The GOP has posted rather hilarious Valentine’s eCards making fun of Democrats. However, much like Chicagoist, I think that they’re actually probably as funny if not funnier for us liberal folks. Still, I desperately wish I had the time to do up a mock counter site. Scott and I are flush with ideas:
With a picture of Sarah Palin: I wrote this Valentine on my hand, so I wouldn’t forget.
With a picture of George W.: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED …oh wait, I haven’t sent it yet.
With a picture of Mitch McConnell: Don’t expect any Republican support for this Valentine.
With a picture of Scott Brown: I wrote this Valentine from my truck.
With a picture of Mark Sanford: Let’s hike down the Appalachian Trail for this Valentine’s!
With a.p.o. Jeff Sessions: I will give you this Valentine as soon as you give me funding.
With a.p.o. Lieberman: Do you mind if I’m their Valentine, too?
With a.p.o. Sarah Palin: How’s this Valentine-y lovey stuff workin’ for ya?
With a.p.o. Tom Tancreto: I’d like to be your Valentine, but only if you can pronounce or spell it in English.
With a.p.o. Dick Cheney: This Valentine deserves no constitutional rights.
With a.p.o. Larry Craig: Tap three times if you’ll be my Valentine.
On Wednesday, I arrived at DC’s Union Station with my luggage and headed out. I quickly found the Metro and checked the class map to see where the hotel was (where the class was leaving from). There was a red pushpin right near a Metro stop near K-street, so I took the Metro there. After getting out, I looked around but couldn’t spot our hotel. I kept staring at the map and still couldn’t find the hotel. It turns out that the map wasn’t centered on the hotel; it was centered on one of the myriad of places we’d be meeting people at during the week. So, I was in the wrong place. At this point, I’d be running late to get to the hotel, and I realized taking Metro there meant a 4-6 block walk with my suitcases, so I took a cab. I checked into my room and then called the instructor to see where to meet them. It turned out that I’d only missed like the first ten minutes of meeting with Congressman Kind, because he had been running late, too. I took a cab from the hotel to the Longworth building. For reference, here’s a quick map of the House and Senate buildings I’ll be referencing in this post. (Google Earth/Maps is also helpful here.) Longworth is one of the House buildings toward the bottom of the map. So, that all worked out okay, aside from me already being a sweaty mess. Meeting Congressman Kind was relatively uneventful. Most of his talk was about how he sees many common issues between the parties and believes in bipartisan efforts.
Our next stop was Union Station (hey! I was just there!) for lunch. I didn’t really get to hear the guy that met us there for lunch. I was sitting kind of far away, and there was alot of ambient noise. However, Ed Greelegs was sitting near me, and I got kind of a private audience with him, which was great! I really enjoyed talking to him. Then, we walked to the Dirksen Senate building to meet with Deb Whitman. Deb was really enjoyable. She went through the real version of how a bill becomes a law. She gave an example of a bill that she’s been working on for two years for her congressman, a relatively unobtrusive one that would prevent people convicted of violent or abusive crimes from working in nursing homes. Even though there’s no opposition to it, it’s still taken years for it to even get into committee. (It actually moved out of committee and made it onto the floor list while we were in DC. She texted us to let us know that we were her lucky charms!)
Then, we walked to the Hart building. I can’t remember if we met with someone or if we just went over there to see something. What I do know is that we found out that the Senate hearings regarding Health Care were being held over there, and we eventually tracked down the room. We didn’t have enough time to really sit in, but we got a quick glance inside the room:
There was also a Calder sculpture in the lobby. I took a picture, just because it’s a tie back to Chicago (where Calder has a famous Flamingo sculpture).
Our next stop was a lobbying office on Constitution. I found the location using my G1 and had GMaps give me walking directions, but the class ended up taking a different and longer route such that we walked a mile for what should have been a half mile walk. The view from the office of the Capitol was spectacular; I took 2-3 photos. At the office, we heard from a person, not affiliated with the office–he just met us there, who (by his own description) makes conspiracy theorists stay awake at night. He manages public opinion, which is to say, he does things like push polls, hiring protesters, hiring people to ask questions at town halls, and drafting opinion letters that aren’t real. Ironically, I can’t recall his name. Then, two of the lobbyists spoke to us about their job.
