Impressions of Election Judging

I started to put these on my last post, but I think they deserve their own.

• Voting makes people feel good. People felt proud to vote. That makes me feel good too.
• Illinois voters had two ballots this year. That's annoying, but people did pretty well with them. I still maintain that the amendment is stupid.
• The Chicago Board of Elections is really organized. I'm sorry, Chicago Board of Elections/Cook County Board of Elections. We didn't do the best job on our paperwork. Too many cooks spoil the paperwork. Next time, I'm taking charge. And maybe yelling.
• Our precinct had about 50 percent turnout. At 5:30 p.m. we had 164 voters - I hollered at everyone that we'd get to 200 and we did! 204 voters, plus 51 early voters. In a precinct of about 430 voters on a mid-term election that's excellent.
• People are pretty patient. We had lines and some people had to wait a while for us to figure out exactly what they should do (especially when people recently moved). But no one was angry or upset. Hooray for that.
• People are very punch-ballot focused. At least five people told me they knew how to punch the ballot, which is not how we vote here anymore. Thankfully we just connect two lines with a "special voting pen," as I call it, and it's not too tricky.
  
• I thought all the election judges would be old, but they were not. They were all pretty weird though. And all were either easily confused or surly about confusion. I was - without a doubt - the friendliest election judge. But the judge in charge of my precinct was very friendly to all female voters, which counts for something, I guess.
  
• Voting is awesome.