"It's loads of fun," the Abington resident said, as her friends and neighbors bid her greetings while they walked into the car dealership building to vote.
"You see all your friends," said Detweiler, a Republican committeewoman. ''And, of course, just the election itself. There's never a dull moment with the presidential election."
Not many dull moments, anyway, for some of the poll workers who were passing out leaflets for their candidates, registering names as residents arrived to vote, and watching from the sidelines as judges to ensure fairness in the election.
For a few women working the polls inside Hopkins Ford, there was hardly time to paint their lips or powder their noses as the day wore on.
Lois Wilson, a county election judge, said that a line of residents wanting to cast their ballots had formed there at 6:30 a.m.
"We're always busy here," she said, adding that the elderly living at Rydal Park, a retirement home, vote in large numbers.
She said that the stream of voters trickled about lunchtime, but after that it was constant.
"I can barely get my paper work done," she said.
Democratic Committeeman John Kidney was on hand at the Abington Free Library to pass out yellow leaflets for his party.
"They don't pay any attention to them (the leaflets) because, hopefully, they already know how they are going to vote," he said.
As many as 30 people were in line when the polls opened at 7 a.m. at the library, he said. And, except for a slow period about 1 p.m., there were voters passing through the doors constantly. "It was nap time," said another poll worker.
The Election Day duty did take its toll on some workers, though, particularly Democrats who work in this bastion of Republicanism.
"Are you for him?" one man said to Kidney as he pointed to a sandwich board sitting outside of the voting place that was plastered with posters for Michael Dukakis and other Democratic candidates.
"You're never going to educate me," Kidney said, laughing as he extended his hand to the man.
"It's a moral issue," the man said. "I could never support anyone who supports abortion."
Kidney said he often gets those comments and other ribbing while working at the polls, "particularly when you've lived here a long time and you know the people."
Kidney's Republican counterpart, Bruce Fox of Rydal, said he's mostly spared the jabbing.
"It's a bigger problem for him than for me because I'm a Republican," said Fox.
This was the first election that Vita Berson of Abington spent working the polls and passing out literature for the Democrats.
"I'm doing what I feel is right," she said, as she stood in the cold to hand out leaflets to voters. "All you can do is just offer it to them.
"At this point, I think most people have made up their minds who to vote for," she said.
Bruce J. Reimenschneider, a Republican committeeman working at the polling station at Hopkins Ford, spent much of Election Day directing traffic in the parking lot and helping elderly women into the building to vote.
He also passed out literature to some voters, but was not always successful.
"No, thanks, I don't need one," one man said as he walked toward the polling place.
"Don't need it?" Reimenschneider said. "What am I going to do with it?"
"I don't know," the man retorted. "Take it home and use it on your walls."
