ROAD MAP

DAY 29

After a short drive up to San Francisco, we unpacked the car, voted, and met up with Lila. Lila and Michael hit the streets for a few more interviews on the big day. We had some good conversations, but it seemed that many people were starting to get burned out by all the talk about voting.

In the end, we feel that the timing of our trip was just right. As we started our journey, people were becoming interested and informed about elections, and were eager to talk. A month later, we've hit a spot of election saturation. That's OK-- That will give us some time to work with the footage we have and identify people we would like to contact for additional interviews.

After 9278.8 miles, more than 100 interviews, nearly 30 hours of footage and visits to 29 states, the big roadtrip is over. We'll continue to update this blog as production moves forward, but not on a daily basis. Among other developments, we will create a website dedicated entirely to the movie and look forward to posting some interview clips as we start the editing process. If you would like us to let you know when the new website is up, send an e-mail to either lila@lahoodproductions.com or mike@lahoodproductions.com and we will add you to our mailing list.

DAY 28

After one last interview with an artist who sold his photographs at the hotel, we headed off to California. A big driving day so we could make it back to San Francisco in order to vote in person. We made it all the way to Gilroy, a little over an hour south of San Francisco.

DAY 27

We spent the morning at Earl's, a diner in Gallup with a weekly local jewelry market out front. After downing some waffles and hashbrowns, we talked to the management and were told we could do interviews in front of the diner. We came across many friendly, interested, informed people, but also found a bit of reluctance to speak on camera because of taboos regarding filming and photography in Navajo culture. Fortunately, there were many people at least stopping to chat, so we were able to interview a few people of Zuni heritage before heading off to Arizona.

We got to the Grand Canyon at sundown and were able to do a fantastic interview despite the cold weather (there was snow on the ground) and gusts of wind.

The hotel we stayed at had a pumpkin carving competition, allowing us to have a little bit of Halloween on the road. Meredith took first place in the adult category, and Mike took third. We forgot to take pictures of the pumpkins or we would have posted them...

DAY 26

We had a fantastic interview today with the former mayor of Estancia, New Mexico. He told us about his re-election in 1998, where he and his challenger received the same number of votes. According to New Mexico law, they played a game of chance, in this case, one hand of poker. Two flushes were dealt, and his high card won. The likelihood of two flushes being dealt was probably higher than the chance of the mayor's race being tied (although signs point to poor shuffling of a new deck in this case).

The evening was spent with family friends in Gallup. A bit of home on the road is always a huge refresher.

DAY 25

After a great breakfast, we filmed man-on-the-street interviews in Alpine. We drove down to Lajitas, back up to El Paso, and into New Mexico, where we're spending the night in Las Cruces. The drive today was beautiful, but there simply aren't many opportunities to interview people in rural southwest Texas. We're looking forward to some good interviews tomorrow.

DAY 24

Lila flew to Michigan today for a wedding, and Meredith joined Mike to drive through the Southwest and back to San Francisco. We got another oil change for the car (the miles are piling up!) and drove all the way to Alpine, Texas. Not much interviewing going on, but it was quite the travel day for us.

DAY 23

We're staying with friends in Fort Worth and have also had a chance to say hello to some of Lila's former colleagues at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. This afternoon, we filmed several good interviews in Sundance Square (that's in downtown Fort Worth) before driving west to the town of Granbury, where we heard one of the best answers yet to our "tell us your voting story" question. We don't want to spoil the surprise, but let's just say that this was an old-time tale about what political parties used to do (we hope it's all in the past) to buy votes. Back in Fort Worth this evening.

DAY 22

We drove north today toward Shreveport, Louisiana, but a sign for the historic district in Natchitoches caught our eyes, so we decided to stop there. We had good luck with interviews, but found ourselves wilting in the muggy heat. Time for lunch. We enjoyed bowls of etouffee in a nicely air conditioned café (Mama’s Oyster House). This afternoon, we continued driving north until we hit Interstate 20, took a left turn and headed for Fort Worth. With our arrival in Texas, we’ve visited 27 states in 22 days.

DAY 21

Today was one of our best days of filming. We tried to set up a last-minute meeting with a local voter advocacy group in Tallahassee, but when that didn’t work out we shifted gears: more on-the-street interviews. We made our way to the center of town and arbitrarily picked a scenic corner. Fortuitously, we had chosen a spot on the same block as the early voting polling place for Leon County. We filmed our first few interviews far from the entrance to the polls, but once we noticed a local television crew interviewing voters as they waited in line, we adopted a bolder approach. By lunchtime, we had interviewed a dozen people.

Energized by our successful morning, we started driving west on Interstate 10. We made a brief stop to film in Mobile, Alabama, and then continued on to New Orleans. After dinner in the French Quarter, we drove the final stretch to Lafayette where we are spending the night.

