I survived Election Day! We all survived Election Day! I worked just shy of 15 hours on Tuesday - arriving at 7:45 a.m. and getting home around 10:30 p.m. It was a great day overall. I felt great! I felt stronger after being sick for so many days, and I was able to laugh and be cheerful the whole time, whether I was helping someone in person, or answering the millionth phone call.
Just before lunchtime, I was asked to go out and "babysit" a polling place. There were a couple of last minute subs working there and things weren't going as instructed. The election office had received a few complaints already. I was sent out there to get everything straightened out. I ended up spending 3.5 hours with them, taking my time to sit by a couple poll workers at a time to first observe, then give some tips to help things run more smoothly. They were all really nice, and appreciated my assistance.
I helped to clarify information they were giving to voters, such as whether they were in the correct polling place or not, making sure they had the correct paperwork with them to register BEFORE they began filling out the registration card, and making sure they actually filled out the registration card! If a voter had already registered in Bonneville County, but had moved, the poll worker was just updating their information online, instead of having them fill out a new registration card.
I also helped them to get more organized with the flow of patrons, who was the first check, who was directing traffic, and how to be more efficient overall. I also gave some tips on keeping everything sanitary, such as the pens that were being used. Clorox wipes had been sent out to each precinct, as well as hand sanitizer, and a spray bottle with rags to clean the booths regularly. But these were all being very underused, and in some cases, not at all. So I got that all straightened out!
After I got back to the office, mid-afternoon, I answered phones the entire rest of the day. :)
Twice, a news anchor showed up to do some interviews and get footage of what was going on in the office. In the morning, I was in close proximity to Penny Manning, my former supervisor when I worked in the Election Office, and who is now the Bonneville County Clerk.
I ended up being filmed briefly while I was on the phone up front. I was taking a call from Michael Farmer, one of Scott's army buddies that he's known for probably 20 years now. Michael was at the tail end of his bout with COVID-19, and wanted to still be able to vote. So I was putting him on the list of voters that were being organized for later in the day. (More on that in a minute)
Here is the link to the news clip where you can see me for about 1-2 seconds, ha ha. I can be seen about 14 seconds before the end of the 1.5 minute clip.
https://www.kpvi.com/news/local_news/election-2020-so-far-voter-turnout-by-county/article_e2e66c88-1e27-11eb-81cb-97eadae90b02.html
I sent my family a funny photo sometime that evening, showing how many calls had been missed so far that day. I texted, "I'M TRYING! I'M TRYING!"
This was my work station. I kept a call log of every call that was received from a poll worker, especially a chief judge. The yellow sheet was a special list of step-by-step instructions if a poll worker was having trouble putting in a new registration address, such as if the address was new within the county and wasn't being recognized by the state program. It was the most magical cheat sheet ever!
For those who had COVID-19 but wanted to be able to vote, they assigned each person an approximate time to come. They had to stay in their car, and we brought everything out to them.
This is our supervisor, Brenda Prudent. She is in her 70's now, and has worked at the Election Office for close to 40 years!!
As they took paperwork out to the cars and back, they kept everything separate from any other paperwork. For example, if the person needed to register, the registration card was placed in a ziploc bag. The information would be put into the computer while reading it through the clear plastic bag. Once the voter finished voting, their ballot was placed in a separate ballot can. Those ballots were not fed through the same scanner as the thousands of other ballots. Everything was kept very carefully and meticulously separate.
A short time later, another news anchor showed up. This time from Local News 8. Here you can see Brenda, our supervisor, in the blue sweater with her back to me. The news anchor woman is in the bright blue blazer. And Brenda's daughter, Alisa, (seen in the black shirt) was part of a team of several deputies from the sheriff's office who helped in a variety of ways throughout the evening.
It was a good day, and a long day, and an epic day! What a close presidential race this has been. I think the best thing I've heard recently was something Amber said to us one evening last week. She found a quote that in essence said, Instead of asking ourselves what kind of president do we want for our country, let's ask ourselves, what kind of country do we want for our next president?
In other words, we need to be our best selves as individuals, groups and communities. We need to be responsible, kind, hard working, and willing to create a wonderful future for ourselves no matter WHO the next president is! AMEN. :)
Monday: As we were doing our first church-sponsored Personal Finance class (with Amber as our class leader), and were about 45 minutes in (it was awesome so far!), Scott got a call from the school district office. She basically said, "I'm sorry to inform you that you've been potentially exposed to someone who just tested positive for coronavirus and you'll need to quarantine for 14 days."
Scott was shocked first, then mad soon after. Turns out that on Friday (a week ago), he was in a mandatory faculty meeting with about 30 people in a room. He sat by several people in close proximity around a table (all had masks on) as they learned how to put a tourniquet on someone if the need should arise. (!) Because that happens often in a high school??
One of the staff members at his table tested positive with COVID-19 over the weekend. He was mad because it was a mandatory meeting, but then they were not able to be socially distanced from each other, and now it was going to be so inconvenient to try to teach his students for 2 weeks from home.
