For the Record: Fake your way through election night

Remember Game 7 of the World Series last week, when it seemed like the entire country was watching and tweeting about every moment? Tonight will be a lot like that, except angrier. If you're watching the returns with friends or just following along at home, we're here to help make it sound like you know what you're talking about.

Where we are now (probably)

Monday's polls were solidly pro-Clinton on the national level, showing Hillary leading by anywhere from 1 to 7 points. Two polls showed Trump ahead -- the IBD/TIPP tracking poll had him up by 2, while the consistently pro-Donald LA Times/USC tracking poll showed a 5-point margin.

So that settles it for Hillary, right? Not quite; the trick for both candidates today is turnout. All pollsters are making assumptions as to how many voters in each demographic are going to show up. Tor example, the very pro-Hillary polls might assume that Hispanics are going to turn out in higher numbers than 2012, which would help her win Florida, Nevada and other key swing states. Team Trump, on the other hand, has been counting on the "hidden Trump voter" -- the blue-collar whites who don't usually vote, but could head to the polls for Donald.

Don't get all freaked out early. Pace yourself for later freakouts

Slate has announced it's breaking with tradition and will partner with VoteCastr to announce real-time exit poll results in seven battleground states even before voting ends. In past years, the media has generally avoided announcing results while voters still have the ability to cast ballots. The fear is that you might head off after work to vote for president and the county commissioners and the board of aldermen, but on the way in you'd see a tweet that Presidential Candidate X was about to win your state, and you'd say "screw it, I"m not waiting in line just to pick aldermen" and then all the wrong aldermen would get elected. Still, the data is out there ... so why not keep an eye on the early results? What else to watch for, and when:

• 12 a.m. EST: Three tiny, zany, completely adorkable New Hampshire towns have this quirky thing where they vote at midnight, giving Trump an early 32-25 lead. Trump's seven-vote lead will not be the final margin of victory.
• 6 p.m. EST: Indiana and Kentucky will be the first two to close their polls. Both states will go to Trump, so don't immediately start doing your victory lap and/or drinking heavily. 
• 7 p.m. EST: Save your freakouts for an hour later, when the first results come in from Florida. Both candidates need Florida, and it's going to take hours before the final results are tallied. Early results will skew toward Clinton, because the more conservative panhandle counties have an extra hour to vote.
• 7 p.m. EST: Watch to see if Clinton can take Georgia; if she manages to win in a state that Trump should have taken easily, it's going to be a long night for the Trump Train.
• 7:30 p.m. EST: The opposite is true in North Carolina, a racially diverse, socially conservative state where Trump might exceed expectations. A Trump victory here would indicate that polls have been underrepresenting his support, which means polls could be underrepresenting his support in other key states like Pennsylvania and Michigan, which wrap up at 8. Ohio also wraps up at 7:30; a Republican has never won the White House without taking Ohio, and it should go solidly Trump.
• 9 p.m. EST: Colorado at 9 and Nevada at 10 are the last two swing states, but it's possible that the race will already be wrapping up before things get too far out West. Utah should also be fun, where conservative Trump foe Evan McMullin could win, taking key electoral votes in a usually deep-red state.
• After 10 EST: Protest votes aplenty! Watch for Jill Stein or Gary Johnson or Harambe or whoever to do really well in California, Washington, Hawaii, Alaska and every other state that's already locked into one camp or another.
• Nov. 9: Either a mass exodus to Canada, or random cities in northern Idaho go all Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and declare their independence from the U.S.
• Dec. 25: Watch carefully for passive-aggressive Christmas presents given to you by partisan family members, including handmade "Make America Great Again" sweaters or donations in your name to the Democratic National Committee.
• 2024: Democrats will deem the Republican nominee and all future GOP nominees as "worse than Trump."
• 2032: Democrats will begin using Trump as an example of a Republican they respected, saying that the current state of the GOP would be shocking and unrecognizable to The Donald.
• 2040: Republicans will gear up to prevent Chelsea from taking the Oval Office.

End of the campaign trail

• Trump goes on five-state tour on the campaign's final day (Paste BN)
• Clinton hits up three states. Insert your own stamina joke here (Paste BN)
• 'I got your blue state right here, baby,' said Ted Nugent while grabbing his coastal, urbanized crotch (Paste BN OnPolitics)
• Theft of Trump signs escalates into low-key car-ramming in Vermont (Burlington Free Press)
• Ann Coulter tweets that maybe Trump and his children shouldn't be allowed to vote (Paste BN OnPolitics)

Today's Ken Bone emoji doesn't even crack the top 10 weird Ken Bone things this election

To celebrate Ken Bone's last moment in the spotlight, be sure to use the hashtag #MyVote2016 to add an emoji of America's favorite question-asker and Reddit porn critic. (In all seriousness -- decades from now, will we remember his role in the 2016 campaign? Somewhere in America in the late 2020s, parents will show photos to their kids of the Halloween party where they first met, and neither of them will recall why Mom's costume had a mustache and a microphone.