Thanksgiving - I am truly blessed!!

So today I celebrate my 46th Thanksgiving day, and they have all held their own meaning to me.  This year I am most thankful that Bride has tolerated my idiosyncratic dumbassedness for a long time now and we still love each other.  She has overcome some HUGE hurdles this year and I have never been prouder of my best friend.   We lead a great life and are so lucky to have fate putting us together in Annapolis Maryland 23 years ago.  We are as happy as we have ever been and our relationship seems as if it gets better every day – I love that woman with every fiber of my being, her love is my greatest blessing. 

I am thankful for all the friends I have, I treasure each and every one of you.  Some are closer than others but sometimes, I am thankful for that as well.  I am thankful that one of my best friends got a clear PET scan after going through a brutal round of radiation treatments that killed some of his saliva glands as well as his taste buds.  I was thankful that he still held the “Goode's Turkey Fry 2011” which I think is in the neighborhood of a 15 year tradition.  Knowing he would not be able to enjoy the festive meal made me sad, until I reminded him I was going to enjoy it enough for both of us!  Love ya brother and that turkey was KICK-ASS Goode!!

As I sat on the beach this morning thinking about the things I am thankful for all that could come to my mind was how blessed I am.  I posted on FB “I am thankful that I am sound minded and able bodied enough to recognize the truly countless blessings I am fortunate enough to have received - I hope each of you have a great day!!”  I am thankful that I can go to beach and watch the sunrises in the morning, it allows me time to reflect on my life and work through whatever issues I might be dealing with.  Most times I try to just sit and stare, like I would any other piece of art.  Trying to find the meaning of it, not anything else but the meaning, to me, of the art.   That is when I can begin to truly appreciate the sheer beauty of it.  It seems impossible for me to come away not feeling small and insignificant.  I thankful for the time to make those trips to the beach, it refreshes my soul.

I am thankful to all who are or have ever served in the military of our Great Country.  These young men and women are the bravest souls among us and are deserving of our respect and gratitude.  I will say that during my time on the military when I was deployed we ALWAYS had a pretty damn fine thanksgiving meal, I was always thankful of that.  I have made some lifelong friends when I served and I am thankful for Facebook bringing us all back together, at least in a new fangled electronic way.

Seems weird that I could write all day and not cover all the things I am thankful for, none of them could be purchased on black Friday either.  We seem to sometimes get all caught up in the materialness of our lives, those are not things to be thankful for.  Most of them just bring us suffering anyway when they don’t work or don’t work correctly anyway.

Lastly, I am thankful for this electronic shoebox that I can climb up on and pontificate every once in a while.  I hope everyone has a great day and a great weekend! 

Toasters - one of those innocuous appliances!!

So the other day, I was making Bride a chicken sandwich on a bagel thins, she like them toasted so I attempted to toast the thing.  Well imagine my surprise when the toaster did not pop up.  I went to look and low and behold about two strands on one of the four elements was glowing a VERY dim orange.  As I stood and stared, I wondered, when did we get this toaster, how much had we paid for it, what caused it to stop functioning correctly?   I was standing there long enough that Bride came in to ask “what’s wrong”.   She eventually enjoyed the sandwich on a very partially toaster bagel thin.

Now since that time I have thought a lot about the origins of that toaster.  It was like an old friend in some ways.  You sometimes never even know when the friendships started, it just seems like it has always been there.  I will inject another toaster story here that is unrelated but funny all the same.  Bride and I were at my Sister’s house for Christmas one year.  My Mom was there as well with her husband.  My Mom was well known for odd Christmas gifts but this year we had an all time winner.   So Bride was opening a gift from Mom, she pulls out a screaming red toaster.   I immediately that, wow, a toaster is such an odd gift and what was even odder was that it was screaming red. Bride and I had not one red appliance and this thing was no doubt red with chrome accents.  Well as Bride was looking at it she turned it over and a ton of crumbs dropped out.   We were all kinda shocked by that but it got even funnier.  She then told us she has picked it up at a yard sale (bad enough) and then to ensure it worked she used at her house for a while.  HAHAHAHAHA, it makes me laugh to this day to think about that.   There were years of crumbs in the bottom of that toaster, we laughed and took it home with us.  My intent was to give it back to her the following year but it was not to be.

