21:55 just spoke with my indefatigable friend tom, who's up in wisconsin counting absentee ballots (fine work up there, lad, by the by): "set your tivo for ten," sez he.
21:20 FOX predicts ohio for obama - HOLY SHIT!
20:50 wow: on CNN, david gergen just told anderson cooper that tonight could be "not just a win, but a very big win" for obama. gergen is the king of cool, so i take that seriously (i feel jessi klein a bit on him).
20:40 jacob reports that "rachel maddow needs to chill out," which i can neither confirm nor deny (having watched ABC for the last hour), but 1) she did tweet that barry has yet to wish any bush states and 2) often needs to be "talked down," as she calls it. i feel you, rachel: i think a lot of us need to be talked down right about now.
19:55 meghan mccain's song of the day is journey's "don't stop believin'" - which is a good omen. i couldn't begin to tell you why, but it's a good omen.
19:10 MSNBC sez the new house will split 261/174, "a total repudiation of the republican party" (joe scarborough). this is killing hamlet in the first act, guys.
18:50 see, this is why i distract myself with photo safaris and food: numbers are pouring in on MSNBC now, and even the expected stuff (like obama getting shellacked in kentucky) is making me sick to my stomach.
18:00 encountered my first line of the day at the times square ben & jerry's (one of only two in manhattan, someone said). naturally their corporate photographer showed up and took four thousand pictures just as i got to the door: "hi, i have nothing better to do than wait for ice cream all night." i...probably deserved this.
17:20 CNN on the brutal wait times at some polling places: "sing songs, do whatever you have to do. er, bring a book."
15:30 CNN's times square HQ gets this season's spiffy election digs award; NBC/MSNBC in rockefeller center is a close second, and FOX's avenue of the americas efforts sadden me.
14:30 sitting on the floor in penn station, photographing a doughnut. good on you, krispy kreme.
13:50 the national republican trust PAC is still running its jeremiah wright attack ad on CNN; i'd laugh, but CNN showed an illinois voter flipping a coin to settle on a candidate fifteen minutes ago.
13:00 fitness (and thus news) hiatus: since the sets at the gym* were all tuned to sportscenter, the closest i got to political news was "it's election day, go vote! who's getting the heisman this year? who's in the BCS championship?" the wait to vote in downtown brooklyn is, at present, four hours(!).
10:30 free coffee acquired! i tipped the tired-looking guy at my local starbucks. voting itself was hassle-free as well, though the police officer at my polling place busted me for wearing an obama button on my coat (wearing it counted as campaigning, which obviously isn't allowed there). i apologized and tucked it in my pocket - and sent psychic waves of sympathy to people who show up to vote wearing obama shirts (hope you wore the good underwear).
10:15
09:45 off to vote / snap hell's kitchen polling photos / smile pretty and ask for free coffee.
08:39 live TV feed of barack obama voting with his daughter on ny1: vote, guys, vote!
08:15 okay, so a recap of the voting-related national freebies: a doughnut for voters at krispy kreme, a tall coffee for voters at starbucks, ice cream for the hell of it from ben & jerry's (5-8 p.m.).
*to which i wore my threadless robot tee to hail our obama-bot overlords.
very short lines at my precinct in providence this morning. it took all of 10 minutes (tops) from the time i arrived. of course, we're not like CA with it's 82 ballot initiatives. i think there were 7 total markings i had to make - pres, senate (jack reed), house (patrick kennedy), state senate and rep, and two bond measures.
ReplyDeletefor an RI voter, i think the only interesting thing to look out for is if obama's margin of victory is larger than any other state (maybe even including illinois). my prediction is 30 points, but i wouldn't be surprised to see a 40 point win for obama here.
it was crazy here first thing in the morning - i heard reports that some polling places had 200 people queued up at 6 a.m. - but i'm guessing that everyone's gone to work now, and am about to head out myself (@ 9:30). i'm itching to take pictures, and i've got the day off - what else am i going to do?
ReplyDeletewe voted by mail over a week ago, but happily, the materials included an "I Voted" sticker. (i'm irrationally pleased about the sticker. and it's like a ticket for free coffee!)
ReplyDeletelove that you have the day off for election day.
Jessie wanted to make a PROP 8 BLOWS GOATS T-shirt but apparently that is an unprofessional thing for a Stanford instructor to wear. Hoping -
ReplyDeleteIt took me longer to vote in the booth than it took for Jacob to wait and line and vote. After two and a half !! hours in line (the shortest line they had seen all week at city hall, thanks to the pouring rain) they handed me FOUR ballots. It had taken 2 of the 2.5 hours in line just to read up about all the propositions, we had a gazillion in the city alone. I swear, I hate propsitions on principal. Poorly written, nutty, expensive, and it discourages people from voting because it's like a civics exam. But whatever. No on 8, and all that.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I'm glad I'm done voting, but I feel nervious and puke-y and awful. AND I have a group presentation at night school, which means I won't be home and to our party until 7pm PST. AHHH!!!
