Early Voting in NC

I like the idea of early voting. Of course, being the procrastinator that I am, I waited until the last day of early voting to cast my vote. I left the house on Saturday around noon, expecting to be in a line for an hour or two. As I was getting out of my car, I happened to grab a book that I had in the backseat to entertain myself. Otherwise, I was entirely unprepared for the upcoming FIVE HOURS I would spend standing in line to vote. I hadn't even eaten lunch. I fortunately had a friend who had come with his girlfriend, and she held his place in line while he went to grab some lunch and drinks for us (thanks, Remco and Caroline).

I was really surprised, though, how friendly and polite and patient everyone was while standing in line. There weren't even that many complaints about the wait. People were holding other people's kids for them when their arms were too tired, perfect strangers were protectively swatting bees away from a woman who was allergic but didn't want to leave the line to get an epi pen, and the Black Student Union was bringing around sweet tea to people that had been standing in line all day. It was very friendly, all around.

It seems that early voting has the potential to counteract the acts of nature that sometimes prevent people from going to the polls (cold, rain, snow, whatever). There still must be some interesting impact of weather on elections, though, even with early voting. I assume that Saturday was the biggest turnout for early voting. The weather on Saturday was absolutely beautiful. If it hadn't been, I don't think most people would have been willing to wait in line so long.