For Better or Worse: Vote!

Monday is municipal election day in Ontario and I hope you get out there and vote!

I live in Tiny Township, and this year voting was done through Vote By Mail ballots.  I found that out on Friday.  I have never voted in a municipal election in Tiny, so I was not on the voter list and did not receive a Voter Information Package.  I called the Tiny Township office on Friday to ask where the polls were going to be held on Monday and I was simply told that it was Vote By Mail this year.  I said that it was obviously too late for me to vote by mail (because there is a reason they call it snail mail), so I asked what to do instead.  I was told that on election day (Monday), I can get a ballot at the Tiny Township office and put it in their ballot box.  So the Tiny Township office is the one and only polling station then?  That doesn't sound good.

Maybe it is because I am used to casting my vote in Toronto, but it seems like a really bad idea to only have one venue for voting.  Tiny Township has over 18,000 residents who are eligible to vote.  Is there enough space for everyone who will be coming to vote?  Does the township office have a room to vote in?  Is there enough staff to assist people?  I imagine they are assuming that most people mailed in their ballots and that people casting their vote at the office will just be those who aren't on the voters list.  Unfortunately, if the people I know are an example of Tiny voters, I think there are going to be plenty of confused people at the township office on Monday.

Two people I know who are on the voter list and got a Voting Information Package in the mail, didn't even open the envelope.  They both assumed they didn't have to care about it until election day.  That seems fair to me.  People are really apathetic about voting in general (voter turnout is less than 50%), so I don't think it is too much of a stretch to think that people wouldn't give a shit about their Voting Information Package until the day they thought they had to (election day!).  I didn't even care about asking where to vote until the Friday before the Monday election, and I think voting is really important!  Who knows how many people just left their ballots in a pile of mail on their kitchen table, only to open them sometime this weekend and not understand what to do?

Another person I know received their voting package and opened it, but thought the information about voting by mail was just that - information.  They assumed they could take their ballot to the polling station on election day.  I looked over the package.  It does have instructions on how to vote by mail, but it never tells you why you should.  Nowhere does it say: "Hey Look! There is NO POLLING STATION in your area! We want you to vote by mail this year! Please mail this back to vote!!"  A lot of people just expect to do what they did last time (go to a polling station) so unless it is specifically spelled out, I imagine some people just ignored the vote by mail option and assumed there was a polling station somewhere.  I know I thought there was.  Isn't there always a polling station somewhere?

Oh yeah, there is...  The Tiny Township office.  I wonder how full and crazy it is going to be when I get there on Monday?

Even if there are long lines, make sure you get out there and vote!  It is worth it to make sure your voice is heard.

UPDATE:  The township office wasn't all that busy when I went to vote.  There was a steady flow of people dropping off their ballots in person, as well as a few I overheard saying "I just opened it this morning..."  The woman I was behind in line said her parents opened theirs that morning, and if they had known, they would have mailed it last month.  I asked the election clerk how many ballots they got back through the mail and she said it was over 6000.  About 9000 people vote, so that left about a third of voters dropping off their ballots/having to vote at the office.

Double (Let) Down (All the Way)

I had suffient warning before I tried the KFC Double Down.  My brother didn't like it.  My friend James didn't like it.  I had a pretty good idea it was not going to be good or worthwhile.  However I am a craver of pretty disgusting foods from time to time and this had the potential to be a disgusting food that I would enjoy.

The Double Down experience was a let down from the start.  The staff didn't anticipate so many people ordering the sandwich and it took an incredibly long time to prepare.  Believe me, I want my food cooked, but it took over twenty minutes from the time we ordered it to when we were back in the car with our 'sandwich'.  Twenty minutes was too long of a wait for something that was probably going to be gross.  So this kind of doubled our disappointment.

Next was the price.  We got one Double Down sandwich to split, and it was $7.90.  No fries, no drink - just the sandwich for $7.90.  I think that is really expensive, and my frugal brain only let me buy it because it was a novelty and (most likely) a one time thing.  Plus John and I split it - so it was only a $4 extravagance.

So it cost too much and it took to long to make, and when we finally got home to eat it... it was mediocre.  It wasn't as awful as everyone said and it absolutely wasn't as good as it could have been.  It was just mediocre.  And it didn't do much to quash my hunger.  We split the sandwich, so each of us only got half of the 30g of fat and the 1700mg of salt, but even if I had eaten a whole one, it just didn't seem like a lot of food.  Maybe I am biased by the $8 I spent on it, but there are many other things we could have spent $8 on that would not have left me hungry.  And would not have been mediocre.  If I could do it over I would have gotten a rotisserie chicken from the Real Canadian Superstore deli - it's the same price and a hell of a lot more satisfying.

Our Double Let Down

Mixed Precipitation

I don't want to alarm anyone, but it snowed here today.

Don't worry, it was nothing like this photo.  The snowflakes today were actually so light that I couldn't capture any on film.  Regardless, it is a bitter reminder that the winter pictured above is coming.  Hopefully not until January, but it is coming.

Anyone know where Summer went?

The Birds!

Hundreds of blackbirds were flying around in the backyard this morning.  Kinda made me think of that Alfred Hitchcock movie...

Driving Around the Learning Curve

When I awoke this morning I noticed the car was looking a little slumped to one side and further investigating revealed that the drivers side front tire was completely flat.

First: Thank goodness it was flat at home and didn't happen while I was driving.

Second: I realize I would have no idea how to change a flat tire if it happened to me on the road.

Since I now own a car, I am going to be driving a lot more often, and I need to be prepared for emergency/problem situations that may arise.  I have common sense and I took a driving course (12 years ago...), but I still have some serious learning to do.  Right now I feel like a grandparent who is first learning how to use the computer; I'm worried that everything I do or touch is going to break it somehow.  I need to get over that.

On Friday we thought the tire was low but we didn't bother to check the gauge or fill it up (it was late, I was tired).  I drove it on Saturday and I felt it was pulling to the left (a sign the tire was low), but I still didn't check it.  Then this morning, the tire was flat.  We used a motorized air pump and filled the tire. We waited a few hours to see if we had a fast leak on our hands, but it stayed inflated so we drove to the local gas station and used their heavy duty pump/gauge.  Each of the tires was filled to roughly 32psi (our optimal pressure).

Tonight we drove into town and bought ourselves a digital tire gauge.  I was really hyper about the tire the whole ride there and the whole ride home.  It has continued to stay inflated.  The digital gauge is awesome - this is a necessary technological advancement.

So hopefully our tire issue is just that we drove on a low tire and by neglecting to fill it up on the two days we noticed it, it rebelled by going flat.  Or there is a slow leak and it will have to be fixed.  We tested the gauge of all the tires tonight and we'll test them again tomorrow, so if the one tire does have a leak we should be able to tell.  I have learned my lesson about air in the tires though, and I will happily be checking the gauge regularly.  As for everything else there is to learn about car ownership/car maintenance/emergency car situations, I am reading my owners manual and taking it one day at a time.

UPDATE:  Ten days later and the tire hasn't gone flat again or lost more pressure than any of the other tires.  We've been driving around a lot since then, too.  I went through a phase where I was afraid to use my car because I thought the tire was going to blow up, but it hasn't given me any reason to continue to think that.  So far so good.