A jury pool . . . or...

A jury pool . . . or a jury ocean?When a questionnaire for jury duty in Compton was mailed to Lawanda Bennekin, her father-in-law, Anthony Jones, wrote back that Bennekin now lives in Germany.

“A week later the form was returned with a handwritten explanation that the form hadn’t been completed,” Jones said. So, he completed the form and sent another letter of explanation.

The result?

A jury summons for Bennekin arrived.

Here’s what Jones wants to know: “Can you find out if they still pay 5 cents a mile? After all, it’s only 5,081 miles each way.”

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On the other hand: Maybe, in the case of the O.J. Simpson trial, it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to import jurors from other countries.

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Weary of Robert Shapiro and the rest of them?Maybe you should mute the sound of the trial on your TV set and listen to “Guilty or Not Guilty,” a tape just released by Albert & Davis Production Co.

It’s described as “instrumental music which lets one hear the hurried heartbeat of Los Angeles, and visualize how the media and the public have been enthralled by the city’s perilous pace. . . . Hear the beating of the drum match the pulse of our hearts as the tragic drama unfolds.”

Being 5,081 miles from L.A. does have its advantages.

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At least it’s not checkbook journalism: When a pilot crashed on the White House lawn earlier this month, the San Gabriel Valley Tribune was obviously determined to run an official shot of the area. So a staffer pulled one out of his wallet. We wonder if any readers momentarily thought they had received something more valuable than a coupon with their newspaper.

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Attn. Only in Portland columnist: Barry Curtis of L.A. sent us a real estate ad he noticed on a trip to Oregon, one that was headlined, “RANCH + HOT TUBA.”

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Or maybe we were just seeing things: Not long ago, we mentioned a news-oriented billboard that proclaimed: “You Can’t Do This With Just Any Camcorder”--and showed an image of a black-and-white police car in the viewfinder. Very subtle. Anyway, soon afterward, the artwork was changed so that the police car was replaced by a little green extraterrestrial type.

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A reason to go on living: Radio ads for Six Flags Magic Mountain have been excitedly trumpeting the park’s latest innovation--”a new musical interpretation of Batman the Ride.”

miscelLAny Under his windshield wiper, R. Scott Seomin of Hollywood found an ad for a “phallic casting service. Specializing in phallic replicating. . . . Ask us about gift certificates and group casting.” Further proof that there’s something for everyone in L.A.