What a country!

I saw a billboard today advertising DSL service. The slogan was "Internet that logs onto you."

That sounds like the end of a Yakov Smirnoff joke: "In America, you log onto the Internet. In Russia, Internet logs onto you!"

Trial by jury

Here's the full story of the trial on which I served as a juror from September 11th through 23rd.

I was in the first panel of jurors (randomly?) picked to leave the assembly room on Wednesday the 11th, and then I was in the first group of jurors to be put in the jury box and interviewed. We were told that the defendant would be representing himself, and he was charged with two counts, possession of methamphetamine and being under the influence of meth.

Here are some of the potential jurors who ended up being excused in this case:

• A woman on the board of the Southern California ACLU, who said she would have major problems finding someone guilty on a simple drug possession charge because it's a victimless crime, and so on and so forth. Despite intense questioning by the judge ("Now, you understand that this isn't a referendum on our drug laws, right?"), she was excused.


• A woman who claimed that the fact that the defendant was accused of a crime pretty much meant he was guilty. Despite intense questioning by the judge ("Now, have you ever been accused of anything you didn't do?"), she was excused.


• A woman who, when asked how she feels about law enforcement, spun a tale of being harassed repeatedly by bounty hunters after a former roommate for whom she had posted bail skipped out on it. Despite intense questioning by the judge ("Now, you do realize bounty hunters and police officers aren't the same thing, right?"), she was excused.


• A man who wouldn't admit to having any prejudices, even after the judge talked about how he was prejudiced against grilled cheese sandwiches.

Here are some of the potential jurors who weren't excused in this case:

• A professor of Greek history at UCLA. The deputy district attorney's first question to him was, "Do you feel Socrates was treated unfairly?"


• A business attorney, who was himself shocked that he wasn't excused.


• A Southern Baptist pastor. The defendant's first question to him was "Do you believe we're in the end of days, when corruption runs rampant on Earth?" The deputy D.A. objected. The judge eventually distilled things down to the question, "Regardless of whether or not you believe we're in the end of days, do you believe you can be fair and impartial?"


• Me, and I was probably asked fewer questions than any other potential juror.

The case itself stemmed from the defendant being arrested on a street corner in March by a policeman from the special Metro division of the LAPD who was, that day, working in the Hollywood division. The cop allegedly found a bag of meth in a pocket in the defendant's vest, and a syringe in a pocket in the defendant's pants pocket. At the Hollywood police station, the defendant was interviewed by another officer to determine if he was under the influence, and then he claimed "I can't go" when asked to take a urine test.

The main witness for the people was the arresting officer. A main part of the reason the trial lasted longer than the judge though it would was that the defendant kept asking him long, drawn-out, complicated questions, and he kept asking for them to be broken down and/or repeated.

The syringe was the key piece of evidence. As we saw it, it was in an evidence tube with a piece of cork and with an orange plastic cap over the business end; also, the needle had broken and the broken piece had been put inside the barrel. There was a lot of contradictory testimony over when and by whom the needle was broken. It also turned out that it didn't have the defendant's blood on it, so we heard quite a bit of testimony about drug addicts sharing needles, and why people might keep old needles so they can turn them in for new ones at the Hollywood needle exchange, and so on and so forth.

We also heard from various friends and enemies of the defendant, all of whom are the type of people who hang around on street corners in Hollywood all the time. Some of them said the defendant never uses meth. Some of them said the defendant uses meth, sells meth, and practically runs a meth lab. One of them had said in a deposition that the defendant uses meth, but recanted that statement in court.

The defendant never testified, although some testimony crept into his questions. Meanwhile, the deputy D.A. rolled his eyes and sighed a lot during the defendant's questions.

Anyway, we finally heard closing arguments late on Thursday the 19th and started deliberating on Friday the 20th. There was a lot of contention in the jury room that day, much of it on the part of the business attorney, and we decided nothing. We did ask for, and get, some testimony read back to us by the court reporter, regarding whether the arresting officer had said he felt the baggie of meth from the outside of the defendant's vest before sticking his hand in the pocket.

When we returned on Monday, it turned out a few of the jurors had a change of heart over the weekend, and we decided on both verdicts just before lunchtime. A lot of inconsistencies in the arresting officer's testimony, as well as the strangeness involving the syringe, left us with reasonable doubt on the possession charge, so we found him not guilty there (although we definitely believed that he had been in possession of meth on many other occasions). However, we found him guilty on the under the influence charge.

So now I've been a juror in both a civil trial and a criminal trial in a period of about a year, and although the experience was interesting, I hope it's a long time before I get called again.

Happy birthday to me

Funny, I don't feel 28.

More untargeted marketing

What I saw just now near the top of amazon.com: "Jim Ellwanger, save up to 67% on bridal magazines!"