Anyway, back to my current toaster, the Proctor-Silex model - T4400 type T16 with a serial number of A1249.  And if you know anything about toasters, you will know that is the wide slot model to allow for toasting fat bagels.  After discussing with it Bride, we were unable to determine when or where we got that toaster.  I do remember back in the day when you opened a bank account you could get a toaster or some other little appliance.  We wondered if we may have gotten that in that way when we lived in Maryland.  I am pretty sure that toaster is at least 20 years old and most probably a bit more than even that.  One of us may have owned that bad boy before we got together.  I seem to remember having some appliance when I was living in the barracks in Annapolis.  I do remember a microwave, a fridge, a crock pot and a hot plate.  Seems only logical that I would have had a toaster. 

So I immediately decide I would write a letter to Proctor-Silex and complain about the shoddy workmanship of this particular toaster, I mean they are supposed to last forever.  This toaster has seen some milage, the heat resistant plastic that made up the front and rear covers where chipped and broken on the corners.  The bottom looked horrible, burned on bits of toast from over the years.   I was just saddened by the loss of my old friend.  I wonder how many bagels and slices of bread had made its way through that toaster.  Too bad there was not a computerized counter that would keep track of the usage.  That would allow one to determine the cost per slice over the lifetime of the toaster.  Imagine, 20 years of toasting, lets say one slice of toast per week.  That comes to 1040 pieces of bread toasted.  Now if I use the price of the replacement toaster that would work out to roughly two and half cents per toast, not a bad return on the investment when you think about it.  I know I have toasted way more than that though, so I bet my return was closer to about .75 percent of one cent per slice.

I know toaster don’t or won’t keep track of such things, who would care about such an inane thing, other than me??   I do remember a the coolest toaster I have ever seen and had the great pleasure of using.  It was the mid-seventies and the toaster was a Sun Beam model T-20.  I did not know that at the time but a few minutes with Google and I found it and this video. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BiAFTkkZKc

This toaster would automatically lower when a slice of toast was put into it.  How cool was that??  This was before the days of some code being written on a computer chip.  This was 100% mechanical!!  I remember then wanting to take it apart to see how that worked.  I have never before or since seen a toaster that operated like that.  There was no handle to push down or pull up to get the toast in or out.  Its real appeal is in its performance, Sunbeam called it Automatic Beyond Belief. There are no levers to press down. Just put the bread in the slot. The weight of the bread activates the heating elements, causing the center wire to lengthen microscopically and the bread to be carried into the toaster under its own weight.

Inside, the Radiant Control thermostat monitored the heat radiated (not conducted) from the outer surface of the bread, which is directly proportional to its color change. There are no timers. The toast is raised only when it is properly toasted; no sooner and no later.  Hahaha, how freaking cool is that??  When the thermostat opened, the elements cool, and the center element wire contracts. This movement is very small — on the order of thousandths of an inch — but a mechanical linkage multiplies this movement approximately 175 times. This is sufficient to operate the carriage and raise the toasted bread from the toaster.  I was able to find modern day automatic toasters but I do not suspect I would be willing to pay over a hundred and fifty bucks for a toaster.  That would raise the cost per slice to well over 14 cents per slice, not a cost effective solution in my opinion. 

