Are you in a prognosticatin' mood?

I don't even dare to think about it. I've lived too many elections that turned into nightmares. Tonight I went to Best Buy and fought for the online sale price on a front-loader washer and dryer to replace the washer that came with the house 12 years ago and dryer I bought from a co-worker for 25 bucks, also 12 years ago -- figuring that since the old freebie washer is starting to trip the GFCI it's plugged into, and since we're both working, might as well replace it now. Of course this will mean a learning curve to do the damn laundry this weekend, but either the burden will be made lighter by knowing that the forces of fear and loathing and bigotry and hate and darkness and unbridled avarice have been beaten back (however temporarily), or it will be a distraction from the death of the country we live in.

I'm going to go at 6:30 AM and vote in my one-party Republican town on a Sequoia voting machine that's highly suspect -- but since I live in New Jersey and my town is an anomaly, it won't matter too much. I expect Barack Obama to take the state handily. I expect Dennis Shulman, the psychiatrist/rabbi looking to topple Ernie Scott Garrett, one of the most loathsome creatures ever to crawl out from under a rock and emerge as a Republican, to come closer than any of his three predecessors, but still fall short by about four points. I expect Frank Lautenberg to be re-elected. The Gang of Thieves that runs my town aren't up for re-election till next year, not that it matters, since they have run unopposed for over two decades.

Amd that's about it for expectations. I'm too old to dare to hope anymore. I know what I want to be able to say tomorrow night. I just don't want to jinx it.

I'll be at home tomorrow night, because the new job precludes burning the midnight oil. But I'll be hanging out, at least for a while, with the good folks over at PJ's chat and will also stop in and see what's going on at Hoffmania. So if you're in the neighborhood, stop by either place and chime in.