Election Judge

Yep, I'm going to be an Election Judge on Tuesday, for the first time in my life. I found myself training this morning at Winchester Hall here in Frederick at 10 AM. Well, I was 10 minutes late, but I still made it. I had to find parking, which was a new venture for me. It turns out the garage across the street from Winchester Hall only charges $1 for parking on Saturday. This would be a $10 rate if this was downtown Baltimore. Frederick is so quaint.

So I'm heading for the front door when some City worker who is headed to her office in the same building starts to question why I am here. Then she finds the door is open, and she sees the Election Judge training room full of mostly grey haired peeps who are listening to another grey haired peep tell them how to set up the Diabold voting machines. I get questioned by the woman in charge of handing out materials and stuff. She asks me if I'm a book or a unit Judge. I tell her I emailed someone at the last minute and they called me this morning to say I could be on standby status. She asks for verification from a man nearby, finds out I'm legit, and hands me my blue book and other papers. I sit and listen.

We get up to stand in front of the voting machines and get all kinds of special instruction concerning the voting machines, which are easy peasy to operate, really. The instructions are in the blue books, anyway. After at least an hour of voting machine training, I learn that they've found a spot for me, although it's not at my neighborhood polling location. I'll be at Monocacy Middle School, doing the Book Judge job. I'll be one of the ladies at the tables with the books and forms to ask your name. I find out later that Book Judges make $120, Unit Judges make $135, and Cheif Judges make $150. I could do the Unit Judge job with one hand tied behind my back, but we will be there for 14 plus hours, so I guess it's just as well to have a sit down job.

We are not allowed by law to ask for ID or even for the voting card. We do need to verify by looking up their records, though. Since this is a Primary Election, we have to make sure they are either Republican or Democrat, so we can tell the Unit Judge, who will program the voting card for the correct ballot.

One of my friends told me her father registered as a Dem, even though he was a Repub, so he could vote for the worst Dem candidates in the Primary. How awful! He's not the only Repub I have heard about doing that, and I don't think Dem's ever think along those lines. Sneaky Republicans!

Anyway, I have to take food for the entire day, and one woman told me to bring a comfortable chair if I don't want to sit on the hard metal folding chairs. I met my Chief Judge, and he is a short white haired gentleman. I hope we all work well together.

I saw a friend from church there, and she asked me if I'd ever done this before. I said, no, and she told me that she hadn't either. She has long salt and pepper hair, and looks like a hippy. She is the mother of 10 children.

We won't receive our pay for 7 weeks, but I guess that's okay. We also get paid $25 for being there today.

I applied for a job at the mall today, along with my friend Chainah. We are looking for Christmas work. The woman would not let us take the applications home, so we had to fill them out there. I thought maybe it was because the store, the Bonton, was kind of stuffy, but the less stuffy Boscov's also wanted us to fill them out there. We said we'd come back on Monday for the Boscov application. I have an application form to fill out for Burlington Coat Factory, too. It is much longer and asks for a resume and references.

I just want to find a Christmas job, so I think out of 3 stores, I should find something. If all 3 call me, then I can choose the best fit for my needs. I don't want to work weekends, or at the very least, not on Sunday. We'll see how it all pans out. Chainah thinks she'll spend all her money on clothes.

Chainah was in a fashion show at Fashion Bug today, but she told me it was at 3 PM. I took my time, and got there as they were taking down the chairs. Darn! It was at 2 PM. I looked in the store for C, but didn't see her right away. Maybe I'll sign up for the fashion show next time, because the participants get 50 percent off. I saw two things I'll like from there.

I also saw a Mudd purse at Boscov's that I really like. Man, I do so need a job.