Every citizen is required to spend a day performing in the circus. And not some frilly little girl-circus like Cirque du Soleil, but a real circus with elephants, lions, hairy women, and midgets who can tear a phone book in half.
Circusers are chosen at random, just like jury duty, and it is a felony to skip circus duty without a valid excuse.
Circusers are compensated for their lost wages at a rate of $10/day or they can trade their $10 for a year of free circus admission.
It is a felony for an employer to prevent you from performing circus duty, as it is your obligation as a citizen.-- DeathNinja, Sep 02 2003 Rehearsal Coordinator, aye? http://www.bigapple.../JoinUs/Employment/ [thumbwax, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 05 2004] At least give me a choice between jury duty and circus duty!-- phundug, Sep 02 2003 Can I be a clown?
Oh wait...-- Cedar Park, Sep 02 2003 How are you going to randomly find enough hairy women and midgets?-- FarmerJohn, Sep 02 2003 [FJ]: Have you ridden the subway recently?-- Cedar Park, Sep 02 2003 It's a circus down there?-- FarmerJohn, Sep 02 2003 I put my head in a lion's mouth just last week in fact.-- waugsqueke, Sep 02 2003 Recent studies have suggested that due to the acceptance of a wide range of 'valid' reasons for missing jury duty, most juries in the UK show a skew toward pensioners and the long-term unemployed. While this is not a massive problem for jury duty I suspect it would make for an unappealing circus (roll up, roll up, see the wrinkled lady).-- dobtabulous, Nov 24 2003 Too bad you may only do this twice in your lifetime. +-- sartep, Nov 25 2003 CIA agents have mandatory circus duty. They train at the Ringling Brothers Clown College in Venice, Florida (where Mohammed Atta learned to fly) to learn sleight-of-hand.
Source: "Mohammed Atta and the Venice Flying Circus" by Daniel Hopsicker.-- mystic2311, Dec 05 2003 random, halfbakery