So the one-year-old class transition has gone well for e-baby. Both days I've picked her up, she's been downright silly-giddy, as if she wants to tell me all about all the cool new things she did today-- playing on the slide, and the rocking horse, and the ride-on bike-thingie, and singing new songs, and dancing, and the sandbox, and new kids, and everything that is great. She's also pretty pooped at the end of such a big day.

I was going to take the morning off today to visit with Fish, who was going to a conference in Charlotte and decided to stop in Raleigh on the way. True, Raleigh isn't on the way from Pittsburgh to Charlotte, but both are in North Carolina, and that's a good excuse to come visit. Everyone was really excited about it, but unfortunately, he did not make it because his flight was cancelled. Adding insult to the situation, his girlfriend got a ticket when she dropped him off-- by the cop who directs airport drop-off traffic. Since when do they give tickets? So now Fish had to drive to Charlotte, just in time to get to the conference.

Unrelated side-thought: yesterday was election day, and unlike most off-years where I show up to vote for a bunch of people I've never heard of, this time there were three people I knew running for various offices, plus one that SNG knows and one that Dianaverse knows, bringing the total to five familiar names on campaign signs. This year I was actually looking forward to the off-year election day. It kind of felt like student council elections in high school.

The trouble is that ever since we moved to the woods, we don't actually get to vote for any of these interesting offices. That's right: no mayor, no city council, no city park bonds. We're in The County, living like militia members with a population density of 0.8 Porsches per household. I always forget this because we used to live in Raleigh, and I'm still not used to living on the fringes. I left work a few minutes early and hopped my bike over to the polling place, announced my name, gave girl scout's honor that it was really me, and received my ballot. I stepped up to the booth, ready to vote for all my friends. And what did I see?

1. School Board
-So-and-so incumbent
-Next door neighbor with the cute kids and the world's most spry elderly dog
-Wierd guy who actually said in an interview "I'm not interested in the school board but I think it's my civic duty to serve"
-Some nobody

2. Public space bond bla bla $200,000,000,000.00 for county parks that will eventually be "accidentally" granted to developers
-yes/no/Buchanan

3. Community college bond bla bla $100.26 for education
-yes/no/Buchanan

4. County library bond bla bla $15.08 and box-tops from cereal and crackers collected by rural county residents to fund new books and technology
-yes/no/Buchanan

That was it. The whoooooole ballot. I actually turned it over to see whether there was a back-side continuation. There wasn't. So, in about 10 seconds I had filled out my ballot, and spent the next 30 seconds checking my work so I wouldn't be the first one to turn in their paper and leave the class.

I rode back to my office in time to do another 30 minutes of work. Woo. What a life.

At least e-baby got another "I Voted" sticker, which made her happy.

My neighbor didn't win, but he did have a good showing, coming in 2nd place. In fact, only one of the people I know actually won. But I didn't have any say in the matter.