So my new model is the Oster model TSSTRT2SST, and they do not assign a serial number to them anymore.  I suspect that there is no need as they are mostly disposable.  I wish I understood the logic of that model  number, the only part I know is that the “2” indicates that it is a two slice model.  If that number were a four, it would be a four slice model.  I know this because the owner’s manual covers both models and it shows me a picture of both on the cover.  After reading the user manual, I was amazed that the operation of a toaster needs to be explained at that level to anyone.  I am pretty sure I could figure out how to use a toaster even if I had never seen one before in my life.  Anyway my favorite part step six under the  “preparing to use your toaster for the first time”.  It talked about the fact that when you first turn this bad boy on, you may get a bit of smoke coming out of it.  We are to preheat the device and as the elements heated up it would “burn off any dust which may have accumulated during storage or manufacturing".  Seemed odd but sure enough, when I first pressed the lever down some smoke came out of it.  Hahaha, since I was assured this was normal I thought OK – we are ready to go.

Well, I suppose I am going to have to start building a friendship with this new guy, I spent some time in quiet contemplation about my old friend but, we must move on.  I don’t know how long it will take me to get through the stages of grief but I am hopeful the performance of the new kid will speed the process. 

One year into sharing the names of those who died - Veterans Day to Veterans Day

It was last Veterans Day that I decided to start posting a picture and small bio of each fallen hero from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.  That has been tough for me at time, so much loss and for what?  Since I started I have written and posted on Facebook 513 deaths, mini eulogies is how I see them.  When I started I warned people that I was doing it and if they need to unfriend me that was fine.  I do not know if anyone did but I have received feedback from one end of the spectrum because of it.  Most are appreciative that someone is bringing it to their attention, since the media does not do a very good job of it. 

One group of deaths have affected me and heightened my anger at our Government.  That was the deaths of a lot of seal team 6 in a helicopter crash.  I have not been able to find it now but when that accident first happened I remember reading that it was Seal Team Six on that chopper.  Since that time I have not been able to find one reference anywhere to Seal Team Six in relationship to that crash.  Since then the ones killed were described as being in an East Coast-based SEAL team.  I found my conspiracy minded brain kicking into overdrive.  I believe these are the men how got Osama Bin Laden and the fact that we don’t know – scares me.  I can understand not wanting the public to know that Al-Qaeda might have gotten the men who Got Osama.  Each of their pictures are below, they look just like any of our friends might look, smiling like we were cooking out and telling stories or something.  It makes me sad that on August 6^th these 31 hero’s all lost their lives in a helicopter crash.

So, since I have been writing (a lot of copy and pasting) and posting them on Facebook I have seen many reactions and many comments.  Some comments anger me and others have made me cry.  Some have made me laugh and others made me sit in quiet contemplation.  I want to thank everyone for all the feedback, it is what has made this self-assigned task do-able.  I just can’t understand how it is that we (as a Country) can continue to justify, to ourselves, our involvement in these faraway places.  Don’t be mistaken, that we are convincing or justifying this for other countries, we don’t really give a shit about other countries or their culture, unless of course it affects our lifestyles.  Why have we not called for the removal of the troops from Afghanistan and Iraq?  Make no mistake, congress (the ones working for us) have it within their power to end the funding for this insanity.  They also have the ability, and are the ONLY ones who have the ability to balance the budget so when they get up and talk about not being able or blaming the President or anyone else – remember back to your school days and remember it is congress who creates the budget.

I was not sure where I was going to go when I started writing this, I did not think I would wind up here though.  Funny how that happens, sometimes I just start writing and I wander around where ever my mind takes me.  Anyway, I also want to take this opportunity to thank all the folks who have or are serving or is the Mother, Brother, Husband, Father, Sister, Aunt, Son, Uncle, grandson or Sister of someone serving.     

Here are the pictures of the 31 men who died on August 6^th of this year in a helicopter crash, the men I believe to be the Men who “got” bin Laden.  Even if they did not, they still made the ultimate sacrifice in our war on Terror, please honor them and the other 482 Military folks who gave their lives for the cause this last year.

Beach re-nourishment, what the heck is that??

So for those who don’t know I live in Jacksonville Florida. I live close to the beach and the Atlantic Ocean, I go there a lot and I really enjoy it. I was there this morning to watch the sunrise, and the ocean was angry today. It was a magnificent sunrise all the same. While I was there I noticed we were at high tide and the water was WAY up, within 20-30 feet of the dunes. I remember back earlier in the summer the Army Corp of Engineers contracted to have the beach re-nourished, it had been 6 years since it was done last. They skipped last year (normally done every 5 years) due to budget constraints.

