Today was election day. Pennsylvania makes it really hard to vote. I'm convinced that they were actually trying to prevent me from voting, and they did a good job. I registered to vote in PA back at the end of August. I wanted to vote here because it is a swing state as opposed to voting in Massachusetts. I filled out the registration for with one of those people on campus. I don't know how but my registration was lost. I never received a registration card like they said I would. I don't know if this was the fault of the person I filled it out with or the state. Maybe I should have taken care of it while there was still time, but I didn't.

I decided I should at least try to find where my polling place ought to be so that I could at least cast a provisional ballot so that I could say I tried. All the websites that try to tell you where your polling place is just pointed me to Pennslyvania's page that doesn't let you look it up online. All it gives you in the phone number for one guy for the whole Alleghenny County. At night his phone doesn't have an answering machine and during the day it is always busy. I'm convinced that he must just take is phone off the hook because I used *66 and I didn't get through even after waiting an hour and a half.

After I'd given up I just happened to be stopping in Wean Hall to pick up a key on my way to work. I saw a poster for yet another find your polling place site. This one was run by CMU students. I went to the cluster to give it a try and actually found the place. I went there and it turned out that my next door neighbor was the judge of elections. I suppose I should have asked him where to vote. Anyway, I guess that meant there could be no question of my residency, i.e. registration eligibility. Of course since I wasn't actually registered I was only able to fill out a provisional ballot. I guess it won't really count but at least I can say that I tried and I did vote, sort of.