This has been a crazy 24+ hours. Last night I canvassed in Hampton till past midnight. It was hard to get to sleep afterwards. Then I woke up at 5 to go to a poll in East End and be a poll watcher. I pulled up to the polling place (an ancient Elks lodge) and saw, at 5:30 in the morning, in the freezing rain, in downtown NN, a huge line waiting patiently for the polls to open. It was packed. The rain from people's clothes got on the ballots, which ended up jamming the ballot box, which took a few hours to resolve (and happened elsewhere in HR, I hear), but people were in good spirits (no votes were harmed, don't worry). People endured the long lines. I met so many first time voters - one woman was 74, and a proud first time voter. No shenanigans happened at my poll (there were a few weird GOP campaigners in trenchcoats, but that was more disturbing than intimidating); the lawyers went unused. I watched the polls until about 2, then I went to my own precinct - Hilton - to vote. Night and Day from the one I was polling at - little to no excitement, no line, no making friends (and the place smelled like a skunk). Then I went canvassing. We had a huge amount of out-of-state volunteers coming down to NN to help out. they are awesome. I went around a sort-of-scary neighborhood by myself (because my other option was to go with an older woman, who I felt would slow me down - I was pumped on nothing but 3 hours of sleep, copious amounts of caffeine, and lots of adrenaline at this point). People yelled when I knocked on their door, but then they opened the door and were really friendly when I told them I was with the Obama campaign and I was reminding them to vote (most already had by this point). We did this up until the polls closed. At one point, we were careening down Mercury, with a voter in the car, five minutes before the polls closed. After 7, driving back to the campaign office seemed really surreal and quiet. I called some people in Colorado before their polls closed. After that, I watched the polls for a while. It reminded me of being a kid, watching the network channels for snow days, because of the way they roll through the counties and cities. I've been very emotional and anxious tonight. - According to the polls, Obama is now the president-elect. Yes, I cried when I saw this. This is awesome. Before that news, I saw that VA went blue, for the first time in 40 years. I am stoked. I keep checking all the news sites - CNN, BBC, ABC, FOX - everytime I see Obama's electoral votes, I get emotional. Oh my goodness. This is fantastic. John McCain is conceding! I still can't believe it - this has been a really great day. | 