We are waiting until after 5pm to vote.  We usually are among the first 20 or so at our polling place, but today I want to go later in hopes of doing some good people watching. I think I will take the camera.

If you want us to post a video, e-mail it to me. If you don’t, that’s okay too. Just saying.

Of course, I use gmail, so it’s unlikely that I’ll ever receive a large file.

I early voted here in Mo City on the 24th, mainly because I wanted to avoid the mad rush today. I was surprised at the number of people that were there. I was more surprised at how quickly it went, it seemed like a lot of people voted straight party, based on the amount of time they were in the booths.

I mailed mine in a week ago.

Get out and
VOTE!

I had a dream that when I got to the polls, I couldn’t vote for my personal choice, Obama. They said that there had been an unannounced meeting at 6 am, and if you planned on voting for Obama you had to be there or you couldn’t vote. So nobody could vote for Obama.

I went home to contact the board of elections, but all my computers had been turned into Atari 2600s so I couldn’t get online. All I could do was watch Pac-man.

Anyway, I woke up at 5:30, a bit nervous and made it to the polls early.

And by the way, I was looking at the little card they handed me with a chip on it. I wonder how hard that would be to hack. Just make your own chip-card, switch it out. Make the machine switch all the votes.

Eh. Just a thought.

If you are going to hack the system, make it so Obama wins Texas. That’ll piss them off good.

it seemed like a lot of people voted straight party

Not in the swing states baby!

Switching all the votes would (probably) be noticed, plus you are only hacking one machine.

A much better idea would be to make sure the software used in the voting systems was NOT open source, and that the manufacturer is in your pocket. Then they can do smart things like wait until whatever result you want isn’t coming forth, then start to swap a few votes so you get back in the lead…

A much better idea would be to make sure the software used in the voting systems was NOT open source, and that the manufacturer is in your pocket.

Chuck Hagel already did that. That’s why he’s a senator.

FUCK. I just wrote a long thing about my voting experience, then i hit submit, and it got lost in the cosmos. FUCK. Fuckity fuck fuck fuck.

God dammit. It happened again.

I’m not allowed to vote, on account of my being a sex offender.

And I hit control c before hitting submit, and it pastes nothing.

My polling place is a Church on Michigan Avenue where we used to smoke dope in the Cloister area.

And I hit control c before hitting submit, and it pastes nothing.

You might want to go back and make sure your vote registered. You seem a little “Luddite” today.

I’m not allowed to vote, on account of my being a sex offender.

Enough with the guilt. I didn’t press charges, the state did.

And I hit control c before hitting submit, and it pastes nothing.

You mean it copies nothing? Isn’t that the problem I keep having and you say you’ve never had? Chickens are coming home to roost, aren’t they?  Does that metaphor even fit? Isn’t that the pot who said that they never had a conrol c problem and called the kettle… a guy… I… just ate a jelly donut and my brain blood is all gooey.

Enough with the guilt. I didn’t press charges, the state did.

Your lips said no, but your rosebud cried YES, OH YES!!!

but your rosebud cried YES, OH YES!!!

I prefer to call it my “dogstar.” Reminds me of Keanu.

I prefer to call it my “dogstar.” Reminds me of Keanu.

Who doesn’t want to think of Keanu when they’re getting it up the poop shooter?

So once more, with feeling:

I wake up early, and head out to the cupcake cafe (which, incidentally, sports an Obama/Biden poster in the window) to buy two boxes of cupcakes (one for the poll volunteers, one for the office):

Then I go up to the union office where we vote. It’s not a United Auto Workers Union or a Steel Workers Union, it’s the Musicians Union--typical theater district stuff.

The line there is long, but it only takes 20 minutes or so to get to the first desk. Still, there is a line. There has never before been any kind of a line.

Inside, I see my neighbor. He tells me we are the only two in our building who vote. I don’t know how he knows this; I know for a fact that the writer on the first floor has given Obama $500.

The lady at my district’s card table lights up when I give her the cupcakes. Then she shows my neighbor the giant scar on her knee from when she had knee surgery.

There are too poll machines for my district. On the left, voters with last names from A - L can vote. On the right, voters with last names from M - Z can vote. 14 of us get in the same line. Nobody is in the other line. That’s only for the other half of the alphabet, and we are strictly forbidden from using it. Rules are rules.

We wait. And wait. And wait. Whoever is in that booth is taking forever.

Our booth is declared broken. Maybe somebody will fix it later. Is he coming to fix it? The pollworker asks another pollworker. But nobody knows if the pollbooth technician is coming. So they shuffle us over to the other booth, the one for the other half of the alphabet.

The WASPy lady directly in front of me can’t take it anymore. “I’m going first!” she shouts. There are at least five people ahead of her. My neighbor is at the head of the line, and he amiably steps aside. “I guess you are!” he says.

