Election day in the UK

Wow. I am hung over. If it possible to be hungover on potato chips, diet coke, and glee, that is.

Since polls didn't close until midnight England time, I decided to join my friends for an all-night celebration in the on-campus bar. We had on CNN, and while I don't mean to say anything negative about my English friends, I don't think they understood what they were sheering for. They knew blue meant good and red meant bad (okay, that was sort of my thinking as well), but they would get excited when states were called with 0% of the polls reporting (my least favorite thing about CNN election results-exit poll projections). My American friends and I sat there, shaking our heads, knowing we had to wait for every last vote to be counted.

That didn't stop me from cheering with everyone else at 4 am, when polls on the west coast closed and California was automatically given to Obama. We knew he had the entire west coast coming his way, so it was no surprise. It was interesting to see how excited all the British kids were about Obama, though. There wasn't a single McCain supporter in the bar (or if there was, they kept to themselves, and I don't blame them).

I went back to my room and planned to just stay up until my 10 am class. That didn't happen. I crashed at 5 and slept right through my class, but woke up for my afternoon class. I am still so overtired. I am very glad I handed in my paper yesterday so I wouldn't have to worry about remembering it for today.

As a sidenote, there was a downside to this election, and that was the ballot measures in Arizona, Arkansas, California, and Florida. AZ, CA (despite the Supreme Court decision), and FL all voted to ban gay marriage, and AR banned adoption rights for gay couples. Colorado voted that life began at the moment of conception. In a world where we can elect a president who will be a champion of change, there are still flaws in the American patchwork that need to be rectified.

Notables: Michigan now allows medical marijuana, and Washington allows doctor-assisted suicide.

But for the first time in quite a while today, i belted Lee Greenwood's "Proud to be an American" in my room. It's not that I was never not proud to be an American, but there was such a stigma attached to this country these last eight years. I feel like Ronald Reagan in 1984: "It's morning in America again."

Yes, Sir, it is. And it's going to be a good day.