Somewhere in the halls of the Criminal Justice Center, somebody else was wearing my belt. It might not even have been his fault, but I was the one holding up my pants for the rest of the day. Welcome to jury duty.

I began to dread the prospect of jury duty from the moment I received my summons in the mail. This is not uncommon for most of us – nobody wants to put a hold on their lives to become a member of a jury of their peers, passing judgment on someone who probably wasn’t a peer to begin with. But jury duty is one of the unfortunate perks which comes from being a registered voter. The other perk is voting for politicians, but that’s another story. continue reading »

Tacony-based Dietz & Watson gives out thousands of free sandwiches at City Hall.

Who says there’s no such thing as a free lunch?

Thousands of people stood in fast-moving lines on Dilworth Plaza outside City Hall yesterday, with good reason:  Dietz & Watson was there to give each and every one of them a freshly made wrap sandwich and a bottle of ice-cold water.  Our corporate neighbor, in that big, shiny, 600,000-square-foot facility at 5701 Tacony St., sure knows how to throw an anniversary party!

They did so by inviting everyone to celebrate the company’s 70 years in Philadelphia by giving people a free lunch.  A group of  550 employees from the neighborhood plant were on hand to make the sandwiches (moving fast) and hand them out to all of us with a description (mine was baked turkey with roasted garlic-infused American cheese and D&W’s own cranberry honey mustard) and a smile. continue reading »