Jury Duty & The Home Alone Twins!

I've been proud of the fact that my dogs have been minimally destructive throughout the past 19 months. I've even bragged to family about how good my dogs have been. I've left them in the past for 6 hours at a time with access even to the inside of the house with no problem. And then along came this week - JURY DUTY!

I was assigned to be part of the jury pool for a murder trial - ugh!! The first day they sent us home in the morning, unfortunately telling us that we would likely go all week as the final jury was chosen. The next morning I was up and out before my husband and the dogs were out of bed. Fortunately I was close enough to the courthouse that I came home for lunch, only to find this most charming "artistic" rendering strewn across the entire surface of my driveway.

I was so frustrated I couldn't say a word. After standing dumbfounded for several seconds I opened my cell phone and pix messaged the above photo to my husband. I knew what he had done without him even telling me. He decided to take one of his garage mats and leave it for them to lay on so that they "could be comfortable". Obviously they had other creative ideas when it came to the grey foam mat.

The next morning he assured me that any overblown compassion he may have felt the day before was gone. I suggested that when he left he should bring out all their bones to keep them occupied. My morning in the jury pool was exasperating as the lawyers began to interview the first group of 18 chosen as jurors. Several were dismissed and as the noon recess approached I began to dread the next roll call. Sure enough I soon found myself in a jurors seat being interview by the defence attorneys. By the time the noon recess was called I was juror #2. I had very mixed feelings at this point as much as I was willing to do my civic duty I had no desire to spend likely over a month of my life being dragged through the details of the murder. I don't enjoy TV shows or movies of this nature and I certainly didn't want to have it in my face, real life with no ability to turn it off or change the channel. I would be a very long and hard month.

This was my state of mind when I arrived home to fine yet another artistic rendering strewn across my driveway. My hope of enjoying my lunch snuggled up with my dogs went up in flames. There before me lay another wasteland. And the source of their artistic medium hung pathetically in tatters.

What had inspired this was beyond me. It's not like the fence had magically turned into beef jerky but from the looks of things you would have thought is was. Their throw-up and their poop over the next 8 hours was proof that some bizarre delusion had over come them. More had been eaten then I dreamed possible given the complete lack of enticing flavor that wood could possibly have had.

Once again I spent my lunch cleaning instead of getting my mind off my morning. The return to the court room was a dread. Obviously our driveway was in much need of dog proofing, dog proofing that I thought we were well past at this stage. When the lawyers took up their juror questioning again it was hard not to be frustrated at the redundancy in their line of questioning with some of the potential jurors. After a five minute recess the judge called us back into the court room and the lawyers were given the opportunity to dismiss jurors. When the defense turned and thanked me and said I was excused I could have jumped out of my seat. I happily stood and floated out of the courtroom. I was done, and obviously the dogs and the driveway were better off for it.
I categorized this photo under Humor as someday soon I'll be able to laugh about this weeks foray into my dogs hidden Picasso talents.