November 4, 2008, 8:27 P.M.

Kevin,

I’m jumping my turn, but I imagine your house’s bath time is a little more involved than mine, you having children, and me having dogs. Every few weeks we just take them out to the yard and turn the hose on them. I imagine if you did that you’d get a visit from child and family services.

I wanted our loyal readers to know that we have an honest-to-goodness field correspondent at the Obama Grant Park rally, my brother, who scored some tickets via some local Chicago political connections. He doesn’t have hologram technology, so he does have a phone, so if anything of note happens he’s going to call.

—John

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November 4, 2008, 8:02 P.M.

Kevin,

CNN is usually my election returns network of choice, but they haven’t called Pennsylvania and NBC/MSNBC have, so I’m switching allegiances.

When there’s something personal at stake I like to listen to the home team announcers. (There’s nothing better than listening to Ron Santo freak out on mic when the Cubs do something good.)

It looks like St. Joseph county, home of your alma mater, Notre Dame, is going to go for Obama after leaning toward Bush in 2004. My general loathing of the ND football team aside, I’m feeling much warmer to the area right now.

—John

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November 4, 2008, 7:52 P.M.

John,

This is why we’re too old for live-blogging. You’re eating, I’m doing the dishes. In a few minutes I’m giving my kids a bath. At some point I’m going to bed, honest to god. When it’s time for bed, at my age, there’s no stopping it.

I was going to open a bottle of champagne later if it looked like Obama had sealed the deal. Instead I opened one when I got your letter about the Obama campaign email. It must be a targeted message, because I didn’t get it and Obama’s people email me more than my sister. But why they would send it to you in South Carolina, which CNN just called for McCain with only 1% of the vote in?

Maybe they just figured every Obama supporter in Illinois was down at the park.

My first prediction this afternoon was an Obama upset in Indiana. I’m not calling it yet, but Obama is way overperforming in the downstate counties at this point as compared to John Kerry. Keep watching that.

I’m told it’s bath time. I might take one, too.

—Kevin

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November 4, 2008, 7:26 P.M.

Kevin,

Watching CNN, I was.

I was eating dinner so I couldn’t get to the computer fast enough to get my Princess Yellin joke out. You got the feeling that Wolf and Yellin thought it was ridiculous, but time and money had been invested, so, by God, she was going to be projected into the studio even if it came at the expense of her dignity.

—John

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November 4, 2008, 7:20 P.M.

John,

Oh my God, are you watching this awful hologram thing on CNN? I am so waiting for Wolf Blitzer to strike Jessica Yellin down with a light saber.

—Kevin

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November 4, 2008, 5:42 P.M.

Kevin,

First polls close in less than 20 minutes and I’ve started drinking. I blame the Obama campaign because they sent me this:

Friends—

If you aren’t already out canvassing, Barack needs your help right now—our data indicates that the results will be very close in many states. I can’t emphasize enough how urgent this message is. Please go to http://my.barackobama.com/call and start calling as soon as you can.

We are not going to hit our goal of 1,000,000 calls for today without your help.

Can you call now and continue for as long as you can manage?

http://my.barackobama.com/call

Judith
My.BarackObama.com/Call

“Very close in many states.” I notice they don’t say which ones, but honestly, do they have to worry me like this? It’s like when your teenager is out past curfew (do teenagers still have curfews?) and they call home and start with, “Everything is fine, but…”

Maybe this is just a pre-planned strategy, like the Labor Day auto dealers claiming all inventory must go and prices will never be this low again…until the next sale a month later, but man, I just want to see some actual results.

—John

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