February 13, 1991
Dear Everyone:
In 1984 Kenneth Johnson produced a TV mini-series
called “V”, a sci-fi
analogy of the Nazi takeover in Europe.
The “V” stood for “Visitors” from outer space who, ostensibly,
came to bring the Earth peace and prosperity, but who actually came for
lunch with the intention of staying for dinner.
In a word, the “Visitors” liked to munch on people, rodents,
miscellaneous insects and anything else that didn’t eat them first.
Naturally, there was a ragtag band of resistance
fighters determined to save the Earth from the dinner table.
The miniseries did well in the ratings and the network asked for
a sequel. This also did
well, ending with the defeat of the “Visitors” and victory for Earth.
However, since the sequel also did well in the
ratings, the network decided to go with a weekly series and so, the
“Visitors” became un-defeated at least in certain areas such as Los
Angeles where they were close to the studios.
(Actually, the show was frightfully expensive to produce.
All those laser guns shooting bolts of lightning had to be
hand-painted directly onto the film, frame by frame.
“And what do you do for a living, Mr. Smith?”
“I’m a laser-bolt-painter.”)
Each week, the series opened with Howard K. Smith,
portraying himself, reporting on the status of The War.
After three months, the novelty wore off and the ratings began to
sag and the network decided to cancel the series.
Johnson ended the show with a flourish and a declaration of peace
between the two planets.
These days, you don’t have to wait a week for the
status on The War. You get
it every hour on all networks (Life Imitates Art), except for CNN which
occasionally interrupts The War with other news.
I noticed that this morning, they pre-empted The War to show live
coverage of the announcements of this year’s Academy Awards nominations.
It’s nice to see that some
priorities are still in place.
And is it only in America that The War has
sponsors? “This has been an
update of the Gulf War, sponsored by Poppin’ Fresh.”
In other news…
I have been summoned (praise be to Heaven!) for
Jury Duty next week. Some
people object to serving Jury Duty, but not I.
For starters, you get to sleep late (past 4:30), at which time
CNN is covering how The War is affecting the London Stock Exchange).
Next, you get to hang around the Martinez Courthouse and there’s
nothing to do but read. Last
time I served Jury Duty, I read an entire Leon Uris novel (The
Haj). This time, I might
even finish Noble House.
Of course, there’s always the chance that I’ll be
selected for a jury. That
would be OK as long as we’re finished by the 25th.
I’ve been invited to a service award luncheon on the 25th
and “Ashley Holtz” is trying to set up a “congratulatory lunch” on the
27th to thank all the people who worked on “his” project:
The Billing System. I
wouldn’t want my civic duty to get in the way of a free lunch or two.
So far, the greatest contribution “Ashley” seems to
have made to “his” project is arranging to buy the rest of us lunch.
However, that may change.
Next week is when the Billing System has to run and I won’t be
there to do it if I’m hanging around the Courthouse.
“Ashley” may get a crash course, in ”his” system rather sooner
than he planned.
However, my chances of actually getting onto a jury
panel are probably somewhere between slim and zilch.
One of the questions they always ask is, “Have you ever served on
a jury before?” (Yes.)
If the answer’s yes, they say, “Without
saying what it was, did you reach a verdict?”
(Yes.)
Actually, if the defense attorney has done his/her
homework, he/she already knows that I did serve on a jury and we fried
that sucker. Which is to
say, a verdict of guilty was reached in just a few hours but, because we
ran over the lunch hour, they brought us sandwiches.
(This is not what I have in mind as a free lunch.
For one thing, there’s no wine list.)
It took three days to present the evidence that, although no one
actually saw the guy steal a
girl’s wallet, he was caught with it and the DA’s office was going to
make this one stick. The two
attorneys spent most of their time approaching the bench and we spent
most of our time in the Jury Room (another good place to do a lot of
reading).
So, if I get as far as having my name called and
going through the question and answer part, I’ll probably be excused.
If not for having served before, for having a Court Reporter for
a sister who probably deposed one of the witnesses and told me all about
it over dinner at Fuddruckers.
Love, as always,
Pete
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