So I thought I would take a look about when this trend of beach re-nourishment first started. I say trend because the ocean has been placing the beach and coastline where ever it wants to place it for about 4+ billion years. That was all without any human intervention. I remember the first time I saw it done was some years ago, I remember thinking, and asking, what are they doing and why?? It did not just not make sense to me to take sand from a mile or so out and bring it in and dump it one the beach. Water finds its own level and simple physics tells one that what’s in the way of the ocean will be eroded, regardless of what composition that obstruction may be made of. The force of the ocean has eroded rocks and islands and anything placed in its way, sand being about the easiest for it to move.

I have suspected since then that someone at some time in the past thought, I can get someone to pay me to move sand from here to there. AND the best part is, the ocean will move it right back over there so the job will never end. They must have been related to or knew the genius of King Camp Gillette, the inventory of the disposable razor. That was the first real thing made that had to be purchased again. Before that time razors lasted a lifetime. Anyway creating a market by making and selling a consumable product is the way of our world now but it was not always so. Anyway……..

So first a little about what beach re-nourishment is. It is basically a process by which sediment, usually sand, is lost through erosion is replaced with material from outside the eroding area of the beach. In the case of Jax beach they had a dredger type ship that would go out over the horizon and suck up a load of sand and then return to the coast and pump that sand back onto the beach through gigantic pipes. Once it is back on the beach bulldozers move it around. That sounds simple but I would bet that there is a very specific plan and the bulldozers are probably controlled by GPS to ensure every grain of sand winds up in the correct position. That in itself is kind of funny to me. I can just hear the conversation of the company doing the work - Since we are bilking the community out of a shitload of money we had better make it appear that we have injected some science into this process. One guy with his butt crack showing said, hey, what about GPS controlled bull dozers, that will convince the locals that we know what the hell we are doing. Makes me laugh and I wish I could be a fly one the wall of the marketing group of the folks who perform this service.

So the first instance of a beach re-nourishment was in 1923, it was at Coney Island, New York. Since that time it has becomes a common shoreprotection measure utilized by public and private entities. I am pretty sure a fortune has been made since that time moving sand back onto the beach, waiting a couple of years and going to get it and move it back to the beach again. There was a project in Miami that took 5 years, 76-81, and cost $64,000,000, yeah that is 64 million dollars moving sand about. That project was 10 miles long and took 5 years and cost 64 million dollars. How crazy is that.

Nourishment is one of three commonly accepted methods for protecting shorelines. The structural alternative involves constructing a seawall, revetment, groin or breakwater. Alternatively, with "managed retreat" the shoreline is left to erode, while relocating buildings and infrastructure further inland. Which, by the way, seems to me the only real choice. This re-nourishment moved about 700,000 cubic yards of sand from about 8 miles out right up onto the beach. Keep in mind that for an 1800 square foot home it only requires about 30 cubic yards of concrete. 700,000 cubic yards of sand weighs about 1.8 billion pounds when it is dry, and they pumped it off the bottom so it was probably closer to 2.4 billion pounds. That number does not even fit inside my head and I wonder if moving that volume of weight changes the spin dynamics of the earth.

The Army Corps awarded the $11 million contract to Great Lakes Dock and Dredge of Chicago in April. The project comes after years of effort to restore the beaches, which have been depleted of sand over the past six years from repeated tropical storms and northeaster winter storms. What bullshit!! I hear the Politian’s talking about how it worked, it protected our beaches from erosion. Of course they would say that, what elsecould they say after spending 11 million dollars a few months ago and all the sand is gone already. The Army Corp explains that a Beach re-nourishment is a complicated process. The Army Corps plans to use the same offshore borrow pit it tapped for the 2005 project. Barges go to a sand shoal about 8 miles offshore and the sand is delivered to the beach with a hopper dredge. More bullshit!!

