News & History: November 2008 Archives

I want to wish a Happy Thanksgiving to all of those that we cannot be with or see this holiday weekend. I hope that you have a chance to enjoy the company of friends and family. Let’s be thankful for the many blessings that we do have and remember the things that are most important to us.

(pauses for a moment of reflection)

Of course, what Thanksgiving is complete without football. (Kind of sad, now that I think about it.) But while you won’t get John Madden broadcasting one of your football games today (you do realize he’s at NBC, now, right?), I will leave you with this impersonation of John Madden — by Frank Caliendo on the Letterman show.

Kellie went out first thing this morning, getting in line at 5:30am. She was home just after 6:30am. I’m sure she doesn’t completely feel this way, but that probably wasn’t too bad, considering some of the reports of much longer lines throughout the commonwealth.

I went in at just after 3pm, not sure what to expect. Luckily for me, there were essentially no lines, so it was in-and-out. As of 3:10pm, 2462 votes had been cast at my polling place. That’s an astounding number. I don’t know how many are registered in my precinct (I haven’t been able to find that info easily), but that’s a huge number for any precinct. And that doesn’t even include absentee ballots. As of the 2008 primary, there were 3987 registered voters in the precinct.

That’s huge turnout percentages already (over 60%). I’ll post a follow-up later once the final precinct results are posted. We’re definitely heading over 75% participation in this precinct, I’m guessing. As a comparison, there were 757 votes in my precinct for our state senator in 2007 (3927 registered voters that year), 2294 votes in my precinct for US Senator in 2006 (3961 registered voters that year), 1933 votes for governor in 2005 (3914 registered voters that year), and 2847 votes for president in 2004 (3906 registered voters). That’s a fairly steady headcount of registered voters over 4 years (there hasn’t been much development in the area during that time).

A part of me has passed on. I must say I’m pleasantly surprised by the finale for Opus. (If you haven’t seen the final panel, where he winds up — well, you can see it here.) Where Opus winds up really hit me, because it’s a book I often read multiple times each night to the twins. And it seems so peaceful and right. No, he doesn’t get the hot island babes, but there’s something everlasting about that final page (even in the original)

And this sure looks like it for Opus. Nice of Berkeley Breathed to share him with us all these years. (Yes, I had the collection books, and the t-shirts, and the Opus dolls in the 80s.) And we finally get to see Steve Dallas without the sunglasses today, too, and he looks like a kind and sentimental soul, too. Perhaps a bit of Berkeley showing in that look?

Berkeley Breathed shares his thoughts in this interview that I saw in syndication here in the Richmond paper today. Thank you for Opus. He’ll remain a piece of my heart, that subversive little penguin.