One of the things that most people in our class found shocking (but I already knew) is that lobbyists serve a valuable purpose in the system. They provide information to the Congress (via staffers, usually) that the people might not otherwise know. Congresspeople aren’t experts on every topic, and lobbyists primarily give briefings. In the 80’s and 90’s, they’d gain Congress’ ear by taking staffers out to dinner or having fancy parties. But now, staffers aren’t allowed to accept things from lobbyists, which really sucks for the (incredibly underpaid) staffers…and has basically made it such that you have to be independently funded (i.e., your parents are rich) to be a Congressional staffer…and being a staffer is the #1 way to get into more influential positions later. So, by cutting off lobbyists from staffers without compensating staffers, we’ve created a system that kind of sucks and will eventually really screw with the quality of our government. At any rate, yeah, the lobbyists are trying to sell the staffers on something, but every single person we talked to, lobbyists included, noted that staffers, even back in the “good old days”, couldn’t be bought. A staffer can’t force a Congressperson to vote a certain way, and it was rare to come across a Congressperson who could be bought. That is, the scandals were scandals because of their rarity, and they got overexaggerated. What lobbyists do for staffers generally is to help them get briefed on side effects of legislation that they might not understand, to keep the Congressperson from voting for a bill that might not do what (s)he thinks it will do. And, staffers are generally smart enough to take what lobbyists say with a grain of salt. Many DC-ers commented on Obama’s anti-lobbyist policy and said it’s a huge mistake. They said it will end up with him getting less-qualified staff because he’s enacting a rule that eliminates anyone with any real history in DC…as you pretty much go into being a lobbyist when you aren’t working on someone’s campaign, if you’re good at understanding and working the system, have contacts, etc. So, I mention all of that because it seems like it’s still not really understood or well-known.
The class split up to head back to the hotel. Some people wanted to take a cab, and others wanted to enjoy the (now cooler) weather by walking to union station. I ended up leading the walking group back to the station and eventually to the hotel. Along the way to Union Station, we came across a memorial to the Japanese Americans that were held in internment camps during WWII. I formed a quick friendship with the girls I walked with. Their names were Karen and Linda. One was a fan of Amazing Race and the other was a West Wing fan, so we had things to talk about.
We ended up back at the hotel. A bunch of people were going with the instructor to dinner and a night walk around the monuments, but I was tired of walking and tired in general, so I didn’t want to go. Neither did Karen or Linda, so we met separately and had dinner near the hotel. On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at a Walgreen’s. I wanted to buy a cheapie cup to use for soda at the hotel, and one of them needed a toiletry item. I ended up getting a DC souvenir glass. While looking at souvenirs and postcards (including the one that those of y’all on my postcard list got), I saw lots of camo-print items with a panda on them. I was like, “why are there pandas on DC things?” I had no idea that DC had a National Zoo that had pandas. Apparently, they’re a source of controversy because it costs alot to maintain them. After buying my cup, I went back to the hotel and crashed.
I should note, I had a roommate, who was also nice generally. But, she went to bed late most nights, and I went to bed early. She got up early in the mornings, because she took *hours* to get ready, literally. I woke up at the last minute I could. I don’t know how she exists on so little sleep. Also, she wore 2 inch heels every day. Granted, she took cabs many times that I walked or Metro’d, but still! I’d die if I were her.
The next morning, I met Karen and Linda in the lobby, and we Metro’d to our first stop of the day. We stopped in Union Station for breakfast along the way. Then, we headed to the Dirksen building for the Durbin/Burris town hall meeting. (IL senators have a longstanding tradition of holding a weekly town hall versus holding individual meetings with visiting constituents.) The meeting started with introductions from every group represented at the town hall. Then, they opened it up for questions, and anyone could ask any question. That didn’t mean you got an answer…but you got to ask. The highlights were:
Burris accidentally introduced Durbin as “the senior citizen” instead of “the senior senator.”
Burris meant to reference that there’s no intention of death panels for senior citizens, but instead said that there’s no intention of giving the death penalty to senior citizens.
So yeah, generally, Burris was a dolt, and Durbin was impressive. Then, we headed over to the house buildings for meetings there. Congressman Ryan struck me as a balanced and reasonable person, with good and innovative ideas. He also had what I jokingly call iPod nipples when DH has them…that is, he had an iPod Nano with lanyard tucked under his shirt, so that the headphones look like nipples.