One of the unintended consequences were our little sea turtle buddies. It is well known that through the months of May through October the sea turtles take to the beaches in Northeast Florida to lay their eggs. So we started our re-nourishment in July. They found some nests, 23 of the 27 nests found so far this season had to be moved north of the projected project area. I wonder how much that cost??

Well, I suppose all this and those decisions are above my pay-grade. It will not stop me from wondering, what the hell are people thinking, 11 million bucks to move sand around??? Oh well, good for the Great Lakes Dock and Dredge company for coming up with a plan, executing it and keeping some folks employed. Regardless of whether there is sand from 8 miles out or just the same old sand that the ocean places there for me is all the same to me. Enjoy sitting there watching the sun come up over whatever sand is there and the water that is slowly moving what is left of the re-nourishment back out to sea. 

Friends – what does that really mean to you??

The other day a great friend of mine posted a comment on Facebook.  Here it is.

MY DEFINITION OF A FRIEND...

"Friends" on Facebook is a very loose term. To Facebook, everyone is your friend. I see however that even Facebook recognizes that not everyone is really a friend by creating a "Close Friends" list.

For me a friend is someone that would never intentionally cause you harm or grief. A friend is someone I can enjoy having a conversation with, joking, laughing, sharing, and whom you don't need to take life quite so seriously with.

A true friend is someone that when you are faced with adversity will respect your privacy, reach-out to help, and listen openly without passing judgement while offering advice. A true friend knows when you need a hug, knows how to comfort you, and can be trusted with your most private thoughts.

I want to publicly thank my true friends: Sue, Mark, Dee, Sandy, Velora, Patti, Smitty, and Vickie... Thank you guys for being you. You each have a specialness and a place in my heart.

Now just for some background my buddy and I served together on shore duty in Annapolis Maryland, the Naval Radio Transmitting Facility (NRTF) NSS-9.  He was my boss, work center supervisor it was called in the Navy.  We worked and played and drank together, it was a small base and there was not much to do.  He was a volunteer firefighter at the local fire department.  We both ended up meeting girls at that base, there were the only two that were eligible.  There were others available but they either had an excess of facial hair or were complete and very unpleasant women.  I say that in the most polite way possible.  We were stationed there together in the late eighties and we each met our Brides.  At the time I don’t suspect that either one of us would have still been with those same Girls 20 some years later, but we both still are happily married to the same women.

I say all that to get to the point about friendships I have made over the years when I served in the United States Navy.   I am not going to say that friendships I made before or after are better or worse but the friendships I made when I served are some of the strongest bonds I have.  Rob and Jen and Bride and I had lost touch with each other many years ago.  We often wondered where they were and what they were doing, I am sure that over the years they had the same thoughts.  Anyway, some time back we reconnected, right here in Facebook.  It was like we were still stationed back in Annapolis and before long they were at our home in Jacksonville Florida.  They were on vacation at Disney in Orlando and I was sad we only got to spend part of a day together. 

Now we did not speak for nearly twenty years and we reconnected a couple of years ago on here and he still considers me one of his true friends.  I have the same feelings about him, but sometimes I do not think I do a very good job of expressing myself.  I look back on those times when we hung out together at that little 277 acre peninsula on the Chesapeake Bay called NRTF.  We watched the sun come up over the bay and played a lot of volleyball, first on the beach and then later on a court right up by the barracks.  We cooked out all the time at a little club house not 100 feet from the barracks.  We threw parties out there where we drank all night and listened to music too loud.  We would go to this little shithole bar on the Naval station and drink whiskey until we could barely walk, or at least I could barely walk.  We worked on very important and VERY large systems that provided one way communications to submarines in the Atlantic Ocean. 

