Let's Vote!

This morning I had set my alarm to go off at 5:30 am so that I could be at the polls by 5:45 and ready to vote as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, when I was setting my alarm clock yesterday I accidentally set it for pm instead of am. Imagine my surprise when I woke up this morning and realized it was 5:37am and my alarm clock was not going off.

Lucky for me this slight error only meant that I arrived at the polls at 5:50 instead of 5:45 am. Not surprisingly the line already had probably around 100 people in it, and by the time the polls opened at 6 it had doubled.

Voting in Virginia is definitely different then voting in California. First of all I didn't have to sign the voter register to say that I was there and cast my vote. I simply had to show my ID and tell them my current address. Secondly, here we use the e-slate system instead of a paper ballot. The e-slate looks like a PDA and has a rotary wheel you turn to highlight your selection, then you press the select button and continue on. Once all of your selections have been made you get a summary and then you hit the red cast ballot button. Lastly, the I Voted stickers you get on the way out say I Voted in Alexandria, not just I Voted.

So there you go. The whole thing took an hour and now it's time to get ready for work. An early start to a long day but at least I have voted.