The Things We Do For Blogs I: "Super Tuesday"

Election Poll Worker


A solar flare outage just made me lose all of this post!  It's also making my mouse do weird things...

Getting up at 4:30 a.m. isn't my cup of tea.  I was up before the chickens!  I know that because I got a lot of dirty looks when I opened their door.  What I don't do for you guys!  As usual, I had time early on, but wound up having to scoot out to the car to get to work on time.  I arrived at 5:28 a.m.  Winning!  

It was lucky that I only had to go three miles because the gas gauge allowed me eight before I would have to push.  Since I forgot to get directions, I had to drive by braille (as Mark says) thinking I knew about where this church was.  I found it first try, tucked behind some buildings on a side street.  Winning again!

If you've ever wondered why you can never find a parking spot at the polls it's because the workers park in front.  Many of them had handicap permits and used those spaces as well.  We weren't going anywhere for 15 hours!  It was also an unusually sunny day here in Ohio in March, so we weren't even dodging rain.

After swearing in, my first order of business was to change the roll of toilet paper in the ladies room.  Ahhhhh, just like home.  I can do this!

The set up hour went fairly quickly.  The other workers were very nice and chatty, which helped the day pass.  It was kind of weird to see the precinct tables lined up on the altar.  (The church uses it as a worship/multipurpose room.)  About 6 a.m. I smelled something odd and it took a few seconds to place it.  Chocolate chip cookies in the oven!  The wonderful church ladies had cookies and coffee for everyone the whole day!  (We tried to conjure up that smell as we teary-eyed-ly, but politely, helped a group of farmers who had just been in with hog poo... Ugh!  and they were on their way to lunch???)

There is definitely a senority "dibs" method to who does what.  I was assigned the "number a pink (R) or green (D) or white (other) voter slip to each voter in chronological order."   But, then I also got the "hand out the 'I Voted' stickers" job on top of that.  No problem, I was born to multi-task!  On my own I decided to keep a running tally to make it easier to balance during the day.  What initiative!  I also managed to knit half of a scarf... we weren't allowed cell phones (no service anyway), newspapers or computers.  Voter turnout was low because it wasn't a general election and there were no issues for our precinct to decide.

Of course we had to learn the other positions as folks took breaks, so I got to do the cool "put the cartridge in the voting machine and explain" job.  With us switching off and often doing several of the jobs, little boo-boos happened, but we balanced the books quickly at the end of the day.  We got out at 8:30 p.m. which I am told is a record.

If you are wondering about the pay, know you will not get rich from this.  Ninety percent of the workers are retired and call this their way of earning "mad money."  I was by at least a decade the youngest there.  They get to visit with their friends and see lots of neighbors if they are working in their own precinct (which I wasn't...dibs again!)  We get $25 for the training meeting and $100 for the 13-hr day before taxes.  They say it takes about a month to get paid.  (Just got check!  We must have gotten a $10 raise!)   I probably will volunteer when I get to that age as well.  I don't think I will be doing the prez election.  It will be crazy and I hope to be working a regular job.

So, on to the next assignment.  I've been hired as a temporary "Crash Test Dummy."  Seven 10-hr days in a row at the end of this month.  From the looks of it, it will be more like bumper car dummy.  But, the pay is $160ish a day and we can use it right now.  I won't be getting photos as we aren't allowed, but trust me, I will give you a full report!

Until next time,
Gale

Quote of the post: 

"A true friend thinks you are a good egg even though you're slightly cracked."  --Author Unknown

Somethings Old...Somethings New!

"Carrie"  aka Darby Creek Carrera:  She is annoyed that she hasn't been mentioned yet in my blog.  She's always within eyesight of me and is a cuddler.   She is CH. Patrick's daughter.  

Hi all!

This will be a brief post, but I promise I'm working on several things.  More on this in a few paragraphs.

Something New! A friend Catherine told me about a website called "Pinterest" that looks to be pretty cool!  It is kind of a cyber bulletin board where folks post anything from artwork to recipes and anything in between.  It takes about a day once you request to be invited, but you really ought to give it a look-see.  It's pinterest.com.

"IZZY"  Appenzeller Spitzhausen hen enjoying weird February weather by swinging on the swing set!

(Can't seem to get my other weather pictures to load:(  Will try again soon.)

UPDATES:
The "Sophie Scandal":

She must have made her "choice" because other then a few dents, I've been getting 6 to 8 "good eggs" a day.  I make sure they never run out of food and try to do treats often.  I put berber carpet on the floor of the nesting boxes to perhaps soften the landing of the eggs, but I had already gone a few days without a problem.  Good girl Sophie!  I now have eggs out the wazoo (at least theirs LOL) so now I have to figure ways to use them.  Mark is getting tired of egg sandwiches every morning.  Got 11 eggs on 3/4/12 which means everyone is laying!!!

STEP INTO MY OFFICE:  Wherever that may be...I assure you that I hate getting dirty and am grossed out easily, so these will not put "Dirty Jobs" off the air.

I've been a substitute teacher (all grades and abilities) for 11 years, so almost nothing scares me:)  Though my goal with that is to always keep things from happening that are newsworthy, I'm sure I will probably post on it later. For now I plan to try new "jobs" or activities and report back how-tos and how it went (along with photos.)  I also plan to toss in my experiences as a movie extra/ bit part player, office temp in Los Angeles and other "odd jobs."  I've applied to do a 7 day, 70 hour stint as a car test driver (aka "Crash Test Dummy")in a few weeks and got a call for an interview, but first I will be serving as an...

Election Poll Worker

On the face of it, this doesn't sound to awfully funny, especially since I went to the training session.  I did laugh when I got the pink card assigning me as "Judge."  What?  Turns out pollworkers are called judges.  I will try to report details without giving away any government secrets!  I can't wait to be at the precinct dark and early at 5:30 a.m.  We might be there as late as 9 p.m. for a day rate of $100.  We aren't allowed computers, newspapers or cell phones.  They warned us that this will be a s-l-o-w day as there are no issues in most precincts and it's not a presidential election.  What have I gotten myself into???? Well, I am proud to help folks exercise their right to vote, so here goes...

(Note to self:  Buy some 5-hour energy drinks!)

Well, hope you'll stay tuned!  Would really appreciate it if you "follow" this blog.  I have a lot more readers than it appears and would like to have a more accurate count:)

Until next time,

Gale

"Quote of the Post"-“I am always doing things I can’t do. That is how I get to do them.” -Pablo Picasso