He was there the night I drank myself silly while cleaning for a barracks inspection, almost literally silly.  That was when I quit drinking, the skipper of the base made that recommendation as well.  It was not much after that when I met Bride.  They were great times at that base, all made better by my GREAT friend Rob, I love him like and brother and am so happy that after nearly 20 years we were able to reconnect with each other and it was like we picked up as if we were at that little shithole bar the night before.  Hahahahha, I love that guy and over the last several years I have learned to tell my friends that I love them, life is too fucking short not to.  So if you have made it this far in this blog then you must be a friend as well so - I love you and you have a special place in my heart as well.         

You are what you eat – it is true of many other things too!!!

I am a perpetual people watcher, I love looking and observing the behaviors of others. I am not sure why I enjoy it or even why I do it but I do and it does not cost me one thin dime. When I get serious about watching folks I find that I wonder about their lives a lot. What kind of childhood, what traumatic events have they lived through –what has lead them to me, at this moment. What is the cause of the behavior they are exhibiting, good or bad? What in their lives caused them to give change to the homeless man, what caused them to not hold that elevator door because they were in a hurry to get someplace? Sometimes it scares me, more then not folks seem to have rude or gruff behavior and seem only concerned about themselves.

Having watched people for so long it has given me a bit of insight into my own actions and behaviors. I knew all along that I was an odd bird with lots of idiosyncratic behaviors, I actually am one with them and cherish them. I don’t want to conform, I am who I am as Popeye the Sailor man used to say and since I was a Sailor back in the day- I am saying it as well. I have learned that we tend to see what we want to see. What does that mean you might ask?? Well if we are happy and in a good mood we will tend to see those behaviors and actions. If we are pissed off at the world and hate everyone, that in turn those are the behaviors and actions we tend to see in others. Weird how that works but it has been my experience that that is an undeniable truth.

Why is that I wonder, seems counterproductive really when you think about it. When you are pissed, you see the ugly in others and then it perpetuates itself into a cascade of pissed off. Think about the last time you were mad in your car, people are pissed off when driving A LOT!! Does it make you feel better to take the frustrations of someone cutting you off on that person by zooming up and cutting them off? Or not letting someone back over, of course not but the anger so clouds our judgment that we don’t even notice the toxic effect the whole thing is having on us. All, due to us transferring our own irritability and bullshit onto someone else – weird I tell ya.

Anyway, I wrote this first part yesterday after being irritated in the morning and watching my own behavior and the effect it was having on those around me. Long story short by noon I was in a much happier mood and I was able to see the opposite reaction in the people who were around me. I went to bed last night feeling damn good about my day and my observations about myself. Well anyway, this morning, as I was leaving the Gate station on my way to watch sunrise, a woman held the door open for me. Now I saw her when she came in and I was obviously late for her, up all night – for me, it was bright and early.

I was purchasing a cup of coffee, she was right in front of me in line. She too was having a cup of coffee, I watched her as she was lovingly and very slowly preparing it. It was black with a couple of ice cubes, funny because I like a couple of cubes in mine as well to drop the temperature a bit. Anyway she paid and I paid and she walked out right in front of me. She had let go of the door already when she saw me right behind her. She reached up with the speed of a Ninja and caught door and opened it back up for me. I said thank you very much. She then said, my pleasure. That set the tone for my whole day. I hold the door a lot for folks and if or when they say thanks, I say my pleasure. It never fails to put a smile on their face. This was the first time that someone had used those words when I said thank you for holding the door. It brightened my day and reinforced why I say it as well.

So lighten up folks and smile. If you stay pissed or irritated, you will see and hear nothing but that. If you smile and laugh, those are the things that will reinforce you belief in who you are.

Juror number 3

So there I was, minding my own business when my summons arrived.  Not just for city court, nope.  This was for the US District Court for the middle District of Florida, which actually covers 12 counties in and around Jacksonville Florida.  This was the second time I have been called to serve for this court, it was my first being selected and seated as a juror though.   So when you get a summons from this court you are “on call” for one month and required to call a specific number after 7:30pm Friday night.  Week number one was easy, please call back next Friday, that call took about 30 seconds.  The second week of my on call status was different, that Friday night the voice told me my service was required and that I needed to show up at the courthouse by 7am, the Bryan Simpson United States Courthouse.  They also instructed me to use the library parking garage and that they would validate parking.

