1. So there's all this abstract talk about counting absentee ballots and transparency and election observers...but what does the actual process look like?

How does a vote get from the post office to tabulation?

Come along with me, dear reader, as I take you to Green Bay, Wis...

2. We begin at the Green Bay Convention Center with its views of the Fox River and carpets that stretch forever in the Green-and-Yellow of the Packers.

In a cavernous convention hall, more than 150 people came and went in three shifts beginning at 6 a.m. to tally votes.

3. Let's talk security. There was only one way in and out of the convention hall room. In front of the door was a check-in table. Beside the door was a cop.

Everyone who arrived was accounted for. Everyone had a lanyard that said why they were there, I had a "Media" one.

4. At 6 a.m. the first workers arrived, ready to go. They couldn't get started (by law) until 7 a.m.

So they milled about, set up tables and looked at the dozens of locked, black plastic bins filled with votes. Each bin had a gold number on the side to keep track.

5. When 7 a.m. hit, the process began.

Only a few bins were opened at any given time, and the first stop for a ballot was at a table with a commercial letter opener that sliced a thin strip off the envelope to make it easier to get the ballot out.

6. (Don't fret, dear reader, the workers had hand-held letter openers just in case the machines went down.)

7. From there the ballots went to a team of two people who checked the ballot off a master list, essentially marking it officially received.

Don't worry, they checked the list twice (like Santa) to prevent anyone from voting twice on purpose or inadvertently.

8. From there the ballots went back into their black bins and then on to one of three electronic tabulation machines.

But let's talk again about security to this point before we get to the machines...

9. The people opening the envelopes and then checking the ballots off a master list were organized by wards, all sitting around folding tables put into "pods" or rough circles.

In the center election observers and other workers prowled around like watchful pit bosses in Vegas...

10. Ballots were never in the control of only one person. And roving, independent observers were ever-present, like flesh-and-blood panopticons!

Jeremy Bentham would be proud.

Hold on, what about the credentials of those observers? Well...

11. Independent observers came in and out of the hall, signing in and putting on a huge nametag that said, "ELECTION OBSERVER."

Who are these folks? Well, they're people like Joe Goode, a trial lawyer who's done this as a non-partisan observer for four presidential cycles.

12. These observers get hours of training on all the punctilio of state and local election laws and then go to polling places and tabulation centers to make sure everything's according to Hoyle.

Observers' personal and professional reputations are there on the sign in sheets.

13. Remember that. A record of election observers' visits to polling places and tabulation centers is there in black and white.

And there's multiple observers there at any given time. And workers never know when an observer's going to show up and look over their shoulder.

14. OK, before I get back to where the ballots are in this process, let's talk police escorts, parking validation and turkey sandwiches!

We can't neglect to talk about the logistics that go into all this and all the people who take part in this process tangentially.

15. The ballots get a police escort every time they go anywhere. Even in the elevator going up from the parking lot to the counting facility.

In the evening the Green Bay police chief stationed a few extra cops and cars outside the counting center.

16. All those workers counting ballots needed grub! So there were box lunches. One woman I spoke with had the turkey sandwich, pasta salad and an orange. (She chose water over a soda because she didn't want to get logy...)

The Green Bay Packers sent over goodie bags.

17. And parking validation!

The mayor's community liaison who was making sure everything went smoothly kept peeling off validation tickets from a stack he kept in his right pocket.

Workers had to get home after their shift, right?

18. That's all to say this isn't some cabalistic, fly-by-night operation.

And nothing was secret. It's all happening in a space that observers, convention center workers and even citizens who want to walk in can see...but from a distance, which is important...

19. A city official walked around the floor with me, a reporter.

He dutifully kept me far enough away from tables and machines and ballots so I could see what was happening but couldn't see names or votes.

And he hewed to precise terminology when explaining things.

20. And there were some boooring press conferences from Green Bay @MayorGenrich.

That's not an insult to the mayor! To the contrary!

When it comes to election procedure updates you want pressers to be as yawn-inducing as possible!

It means nothing crazy is happening!

21. Anyways, let's get back to those ballots which are out of their envelopes and ready to count.

Now, they're back in black plastic bins waiting their turn at a counting machine.

Here's a bottleneck. But don't fret, the process rolls on inexorably like the mighty Fox River!

22. There's three electronic readers at the Green Bay facility, two are older legacy models and then there's the hulking DS-450.

That monster looks like a combination of a commercial Xerox machine, a printing press, a spaceship (and Calvin's transmogrifier).

23. This is likely the slowest part of the whole process. Two workers (and a DS-450 technician) feed ballots into the machine.

And though the DS-450 should be infallible as a medieval pope, the workers make sure it's tabulating things correctly, which is why there's a bottleneck

24. But what about damaged or inaccurate ballots!?!? Seems like some potential shadiness, doesn't it? Maybe a few hanging chads or whatnot???

Well, what about those damaged ballots?

Come along as we make our way to the very center of the convention hall.

25. In the middle of the room we find workers bent over blank ballots filling them in!

O tempora! O mores!

Now now, don't fret! They're just transferring votes from damaged ballots to fresh ones so the machine can count them. The damaged ones are then saved, never thrown out.

26. "You'd be amazed what people can do to a ballot," one person said to me.

Voters might tear them, rip them, crease them, fold them, and otherwise sully them before they mail them in.

So workers--multiple sets of eyes, mind you--make sure those sullied forms get counted.

27. For ballots where voters have made clear errors (like voting for two candidates in a race) a poll worker reaches out to the voter so the person can rectify the matter.

Yet there are inevitably some rejected ballots, (you can check with election officials for those numbers).

28. So here’s a photo of the scene. It’s a really bad photo because election officials don’t let media get cameras close to ballots (and I wouldn’t have wanted to)…

There’s a lot of people around all the time! Remember that. And they all sign in.

29. Our friends, the ballots themselves, went back into their black, numbered, locked plastic bins and waited for their eventual police escort to the county clerk.

The vote tally went by thumbdrive or similar storage method to the county as soon as possible.

30/30. That's it.

That's the Green Bay absentee ballot-counting process in a nutshell.

No magic, no secrecy. Just 31,000 ballots and a few hundred turkey sandwiches.

I hope, after their shifts, the election workers had themselves a few old fashioneds. With brandy, of course.