You can see the list of people we met with in the post before this one, so I won’t itemize. Suffice it to say, we ran all over the place. I tracked it on Gmap pedometer, and I did around 8 miles of walking that day. I went on the Capitol tour, which sucked. I don’t recommend it. I mean, it’s free, which is nice…but you don’t get to see anything anymore. They’ve shortened it considerably since 9/11. The tour is less than ten minutes long. I really enjoyed meeting with the EPA. The two people who met with us were young and really enthused about what they do.
That night, the class went to a restaurant near the hotel. They had a martini drink that I loved. I had several. We all laughed and told stories, and it was a blast. Some folks stayed out late, but I crashed, as usual.
The next morning, I was awake before my roommate. My plan was to check into my hotel for that night before leaving with the group to go to our first stop of the day. So, I went there first thing. I took a cab, even though it was only a few blocks away. The hotel location was awesome, right around the corner from a Metro stop. Also, I was able to get into my room at 8am, which is amazing. Then, I had another busy day of meetings. The two most interesting were Paula Pfingsten, a member of the press corps, and Grover Norquist, a Conservative leader and author. Norquist was an eloquent speaker, but he started off his bit by saying that the Republican party is the party of freedom and the Democrat party is the party of loss of freedom. He said many other things that bothered me, but that’s just a joke. Neither party is high on my list of defenders of freedom these days, but Republicans are far lower on the totem pole than Dems. So, I began making notes of all the freedoms I could think of that Republicans have either denounced or removed in the past decade or so that Dems have generally supported…you know, like the right to marry, the right to an abortion, freedom of speech to criticize one’s government, free borders (which goes hand in hand with free trade), the right to not have a cellphone company hand over your phone records to the government without a warrant…stuff like that. When Norquist asked for a question, I brought up all of this and asked if he still considers Republicans the party of freedom. His answer, in short, was that government security is important, the only vital mission of a government, and basically implied that rights should be sacrificed for security and/or those rights aren’t important enough. He did not give me a chance for a follow-up.
We ended up having a long lunch break that allowed for sightseeing, due to some cancellations and whatnot. I spent my lunch at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. I’d been to it before, but they had a Darwin exhibit that had inspired a smattering of picketers, and that made up my mind for me. I learned that Darwin was an avid beetle collector. I also went through an indoor butterfly garden with hundreds of butterflies flitting about. I saw tents being set up for the National Book Fair and resolved to look up more info about it, to decide whether to make it part of my agenda.
After our speakers finished up and the class finished a wrap-up talk, I had just barely enough time to Metro back to the hotel, change, and then Metro over to Chinatown to join up with my scheduled Segway tour. Though my feet were aching, I signed up for a Segway tour, which means standing in one place for 2-3 hours….’cause I’m brilliant. Anyways, I had tons of fun on the tour. I was one of the few that never took a tumble. Most people fell getting on or off, or they brushed a wheel against something and lost control…or one person didn’t realize she was about to drop off of a curb at the last second and jumped off. During the Segway tour, we saw the president’s helicopter land at the West Wing, which was pretty darn cool. I briefly saw an Obama head. The Segway tour was actually a great way to get the lay of the land before my day of touristing on Saturday. The tour guide recommended a few things that I hadn’t thought of doing but ended up doing, like lunch at the Native American Museum (the newest Smithsonian), the Japanese art exhibit, and seeing the pop culture exhibits at the American History Museum.
I had dinner in Chinatown and then Metro’d back to my hotel to crash. I spent some time on the internet, during which I found that the one author at the book fair that I’d want to see (Gwen Ifill) would be speaking too late for me to do. It was also supposed to be rainy, so I opted for touring the Smithsonian campus rather than doing the National Zoo. I decided to wake naturally instead of an alarm, which worked out fine because I didn’t sleep in much. I got everything packed up and checked my bags with the porter before heading out for the day.
