Early voting has begun for the Ohio General Election, Nov 7, 2023. Both abortion and recreational marijuana are on it.

August was just the preamble, this is the big show. If you managed to drag yourself into the booth for that August thing, don't leave us hanging, now.

Here's a Columbus Dispatch article breaking down the situation a bit more professionally.

There is a constitutional amendment to protect the right to an abortion in Ohio on the ballot. It's a pretty big deal, so if you Voted No on Issue 1 a bit ago, get your booty in that ballot room for this one. All that was about this, so don't drop the ball.

Legalizing recreational weed is also on the ballot, I get the impression that it's an acceptable enough law, not like the previous one that was so bad that NORML was telling stoners to vote it down. This will NOT be a constitutional amendment, just a new statute, and can be tweaked later on, it's not as big a deal as Issue 1, abortion. If it wasn't for Issue 1 it would be the biggest deal on the ballot.

As always, the ballot will be full of little nobodies to vote for, except those little nobodies will end up controlling the situation in your literal backyard, so get a ballot and make sure the head of your local Klan isn't running for anything, vote him down if he is. Keep an eye on your school board elections. Look for "Shall we fund the local library?" type stuff. Expect variety.

Some of you will find yourselves, oh, choosing between 1 of 4 Republican sheriffs and similar situations. I don't want to hear the teenaged logic, vote for the least of 4 evils if you must. Next year, know their names better. One of those guys will be least likely to tell his troopers to shoot first, so try to vote for him.

Head straight to your county's election board website for a proper example ballot that YOU can expect to see, so you can do research. The state website will just end up sending you there, since each ballot is sorta personalized with stuff specific to your county, like school boards, funding measures and such.

It's not too late to send in your application for an absentee ballot, the cutoff to send the application is Oct 31, but don't quote me. It does take weeks to get a ballot in your hand, though, with lots of back and forth through the mail.

Early vote is the move, in my opinion. On a good day, it's a ten-minute process on a Tuesday afternoon. Done. Lookin at you, person with a service job and weird weekdays off. Go for whatever works, though.

Best of luck out there. Tell your friends to vote.