Amalgamated Content

I don't know how to start with this. There are a number of isolated moments that stand out in my mind. Some are poignant, like the woman who, upon hearing we couldn't find her registration in the computer, shook her head and said, her quiet frustration palpable, "I just won't vote, then." She put her driver's license away and calmly walked out of the room. We had already told her about the Voter Verification Hotline, but she didn't seem all that interested in waiting on hold for what promised to be a very long time. So she left without casting her ballot. I tend to personalize negative outcomes in a way that isn't warranted (my wife can attest to this), so I had to acknowledge, then dismiss, the sinking feeling that the situation was somehow my fault. Some moments were joyful, in that primitive "caveman starts fire" sense, like when our one troublesome ePollbook (the custom laptop builds used to check in voters) finally connected to th...

There's something you should know about me.  I absolutely dread doing home improvement projects. The scope of the task in question doesn't make any difference.  Even something as simple as hanging up a picture frame fills me with trepidation and angst. It's not that I'm lazy, or unwilling to do the work.  One major problem is that these simple jobs never, ever turn out quite so simple as I'd hoped.  Before I discovered toggle bolts, I mangled several spots in our walls.  But then I became enlightened in the ways of properly hanging objects on plaster and lath walls. So I proceeded with confidence to the next project, now equipped with the correct tools.  But the hole I drilled wasn't big enough to insert the folded wings, so I had to keep widening it.  And since I didn't have a large enough drill bit, and didn't want to spend another hour going to the hardware store, this involved wiggling the drill around in a circular motion and hoping for the best....