My Saturday was as follows:
First stop: Freer Gallery – Japanese art exhibit
Next stop: American History Museum – saw the pop culture exhibits and the musical instruments area
Next stop: Swung through the book fair – saw one author speaking, didn’t recognize her, got a tote bag and a picture with Bullseye at the Target tent
Then, I walked along the mall to the Hirschhorn Museum (contemporary art) and sculpture garden – was interesting, but I wasn’t in a mood to contemplate art
Walked up to the American Indian museum to have lunch – had to wait in line for a half hour to get lunch, mainly because people DO NOT UNDERSTAND BUFFET SERVICE. You do not have to wait in line at a buffet-style service unless the space demands it. In most large buffet setups, you just dart from station to station, like a bee in a garden. I’m so tired of people not getting this. THIS IS WHAT MAKES BUFFETS EFFICIENT, PEOPLE!!! So, anyways, the Mitsitam cafe at the American Indian museum has stations that serve food from each region represented in the museum. You can get South American food, Alaskan food, or lots of others. I got Midwest food. (Hey, I had to eat from my own region!) I had a pulled buffalo sandwich that was dee-lish. It came with Chayote squash slaw, also good. And, I got Fry Bread with Cinnamon and Honey for dessert…yummy! I also got Prickly Pear Agua Fresca to drink, which tasted kind of like watermelon juice. Then, I went upstairs in the museum and wandered around. One of the cool things about this museum is that it’s got all these story stations, which are basically cozy areas around a speaker or TV that has a recording of someone telling a story about American Indian life. I heard stories about how the stars came to be. It was a very cool museum.
My final stop was the Portrait Gallery. I decided to see if Colbert was still there somewhere. If he was, I couldn’t find him.
After that, I took the Metro out to Reagan International to pick up my rental car. People, do not rent from Enterprise near DCA. First, they’re off-site. Now, I knew that going in…but they have a shelter area that is marked for the Enterprise shuttle that is NOT where the rest of the rental car shuttles go. So, I had to hunt for this special shelter which took awhile. Then, the shuttle driver didn’t even stop at the shelter…he just did a slow roll to see if anyone waved at him. I didn’t, because I was in the shelter with like eight other people, so I figured him stopping was a given. It clearly wasn’t until I flagged him down. When I got to the site, the service was SO slow, and they were overly enthused about the upsell, even after I kept saying I was in a hurry and really didn’t want to upgrade. The girl wanted to give me a ten minute lecture about getting their insurance because it was sprinkling rain. She tried to sound ominous, and I just laughed. I have insurance. I don’t need theirs. Rental car insurance is a rip-off, in part because the only people who get it are the people who need it, if you know what I mean. So, finally, I was on the road back to my hotel to pick up my luggage. Fortunately, my generous tip to the bellhop when I dropped off my luggage paid off (the bags were very heavy), as he was super-speedy in getting it to me, so I tipped generously again ($5 for 2 bags). I ended up with plenty of time to make it to my friend’s concert out in MD that night. I even got to stop for ChickFilA on the way there. Woot!
So then I spent that night and part of the next day with our friends in MD. We played Pillars, and we caught up on things. I had an uneventful drive to the airport and then…more reason to not rent from Enterprise at DCA. They weren’t clearing the returns fast enough, so there was a line backed up out onto the street to get in. I waited 15 minutes just to be able to pull the car into the garage. Then I was standing by it for another 10 minutes waiting on an attendant. Finally, I gave up. I left the keys in the ignition, locked the doors, left the “turn in” copy of my receipt in the car (keeping my copy), photographed every side of the car and the keys in the ignition and then headed out to the airport shuttle just before it left. Then, I called the office and told them where the car was and why I’d left it there. They were friendly about it and admitted to being crowded, but still…it was just lousy service all the way around.
The flight home was uneventful. Oh, yeah, people were stupid at the Midwest Airlines check-in counter. Midwest and Airtran’s counters were right next to each other. Airtran’s “first class only” line was right next to the normal line for Midwest. And then on the far right, Midwest had their “online check-in baggage check” line. So, the normal line was empty, and the online check-in line had 30 people in it. What’s more, there were 3 “check-in luggage” machines, but only one was getting used, though all three were functional. I had checked in online, but this seemed ridiculous. I examined the signs three times, looked at the people in the line and then went through the normal check-in line. While in it, I looked at one of the people in the online line and asked why they were all standing in that line. The man was like, “That line is for first class.” I said, “No, it’s not. The line over there (pointing) is for Airtran’s first class. This is just the normal line…”, I paused and caught the eye of a desk attendant as I walked up to the counter, “…right?” She nodded. I shrugged and checked my bags in at one of the two free machines. I got many dirty looks from the line of people. But, as I see it, politeness only dictates that I inform them of their error, not that I let them go ahead of me once I confirm the error. (And honestly, it’s Midwest’s job to manage their line. One of those attendants should have fixed this problem.)
