Today I served my last day of jury duty.

On call all this week, I finally had to appear this afternoon, as part of a pool of prospective jurors for a gang murder trial expected to start in May and last for six weeks, into the end of June.

That schedule conflicts with my planned — and already paid for — trip to Paris with my daughters, which qualifies as a hardship under California law. So I was excused. And, since I expect to be living out of the U.S. in the very near future, I can anticipate being unavailable for future jury service.

Don’t get me wrong: I acknowledge the civic duty of jury service, and take it quite seriously. I have served on three juries since 1986, all of them drunk driving trials. If I was called for another such trial I would complain and disqualify myself, as I see them as a waste of time and money.

So, farewell jury duty! It’s been, well, interesting. I’ve done my time, thank you very much.