At last Falafel is relaxed

Jean Schmidt's supporters and campaign workers huddled together with cell phones and laptop computers as the early election results finally started to come in.

A few shouts of "Yes!" erupted when returns from Clermont County showed Schmidt with a narrow lead over McEwen. But she did well in Clermont last time around, and the election still went down to the wire.

So for now, the early returns are doing little to calm nerves.

"It is what is. We're anxious," said Schmidt's daughter, Emilie LaRosa. "It's the nature of the beast."

Speaking of beasts, the most relaxed party-goer was Emilie's dog, Falafel, a miniature Yorkie.

The dog lounged in Emilie's arms for much of the evening, taking an occasional break to nibble on scraps of lunch meat from the buffet.