Vote Tomorrow!

OK, I know who we elected state and federal, but I had a devil’s own time finding town data online. DH finally told me the state NPR station had it, which they do.

That’s great, BUT, it’s sorted by county then town. There are no headers for the columns except at the very top AND the first two columns are headed “TP” and “PR” which I really doubt means toilet paper and public relations, which is what I think of!

Small towns can be FRUSTRATING too!

If YOU know what the TP and PR columns are for in nhpr.org’s results by town spreadsheet, please let me know. (btw, don’t tell me to look at the unionleader.com’s charts, I tried that first. You can’t scroll down (or I couldn’t) to get to my town, so if you live in the first 10-12 towns alphabetically in the state, you’re all set, but the rest of us? We’re outta luck.)

I think I’ll just go buy a good, old-fashioned newspaper!

jkd

of my sister at the polls:

http://www.daylife.com/photo/0cAWcjFaGg7zb

And a quote that some of my African American friends are passing around (provenance currently unknown, but it was quoted in an NPR report before the election):

Rosa sat so Martin could walk. Martin walked so Obama could run. Obama is running so our children can fly.

opened here. There were no lines, but we live in a very small town. (Not as small as Dixville Notch or Hart’s Location.)

DH went down at lunchtime and took a few pictures as a part of a project by a group he’s in, and he’s off counting ballots now. I can report how our town voted when he gets back.

However, a federal election usually we’re counting ballots until midnight. Last time when it was so close, 2 or three groups of presidential ballots got recounted. (I think Bush won by 8 votes in the town or something like that? I don’t remember exactly, it was 1-2 on the sheet I was working on.)

For those of you in big towns, this is the way it works here:

You stand in front of someone, and say your name. They look to see if you’re a registed voter and give you a party ticket it it pertains (in the primary) and just mark that you picked up a ballot otherwise.

You go into one of those funky little booths and mark the ballot with pencil, fold it back up and go to a different table. You say your name again, and someone else marks off that you turned in your ballot. The moderator takes your ballot and puts in in the ballot box, which is locked.

When the polls close, the box is unlocked by someone (I think NOT the moderator?) and the moderator assigns people to tables and then assigns you a job; you’re one of a team of four. One person reads the ballot. A second person checks that the person read what was actually marked on the ballot. A third person marks a tally sheet. The fourth person makes sure the person marking the sheet did so correctly.

The tally sheet is numbered. The ballots are counted to make sure that all the ballots are tallied. The whole stack and the tally sheet is given to someone else, usually (here) the town clerk. She recounts the ballots and adds the tally sheet numbers together. I don’t know this, but I think she checks it several times.

At the end, the amount of votes cast is announced, and then the election results are announced.

The polls here opened at 8 am and closed at 7. It’s 7:35 now, they’re just starting actually counting ballots.

Small town democracy in action!

jkd

with more than my generic report of having voted. I want to share my sister’s report about her experience (she lives in Los Angeles):

After waiting in line for 2 hours (I got to the polling place at about 7:20), reading an article, and chatting a little with other people in line, it was finally my turn to vote. I was feeling just fine, optimistic, hopeful, happy, pretty normal, and then when I opened to the page where we vote for president, I broke down and started crying. Then I couldn’t see the ballot, and I wondered how I was going to be able to vote. We white people were about 5% of the group in this polling place. The people next to me started calming me down, and then two lady volunteers came over with tissues, they called over a grandmotherly type, and I asked if anyone prayed. So they hugged me and prayed a “praise God” kind of prayer, very non-partisan, and I tried to breathe deeply and stop sobbing, and they prayed for the peace that passes understanding, and finally I got composed enough to vote. I still had some difficulty seeing the ballot, but I believe that I marked all the ones I intended to mark.

It’s not Obama himself that prompts this intense emotional response, though I believe that he has much more personal integrity, resilience, and important life experience than most of the other presidents that we’ve ever had. It’s what he represents, a point of healing of 350 years of tragic and violent history that has caused deep pain and division between peoples.

I am so grateful to have lived to see this day, & I too am crying.

than I’d ever seen before at my polling place, but it wasn’t terrible. Once I got the ballot, what took the longest was working through the long, long list of judges up for renewal or for new positions. I had printed out the recommendations of the Illinois Bar Association, & I used them as a guide. When I was finished, I passed that printout on to another voter. (If any Illinois 43Thingers want to know where to find that list online, just let me know.)

I voted absentee ballot about a month ago. Really looking forward to the end of this process!

before going to work.

And after work we’re going to meet in the Loop to witness the mongo rally in Grant Park!

This is historic indeed.

tomorrow was last week, but I did vote then.

DH is,b ut this is the 1st federal election I haven’t counted ballots in about 10 years!

But of course, I’m going to vote!

Please join me?

jkd