first note

fronts

backs

"let's go save this country"

long lines!

We had turnout close to 80% statewide. My line was 50 minutes. My wife waited in line for an hour forty.

made it in...

the booth-- no place to hide

one note placed

discreet and low profile. Covered by my sample ballot (I needed to look up all those downballot races on the internet before going in)

more notes

again, trying to do more than just stack them.

on the right side

victory pot luck!

After voting, i spent the rest of the day volunteering. This is at the Obama office in our neighborhood. It was a total party festive atmosphere, but also very concentrated, focused. And everyone was ready to help. After we sign in, they directed us to the food line.

Got Hope?

This is the countertop where the office staff worked, with their laptops all set up. You can see they were fueled by mountain dew and red bull. Oh yeah, and HOPE!

My congressman

Rep. Keith Ellison (the only Muslim member of the US House, btw) was in the office, and I felt it was important to shake his hand and get my picture taken. I think Keith is the heir of the spirit of Paul Wellstone and he's such a positive guy. Also, smaller than I was expecting as you can see my hamfisted gigantism towering over him. . .

my assignment

After they'd sent out the last of the canvassers and door knockers and sign wavers; and after I'd helped deliver one disabled senior citizen to his polling place, they found a job for me: drive to all the precinct polling places in the 4th and 5th wards (the north side) and report back problems. So from about 5 until the polls closed at 8, I was booking to each polling place and scoping the scene, making sure that if anyone was in line they knew what their rights were. And checking up on the observers and poll challengers to find out if any suppression tactics were going on. It was really cool. By the time I got out there, most of the voting had died down from a morning flood to an evening trickle. And I observed hardly anything resembling suppression . There was one precinct where the election judge said she'd had challengers hovering over her making "helpful suggestions" and kind of slowing things up a little bit, but no real challenges. And one precinct site was right across the street from another, which caused some problems when people would wait in line for an hour only to find out they should have been across the street (nice maps, Ward 5!) But it was peaceful. Here's a shot of my golden city from the southern end of Ward 5, at a site where the Dem challenger said his GOP counterpart hadn't even bothered to show up. We rolled those guys on the north side, baby.

counting

I was at a polling place at the end of the night, ostensibly to make sure anyone who was in line was not denied their rights. There was no one in line. I know one of the judges and we chitchatted. He said I could stay behind as they ran the tally out of the machine. That was neat. Everyone close and relaxed-but-intent on getting things right. It was on the stage of a high school auditorium which I thought was an interesting statement about polling places in general.

running the tape

They ran out the tape and chatted a bit about some absentee ballots that had ALMOST gotten in the door too late--some weirdness with the machine wanting to start its automated closing routine before they'd got the ballots.

the tape

too blurry to really make out. Something like 929 people voted at this precinct. Obama beat McCain 734-190. The real interesting numbers (not caught in this picture, natch) were of course the Franken vs. Coleman vs. Barkley ones where Al won 607-200-111. Oh, and Keith Ellison beat his challenger handily by a very spoooooky 666-166.