The only time I ever want to have to look at a bridal magazine is if my fiancee is showing it to me, and even then, it better be accompanied by a question along the lines of, "Do you like this wedding gown with the really low neckline?"

Hair-way to heaven

The man sitting in front of me on the subway this morning was maybe 35 or 40 years old, and yet he had a fairly impressive amount of hair growing out of his ears. So I spent much of the subway ride trying to figure out if he was a werewolf, or if he had merely had some sort of excessive ear hair curse placed upon him at some point.

Things to say at Shoney's in Calhoun, Georgia

"I'll have a Coke. I'm not a terrorist."
"Burger, medium, and a side of fries. I'm not a terrorist."
"Can I get an apple pie to go? I'm not a terrorist."
"Check, please. I'm not a terrorist."

The real problem with our nation's economy

In 1992, my grandfather bought a Macintosh computer system, along with an HP Deskjet 500 printer. In 1993, he decided he didn't want the computer, monitor, and printer, and gave them to me.

That printer served me well for seven years, until I got my second new Mac in 2000 and bought a new printer to go with it. (The Deskjet 500 was still working okay, but it only had a serial connection, and the new Mac needed USB; also, I wanted color.) This time, I got an Epson. It never really worked well, especially because the cartridges tended to drip ink onto the rollers, which then left that ink on the paper.

So, after two years, I finally got sick of the Epson and bought...a new HP. It turns out their numbering system is way up past 500 now, all the way to 920c. Problem was, in setting up the printer, it kept insisting that the color ink cartridge was installed incorrectly.

Finally, I gave up and went to Office Depot to buy a replacement ink cartridge, to see if that one would work. It did, so now I'm going to call HP when I get around to it and complain that they put a bad ink cartridge in with my printer.

Now, there's some interesting economics at work here...

Price I paid for the printer, which includes a color and a black-and-white ink cartridge: $69.99

Price of a package containing a replacement color and a replacement black-and-white ink cartridge: $59.99

Had the replacement ink cartridge not worked, either, my next move would have been to buy a whole 'nother printer, because if that one had worked with the original color cartridge, I'd have a working printer, plus two sets of replacement ink cartridges, for only $10.00 extra (and Fry's Electronics would probably have charged more than $10.00 for returning the original printer to the store in an open box and with "opened" ink cartridges).

Clearly, at those prices, either the printer is priced too low or the ink cartridges are priced too high. Or maybe both.

Oh, the printouts from my brand-new HP Deskjet 920c look better than printouts from the Epson ever did, even when it was brand-new. And it was only 70 bucks. Another triumph for American engineering, or wherever it is this printer comes from.

Highly untargeted marketing

I got a spam with the subject line "Get PAID to watch TV!!! Job opportunities available NOW!!!"

Thing is, I already do get paid to watch TV. (Sometimes my company even pays me not to watch TV, like right now when they're paying for me to be on jury duty.)

Raising the level of discussion

To quote an article in today's Los Angeles Times, "[B]loggers, who typically have day jobs, turned into 'do-it-yourself journalists...seeking out sources and sometimes assembling these ideas for others,' noted a study on Sept. 11 and the Internet released last week by the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

Well, I had no idea I was supposed to be a do-it-yourself journalist. So I put what little journalistic training I have to work, checked my Rolodex full of sources, and managed to get a representative of the telephone company to agree to do an interview over the phone under the condition that she remain anonymous. The following is the complete transcript of the interview.

Me: Good evening. How are you tonight?
Woman: Good evening. At the tone, Pacific daylight time will be 7:56 and 10 seconds.
Me: How long have you been working for the phone company?
Woman: Good evening. At the tone, Pacific daylight time will be 7:56 and 20 seconds.
Me: Are you still recorded on tape, or are you now digitally recorded?
Woman: Good evening. At the tone, Pacific daylight time will be 7:56 and 30 seconds.
Me: Are you worried about your job being affected by the proliferation of devices...
Woman: Good evening. At the tone, Pacific daylight time will be 7:56 and 40 seconds.
Me: ...that automatically set their own time, either from the radio signal or from the Internet?
Woman: Good evening. At the tone, Pacific daylight time will be 7:56 and 50 seconds.
Me: Thank you for the interview. Say, what time is it?
Woman: Good evening. At the tone, Pacific daylight time will be 7:57 exactly.

Source: 853-1212

The paragraph that ruins the magic: I should point out that my alleged "Rolodex full of sources" is actually the San Fernando Valley white pages, where this number is under the listing for Pacific Bell. I can never remember it off the top of my head, because I keep conflating it in my mind with the old number to get the time in Tampa, which was 622-1212. (Therefore, whenever I try to think of the number to call to get the time in L.A., I always come up with 653-1212, which I know is wrong, so I have to grab the phone book and look it up.) In Tampa, we didn't get the "at the tone" bit, the time was rounded off to the nearest minute, and the time was usually several minutes off. Eventually, the phone company discontinued the service, because of deregulation, they claimed. So when I moved to L.A., I was a little surprised to discover that you can still call and get the time for free here. (It's a pay 976 number in most places, as far as I can tell.)

