Vote for him, or meet him?

Beth Khalifa faced a quandary this afternoon.

Just as she was about to leave her job as a graphic designer at DesignBox downtown, she heard that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama would be coming shortly to the Raleigh Times Bar. The problem was, she hadn't voted yet.

"I had to decide whether to go vote for him or come here and meet him," she said, standing on the sidewalk outside the hip Raleigh watering hole just off Fayetteville Street.

Khalifa, 40, decided voting was more important. She raced to her polling place in Pullen Park, cast her ballot, and then rushed back to the Raleigh Times Bar.

As fate would have it, she arrived just in time.  

"I got to do both," she said, sporting an "I voted" sticker.