DAY 20

With a long day of driving ahead of us, we set out early this morning and made our first stop in Athens, Georgia. We captured a few on-the-street interviews and then continued driving to Macon. Unfortunately, by the time we arrived, daylight was running out; not many pedestrians in the downtown area. We decided to continue driving to Tallahassee and use the extra time to plan for tomorrow.

DAY 19

We spent part of the day in Richmond, Virginia, and then drove to Charlotte, North Carolina, where we stayed with friends and attended a pre-Halloween costume party.

A few people have noted that we should explain what we do in our on-the-street interviews. Our interviews typically include the following questions:

Are you registered to vote?
Do you vote regularly?
Do you vote in local as well as presidential elections?
What does voting mean to you?
What does your vote mean at the local, state and federal levels?
Is voting a topic you discuss with family and/or friends?
Do most of the people you know vote or not?
Do you approve of the way voting is handled in your municipality?
Do you have a voting story?

Depending on the answers (and level of engagement) we ask follow-up questions and encourage people to talk about any voting-related topics of particular interest to them. Sometimes these interviews last 3 minutes; sometimes they go on for half an hour.

DAY 18

Today, we focused our attention on man-on-the-street interviews and travel planning. The interviews went well, but we were thwarted several times in our efforts to find free wireless access in D.C. It seems that a lot of places have started advertising the service – must keep up with the times – even before they have the ability to provide it. So, we found ourselves on more than one occasion purchasing coffee or snacks at locations where we expected to download e-mails and conduct online research, only to learn that the WiFi service was out of order. Caveat emptor.

We spent two days filming in D.C. and we will return later this year for additional interviews with voter advocacy groups and individuals involved in promoting or proposing legislation either to change or to maintain our current electoral process. We expected that we might have trouble securing these interviews in the days leading up to the Nov. 2 presidential election, so we decided ahead of time that we would make a follow-up trip (we'll fly next time) after the big election.

DAY 17

We arrived in Baltimore late last night and had to drive to Washington D.C. this morning for several interviews. Our first stop was in Takoma Park, Maryland, for a meeting with Rob Richie, executive director at the Center for Voting and Democracy. We had our second scheduled interview with Meredith McGehee, executive director of the Alliance for Better Campaigns. Finally, this evening we met with Brooks Jackson, director of Annenberg Political Fact Check (a.k.a. FactCheck.org).

DAY 16

Twenty-four hours is not a lot of time to spend in Manhattan, but we managed to cover a lot of ground while we were in town. Lila, who lived in the city for a year, was in charge of navigating; Michael, who is a fearless driver, was the man behind the wheel. We had a small setback this morning when we showed up for one of our scheduled interviews and found that our interview subject was not expecting us (the appointment had been arranged through his assistant) and did not have time to meet with us today. We might have been upset except that he was quite apologetic and offered to help arrange an interview with the president of his organization in Los Angeles (which will be easy for us to do in November when we’re back on the West Coast).

This afternoon, Lila was reminded of her J-school days when she first learned that trying to get a man-on-the-street interview in New York can be more difficult than hailing a cab in a downpour: people see you coming with a clipboard and a camera, and they run. Michael came up with the idea that instead of approaching people and asking them if they want to be in a documentary about voting and the electoral process, we should walk up to them and say “Hey, do you want to be in a movie?” Lila hesitated at first, but came around quickly. We were really only trying to get people to stop long enough (15 seconds) so that we could explain what we were doing. And guess what? It worked! In fact, we got a great interview with a non-voter who gave very specific reasons why he does not participate in the electoral process. We’ve had a difficult time finding non-voters to interview; if they’re not interested in voting, they’re often not interested in talking about voting. We guess it might be akin to trying to interview Lila about the last Superbowl.

Our last scheduled interview in New York was with Steven Brams, a professor of politics at New York University. Professor Brams is a specialist on game theory and has written several books applying game theory principles to voting and elections.

DAY 15

Despite the persistent rain, our drive through Pennsylvania provided some of the most beautiful scenery we’ve seen on this trip. The trees are in full autumn color, and this stretch of the Appalachians seems to be filled with picturesque farms and towns nestled in every valley. The skies are still grey, but the rain stopped long enough for us to get in a handful of interviews in Danville, Penn. From there we drove to Bergenfield, New Jersey, where we made a quick stop to visit one of our cousins before heading into Manhattan where we would meet two more cousins and some friends for dinner at Ruby Foo’s on the Upper West Side. For those who have been keeping track of our visits with family members, we’ve nicknamed this road trip the “cousin tour”: in the past two weeks we've visited cousins in six states!