I tried to help him look at the bright side - such as, Hey, now we can spend more time together! And, Hey, you don't have to get all dressed up for your video presentations! And, Hey, this is what people have been doing all year long - working from home - and they love it! It took a while, but he slowly began to appreciate the flexible schedule throughout the week.
He went over to the high school later that same night to get a bunch of his stuff, including all the food in his fridge so it didn't spoil. He brought home all of his video recording equipment so that he can still prepare his online lessons each day.
Best thing so far: He likes being able to putter around the house during the day. Do some school stuff. Tinker. Then do some more school stuff. Then tinker.
Worst thing so far: He wants to be able to pick up tests and correct them. I might have to arrange to pick them up for him . . .
Tuesday: Election Day
Wednesday: I celebrated being done with election responsibilities by cleaning around the house and playing with the girls.
I set Abby and Gwen up in the living room with several dolls so they could play "school". It worked temporarily, but eventually they roped me into being the teacher. They dubbed me Mrs. Pillowfight. Apparently Mrs. Harmon is way too boring.
Later that morning, Gwen was having fun with the bubbles that were leftover from me washing the dishes.
She kept asking for more bubbles. As I gave her a little blob of bubble fluff on her washcloth, I would say, "Okie dokie!" And her version of repeating it back was so cute! I did a quick recording of her saying it.
Click here to listen:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/wX6C3WsxQE3oPXRu7
Scott and I also took the girls to the park later in the afternoon while Amber went to a physical therapy appointment. We walked down the street to Sunnyside Park. Abby, immediately upon arrival, headed straight over to where all the other kids were playing so that she could make some new friends. Gwen, instead, went directly over to the swing-set area and plopped down in the sand to play all by herself. She scooped sand onto her legs, and later drew with her fingers in the sand while I sat on the swing next to her.
After almost an hour of playing on the playground equipment, we convinced the girls to go on an adventure walk around the perimeter of the park with us before heading home for dinner. They happily led the way while Scott and I followed close behind, holding hands and talking as we walked along.
I had them stop to pose in front of a giant spruce tree. Their facial expressions were priceless. :)
Finding a decent pile of leaves was especially fun for Abby. We spent some time trying to capture her tossing leaves up into the air. I got a couple of good ones.
Then, she asked me to take a slow-mo video. I had never tried it before on my phone, but I decided, Why not? Here is the clipped version of what we did. It was super fun!
(You'll hear me saying "3" at the start. I guess I didn't get that part edited very well, haha)
https://photos.app.goo.gl/JqUEE5dGYxsaEnbX6
After dinner, Jacob called with a math riddle for Scott to work on. It ended up taking more than an hour of combined brain power, ha ha. But they had fun talking it out together.
Jake and Hannah, together for a small second, ha ha
Thursday: We all went outside to clean up the fall leaves in the back yard. I used the leaf blower to round up as much as I could under the trees and launch them out into the grass.
Several bags later . . .
Before you swell with pride in seeing a 3 year old hauling this heavy bag of leaves all by herself (down below), let's rewind for just a minute, ha ha.
Gwen typically announces each day, sometimes 25 times a day, who she "is". Such as, "I am Elsa." (from the movie Frozen) It means, this is who I am pretending to be and I would like you to refer to me as such.
After I watched the live-action movie Mowgli recently with the girls, Gwen now loves to pretend she's Mowgli. We were out in the back yard that morning, and most of us were working hard. Gwen kept saying, "I'm Mowgli!" Scott began a dialogue with her, having a little bit of fun along the way. He would announce, "I'm Mowgli!" To which she'd respond, "No, I'm Mowgli!"
This short conversation is about Scott trying to convince Gwen to help us work, because Mowgli is a hard worker. Gwen didn't want to connect to that part of Mowgli's personality at first, but eventually she remembered that Mowgli helped Baloo to get some honey from high up on the cliffs.
Click here for the short conversation they had:
Now, you can move on to being so proud of Gwen as she dragged that big bag of leaves from the back yard all the way out to the truck in the driveway. All. by. herself. Because she's Mowgli!
After we finished out back, we moved our muscles out to the front yard. While I raked the little bit of leaves on the front lawn, Scott decided to hang up our Christmas lights while the weather was still warm and friendly. We went from the upper 60's on Thursday and Friday to the low 30's by today (Sunday).
He rigged a precarious contraption to stand on and clip the lights to the rain gutter. At one point, I had to stop raking the leaves and come over to hold the ladders in place because it was all so wobbly!
Friday: Scott left before 6 a.m. to head to Boise for his army weekend of meetings.
*It had been an entire week of no COVID symptoms, and he didn't want to miss his important meetings in Boise. So off we went.
I didn't want to get up and dressed that early, though, so I opted to sleep in until 7 and then get ready to drive myself over to Boise. I hit the road at 9:00 a.m.
