Laundromats are all washed up. Grocery stores have passed their best by date. If you want to meet an eligible member of the opposite sex, the hot new place is the jury duty waiting room.
Think of it! Dozens of people sitting in a cramped room with nothing to do but watch videos about their civic duty or get to know each other a little better. Some of those people will be young, and many of them will be single. And, although this may not be high on your list of attractive qualities in a mate, the fact that they haven’t found a lame excuse to get out of jury duty suggests that they have some form of social conscience. What better place to start something hot?
There are so many advantages to looking for love in the jury duty waiting room that it’s hard to know where to begin! For one thing, you have to be 18 or older to sit on a jury, so, unlike meeting people in bars, you don’t have to worry about being caught with somebody who is underage. (And, since most people don’t actually want to sit on juries, the likelihood that somebody will use fake IDs to get into the room is minimal.)
For another thing, if you hit on somebody who isn’t interested in you in a club, they can just leave, but nobody is allowed to leave a jury room until they have been dismissed by a judge. Talk about a captive audience! (You don’t want to make yourself a nuisance, though; court officers have powers that club bouncers can only dream of!)
Of course, as with any social situation, meeting people while waiting to see if you will be chosen for jury duty has its own rules of engagement. You wouldn’t, for instance, want to use the opening line, “Come here often?” (Too eager.)
While waiting to go into the courtroom, it makes sense to size up the other people in the room, measuring them by such qualities as possible availability and general hotness. In fact, the time you’re supposed to be watching the introductory video explaining the important role trial by jury plays in the justice system offers the perfect opportunity to size up the people around you. However, don’t take too long or you may find that you and your perfect match will end up on juries for different trials.
(This can be especially troubling for men. It takes a very strong man, indeed, to be willing to date a woman who has been a juror in a serial murder trial when he has been a juror in a mere shoplifting case. This is sometimes known as venue envy. Men in this situation have been known to belittle the trials of their mates, saying things like, “Well, sure, it was a murder trial, but it wasn’t like it was a gangland murder trial, if you know what I mean.” However, this issue arises in mature relationships, and this article is just about meeting people.)
Never hit on court officers or staff. Never. Don’t do it. You can only legally be asked to serve on a jury once every three years, and even then the odds are that you won’t be called that often. They have to work there every day. Besides, they know the law…
It’s not a good idea to brag about reading the Condensed Reader’s Digest version of The Three Faces of Eve that was lying on a table in the jurors’ lounge. If the person you’re pursuing would be impressed by this, you probably don’t want to have anything to do with them.
If the conversation is not going well, don’t tell the other person to tell it to the judge. Hard as it may be to believe, the judge has more important things to worry about than how badly your first encounter with a potential mate is going.
It’s probably not a good idea to tell George Carlin’s routine about legalized murder to the staff (even if you happen to be George Carlin). Hard as it may be to believe, officers of the court are not chosen for their sense of humour.
And, whatever you do, don’t try to get the other people in the room to line dance.
Meeting eligible men and women while dispensing justice: it’s not just a social nicety, it’s a civic duty.