Cool, I thought I finally get to perform my civic responsibility and sit as a Juror.  Although I knew where the building was and I was pretty sure I knew where the library parking garage was over the weekend I drove downtown to verify their locations.  I realized then that the courthouse was sitting in a spot where an OLD building used to be, it was indeed the very first building implosion I ever saw in real life.  Anyway, with the location confirmed I was ready to get started on Monday morning.  Which I did, I was the first one there, the second fellow who showed up, while I was sitting outside was a nervous fellow who was some form a military, I could tell by the aviator glasses he was wearing.  I wanted to tell him that those went out of fashion not long after the movie Top Gun came out, in 1986!!! I didn’t though and I just amused myself watching him for the next couple of hours.

We spent a couple of hours in the Jury Assembly area filling out paperwork, watching some videos and receiving instructions.  There was a call for anyone who did not follow the instructions and waited to the last possible moment to let them know they would be unable to serve.  The original summons, which I had in my pocket clearly stated that if we were not going to be able to serve, to let them know right away.  Well my boy from earlier was all over that, and the person who was administering was not giving them slack but after a while she did allow 4 people to skip serving.  It was probably for the best anyway, who wants a Juror on their case that is thinking about everything but serving and on top of that is pissed off about serving anyway - I do not want that person in my Jury box.  It was also at this time that we learned we were one group away from being selected for the Grand Jury, an 18 month commitment.

So we went through Voir dire, which is a high flalukey way to say Jury selection.  They ask you many questions in an attempt to determine if you would be favorable to the defendant or the prosecution.  That process took about 2 hours and I was scrutinized by the Judge and the attorneys from both sides.  I answered best I could and there were 8 follow-up questions that were asked of me.   Compared to the answers of some of the other 20 folks I must have seemed harmless, and there were many startling answers in this process from other potential Jurors.  I was surprised how many had similar situations as to the one the case was about.   We spent about noon going through that process, at which time we were all called back into the court room, not in the jury box this time though.  They then read a list of names and those names that were call were moved into the Jury box, I was called third and therefore I would be known from that point on as Juror number three. 

We were then dismissed for lunch and after that we settled in for opening arguments.  Both attorneys did a fine job, there were a combined 9 objections during the opening remarks.  I thought, wow this is going to be a wild ride.  Some of the objections were overruled and some were sustained.  I do not remember which side came out on top of that first skirmish.  Opening statements took about 2 hours and we were dismissed for the day, we were to return two days later to get started.  There was an event going on the next day that had all the judges tied up teaching high school teachers about the US district court system.

Day 2 of witness testimony was long and it was all doctors, talking in medical terms about the spine.  Since my Bride has had a back surgery I consider myself quite knowledgeable about it, the engineer in forced me to research a lot (back in the 90’s when she had the surgery) of information, I even found out exactly how an MRI works.  Anyway, there were a lot of the terms and conditions related to disks in the back and neck I was at least familiar with.  There were lots of objections, some sustained, some overruled.  We heard from the plaintiff’s family, we heard from the plaintiffs doctors and we heard from the plaintiff herself.  Lots of compelling testimony, that was for sure.  This case was somewhat hard for me to understand because some facts were already decided and agreed upon.  I can only assume there was at least one previous trial that determined those undisputed facts, although I do not know that for a fact.  What we did know was that two particular facts were established. 

Having those facts decided made me contemplate what we were actually doing here, although we were told it was about decided what amount of money would be awarded.  That did not jibe, in my mind, with the witness testimony.  The witnesses were all doctors and family members and they were talking about things that we were instructed were already determined and undisputed.  I am a habitual people watcher and the folks involved with this trial, from the judge to the court reporter to the judge’s deputy and including all the witnesses were providing plenty of fodder.  Even a man who was there every day out in the audience, no idea who he was but he looked as if he could have been a Tibetan shaman who just came down from the Tibetan plateau to observe the outcome of this trial in Jacksonville Florida.  Between testimonies it was amusing to just gaze out, and to see who was gazing back at us.

