Look for a fat voters guide to be in your mailbox soon, if it hasn't already arrived.

That booklet's no small feat. According to the Secretary of State's office, there are 43 different versions of the thing, ranging from 80 to 264 pages. Several Central- and Eastern Washington counties get a Spanish/English version. Thousands more copies are printed in Chinese for some King County voters. (Korean and Russian versions are coming soon.) And then there are the braille, audio and large-print versions.

Despite the work and expense (which you're paying), Secretary of State Sam Reed has championed the booklets, saying they're a key tool for many of the state's more than 3.5 million voters. That's particularly true, he argues, as voting in Washington has changed from the polling place to the kitchen table: 37 of the the state's 39 counties now vote almost entirely by mail.

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