The black couple behind me starts laughing. “We could wait here all day, did you see the line in Chelsea?” The gay punk rocker behind them says, “I’m with you!” And I say, “I’ve got cupcakes!”

But the lady in the booth takes FOREVER. This is mostly because she keeps arguing with her husband over who to vote for. He is standing on the other side of the curtain and they are shouting at each other. She can’t seem to hear her him, but we can hear her just fine. “Nadler? Should I vote for Nadler or should I not vote for Nadler? Duane or Leible? I said, Duane or Leible? I don’t see a Goldberg. Okay, what about the judges? Which one of them are good guys and which one of them are bad guys? Duane or Leible already? Is Proposition 2 for freeloaders?”

So she finally gets out of there, and then the line moves pretty quickly. Soon I am first in line. The man who takes my ticket asks me, pointing to my second box of cupcakes, “You brought me lunch?” I tell him, “I did! There are cupcakes right there!” Then he looks profoundly sad. “I can’t eat cupcakes. Doctor’s orders. I don’t look fat, but the doctor says I have the body of a really, really fat person.” It’s my time to vote before I can delve into that further.

And when I get in there, it takes me half a second to flip the Obama switch, once I figure out that you have to pull the red bar over first (I almost break the Obama lever beforehand).

Best. voting. experience ever.

Well I’m not allowed to vote on account of a technicality (being a non-citizen, non-resident) and on account of having a conservator managing my affairs also on a technicality (non compos mentis).  None of this however stopped me from stumping in the swing states.

So once more, with feeling:

I wake up early, and head out to the cupcake cafe to buy two boxes of cupcakes (one for the poll volunteers, one for the office):

Hide in the hiding place where no one ever goes.
Put it in your pantry with your cupcakes.
It’s a little secret just the Robinsons’ affair.
Most of all you’ve got to hide it from the kids.

Sitting on a sofa on a Sunday afternoon.
Going to the candidate’s debate.
Laugh about it, shout about it
When you’ve got to choose
Every way you look at this you lose.

to buy two boxes of cupcakes (one for the poll volunteers, one for the office):

and you didn’t bring us any?  biznitch.

So does anyone really think the “Bradley Effect" will come into play?

I’m sure it will, but I’m hopeful that it’s on a very insignificant level.

We went down at about 4:15. There were about 5 people at the new voter registration table. I let my wife and daughter go first, and then one guy who just got his registration accepted. I got ballot 501. Usually there are a total of about 475 ballots cast in our precinct. There was nothing of note to photograph.

CUPCAKE CAFE!!!
What a fab thing to do.
LP ROCKS!

I got to my votie place at 7:10. It took me till 8:00 to finish, but I almost had a meltdown. The line managing lady started trying to rearrange 75 people into a place that would only hold about 30 people. For about 5 minutes I had an elderly hospital volunteer woman holding on to my love handles to keep her balance. Very Japanese subway feeling situation. I’m not very good with crowded spaces. I was picturing a Who Concert at the Riverfront Arena scene for a minute there.

This afternoon I went to a new OBGYN who had a television in the waiting room blasting FoxNews, really loud. I realized that I used to look forward to going to my OBGYN guy for his tardiness. He had a nice quiet waiting room with a great magazine selection, and he was never on time. It was like recess for me. I will now renew my search, and the only criteria will be that there not be a television in the waiting room. Somebody on the FoxNews was incredibly indignant that Obama was playing basketball this afternoon. Incensed, actually. His word might have been RIDICULOUS!

Holy shit, America won!

Cupcakes are over-rated!

OBAMARAMA!!!

Dimmer and I read over the booklets they send you at dinner Monday night and I handed him the sample ballot out of one of them while I looked at my real-life absentee ballot. I love those things.

He and I had happy discussions about the propositions and whether the folks writing the arguments and rebuttals were scam artists, neo-cons, hysterics, front-men, or real people.

Tuesday morning, I got up and marked all my choices on the absentee ballot, sealed it up and drove to my polling place as it was opening. There were a dozen people in line. Good turnout, not yet insane.

I waved my blue envelope and asked if I could just go drop it in the box. They said yes, drop it in the brown box. I dropped it, took my “I voted” sticker and headed to work.

I then stuck my head in the sand for the rest of the day.

My daughter and her husband vote at a fairly low-income precinct, and told me that as they drove in, someone was handing out pamphlets explaining that if you want to stand with OBAMA you should fill in the circles next to the picture of the DONKEY, and there was a picture so you would know what a donkey looked like.

Somebody on the FoxNews was incredibly indignant that Obama was playing basketball this afternoon.

Obama won a particularly important primary round after playing basketball--it may have been Iowa, so he vowed that on the day of the election, he would repeat this for good luck. Hence, the basketball game.