The county crossing

I wrote/posted this on Facebook earlier and it's good enough to copy here:

"In my travels today, I was unaware that Stapleford is so close to the border than one can simply walk out of Nottinghamshire.

I think this is the first time I've walked (not ridden) out of one British county and into another; the last time I recall walking out of any county was probably from El Dorado (California) into Douglas (Nevada) in 2000 (which was also across state lines)."

Interesting facts about the United States presidential election, 1976

The United States presidential election of 1976 saw Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter defeat incumbent President Gerald R. Ford. Ford's running mate was Senator Bob Dole of Kansas, and Carter's VP pick was Senator Walter Mondale of Minnesota.

What's not widely known about this election is that it's the only one in United States history in which the two main candidates and their running mates would all go on to be defeated in runs for the presidency. Ford was, of course, defeated in 1976; Carter would lose re-election in 1980, Mondale lost in a landslide against President Ronald Reagan in 1984, and Dole was handily defeated by President Bill Clinton in 1996. Ford lost by the smallest margin of the four, winning 240 electoral votes to Carter's 297 (a faithless elector prevented Carter from reaching 298).

Due to the recent death of the former South Dakotan Senator George McGovern, the 1976 election is now the earliest election in which one of the two main candidates is still alive. Carter is 88 and Mondale is 84. George H. W. Bush is the oldest living ex-president (88, a few months older than Carter) and the most recent president to be voted out of office.

Finally, it's notable for being the last time a Democrat won the entire Deep South, the last time the South carried a Democratic candidate to victory (Carter won all but two Southern states), and the last time Nevada voted against the winner. Carter was also elected on the smallest amount of states carried by a winning candidate (23+DC).

I find these facts about the presidential races fascinating. They may seem trivial, but I think they're worth learning about!

Ohio's voting record

In my post about US state nicknames, I wrote that I mistakenly thought Ohio to be nicknamed the "Bellwether State". I led myself into thinking that because of Ohio's ability to vote with the winning candidate of the presidential elections over 90% of the time.

Since 1896 onwards, Ohio has voted for the winner in all except two elections: 1944 and 1960. In 1944, Governor Thomas E. Dewey narrowly carried the state over President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and in 1960 Vice President Richard Nixon comfortably won the state over Senator John F. Kennedy; in addition, 1960 was the last time Ohio voted against the victor of an election.

Missouri had the best record of being a bellwether until the 2008 election, when it voted against the winner (although the state was incredibly close); before then the last two times it voted the opposite way to the victor was in 1956 and 1900...hence its lower win rate than Ohio. Despite Ohio's record, apparently the state with the better track is Nevada, as it has supported the winner in every election since 1912 except for 1976; however, if Nevada is put on the same timeline as Ohio, it voted against the winner in 1896, 1900, and 1908.

The Oregon move

The last two posts have been move-related, and it seems I am now going to post another one! Anyway, it is now eleven years to the date that my family and I moved from Patterson, California to Medford, Oregon. I can remember us being excited about getting to see a new state (at that point, my brother and I had only lived in California and visited Nevada), although we were also saddened about leaving California, a place that had been our home for close to five years.

It was sunny and clear along the stretch of the I-5 from the Modesto area all the way up to the Rogue Valley. We had set off early, before 9:00am, and made it to Medford probably about around 5:00 in the evening, as I remember it being close to sunset when we arrived. We encountered few if any delays on our way up, and we did not rush the journey at all. It was exciting to see the "Welcome to Oregon" sign, and it was at that point that we knew the drive up was almost over: within a day we had gone from living in a valley and having mountain ranges on either side of us to actually living in the mountains...I will not forget the first time we saw our house.

To think how long ago that all happened: we did not expect that ten years on from that day we would then be getting used to living in a new country again (well, technically the old country, but the sheer amount of time we lived in the United States, plus the fact my brother and I grew up there, makes the United Kingdom seem like a totally different country). No, I am not complaining here...merely reflecting on the past and thinking about what has changed and what is still the same from back then.

Coincidentally, we met an American today, though she was not from Oregon (Tennessee, in fact). We have actually met several Americans since being back in the United Kingdom, but I did find it interesting to meet one on the anniversary of our Oregon move.