After we dropped Kelly off at school, Peter and I went to vote since our polling place is conveniently located at Kelly’s school.
I’m the self-designated household designated voting nerd. I’m one of those people (supposedly rare) who looks over the ballot and all the propositions several days before the vote, reads them over, together with the pros and cons, and makes a decision based on that. On the more local issues, I have to go online for information (luckily, the information is all at smartvoter.org), but I’m nerdy enough to do that.
For some reason (post-vacation disorganization more than anything else, IMHO) we only had one sample ballot between us, but I’d marked it up with how I’d decided to vote, so Peter and I decided we’d take turns with our one “cheat sheet.”
I went first, but for the record, there are a LOT of offices and propositions to vote for in this election in California and in our district–for the record, two huge double-sided sheets of them. And our voting method has recently changed yet again: it used to be punch cards, then it was electronic machines, and now we using a “connect the arrows” optical reader sort of thing. It took me a moment to get around that, and when Peter came in and mocked me for taking too long to vote, I lost my concentration, skipped a proposition, and marked the next one wrong. So I had to turn in the ballot I had to be destroyed and get a new one.
So then Peter voted with our cheat sheet, while I stood around while the ballot poll workers gently reminded me on the actual mechanics of connecting two arrows, and pointed to a list of write-in candidates I could choose, because Peter had asked about how to write in candidates. He nominated himself for San Jose Unified School District Council, because we hate everyone on the list.
And then I voted, being ultra-careful and dilligent in my voting. By the time I finished my ballot, there was a long line of voters waiting for a voting booth, and Peter joked I was a one-woman voter suppression effort.
The line wasn’t all that long, especially considering that the patient poll workers who had to deal with us and our need to share a sample ballot (which sure didn’t help us vote any faster) told me there had been almost 100 people in line to vote at 7 a.m. when the voting poll place opened. For the record, there was no weirdness (except maybe me) at the polling place: all went smoothly, and the wait was minimal, if at all.
Yay for Nevada and two weeks of early voting with ‘travelling’ early voting locations all over the valley. I voted on the 19th of October at my neighborhood Smith’s grocery store. I dragged Tian Bo to the Vons on Craig road, which was the nearest early voting location place on Halloween/the LAST day of early voting because I was afraid he’d get scared off if the lines were long on election day. I guess lots of people were afraid it would be crowded on election day because he had to stand in line for over 1/2 an hour just to vote early. The line was so long people were legally electioneering at the end of it.