On to Warmer and Fuzzier Topics
Last night, I'm sure like the rest of this country, Chris and I grabbed our supper (chicken soup full of yummy vegetables and a warm baguette) and sat in front of the TV. We opted for CBS because that's the channel we get most clearly. Since nothing happens for quite some time on election night, and the news networks were being very conservative about projecting their views on the results, we find that one sits in front of the TV for quite some some with nothing happening. It can get boring after a while, which is part of the reason that I fell asleep before California even closed their polls.
We started chatting about some of our favorite election night memories. It is after all, an event more attended to by Americans than even football. I don't remember watching the election as a kid. I'm sure I must have, but I don't remember it at all. I have more vivid memories of the Olympics. In fact, about the only election I can actually remember watching is the last one (sad, but true). I didn't get to vote in the last election. I had forgotten to renew my reg. card, and I was pessimistic about voting, figuring that my vote didn't count anyway. (Well, Florida proved me wrong last time.) I went down to the precinct anyway after orchestra rehearsal to see if there was a chance that I could vote (this year, if I had been in the same position, I probably could've cast a provisional ballot). But I didn't get to vote. I remember that I had a paper due the next day, so I basically buzzed into my apt for a quick bite of supper and went to sit in the library computer lab, my second home. I worked on my paper, punctuated by refreshing the CNN website every 10 min. When the library closed, and I had to go home everybody was watching TV. One of roommates let me use her computer in the livingroom. So I set up there and continued to distractedly work on my paper. Gradually everyone went to bed, and I continued working on my paper and watching the election on mute. I was done about 3 am, and had watched enough to see Bush win, but then turned it off before the whole contest erupted. I woke my roommate, upon her request, to tell her that Bush won. Needless to say, I was confused the next morning. And then we had the whole Election Drama of 2000.
Chris's favorite memory of election night was in 1984 the Reagan/Mondale election. He and his sister were sitting on the living room floor with their own US map and a red crayon and a blue crayon. Each time a state was determined, they colored in the appropriate state with the appropriate color. Except, according to Chris's memory, Reagan won them all, so every state was red. He also remembers at one point, a state was declared for Mondale, so he colored it blue, but then was declared a misdeclare, so Chris had to color over it in red, but then in made purple, and that bugged him. What also annoyed this little 7 year old was that in the end, he could've saved a lot of time by just coloring the whole map in red rather than doing it gradually state by state. I don't remember anything from the Reagan/Mondale election except this random picture in my head of a picture on Mondale on a telephone pole near our post office. (Speaking of maps, we just got a free world map from National Geographic in the mail. woohoo!)
UPDATE: Oh, I remember another thing from elections as a kid. I thought that George Bush, Sr. just HAD to win the election his first time (was that '88), because he would be the 41st president, and that way the first president and the fourty-first president would be named George. Aaaah. The political reasonings of a 10yrold.
ANOTHER UPDATE (11/4): While watching the election other night, Dan Rather on Louisiana: "It's just complicated there."
So back to the interactive blogging medium:
What's your favorite election night memory?
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Completely ignoring what was going on on election night and finding out the next morning. (Oh wait, that's not a memory...that's this election!) I did vote, though... (for Bush, though not without misgivings)
Posted by: Evan Donovan | 03.11.04 10:59
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My favorite memory has to be 1984, watching a little 7 year old boy coloring all the states on his map red . . .
Actually, the state that changed was from red to blue. We originally thought Reagon won Mondale's home state of Minnesota, but he lost it by 2/10ths of a percentage point to Mondale.
Posted by: mom2 | 03.11.04 11:26
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well last nite we watched "Cheaper by the Dozen" which was cute. and then enough dan rather to creep me out (5 minutes), and then to bed until baby feeding time at 4am.
I remember checking cnn.com a lot last time, but other than that, my election nite memories have faded. we've never been a very political family.
Posted by: bobw | 03.11.04 11:29
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Since last night will certainly never rank as my favorite election night, I'll have to say that the debaucle of four years ago was fun for the people I was with, though not so much for the outcome. Besides the obvious up-in-the-air quality of the national election, there was a separate election that was of some interest to my boss in residence life, a good friend of mine, who's a Republican originally from New York. He was on the phone with his mom, whining about how Hillary Clinton (who I love) had won in their state and what an injustice it was for her to have even run for senate there. Despite all my issues with what was going on nationally, that one moment brightened my night. =)
Posted by: Erica | 03.11.04 11:39
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My most vivid election nite memory was 1980, the first Reagan victory over Carter.
We were living in Communist Yugoslavia during the first half of the Carter presidency, and kept thinking that we would like every one who voted for Carter to live in a Communist country for a month! That would cure any socialistic or communistic tendencies!
At any rate, Election Day 1980, we had a huge party at our house in Roanoke. We thought it was going to be a long nite, and had food staged to last until the wee hours. Papa was there to help, wearing a dish towel stuck into his belt as an apron. He and I worked all day making pasta salad with shrimp, (the shrimp cleaned and cooked by us!), cole slaw, potato salad, and assembling trays of cold cuts. We had a big round wheel of blue cheese, and lots of beer! (No one drank much wine in those days.)
We had borrowed portable TV sets and had them set up in the kitchen and the den, as well as the big set in the living room.
All our friends were coming to our party after work in the 7 - 7:30 range of time. By the time most of our guests arrived, the party was over! Reagan had won enough electoral votes in the East and Central states to declare victory before the west coast polls even closed! Our guests ate and chatted little bit and then left to get to bed on-time on a week-nite! I never even got to set out the desserts and fondue I had make for the mid-night chocolate buffet!
Posted by: mom2 | 03.11.04 11:51
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Actually Mondale did win Minnesota and Washington DC in 1984. I know this because I got curious a few weeks ago about whether or not an opponent to the elected president had ever gotten 0 electoral votes, and I had to go all the way back to 1872, when by a resolution of the House 3 electoral votes for Greely were not counted, giving him 0 when he ran against Grant. In 1820 John Quincy Adams only got 1 electoral vote when he ran against Monroe. I'm not an historical scholar so I don't know any more details on these two races than I found online.
My source is the LA Times, who ran a really cool electoral vote tracker this year that let people test scenarios and had the latest poll data provided. It looks like they've changed the funtionality of the tool a bit since the election yesterday but you can still check historial electoral college voting all the way back to the first election. The tool is at http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/sfl-edge-n-electoral,1,7466826.flash?coll=la-utilities-politics
Posted by: Jack | 03.11.04 13:31
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Thanks, Jack. Yea, Chris just remembers that some state ended up being purple.
Posted by: Jeannette | 03.11.04 13:55
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When I was 13, it was 1994 and I met Newt Gingrich. He was a big celebrity back then because he was leading the Republican Contract with America. That election night, my family was watching the returns with some friends over and as the returns came in, my dad and his friend got happier and happier until they were practically dancing in the living room, yelling their delight and pumping their hands in the air. It was a memory of euphoria and elation. In fact, I was reminded of it when I watched the returns come in last night. :-)
Posted by: Matthias | 03.11.04 14:38
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I think that Jeannette doesn't have election night memories because we didn't watch it!! I don't know why. I am really tired of all the campaign rhetoric by then and I just want to vote and wake up the next morning and find out! However, Luisa had a little map this time and filled it in until she gell asleep in front of the TV. I came down around 2:30 and turned the TV off after seeing that it had not been resolved yet. J-net, If you can get over LA going Republican, I can get over PA going Democrat! :>)
Posted by: mom | 08.11.04 07:35