(Morning After a Headache) "Voting Report"

(I started writing this yesterday, but the head prevailed, and I was in bed around 8. This is what I was going to write.)

I was planning to vote after work, since I didn't want to go in the morning and have to worry about the wait and getting to work on time. But yesterday work let us know that we get a little unpenalized time off for voting (up to two hours, in fact), so I didn't have to worry about it making me late, and I decided to do it in the morning and get it over with. (I didn't see an "I voted" sticker when I was there, so you're spared that picture.) It was nice and sunny all day, so that should help turnout, though it was, literally, freezing this morning. There was a bit of a line when I got there, but I'm okay with that if it means that people are out there, voting (not if it's for dodgy reasons like this, though). It's sort of satisfying to be at my local school, for this purpose, and when I can just walk up and vote and walk away, it feels less worthwhile, somehow*. And of course I got the knitting out while I waited anyway. (My ballot** was number 119 in the machine, but that's just my precinct of my little town; I don't even know how many voters are in the precinct.) Just glad to get it over with, you know? Civic duty, check!
*Not that this is a rational response, but that's how it feels for some reason.
 **We get a paper ballot to fill out, then feed it into a machine that records it. Same for you, or different?

I mean, I'm so grateful to live in a country with voting (more or less) open to all citizens, etc., but this election season has worn me out. The phone calls, the fliers, the commercials, the news, it's all been endless and unrelenting. I am SO GLAD that the electioneering is over. As long as (oh, please) there are no problems tonight, no recounts tomorrow, then we can move on, finally, into some sort of peace, no matter who wins what. They made a joke on the NPR radio program Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me last weekend about what might happen in the 2016 presidential campaign, "which starts next Wednesday," and I laughed while kind of wanting to cry. Too close to true!

I did get very ticked at the local NPR people this morning, though, when they had a reporter "on location" to watch Scott Brown vote. (He's one of the senators in MA, and the Brown/Warren campaigning has been as hot around here as Obama/Romney, if not more so.) The mere fact that he voted is not news, and the fact that he "looked relaxed" and "wore a barn jacket"? Is SO NOT NEWS. Please forgive the caps, but honestly. I don't need to know that. Let me know if he doesn't vote, that would be news, but otherwise leave me out of it. Good lord, people. Back to the music station for me. And tonight, when most channels are going ape over votes! and results! and with-6%-of-precincts-reporting-we're-ready-to-call-it-for!, I will turn on NESN and watch a year-and-a-half-old hockey game with great relief. I already know who wins! It's perfect for election night.


(Wednesday-morning me again. I watched a little of the Bruins while getting ready for bed, and this morning my head feels better, plus the candidates I cared the most about won. We have a storm blowing in, but I'm calling it a good day.)