Sings:"Don't he turn my red state blue?"

(I'm spamming you guys because I don't have family with whom to go "Woot!" and "Wow!" and "Whodathunkit?" in person. Please bear with me. )

And he even turned my city, blue, too. In the wee hours of November 5, Chesapeake was recorded as going for McCain, 50% to 49%. According to the Board of Election's website, by yesterday afternoon (1 pm) the percentage had switched: Obama, 50% to McCain, 49%

And it's a trend that seems to have extended across the commonwealth, as well. On Wednesday, Electoral-Vote's map showed Virginia as merely outlined in blue. Today, it's solid (albeit light) blue.

Also, according to the Virginia State board of Elections site, voter turnout was 71.4%. This year, voter turnout was 73.67% (And there were over one million, six hundred thousand more registered voters in Virgina than last time). Let me spell out this next number in words, just to help it sink in:

• Five hundred and ten thousand


• nine hundred

and

• fifty-nine

more votes have been cast this year than four years ago.

Yay for enthusiasm!

Also, this region (Hampton Roads) is a collection of seven independent cities that are not connected to any other government seat. This is great for "fierce individualism", but as the cities all have odd boundries that fit together like jigsaw puzzle pieces, getting anything done (like transportation, waste management, interstate trade, etc) means that all the cities have to cooperate. And none of them want to. But what with the Obama campaign's 11 visits to Hampton Roads, and McCain's 4 visits, and all the news pundits saying we were a key region in a key state in a key election, the rest of the country and world has been looking at us differently, and with some respect. Maybe we'll start looking at ourselves that way, too. A girl can dream.

(Six of the seven cities went for Obama; the biggest (Virginia Beach) went for McCain -- but barely.)