Caucus Barackus
We took part in the clusterf%$@ that was the Texas caucus on Tuesday. As I’ve mentioned before, we live in a neighborhood that isn’t necessarily a beacon of suburban safety but decided anyway, to walk to the nighttime caucus site. There’s something about this election that’s heightened my interest in community, so I wanted the experience of heading over to do my part alongside fellow south Austiners. I envisioned my neighbors descending en mass onto our streets, holding signs signifying a new unity. Alas, there wasn’t any of that, although I did see a lone campaign sign in a neighbor’s yard that gave me hope that we would actually have someone to talk to, should there ever be a block party.
The school that our precinct’s caucus took place at was also a primary voting location, so it was packed. Apparently, not everybody’s as big of politi-geeks as we are, and didn’t vote early.
We had to wait until the very last person finished voting before the circus, I mean caucus, could begin. They were set up to handle about 30-40 people…at least 300 showed. Even though this antiquated system has been in place since the beginning of American time, there didn’t seem to be any sort of plan on executing it. Just figuring out how to get people to stand in line, required an hour and series of attempts by booed at volunteers. It was a rough night. 4 hours after we arrived, we finally took our place at the cafeteria table that allowed for 6 people at a time to pass around the 1 sheet of paper that was allowed to be signed at a time. We signed it, pledged our candidate allegiance and walked home in the dark, shaking our heads at the ridiculousness of the process. I mean seriously, 4 hours to sign your name on the dotted line? This wasn’t Ellis Island, people! But I digress.
So, you say? Sew, I say! Check out my interview in the last issue of Sew News–that I think is still on stands. I loves me the sewing and really appreciate the mag letting a knitter like me, be featured in it.
That’s it for now!
xo,
Vic
We were there too! I wish we had have run into you! We were late, though and that appeared to be just in time. I wasn’t sure WHAT to expect since I was not all that clear on what it was I was doing there in the first place, but I’m excited about this race and wanted to ‘do my part.’ But, yeah, the whole thing seemed like such a cluster. Early voting rocks!
Oh no! What happened to your sewing machine? I was considering getting that model… -Jennie in CA
I know this is off topic but I just found your blog today and wanted to let you know I miss Knitty Gritty very much. I am on the west coast so I think it is on at 2:00am. I would love to know if is comming back.
Oh Lawdy! I partook of the Texas Caucus shenanigans too, and that was definitely a memorable experience. My precinct was apparently expecting less than 100 people, because that was all the building was allowed to hold, by order or fire marshall. Well… there were close to 1000 folks there. So what did we do??? WE CAUCUSED OUTSIDE IN THE COLD! LOW 40’s BABY! That’s right! It was a nightmare. But luckily, everyone seemed to be in good spirits at my location. Everyone seemed to take it all in stride, since it was EVERYBODY’S first (er, last?) caucus. And a wild enough end to the evening was that I got voted to be a DELEGATE for the upcoming county convention! Woo Hoo!
Jen, I think we’re in a different precinct, no?
Brienne, That’s cool about the delegate thing. I wanted to do that, but am going to be out of town the weekend of the county convention.:(
Jennie, Not to worry–this article was written before I got my new machine. The Janome 7330 is alive and well! 🙂
Mammabear–I’ll do a post about this, because I’m getting a ton of e-mails asking the same thing.
xo,
Vic
It was the same in the DFW area. At least I brought knitting!!
We may be…we’re really close but I don’t know how they divide the precints. It didn’t take us four hours, fortunately but we showed up REALLY late and the Hillary line was much shorter than the Barack line. 😉