DAY 14

Rain again. This time, the skies did not let up at all. We were a little discouraged at first because we had hoped to do some filming in Ohio, but then decided that we should go ahead and cover some ground since it would not be difficult for us to come back to film later in the year when we come home for the holidays. We drove all the way to DuBois, Penn., and tomorrow we will head for New York City.

DAY 13

We took some time today to visit with friends and family, and then spent most of the day assembling equipment, packing up and preparing for the next leg of our journey.

DAY 12

Despite the rain, we decided that we should at least try to get a few interviews in the can. We drove downtown to scope out areas with a bit of pedestrian traffic. Unfortunately, the intermittent rain was really keeping people inside. After circling in front of Hart Plaza and driving up and down Woodward Avenue, we decided that our best bet was probably Greektown. Bingo! We still had to dodge raindrops and figure out how to film without letting voices get drowned out by cars, wind or the People Mover, but all in all, it was a successful venture. This evening, we caught up on interviews by filming indoors at Lakeshore Lanes, a bowling alley owned by relatives in St. Clair Shores.

DAY 11

We’re at home in Michigan (this is where we grew up). We had planned to do some filming around town today but were thwarted by rain. So, instead, we spent the day getting the car serviced (3,600 miles since we left San Francisco) and running errands. We’re hoping that the clouds break sometime this weekend.

DAY 10

After working late last night, we decided to sleep in a little this morning. By mid-day, we were on the road again and heading toward Michigan. The drive from Chicago to Detroit should only take about 5 hours; that’s if you don’t get stuck in traffic behind an accident in a construction zone just outside of downtown Chicago. We had hoped to make a few forays from I-94 into northern Indiana and western Michigan, but by the time we got moving, we decided that we didn’t have much time for side trips, although we did have a chance to do a few interviews in Chesterton, Indiana, before heading on to Detroit.

DAY 9

We spent most of the day interviewing people in Chicago’s Millennium Park where we encountered a mix of locals and visitors. We had hoped to schedule an interview with Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. during our trip to Chicago and had been discussing arrangements with his press secretary for several weeks; however, because the congressman’s schedule changes frequently, often at a moment’s notice, we did not know whether he would be in Chicago or Washington D.C. on this particular day. We had just made plans to meet our cousins for dinner when we got the call: the congressman would be available to meet with us late this evening. We were pleased to have this interview, as Rep. Jackson has been active in initiating legislation concerning voters’ rights and the electoral process. We were particularly grateful that he took time from his busy travel schedule to meet with us during an emergency trip scheduled for other purposes.

DAY 8

Our first appointment today was with a professor in the political science department at the University of Iowa. We had a great conversation with him covering topics that ranged from the Iowa Caucuses to the Electoral College. At one point during the interview, he mentioned that one of his colleagues in the computer science department has been doing a lot of research on the prospects and pitfalls of electronic voting. So, after our first interview, we walked over to the computer science department to see if we could speak with the electronic voting specialist. Not only did he agree to meet with us, we ended up interviewing him for nearly an hour!

Following our morning of successful interviews, we made a quick visit to the Prairie Lights Bookstore and then to the Atlas Café for lunch. We needed to catch up on some research, so we spent some time at Java House where the Wi-Fi is free and the graffiti in the women’s restroom reads like one continuous political debate.

After a few more man-on-the-street interviews, we decided to head for Chicago. We made a hotel reservation at a Hampton Inn in Skokie – close enough for convenience but half the price of downtown – and then started talking about dinner. That’s when we remembered Green Zebra, a new vegetarian restaurant that received a rave review in The New York Times a few months ago. Lila called to make a reservation – and to ask for directions from Iowa. Owner Sue Kim-Drohomyrecky not only gave us perfect directions, she also called us shortly before our arrival time to make sure that we didn’t get lost in the city. The restaurant was packed when we arrived at 9:30. I don’t know whether it was our long-distance reservation that made the difference, but we were treated like honored guests the whole evening. The food was delectable. We shared several tapas-style plates. Each dish possessed a distinct personality: apparently simple compositions effusing intense flavors. Our favorite was the mezze luna ravioli, which were filled with white corn and mascarpone and dressed with white beets and a riesling reduction.

DAY 7

We drove Meredith to the airport this morning and then headed back to the University of Minnesota to meet the Rock the Vote tour bus for a rally. We couldn’t find the rally and soon learned that the event had been cancelled. Fortunately, the campus was teeming with students registering voters and eager to talk about their work on camera.

We were back on the road by late afternoon and headed for Iowa City where we have an interview tomorrow at the University of Iowa.

