Life, In General

It's strange how when things happen, they all seem to happen at once. Things that really have nothing to do with each other.
So, I've been selected for jury service in a criminal trial in the county court. It's kind of cool, seeing how our whole justice system works. On the other hand, it's a little scary, the allegations made are pretty serious and could seriously screw someones life over if we as the jury find the accused guilty as charged. Of course we can't really worry about that, we're just supposed to consider the evidence presented and come to a verdict. It's not murder or anything, that would have been sent to the supreme court, but still fairly serious. In the first trial I went into, the jury of which I wasn't selected for, the defendant was accused of armed robbery. I'm not actually allowed to discuss my trial but I'd say the charges are much more serious than that. It's a big thing to judge someone like this. I just hope the barristers do their job well so that the deliberation is easy. The judge said it should be a short trial, should be finished on tuesday. I'm going to be staying with my mum till the trial is over, so I don't have to go to and from the city all the time, costing $12.50 for a train ticket each day. I do get paid for this, for the four days of my service I'll get paid $36 per day, so i should get $144 or so out of it. Pretty crap pay really, but I could use the cash, and it's kind of interesting stuff anyway. Probably won't be so enthusiastic after I actually do a full day in court. I was only really in there for 2 hours today, the rest of the time was sitting in the jury pool room waiting around, and in the first trial. Actually the trial will probably be more interesting than sitting around doing nothing.

In other news I have been going through the process to join the Army Reserve. It's been pretty in-depth so far and it's only going to get more-so. I'm going to go for a general service officer position, I decided against the commando thing for now because they have a greater time commitment due to the more intense training, and it'd be a lot harder to get to and then maintain the fitness level required. Also the officer cadet course thing is well designed to fit in with the uni calender. There might be opportunities to later be posted to the commando unit as an officer anyway, not for 5 or so years though.
Anyway after I get some optometry stuff done I'll have to book in for an assessment day and stuff like that, where they'll scrutinise me more closely and make sure I'm officer material. I'll have to prepare for that, think of good things to say when they ask me why I want to be an officer and such. They ask a lot of questions about the position too, to make sure I know exactly what I'm in for. That'll be tricky too, there's a lot to know. Assuming I do make it past all their testing and selecting and such I'd be part of the June intake, so still a fair way off before I could make any money out of it. Wouldn't head off to pucka for the 6 week basic soldier training until this time next year either. Not much time in the uni calender for that much of a time commitment except for now. I suppose I should look for some more immediate form of employment too. At least I have a pretty decent looking resume and some good written references now. Means I don't have to sit down and do that stuff before applying for a job, which is kind of what stopped me from applying for things before. It was easy to not care enough to bother. Now I don't have to care.

Next up is my house. Apparantly my Dad wants to sell it and move up Glen Waverly way. I'm not really sure why, something to do with this woman of his no doubt. I certainly don't want to go anywhere, though it would be sort of silly of me to stay here when I could live right near uni. I don't like it though. It's especially uncool for my brother, who'd have to change secondary schools and make all new friends an such, and would have to leave the friends he has who live right next door to us and in the street. He's pretty much said that he isn't moving, though he can't really stop it happening. My sister isn't happy about it either. Perhaps together we can convince my Dad that it is a silly and rather selfish idea. I hope so, coz I have lifelong friends here and don't want to have to travel for half an hour to see them, though of course I would. It wouldn't be practical to do all the time though, which would suck.

Ahh that's probably about it for now. Oh, I did fine with my uni results, two D's, two HD's, giving me a HD average for this year, 82.5 or something. Pretty sweet.
I feel sort of weird at the moment. I think it's a discomfort thing at having a bunch of stuff changing around me whilst being put into strange and unfamiliar situations. Oh well, that is sort of what I wanted, in principle if not in actual practice. We don't grow till we're taken out of our comfort zone. And what is life if not growing as people?