Terror verdict watch
I'm still waiting for verdicts in the terrorism case; today marked the sixth and seventh days of deliberations for the two juries. Some of us journalists (and a lawyer-turned-TV-commentator) have basically turned a Starbucks into our office, since it's across the street from the courthouse and gives us access to Internet, coffee and plenty of time to get to the 13th floor of the courthouse when we get word of a jury question.A couple of us, myself included, file stories daily and have to work on other things. Some don't do that because they work for big papers that don't want daily stories. Either way, we make time for plenty of jokes, legal discussions and ruminations on news stories. I think it just goes without saying that journalists are news junkies, and a lot of us soak up legal news, too. We also tend to come up with a lot of jokes (if the trial involves talk of masked pole-vaulters in a basement, how can you not make jokes?), and some trial lyrics have also been created.
But sometimes the jokes find us. Yesterday, for instance, a girl seated near us happened to be talking to a friend about how she "doesn't like water." The LA Times photographer and I just looked at each other, stared some more and never did say much. We were just too speechless. The photographer later commented that he expected her to also say, "I don't like air."
And today, we ventured a little farther away for lunch and drove (so we could fly back to the courthouse in time). We parked in a garage, walked to the elevator and waited for the doors to open. They soon did so, and revealed a young man with his back to us, sitting cross-legged while cleaning the elevator. He didn't realize it, but he was almost giving us a full moon. Again, the Times photographer and I just stared, but this time we quickly tried NOT to look again for the four-floor ride. Thankfully, the man was gone by the time we returned.
Posted by Layla at 11:29 PM, April 21, 2006
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