If you’ve ever taken a long-distance road trip, you know that dining choices along the interstates can be quite repetitive. Determined to avoid such culinary monotony, we’ve been using Healthy Highways, a guidebook that lists health food stores and vegetarian-friendly restaurants in all 50 states. We had picked out two potential dinner spots from the guide, but then realized that we would not arrive in Cedar Rapids or Iowa City tonight before closing time. So, we decided that we might as well eat at a KenTaco Bell (Kentucky Fried Chicken combined with a Taco Bell) near Clear Lake, Iowa. We should have taken the hint when the guy making our burritos kept shouting to his colleagues as he scraped the bottom of a cardboard barrel: “I TOLD you we needed to order more beans.” Definitively, the worst burritos in Iowa. Our dismay was tempered after a stop at Wendy’s for frosties and a visit to the adjacent gas station where we bought postcards and an array of laminated study sheets for subjects such as: Spanish; Bartending; The 50 States; and Stain Removal.

DAY 6

Driving north this morning. During a stop at a gas station, Michael and Meredith struck up a conversation with a local resident who suggested a few towns off the main highway where we might find good interview subjects.


The first town was a little sleepy – not surprising on a Sunday afternoon – but the second stop yielded some good interviews, including one with a Jehovah’s Witnesses who explained to us why it is against his religion to vote.

This evening, we are in the Twin Cities. Lila is visiting with friends in St. Paul while Michael and Meredith check out the sights in Minneapolis.

DAY 5

We had a great interview this morning with Joe Higgins, a member of the Nebraska State Board of Education. While our conversation focused on the connection between education and voter participation, we also had a chance to talk with Joe about many other aspects of the electoral process.


Afterward, we drove back to the Old Market for some man-on-the-street interviews. We captured some great comments, though we had to deal with difficult shooting conditions, i.e. sun, shadows and occasional clouds of hay and dust. (That’s what we get for setting up too close to the carriage ride station.) We enjoyed a tasty lunch at M’s Pub. The baked brie appetizer was especially yummy.

We drove south from Omaha to check out the small town of Glenwood, but we didn’t see many people on the street so we continued driving toward Sheridan, Missouri, where Lila hoped to visit some friends. On our way we spotted a sign for an orchard off Highway 2 in Iowa where we stopped for apples, cherry cider and another good interview. After our visit to Sheridan, we drove northeast toward Des Moines.

DAY 4

This morning we drove to Omaha to pick up Meredith from the airport. After checking into our hotel, we headed to Westside High School where we interviewed Tom Carman, head of the social studies department, and government teacher Nancy Knapp about the role of education in voter participation. We spent the evening in Omaha’s Old Market – a pedestrian-friendly historic district with brick streets, busking musicians, and a host of restaurants and shops. By then end of the day we were all pretty tired, but not too tired to watch a replay of the second presidential debate.

DAY 3

Next destination: Denver, Colorado. Fortunately, we only had to drive two hours this morning. On our way, we bought a copy of the Denver Post to read up on the debate regarding Amendment 36, a proposal that would split Colorado’s electoral votes in proportion to the popular vote. On our way into town, we decided that we should try to talk to the two main groups campaigning for and against Amendment 36. By the end of the day we had secured interviews with both sides of this great debate! We also filmed several good on-the-street interviews.

After our first day of filming, we enjoyed a quick visit with our cousins who live in Denver and then picked up dinner-to-go at Wholly Tomato – a fabulous sandwich and wrap café – before driving all the way to Kearny, Nebraska.

DAY 2

10 a.m.
Mile 337

LaHood Productions is on the road! We had planned to leave San Francisco at 2 p.m. yesterday and drive all the way to Elko, Nev., but last minute preparations kept us in the Bay Area until close to 7 p.m. The lights of Reno were ablaze in all their neon glory to welcome us around 11 p.m. Lila insisted on taking a tour of the city before settling in for the night at Travelodge.

We slept well and received an unexpected but well-timed wakeup call from Baltimore at 6:50 a.m. (Lila’s colleagues for another project calling to confirm details for an upcoming event.)

By 8 a.m. we were on the road again. First, a quick stop for coffee at Jack in the Box, then to Walgreens for a few necessities: water; Red Bull; AA batteries; shampoo for Mike; and blotting paper for our soon-to-be interview subjects.

Much, much later . . .

This was our big day of driving. We stopped in Elko for lunch and then drove to Salt Lake City where we made a quick stop at Wild Oats Market for dinner and to buy healthy snacks for the road. After dinner, we drove all the way to Cheyenne, Wyoming, where we checked into the Wingate Inn just before midnight. A note to our cross-country driving friends: this is the nicest, best-value business hotel we’ve ever seen. The new plush carpet, raised beds and luxurious linens made us feel like we were staying in a four star hotel. As it turns out, this particular Wingate Inn has only been open for one year, which is probably why we felt like we were the first ones to sleep in our room. Add to that free Wi-Fi, a gym, breakfast and unlimited printing and copying. Justifiable enthusiasm!

DAY 1

Drove from San Francisco to Reno.