sest for Tioga County. There is one courthouse with one courtroom for the whole county. When I was 20 and still registered to vote from home, I got called for jury duty. Only one problem: I was studying in Paris. So my father took the notice down to the clerk, toldcher I was in Paris, and voilà, I was removed from the list. When I was in law school, I got called for jury duty in Syracuse. Only problem: it was after my third year and the bar exam, and I had just moved back to NY and was registering there.

It also depends on what rolls are used by the Court System to establish the juror pool. I remember reading decades ago about how NYS had expanded its compilation of a juror pool to include not just voter registratiin, but also drivers licenses and tax filings among other resources.

One time I got called was a week after my daughter was born, when I explained that, they automatically took me off.

When I lived in Detroit, years ago, I would get called nearly every year. I have been seated 4-5 times. I found it very interesting, and also enjoyed the break from having to go into the office-LoL. The longest trial I served on was about 2 1/2 weeks-it was a robbery and unfortunately the prosecutor could not make his case, and we could not reach a verdict. After the trial the judge spoke with us and explained that this was only one charge that was brought against the guy-he could not tell us more, but it irked me afterwards to know that a career criminal was not convicted.

Joanne wrote: "With you there Meli-started feeling really depressed and then the doorbell rang-my bff sent me a gorgeous spring bouquet! What a surprise and cheered me right up!"

That is so sweet!

Jury duty ... I've been called four times, impanelled twice, and actually served on a jury once. That was a case at Children's Court where the question was removing parental rights.

The first time I was called I had to sit around all day at the court house on day one. On day two I was impanelled, but not selected. And I was let go after that. The second time was the case I was selected for ... that proceeding lasted a week and a half. The third time I sat around for a just a morning; I wasn't impanelled and at lunch break I was told I could go home and to call the next morning. When I called I was told I didn't need to return and my service was over. And the last time it was done entirely by phone; I called in on Monday morning of my week of service, and was told I wasn't needed that day; on Tuesday morning I was told I wouldn't be needed at all that week.

In Wisconsin you are obligated no more than once every five years. So even though I only had to make two phone calls the last time, I was off the lists for five years after that.

I'm done with Jury Duty! Actually only had to serve yesterday. I was impanelled in the Criminal Court around 2:30 but when they announced it was a 9 week trial and they would hear reasons why you could not serve on a trial that long, I of course was a slam dunk excusal: attorney with a solo practice. The array of lawyers in the room hearing our pleas to be released did not even finish writing down my name before I was excused.

It was so late in the day - around 4:30 PM - that I did not have to report back to the main jury waiting room and risk being impanelled again.

I'm good for 4 years minimum. And it will get me out of Federal Court jury duty should they call me as I definitely am on their hit list.

Oh and the case where I was impanelled? I really like the judge and it would have been interesting to watch him in action (but not for 9 weeks). Also, it involves an incident that happened in Times Square in 2017 that was front page news. This trial will also get press coverage - at least in NYC.

I got to know another juror -- we were swapping off on an outlet to recharge our phones while in jurry waiting room and we shared a cab home. She also got off -- she and her partner had just paid for a trip to Toronto that's happening first 2 weeks of June. But we shared an interesting discussion - both of us remember well the incident in 2017.

Don't get me wrong - it was a long day and I was dealing with one client crisis after another by email and the entire lunch period ended up with me and my deli sandwich sitting on a park bench handling one conference call after another. That's just sad because the Manhattan courthouses abut Chinatown and Little Italy and the only aspect of jury duty to look forward to is lunching at the restaurants in both areas.

But I'm done!

Well, I think it is too bad you got cut. For heavens sake Miss Dragon Mistress you could have walked the runway everyday with all the press that will be there🤣-just kidding I know the press cannot photograph jurors-but just thinking of it made me crack up

Exciting news! My alma mater, Barnard College, is welcoming back one of the many gifted writers it has produced, but this time to the faculty: Jhumpa Lahiri!

https://barnard.edu/news/jhumpa-lahir...

Just off the top of my head, other writers you will likely have read who graduated from Barnard:

Anna Quindlen
Mary Gordon
Patricia Highsmith
Erica Jong
Zora Neale Hurston
Ntozake Shange
Edwidge Danticat
Margaret Mead
Sigrid Nunez

Theresa wrote: "Exciting news! My alma mater, Barnard College, is welcoming back one of the many gifted writers it has produced, but this time to the faculty: Jhumpa Lahiri!

https://barnard.edu/new..."

Wow, a fabulous group!

Anyone else having to log in every time you want to use Good Reads? Even if set to stay logged in?

And then, some private groups are also now requiring logging into GR all over again to access them -- and I know that's not a change in the private group settings because I'm admin on 3 of them!

So aggravating ... and is this another attempt to force us all into using their godawful app?

Theresa wrote: "Anyone else having to log in every time you want to use Good Reads? Even if set to stay logged in? ..."

Normally, if I stick to my own PC, it seems fine, but the past week or two, if I log in on my lunch at work, or on my tablet instead of my PC, I need to log in there... then when I come back to my PC, I need to re-log in here, too. I was wondering if GR is only allowing us to be logged in to one "device" at a time? Logging us out of the other(s) if we log in somewhere else?

GR is updating their log-in protocols and using some new "secure" method apparently. There's a message to that effect in the help page. Of course, you cannot get a real live GR rep to answer any questions.

In any case, this seems to have tapered off (at least for me). We'll see if it holds true when I get back from vacay.

@LibraryCin - you may be correct. I move from device to device randomly - a laptop and 2 tablets - depending on what is immediately to hand and what might need recharging.