While I drove, I called Kylie to see how they were doing in Italy. Things are very restricted once again because of the new wave of cases of coronavirus. There is a strict curfew each night and if anyone is out and about after 10 p.m. they have to have paperwork to prove why they are not at home. She had plans to hang out with her girlfriends on Friday night while Benson would be at work, but instead of hurrying home before 10 p.m., she made plans to sleep over at their house instead so she didn't get in trouble.
Benson is still working the night shift for a while longer. It isn't easy being married and then trying to have quality time together when one spouse has to work all night and then needs to sleep all the next day. Hang in there kiddos! It won't last forever.
Once I got my things settled into our hotel room on the base, I drove down to the Boise Greenbelt area and began my lovely afternoon of walking along the Boise river for a while.
I started out at Boise State University and just followed the river for a long time, stopping to take a lot of pictures along the way.
Clearly, Boise is a few weeks behind Eastern Idaho as far as the fall season goes. They still have gorgeous colors to enjoy. Most of the leaves on our trees over here have fallen off or are just plain dead by now. :)
Next, I found the Anne Frank Human Rights Memorial on the other side of the Boise River.
It was a huge space for a memorial, with walls and plaques etched with the most moving quotes on the stonework! Everything felt so timely to me, with the chaos and contention that is so prevalent in our world today. I will share a few pictures here, but if you want to read more, I will share a link to the photos below.
Here is the link to all the photos I took at the Anne Frank Memorial.
When Scott got done with his meetings for the day, we found a very interesting place to get our dinner. It was a nearby restaurant called The Goodness Land.
It was Middle Eastern cuisine, and more specifically, it was unique to Iraq. We visited with the owner a little bit to find out where they were from. I didn't tell him that my husband was involved in the war over there more than once. But I did tell him that Scott spent a year over in Saudi Arabia and that we really loved their food. :)
We ordered appetizers #1 (Tabola) and #2 (Hummus). They were delicious mixed together! The Tabola was a mixture of chopped parsley with lemon juice and diced tomatoes, and some other ingredients that I couldn't quite identify. It was so fresh and lovely!
Then we ordered #11 (Chicken Shawarma) to share. Scott didn't have a huge appetite because he went out to lunch with the army dudes and was still a little full from his giant burrito.
I especially loved the pickled beets - not something I have really eaten before. Yes, those are fries. Scott said that fries are very common over in the Middle East, but they usually ate everything all together in a burrito (fries included).
We mixed in more of the Tabola with the chicken shawarma plate. And those yellow and orange things are a delicate rice/pasta underneath everything.
It was really fun to try something so unique! I've never eaten anything like this before.
Saturday: After shopping unsuccessfully for hours trying to find a shelf/cubby combo for our upcoming bathroom renovation, I stopped for lunch at this amazing restaurant in Meridian (adjacent to Boise). It's called Lucky Fins.
I ordered the charred brussels sprouts and cauliflower with bleu cheese and bacon crumbles. It was the most amazing thing I've eaten in a very long time!
I also ordered a side of crab legs.
Let's just say I'm not very good with the tools that they gave me. I know they're standard, but I probably should have watched a YouTube video first or something. I was pretty bad. But after an hour, I think I got all the crab meat out of each leg and had consumed all of the melted butter.
I decided to move on to one last store, which happened to be the nearby Hobby Lobby. Bingo! I found what I wanted and I was very happy that it was on sale at 50% off! I grabbed a couple of cute little rustic tins for some of the shelves, and then my shopping day was complete.
Saturday night, Scott and I met up with his sister, Carol, and her husband, Mike, once again. We contacted about 3 different restaurants, hoping to get on a reservation list. But the wait was more than an hour long at each place. So we decided to go to our favorite little standby, Black Bear Diner, once again.
We had a lovely dinner and a lovely visit together, before heading back to our hotel room for the night.
Sunday: I went to church with Mike and Carol at 9:00 a.m. But, BRRRR, it was so cold! It started snowing around 7 a.m. and by the time I was ready to head out, I had to scrape off almost 2 inches of heavy, wet snow from all over my car! Man am I grateful for bun warmers!!
I always enjoy spending time with Mike and Carol. They are pretty much the greatest grandparents ever, except of course for Weston's mom, Kathy. I really look up to these seasoned grandparents and I enjoy hearing about all the fun ideas they come up with to have meaningful experiences with their grandchildren.
After Sacrament meeting, I followed them back to their house to hang out and discuss our Sunday School reading assignment from this past week while I waited for Scott to finish up at Gowen Field. Because of the snow and wind, he ended up getting done with his meetings by noon since everyone just wanted to get on the road and get home before dark.
After we ate all of our leftovers in our hotel room fridge, we drove home. We are home safe and sound. No problems on the roads. Yes, it was a bit windy and there was snow on the ground on the western side of the state. But everything was dry and fine on the eastern side of Idaho. It's just cold.
So I'm going to get my pajamas on now and climb into my bed. Maybe I can convince Scott to hang out on my side of the bed while I do my whole bedtime routine, so it will be warm by the time I'm done . . .
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