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You would think that in the 123 year history of the University of New Mexico, the Albuquerque police would have dealt with this situation at least once. But apparently, police had never responded to a Voting Under the Influence case before Friday.

Of note: the woman was taken to the hospital, and her vote was counted.

One small step for college students, I suppose.

It has been one year, five months, three weeks and four days since John McCain launched his campaign for President. In that time, we’ve learned much about the man, his policies and his potential decisions as chief executive.

But there is one thing that I do not think any voter can truly understand until you see him as I did today. I watched as Senator McCain reached the end of a receiving line, turned and then passed just feet in front of me. In those moments, I learned one new thing about this great American:

He really needs a nap.

These are the press badges that John McCain — a USA All-Star who never quite reached the level of Miss Congeniality — has been handing out to media on the trail with him.

To be fair, the good folks at Fire Joe Morgan would like to remind you that the All-Star balloting shouldn’t be taken too seriously.

Not actually uttered by John McCain but by the Columbia Daily Tribune’s Jason Rosenbaum, working for the Trib’s afternoon print edition as the Senator ate at Buckingham’s:

At the Tribune’s print deadline, McCain had just been seated at a table at the side of the restaurant.

And you wonder why the 24/7 nature of the Internet has killed the evening paper.

John McCain’s Columbia itinerary (all times local):

12:25 p.m.: Arrive Columbia Regional Airport.

12:45 p.m.: Arrive Buckingham Smokehouse Bar-B-Q.

1:47 p.m.: Leave restaurant, shake hands with locals, look on pensively as I snap this photo.

1:50 p.m.: Leave for Columbia Regional Airport, head to Kansas City, repeat until Nov. 4.

John McCain will arrive here in Columbia, Mo., in less than three hours to hold a campaign rally this afternoon. Here’s the weird part, though: he hasn’t announced where he’ll hold the rally.

Let’s bring the timeline up to the present day:

Thursday: McCain spokesperson says that McCain plans to visit Columbia after local police confirm that they’ve been contacted by the Secret Service.

Friday: Missouri Republican Party spokesperson tells The Maneater, a student run paper at the University of Missouri, that “nothing’s planned” for Monday.

Sunday night: The Columbia Tribune says that the visit is unconfirmed. The Columbia Missourian also confirms with the McCain campaign that nothing is confirmed.

Late Sunday night: Time’s The Page publishes McCain’s schedule, including a 2:25 p.m. stop in Columbia. It is unclear whether or not that is Eastern or Central time.

Early Monday: TPM confirms McCain’s scheduled rally time as 2:25 Eastern time.

Monday, 9:30 a.m. Central: The Tribune finally gets confirmation that he’s coming but that “details for the visit have not been hammered out.”

It’s now 9:45 a.m. Central in Columbia. McCain is suppose to arrive at the Columbia airport in 3 hours. Where will he hold the rally? Will anyone know to show up? We’ll know in a few hours.

Maybe.

UPDATE: The Missourian is now reporting the following: “The Republican presidential nominee from Arizona will be landing and making an appearance at the Columbia Regional Airport.” Can that really be all he’s doing in Columbia?

One of my favorite things about Columbia, Mo.: the hot air balloons. In late summer and early fall, they’re out above the city, gliding over the hills to the south of town.

Sometimes, I’ll be driving back home and I’ll pass under a balloon that’s landing on the hill just beyond my house. Those balloons always feel like they’re hanging just a bit too close to the ground when I drive by.

Some of the local balloons are ripped straight from the Re/Max ads. Others, like this monkey balloon that floated by on Friday, are less traditional.

I’m not sure if this is supposed to a famous monkey, but if a giant yellow hat had floated by a few minutes later, I wouldn’t have been surprised.

I loved a quote that came across my Google homepage this week. It’s from Clive Barnes, a critic at the New York Post, about television:

“It is the first truly democratic culture, the first culture available to everyone and entirely governed by what the people want. The most terrifying thing is what people do want.”

And watching a wall of TVs today, sound muted, showing CNN, Fox News, Headline News and MSNBC, it’s tough not to agree with that.

Browsing through the Miami Herald’s interesting new blog — it’s called Poked, and it’s about social networking sites and their use at work — I saw the image above and thought it spoke for all job-hunting collegians. The internet has become a place where dreams of employment are superseded by that time a Bud Light appeared in the background of a photo you were in. In an age where a Presidential candidate was candid about his use of marijuana in the past, I suppose there’s only one inference I can make from this: future employers don’t mind hearing that you went to a few parties in college. They just don’t want to see proof of it.

I’ve been interested in Cuban sports ever since I read S.L. Price’s “Pitching Around Fidel” a few years back. I got further into the country’s history when I got to write a bit about Livan Hernandez, one of the island’s most famous defectors.

But until I read today’s story in The Washington Post about a Cuban soccer player defecting, I never knew this about Cuban teams that play outside of the country:

After Thursday’s training session in Washington, the team returned to the hotel and the players reported to their rooms. The telephones had been removed by Cuban officials, a standard practice to discourage players from communicating with outsiders on foreign trips.

How must it feel to travel to the modern world and be insulated by your government from the 21st century? I can’t even imagine.