A more vigorous description will come when I have time, but here is the schedule that I followed while in DC for LFGSM 5895:
Wednesday, September 23rd
11:30 – 12:00 – Congressman Kind – 1406 Longworth HOB
12:30 – 1:30 – Neil Hare, President, Global Vision – America Restaurant in Union Station on the 2nd Floor – 50 Massachusetts Ave NE (lunch included)
2:00 – 3:30 – Debra Whitman/Ed Greelegs/ Chris Brown – Staff Director Senate Committee on Aging – Room SDG – 31
4:30 – 5:00 – Steve Palmer at Van Scoyoc and Associates—see www.vsadc.com. 101 Constitution Avenue NW
5:00 – 5:30 – Bill Knapp – 101 Constitution Avenue NW
Thursday, September 24th
8:15 – 9:30 – Town Hall meeting with Senators Durbin and Burris. Russell Office Building Room 385
Walk to
10:00 – 10:30 – Congressman Paul Ryan – 1113 Longworth
10:30 – 11:00 – Congressman Manzullo – 2228 Rayburn House Office Building
11:30 – 12:00 – Congressman Danny Davis – 2159 Rayburn House Office Building
12:30 – 1:30 – Capitol Tour
OR
1:00 – 1:30 – Lieutenant Colonel Luke Knittig – ActionAid Office – 1420 K Street, 9th Floor – Suite 900
1:30 – 2:00 – Tim Kay – ActionAid Office – 1420 K Street, 9th Floor – Suite 900
2:00 – 2:30 – Dan Mendleson – Avalere Health – ActionAid Office – 1420 K Street, 9th Floor – Suite 900
3:00 – 3:45 – Andrea Wilkinson – Director of Federal Government Affairs-Takeda DC –
725 Ninth Street NW Suite 725 (5th floor)
4:00 – 4:30 – Karen Ignagni – President and CEO America’s Health Insurance Plans –
601 Pennsylvania Ave, NW Suite 500 South Building
5:00 – 5:30 – Billy Tauzin, President and CEO of PhRMA – 950 F Street, NW Suite 300
OR
5:00 – 5:30 – Environmental Protection Agency – Mollie Lemon, Stratospheric Protection Division – 1301 Constitution Ave. NW EPA West Building
Friday, September 25th
9:30 – 10:00 – Kristen Hedrow – MPH, Assistant Director of Regulatory Affairs and Quality
Improvement Programs of the American College of Surgeons – ActionAid Office
10:30 – 11:00 – Paula Cruickshank – Washington News Bureau Chief – ActionAid Office
2 – 3pm – Peter O’Driscoll – Executive Director, ActionAid – ActionAid Office
3 – 3:30 – Grover Norquist and Hal Morse – ActionAid Office
3:30pm-5pm – Wrap-up/Conclusions
For my part, this is why I have trouble supporting groups like EqualityNow (though I did contribute to them during the Fannish fundraiser re: Prop 8 that was held on LJ). It’s why I have trouble with NOW, why I had to resign as VP of the LA chapter. I don’t believe in the prosecution of thought crimes, no matter what the potential crime is. (I also don’t believe in putting rape on a pedestal above other crimes. It’s a very terrible thing, yes…it’s a form of torture and just as sick and twisted as torture in its execution. But, there are other terrible things that don’t get anywhere near the attention…and IMO, the way the American feminist movement has escalated rape has, in fact, fetishized it even more.) A video game doesn’t convince you to rape someone, nor to murder. (It also won’t convince you to do things that are even less morally questionable. My husband could play Webkinz all day long, and he’ll never have the want to buy more plushies like I do.) You have to have the desire in you already, the moral/ethical disregard or psychosis, and if you do, and you don’t work out your issues or seek treatment, it’s going to come out someday, no matter what game you play or don’t play.
