In an attempt to curb my election anxiety ("They've stolen it before, they can steal it again"), I'm planning to spend part of the day with the pit bulls at the shelter where I volunteer. My job there is "dog enrichment," which means taking individual dogs outside to run, chase balls, and exchange love--I give them belly rubs, they give me kisses.

Although Sarah Palin has given pit bulls an even worse rep than they already had, most of them are terrific dogs--highly intelligent, athletic, and, unlike, say, some of the herding breeds, really attuned to humans. I have a huge crush on one of the pits, Jenkins, who possesses a temperament that can only be described as merry ("cheerful, joyous, uninhibited enjoyment of frolic or festivity").

With luck, by the time the election results come rolling in, I'll be feeling merry, too.

Photo: TMAC

I spent nearly eight hours over the weekend (including a 7 p.m. to midnight shift Saturday) at the small, local Obama office entering voter data gathered from the massive phone and door-to-door canvassing effort into the campaign's database. The staff--paid and volunteer--are a mixed bunch, ranging from a young campaign field manager who used to work at a PR firm in Manhattan (he plans to backpack around the country after the election) to a middle-aged character in cowboy attire to retired couples who dote on the younger workers as if they were their own grandchildren. A couple of volunteers are Californians who flew in to help with the last weeks of campaigning in Colorado; "It's so much more exciting here than in California," one San Franciscan told me last night.

The highpoint of the weekend came late Saturday night when Obama phoned in on a (nationwide? swing states only?) conference call to thank his field office staffs for their great efforts and to encourage them to hang tough for the next 72 hours. He acknowledged their shared exhaustion, adding, "Listen, no one needs sleep [right now] more than I do."

By the time Obama called, there were probably only a dozen or so people left in the office. The regular staff gathered around the speaker phone, but turned it up loud enough so that the volunteers, spread around the office on computers, could shyly listen in. Even though I had seen and heard Obama in person the week before in Denver, hearing his disembodied voice rallying the troops in that quiet little office in a suburban strip mall was pretty magical.

And one more thing: Obama used a football analogy to describe his position--as of Saturday night--relative to McCain. I won't repeat it, because I'm overly superstitious about jinxing the election, but I found it pretty hilarious that even a guy who's already made history and may be on the verge of making even more history still reverts to that Y-chromosome-generated tendency to explain the world in sports metaphors.

Anne and I went to hear David Sedaris read last night in Boulder. It was the perfect medicine for my pre-election high anxiety levels. I laughed so long and so hard that my ribs hurt, and if you ever want to watch me shoot liquid out my nose, try whispering "slave monkey" to me when I've just taken a drink.

Sedaris opened with his current piece in the New Yorker, which wanders back and forth from what he really, really thinks about undecided voters to his experience as an 11-year-old voter in the 1968 presidential election. You'll have to imagine his wonderful voice, but you can read it yourself at:

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/2008/10/27/081027sh_shouts_sedaris?yrail

" . . . I went out as a chicken pot pie. Mama wrapped me all up in silver foil and she stuck feathers in my hair and hung a carrot and a celery from my ears and she wrote 'Heat at three thousand degrees for twelve hours' across my forehead. You know, I'm real lucky I didn't run into one of those psychopaths because I think he would have had a defense . . . "

Nancy Clark
The Hills at Home

This morning, I took advantage of the opportunity here in Colorado to vote early. It was my first experience with touch-screen voting. The last time I voted in Michigan, we were still using paper ballots, which I have to admit feels more reliable. I like the idea of a paper trail.

CNN is reporting that, as of yesterday, 31.3% of active registered Colorado voters have either early voted or returned their mail-in ballots. That's over 800,000 swing state residents (in a state whose "official" total population estimate is just under 5 million) who wanted to be certain that their voices were heard.

I contributed money to the Obama campaign. I volunteered for the Obama campaign. I voted for Obama. Now all I can do is pray.