Early voting in North Carolina

CNN published that early voting in NC was 200,000 on the first day, Thurs. Oct. 17. 

That's about as high as was the voting for Obama when the state actually went blue for the first time since Jimmy Carter. According to a Wikipedia.

Just to give everyone some high hopes.

Here I was standing close to the doors into the voting room to take this shot...I'd been in line about 25 minutes so far. It wasn't too bad because some of the time my lower half, below the waist, had been in the sun. By the time I got to this place I was totally in the shade, and it was a bit cool and I was glad of my jacket.

Here's one of the women (there were a couple of poor women deranged by the lies I guess) sitting at Trump electioneering sites. There were lots more (not deranged by lies) at the Harris/Walz area, including providing a handy Democrat sample ballot.

The woman sitting in the middle of the room in a purple sweater is an observer. Guess which party she's probably from. Well, I have no idea, but there was only one, so that makes me lean toward our predominant party of Democrats here in Black Mountain. But then the GOP is more interested in finding faults in voting.

My ballot was cast and entered the machine as number 999 for this Black Mountain early voting site. 

Must admit the internet connection with Spectrum has been iffy for the last few days...off for hours at a time. So I'm glad it's working again. I'd ask for credit for the time it was down from service completely, but I don't mind paying for the linemen who were out there reconnecting me to the internet. I guess I don't really know when it was returned to service since I was gone.

I'm having to push myself to eat the good food that I have. I just haven't much appetite for some reason. And I had to make a new hole in my belt for my new jeans...for which I rolled up the legs that were too long. Too much trouble to try to send them back with iffy delivery still from Amazon etc. The nearest Amazon warehouse wasn't damaged by the floods, according to some news or another. Plus the jeans will probably shrink with the first wash.

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Here's Open Culture showing the voting test from 1964 to keep Blacks from being eligible to vote in LA. Take the Near Impossible Literacy Test. You and I will fail!

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Here's a PBS clip that talks about climate change as being a topic for each of the presidential candidates:

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Today's quote:

There is always more goodness in the world than there appears to be, because goodness is of its very nature modest and retiring. -Evelyn Beatrice Hall, biographer (1868-1956)

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The sobering photo of the area around me after Hurricane Helene

Cable cut off in error

 So I have no internet nor TV at home since Sat. around 11:15 am.

I was on my way out the door, and figured it was just one of those intermittent things...would be reconnected from their office within a few minutes. As I walked to my car, I saw the culprit, a Charter/Spectrum truck was pulling away from an illegal parking spot. That was 11:30 Sat.

When I returned home at 1:30 or so, still no internet, nor TV. I tried the rebooting procedures which they have led me through enough times that I can now do it without calling them. No luck.

So I called them. They agreed, I was completely cut off. I'm sure they also looked quickly to see if I'd paid their hefty monthly fees. Had there been a line down in the yard, they asked? I said, no, our cable comes in underground from a box at the end of a building (serving 8 apartments).

I told the national repairs desk that I'd seen the Spectrum truck leaving this morning, and deduced since I had a new neighbor next door that he might have been turning on the neighbor's service, and inadvertently cut mine off.

But they could not fix it from the national repair desk. So I received an appointment and then they wrote a ticket. What that means in Spectrum-talk is that I have a ticket that asks for earliest repair, hopefully immediately.

I then got a call from some local person who told me there was nobody in the area today, I'd have to wait until Aug. 4, 4-5 n pm. I told her I'd seen someone in the area this morning. But she hung up on me.

I then had the unique (to me) experience of feeling cut off from the world. Yes the phone still worked, as well as texting friends. But the activities which I usually spend my waking hours doing were suddenly unavailable to me.

So I had lunch, Then read a paper book for an hour. Then texted a friend for a while. But she wanted to watch the game with her hubby (through cable at her house).

I tried setting my alarm and lying down, thinking I might feel better if I could nap for a while.

Then I went to the drugstore and picked up some vitimins I need. The tried to park outside the church in the shade and get the internet so I could sit in the car and read my digital book. They changed the router, and it is no longer the one I used to have access to.

So here I am at the library until 5 pm when they close (in 30 min.) I have a restaurant still to try, and hopefully the heat of the day will have diminished so I can just have the car's ac on and still read for a while there.

I have blogs to write and photos to edit. And 3 library books on my iPad which I usually read in bed.  It will be the paper book again for that activity.

Tomorrow I'll be glad to attend church (Sunday) rather than watch the YouTube live link from home. That's ok, I've got my mask! Then in the afternoon at 4 is our women's Lammas celebration outside. So my activities will be less dependent on the cable.

I haven't been able to print out the little quote that I've chosen to offer. So now I will try to figure out if I can copy it into a text message for my phone. It's a bit long for that, but maybe I can use the notebook on the phone without the internet...unless someone has told me how to get on line at church again.

Hope all my blogger friends are at peace and cool, and breathing easy with all the smoke puffing along through our air these days. Not to mention, avoiding the plague!

Gratitude

Just a quick note to acknowledge the joy I obtain reading other blogs from around the world with my toast and coffee.

Whow...I looked this morning at raku kilns in New South Wales, Australia; simple living in Sweeden, birds in Alaska, water in Canada, a colonist in costume in Williamsburg, VA, wild flowers in Tennessee, and barns in Kentucky, and I don't remember what else.  And of course the pottery from around the world as well, especially interesting from New Hampshire, Maine, Japan, England and Florida.

I'm so grateful for the internet.  I can sit in comfort in my pj's, barefoot, with a shawl on my shoulders to keep me warm...listen to radio music from anywhere I like, any type I like...and read so very much.

If I don't know something about what someone says on a blog, there are all these great "search engines".  I always think of train engines somehow with that phrase, pulling a bunch of cars full of information, which I can click upon to read, or perhaps leave and go to another site I prefer.  What a smorgasbord of fun.

Feedback on my recent blog "rant" regarding having migraines which blind me.  I did go to the doctor and have a new prescription (fortunately not a high cost one).  That co-pay of $15 was well worth the 20 min. I spent with her, after waiting a half-hour of course.  She also advised me to carry the other blood pressure pills with me, and just take one if I start having the "shimmers" of a migraine.  I haven't had one yet to try this trick out.

I wonder if cutting back the caffeine to help my stomach has changed my vascular workings, which resulted in having all those bouts of blindness in a couple of days.  I am drinking what's called "half-caf" now.  I try very hard, but usually drink 2 cups, thus having the punch of one regular cup.  But that's better than 2 regular coffees, isn't it?

From the Asheville Citizen-Times, a silly banner about a potentially dangerous crash between train and semi.  No one was hurt.   Orange Crush, train hits fruit-filled rig   This happened where I frequently am driving, and just an hour after I'd gone by that way. on Sat.
 
Hope you have something to feel grateful for today!  I'm glad you are there to read this!