But, Penn says all this way better than I do, and what’s more, he says it while basking in the Las Vegas sunshine, just meters from his lovely technicolor backyard:
As many of you have noticed, the blog has gone back in time to catch up on posts from our (very awesome, wanna go back NOW) Disney trip. As such, I skipped over quite a few events that would normally warrant a blog post. I don’t want to spend another month re-capping, so below is a one paragraph, catch-all summary of the things that were, January 2009. As is fitting for anything dealing with time travel, I shall start with Lost…
Lost is back on! Desmond’s baby named Charlie, the others speak Latin, woohoo! B* made me a cake with a Dharma logo. It was delicious…disappeared very quickly, did Ben turn the wheel, shift cake through time? Obama officially president, yay! Didn’t care about inauguration until the day it was on, then was sad I couldn’t watch live and had to work instead. Re-org’d at work into new group but otherwise similar. Got one estimate for the pipe burst repairs from the guy(s) who did our basement, liked their work, but the painting estimate alone was higher than was to paint whole basement. Something smells funny in Denmark, yo. Business name is of the form, [name] the [job]er…which led to Joe-the-plumber, bob-the-builder joking between DH and I. DH has been working odd hours at his second job. Very stressful. Ran Survivor at Mensa AGOG. Had to scramble to get to the minimum ten to play, but once we got there, it was AWESOME. Everyone had bonzer good time. Yay. Knee has been hurting alot lately. Also, period has been irregular. (Not related.) WTF is up with me? Wish knee would stop hurting. But yet, I will be going skiing on Saturday, yay! And knee can just suck on that, thank you very much. Pancake continues to be adorable kitteh. Races me up the stairs. I almost won last night, but only because he let me have a 5 step head start. Thought L4D was an evil time suck, but then Mr. Moo introduced me to Braid, which now is on my bedroom xbox (not mytsukata gamertag). Damn you, Mr. Moo! Got special L4D achievement last night for blowing the witch’s head off, Cr0wnd! Sweet. So cold outside. But weather Saturday promises to be ski-awesome. Found giant and strange fruit at the store, called Pomelo, is huge and we could kill a small child with it, but we won’t. Instead, will eat. Also got some honey tangerines. Enjoying finding and trying out new fruits. Finished second term of class, am 12.5% done with MBA. Group project ended much better than it started. Next term, taking two classes: Effective Leadership *coughbullshitcough* and Negotiations & Conflict Management (win win win). Hoping negotiations will make me awesome at negotiation such that I can help Mensa with hotel negotiation stuff. Will speak quietly so they have to lean in, then will change meeting location suddenly without notice…then will threaten to kill their daughter. Oh and how did Frogurt’s shirt fit Sawyer? Nonsense.
First Lostie to catch the embedded (very subtle) clue in the style of Lost gets something nifty, though I’m not sure what. Adoration? That’s nifty, right?
Best part of tonight: Shouting at 10pm, along with a few hundred thousand of Chicagoland’s finest, “7…6…5…4…3…2…1….(pause for CNN animation/graphic)…..YEAAAAHHHHHHHH! WOOHOOO!”
Worst part of tonight: DH driving me to train station where I left my car this morning only to find a dead battery due to me leaving the lights on. Also, spending 90 minutes trying to jump start proving to be unsuccessful…likely SUPER dead battery. Bad experience with roadside assistance suckitude. too tired to write more.
Edited at 9:45am to add: Car is fine now. The tow company that came this morning was able to jump it. Took straight to AutoZone for a battery test, and the battery is good. Must have just been really dead and we weren’t able to get enough juice from DH’s car to get the engine to turn over. (Tow company had one of those super-powered battery zappers.)
I have a work meeting downtown today, in the building that also houses Obama’s HQ. It took 20 minutes to get through the building’s security. The elevators to the 11th floor (his floor) are sectioned off and have special security. No other elevators will go to that floor. Even for our office on the 8th floor, the security is extra tight today.
Before that though, I voted. I need to explain how my polling site works to make the rest of this make sense. First, they sort you by last name into A-C, D-G, H-L, M-P, Q-Z, roughly. There is one worker per grouping, going through a single stack of voter forms. One thing that is immediately apparent is that these aren’t equal groupings as far as the alphabet goes. What isn’t immediately apparent is that these aren’t equal groupings as far as population distribution either. I don’t know how or why they chose the groupings, but I assume there was some kind of thought process involved. Maybe that’s how the stacks came to them? Anyways, after you sign your voter “application” form and the worker verifies that your signature matches, you take that form over to the line for your district (4 districts at our site, with ours being the largest and closest and thus the most likely to vote), and there is one worker per district. The district worker checks to see what voting form you should get, and gives it to you along with a special voting pen and a privacy screen…then you go to a carol and do some bubbling. Finally, you go to the voting machine that matches your district, slide your privacy-shielded form into the machine, wait for it to bleep and assign you a voter ID, and then you get a sticker and you’re done.