"...[T]he accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed..."

September 11, 2001: I report for my first day of jury duty in Federal court in downtown Los Angeles. After about 15 minutes, I'm sent home, as is everyone in the courthouse.
September 11, 2002: I report for my first day of jury duty in county superior court in downtown Los Angeles. I spend the whole day there.

I think I preferred the 2002 version of September 11th.

Great moments in advertising

Two of the items in the full-page ad for the 99 Cent Only stores in today's L.A. Times are listed together under the heading "The Perfect Combo"...toilet paper and prune juice.

Fire!

There's a wildfire burning in the hills about 8 miles away, and the smoke is drifting towards where I am. I can't smell the smoke, but my current weather can best be described as "yellow."

Food marketing (if you can call it food)

Speaking of things people on the Internet believe to be the worst food or drink product ever created by man, here's what happens when you buy Hot Pockets, Lean Pockets, and/or Croissant Pockets: the cash register spits out a coupon that's good for $1.00 off the number of Pockets you bought, plus one. Buy two, get a coupon for $1.00 off three. Buy five, get a coupon for $1.00 off six.

If I had more money and more freezer space than I do currently, I'd attempt to buy all the Pockets in the store's freezer case, just to see if the numbers keep going up and up, you know, buy 146, get a coupon for $1.00 off 147. But in real life, I haven't even gotten the courage up to see what happens with the "warehouse" package of Hot Pockets. It contains 12 boxes, so would the coupon be for $1.00 off 13 boxes, or $1.00 off two "warehouse" packages?

It's blue, it's beautiful

To follow up on the previous entry, Pepsi Blue is now available in L.A., complete with a "new item" tag on the shelf at Ralphs. I didn't buy any, because I had bought some last week at an Eckerd drugstore in Tampa, just to try it. 75% of the people on the Internet had said it was the worst food or drink product ever created by man, even worse than Circus Peanuts, so of course I had to try it.

It's not that bad, but I probably won't be drinking much of it in the future. It was better than Dr Pepper Red Fusion; the big sin there is that it's too inoffensive and bland. If I want a red drink in the future, I'll drink Mountain Dew Code Red.

Summer is over and gone, over and gone...how long until frost?

Hello. I haven't written much recently, because I was off gallivating about the Tampa Bay area doing various high school reunion-related activities, and also going through my books and papers that were in the storage closet. Now that I'm back in L.A., there's just so many possibilities...

1. How weird it is to rent a car in your hometown.
2. Why the traffic lights in L.A. are much better than the ones in Tampa.
3. The elation of winning the Most Eligible Bachelor award at the high school reunion, and the heartbreak of having the trophy broken into three pieces by Delta Airlines' crack baggage handlers.
4. Pepsi Blue and Dr Pepper Red Fusion: why available in Tampa, but not in L.A. (for that matter, 2-liter bottles of Cherry Coke are also readily available in Tampa but nowhere to be found in L.A.).
5. Something sentimental about sorting through the artifacts of one's life.
6. "Charlotte's Web" (source of the headline quote): best book ever?

However, any essays resulting from those topics above would pale in comparison to one of the artifacts I uncovered, which I consider to be the best thing I've ever written. On May 15, 1994, I filled in as secretary for the government meeting in my college dorm, the Communications Residential College at Northwestern University. After the meeting, I wrote up the minutes in the style of TV Guide. And I even copied the "look" of TV Guide through the magic of desktop publishing. I can't show you these minutes, but here's a sample, in plain text form:

(13) PAGE THREE?--Comedy 1234
Co-editor Jim (Jim Ellwanger) announces his intention of putting out an edition of the FEast this Friday. However, he doesn't get enough submissions, dooming the effort to failure. Jason Kaifesh has a cameo.
(18) MOVIE--Drama 2:00 *** 2439123
"You'd Better Do the Phonathon or Else: The Andrew Hoeveler Story." Andrew Hoeveler plays himself in this fact-based 1994 TV-movie chronicling the efforts of the head of CRC Productions to finish two film projects and a video project. Highlights include the 10:00 Monday main lounge meeting scene.
Additional Cast
Wade Carney....Himself
Josh Grossberg....Himself
(23) WELCOME FRESHMEN 7551230
New Student Week chair Levi (Levi Stahl) calls a meeting for Tuesday at 11 PM in 2-Blue.

Anyway, yes, it's all loaded with references that people who didn't live there during the 1993-94 school year probably won't get, but I think it's both funny and informative. (Apparently, some others didn't think so, because when I ran for secretary myself a year later, fully intending to do minutes in parody form like this every week, I, uh, lost the election.)