Jury Duty
One of the bloggers at This Modern World got called in for jury duty, and that reminded me: so did I. That is to say that my father informed me on Skype that I got a notice in the mail telling me that I’d have to show up.
Fine with me, so long as they fork over the airfare.
It’s pretty interesting, but I guess that they don’t necessarily have a way of telling whether someone on the absentee ballot list is permanently residing overseas or if they’re just traveling abroad temporarily.
This is the second time I’ve been called in for jury duty–and the second time that my location has gotten me out of it. The first time it happened, I was called in to appear just a week or so after my planned move to another county. When I called the courthouse to tell them about this, the person at the other end joked, “Some people will do anything to get out of jury duty!”
Well, this time it’s not so close a call–I’ve been living in Japan for eight years straight (or will have been in two months), so nobody can accuse me of fleeing the country to avoid forty bucks a day.
I am having a terrible time with it. I work in japan on a 3 yr contract, and the state of florida is insisting I give up my FL drivers licence and homestead exemption even though they acknowledge that I am working here. I only travel to the Us 2 or three times a year under the terms of the contract and find this to be very unreasonable and draconian. They are definitely being ridiculous as I have been a florida resident for over 20 years and have always served. If you know of any websites or information where I can find some help in dealing with an out of control govt employee, drop me an email…..