Oregon's a vote-by-mail state: no voting booths, no lines. I mailed in my ballot last week. As a result, today's somewhat anti-climactic. Plus, unlike Valya, we do not get I Voted stickers. :/
ReplyDeleteMy primary objective is to finish this paper for class before tonight's election party. I'm bringing cupcakes - frosted in bright blue, natch! Photos on the blog tomorrow, if my home internet ever comes back up (down since last night's power outage).
i haven't decided whether or not we'll head to our friends' party tonight (joe noted that we were social for the last two elections, and those didn't exactly end well). i'll most likely watch the returns from beneath a blanket on the couch: i feel like a red sox fan c. 2004.
ReplyDeletei don't think i've ever gotten an "i voted" sticker - maybe voting for clinton in college in '96? - but i know that not having one shouldn't affect one's ability to score election day treats (since it's illegal to reward voters in some states, most voter swag is being given to anyone who asks for it).
commenting in bullet point form, because i am tired. but have much to comment about.
ReplyDelete* line was two hours long at my polling place.
* there were a dozen (ish) electoral districts at my location. door guard/assface was only paying attention to the ones he could see from the door.
* thus, it's a good day to be in districts 1, 82, 91, and 129. door guy's got you covered.
* my two hour wait should've been 15 minutes, because my district is small. door guy was not paying attention, despite my asking him to go fucking check the line, or just let me do it.
* here are the three stages of interest from the cops at a polling place (in 15 minute increments):
1) disinterest
2) hey, pissed off guy... leave door guy alone. he's trying.
3) hey, door guy who clearly isn't trying after all... maybe these pissed off people have a point.
* woman working the table at my district DID NOT SPEAK ENGLISH. at all. it was very strange, and extremely alarming.
* she did not know how to work the booth.
* she did not know how to properly fill out the paper ballot (for those whose proof of registration wasn't readily available). i may have saved one poor girl's vote today.
* she also nearly marked me down as the wrong person, despite me putting my finger on the page, next to my name, while saying "THIS! THIS IS ME!"
* they didn't ask for my voter card thingy, nor did they check my id. AWESOME.
all in all, i've had better voting experiences.
random thoughts:
ReplyDelete- i early voted last week. i waited about 20 min. strangely, no one there wanted to see my voter registration card, either. why do i carry it around at all times? (they did check my ID tho...)
- stomach doing nervous flip flops all day today.
- eerily silent anxious palpable air nervous excitement blanketing hyde park today (i work in obama's backyard).
- when i get off work (possibly as late as 11:30) i am headed straight for the rally in Grant Park. the election may be called by the time i get out. if the worst happens, i will head home and hide under a blanket and contemplate a move to canada.
ah, it's over?!
ReplyDeletelucky me had zero waiting time: i went to the polls after work.
propositions suck. i hope 8 gets kicked to the curb in a major way. the exit polls look hopeful...
i'm unusually tired since the time change. argh. i blame the strep throat i'm recovering from.
we started the day around 8 am driving around the polls in Darby, PA. most were manageable, around 50-75 people, but one elementary school was nuts: three districts, three separate lines all about a 2-hour wait or longer, no signs telling people what line to get in. we passed out donut holes and water bottles, but no one seemed to really need their morale boosted. "honey, we've waited a long time to do this," one woman said. "this line is nothing."
ReplyDeletecanvassed and gave rides and distributed please-stay-in-line treats for the next ten hours. we wanted to stay through the end, but decided to race back to New York so A could vote. (cast his ballot at 8:54 pm - whew.)
then headed to Hare Field Road, where what seemed like all of east Williamsburg was packed like sardines in a crushd tin box, glued to CNN. when they called Virginia...people, you know the man is the real deal when he can defeat Irony in the heart of hipsterdom. not sure if it was the speech, the sight of PRESIDENT-ELECT BARACK OBAMA blazing on screen, or being surrounded by skinny-jeaned Brooklynites hugging strangers and chanting "U-S-A! U-S-A!" that brought tears to my eyes. i'm with the First Lady: for the first time in my adult life...
The odometer for my trips for the campaign? About 2,000 miles worth of driving. That's no exaggeration: Milwaukee twice, Racine, Kenosha, Fort Wayne, Ind., two round trips to Madison, and a trip to Milwaukee and Beloit from base camp in Madison this weekend. That's basically Chicago to Boston, round trip, or about $350 or so in gas and tolls. And, of course, that trip can now be made without turning a single pebble in a red state. Whole bunch of red counties, sure. But not a blue state in the bunch. Totally fucking worth it.
ReplyDelete(Yes, that's a bit of horn tooting. Sorry.)
One thing that will not be missed? Truck-stop meals. Yes, it's fine when you are tired and hungry to get a buffet line. But I've had my fill of rubbery food for a while, thank ya.
i....threw a mini election day get together with chris, guests including anyone we knew that wasn't republican. while the champagne toast at the cnn 'breaking news' of the projected win for obama was the best moment i've had in my life so far, i felt completely heartbroken finding out, while sitting with several key friends, that prop 8 was going to pass. i still feel sick to my stomach about it, and while i'm over the moon about obama winning, i'm so, so disappointed about 8. i am prepared to do anything i can to overturn it, whatever that takes.
ReplyDeletehonestly, what tarnishes this election is finding out that people i care about and love -- and more importantly, trusted -- voted yes on 8. normally i respect everyone's opinions, but right now, i am so disgusted with anyone who voted yes. i can't even look at my roommate.