I arrived at the voting site at 6:45am. I had a train to catch, 10 minutes away on a normal day, at 7:37am. First, there was a line out into the hall and back toward the door. A poll worker came into the hall and said that if your name began with A-C, you could go ahead in. Woohoo! So, I head into the polls.
They couldn’t find me in the stack. Scott was there, but I was not. Now, the last time I voted, they had me down as my pre-marriage name, despite me correcting my registration right after we got married. But, I had it changed, voted on a provisional ballot due to the name change, and received an updated registration card. So, it seemed like I’d be all set. But, no. I had to go over to the “laptop desk” which has always previously been the ballot judge, but I guess they decided that was too intimidating. So, now it’s the laptop desk. The person there looked me up and discovered that they did update my name, but they left it alphabetized under my previous name. So, I needed to get in the Q-Z line, which was currently combined with the M-P line and was the line that goes out into the hall and was, by now, about twice as long. But, I reminded myself that I’m a citizen here, not a customer, so I dutifully joined the line without griping. Apparently, the Q-Z person had gone away to try to get security to open up an outside door, as the voting site room was a sweatbox. The AC couldn’t be turned on until 9am, when the “tech staff” for the building arrive.
Fortunately, Q-Z person soon came back, and then we were able to form two lines and it went much quicker. Going to the district table meant another line, as my district had 15 people in line, with no people in line for any other district. ::sigh:: At this point, it’s 7:05am, so I’ve given up on the possibility of getting breakfast on the way to the train. I patiently wait for my ballot. In the interim, I chat with a poll worker about how the day is going. I also note that there is a suited lawyer milling about, helping to guide people to the right line, but also dashing over whenever the “laptop table” has a voter at it or when a question is raised at any other location.
Upon getting my ballot, I go to a carol and start bubbling. I hate bubbling. I miss Palatine’s punchcards, dangling chads and all. I always fear that I will bubble a bit too much outside a line, no matter how much my geek half reminds me that we build in tolerances that would far outscope my careful bubbles. I voted straight Democrat, except for one election where there was only one person running. I also voted for the park district and the school both to issue bonds and be given loans to expand. I debated heavily about the school vote, because I generally vote against school things as I have no kids and no plans for kids. But, I decided that if they expand, they might put in facilities that would be useful to me, as the community center events are often held there.
After bubbling in record time, I proceed to the unsurprisingly long line for my district’s machine. I actually got two “I voted” stickers, so go me! That actually worked out well, because I have one for my work dress and one for my Obama t-shirt (which I’ll change into as soon as my work is done). The machine line went fast, thankfully, and I left the voting office at 7:25am. Now, there’s a vague chance that I might make my train at this point, so I get on the road. But, with traffic, it becomes clear that I’m missing it. There was no backup train for me at Great Lakes but there was one at the Lake Bluff station about a mile or two further south, so I headed there. I ended up driving into a parking space (without having paid) as the train pulled up, so I gathered my stuff and hopped on the train. If Lake Bluff tickets me, I deserve it 2-3 times over, so…
My debate today is whether I stay here for the Obamapalooza or head home on one of the (many) early trains and celebrate at somewhere more comfy and close to home.
On another note, a friend of mine had a funnier anecdote to share from the polls. She has a young son, and they got back from a Disney trip a few days ago. He went with her to the polls. Her son was extraordinarily good, considering the 30 minute process. But, apparently, there was some miscommunication:
As we left, we had the following conversation:
“Thanks for being such a good boy.”
“It was my favorite line, Mama, but where’s the boat?”
“The boat?”
“There was no boat, Mama. There’s supposed to be a boat.”
Yes, I recognize that these are probably the “best of the worst” clips. I also recognize that for every mindless half-ass supporter of McCain, there’s a starstruck supporter of Obama. Still, I can’t imagine what any Obama supporter could or would say that would match the vitriol in these clips.