Day 3 was more witness testimony and the plaintiff wrapped up and the defendant started to argue their case.  Lots of objections, some sustained, some overruled.  A lot of sidebars though out the trial, they would bath the Jury box with white noise when they were having sidebars, and it was very effective at not allowing us to hear anything.  I found today more interesting with my fellow Jurors, quite a diverse group we were.  There were only eight of us, three men, five women and we ranged from 25 to 68 years of age, four of us where black, and four were white.  It was quite interesting to listen to where the conversations went during our breaks.  The plaintiff was a 42 year old white woman from St. Augustine Florida, who we learned through the mortality tables, had 40.7 years left in her lifetime.  All the lawyers, except for one were white men, the other was a white woman, who fidgeted with her lip A LOT!!  With the end of day the testimony phase was over and both sides had rested their case and completed any redirects.

Day 4 was closing statements and deliberation.  Closing statements took about an hour and an half for each side, and then a last word from the plaintiff’s lawyers took another 30 minutes because he wanted to rebut some comments of the other lawyers.  Our deliberation took nearly 5 hours while we rode an emotional roller coaster from the top to the bottom.  The tangible expenses were easy to quantify and easy to award.  She had spent (in evidence) $29,387.58 in the past three years (the accident happened three years ago) on doctors, prescriptions and physical therapy.  The testimony was that she would need at least one anterior cervical discectomy at C4-5 and most likely one more at C5-6 due to a small herniation at that level.  Her side thought she would need three but each doctor indicated that they had never seen three done on one person.  There were other projected medical costs as well and we just added them up, $326,897.00 over the next 40.7 years, which included two $125,000 anterior cervical discectomies, we were able to come to these numbers within one hour.

Then we had pain and suffering, which was defined as the physical and mental distress suffered from an injury.  Including; the aches, pain, temporary and permanent limitations on activity, potential shortening of life, depression, and embarrassment from scarring, which there was. We had to determine what that was for the last three years and the next 40.7 years.   This award was not tangible and was completely subjective.  The plaintiffs’ lawyers gave us what they wanted her to get, 20 dollars an hour for 24 hours a day for the next 40.7 years.  That equated to 7.1 million!!!  And that was a HUGE number!!  We all agreed that was not a fair verdict for the insurance company.  I told the story of my Bride’s back surgery and once it was done there was little pain and suffering after the initial surgery pain and a few months of physical therapy.  It took several hours during which we applied several methodologies to determine the amounts, past and future.  After much consternation and lively debate we finally decided on a verdict.  $200,000 for the last three years – she had been to over 200 doctor and therapy visits.  We then decided on the future, we arrived at $2,000,000.  The total verdict was $2,556,284.58 and we were unanimous.

That was what we determined was fair, I am not going to go into how we determined that, if you have ever served on a jury I suspect you can understand why I am reluctant to discuss the Juror’s actions and decision making process.  We were then escorted back into the court room and our verdict was read by the Judge.  I was watching both side very carefully while the verdict was read, their eyes were glued on the judge.  To tell you the truth, I believe both sides were OK with the outcome, just watching faces anyway.  we were thanked and released by the judge and we were escorted went back to the Jury room.  Within three minutes the Judge popped in and thanked us personally, which I thought was nice.  He also asked if we had any questions about the case or the process.  There were several, none of which I will repeat and he did his level best to answer them all.  I walked out of the courthouse with my fellow juror’s, all of us were holding our heads high and feeling like we did the right thing, I whistled a tune as I walked to my car thinking that was a week VERY well spent!! 

If you ever get a Jury summons, don’t complain, go and serve.  Why, what happens if one day you are in the hot seat and you wind up with only Jurors who had nothing better to do??  I want people like me and you on that Jury, a fair and balanced group that show the diverse makeup of the community in which I live.  SERVE with pride and without prejudice or complaint if summoned – that is what I say to you!!