Free cookies, coffee and Tootsie Rolls made Friday's early voting at the University of Arizona bookstore more of a bash than a bore, students said.

"We say come join the party," said UA Student Body President Tommy Bruce, 21, over the music jamming above the hundreds of students in line. "We're trying to make everyone comfortable."

That they were, even with an average wait of 2 1/2 hours Friday afternoon.

But early voting ended early on Friday afternoon when computer phone lines from the Pima County Recorder's Office downtown were inadvertently disconnected, shutting down the early vote system.

Pima County Recorder F. Ann Rodriguez said Friday night that voters still in line when the 4:45 p.m. mishap occurred were given numbers and will be allowed to move to the head of emergency voting lines Saturday, Sunday or Monday.

"This shutdown was caused by human error when one of our staffers rebooted the server that handles our dial-in connection," Rodriguez said.

No early votes that were cast before the system shut down were lost, Rodriguez said.

When the shutdown occurred, early voting for Tuesday's election was almost certainly on a pace to set a record in the county, Rodriguez said.

A total of 2,803 voters cast early ballots Friday before the accident shut the system down, she said. That brought the number of early voters at Pima County polling places to more than 14,000 since early voting began Oct. 2.

Before early voting ended prematurely Friday, UA junior Amanda Massimini, 20, walked around with a tray full of pumpkin-shaped, frosted cookies.

Massimini voted early, before this week's anticipated long lines, because of the ease and convenience of a polling place on campus.

All students interviewed agreed the biggest benefit to early voting was the lack of ID requirements. They only needed to be registered to vote.

Election Day polling place rules require showing one photo ID or two nonphoto IDs that match the address on the voter's registration.

"That's hard for students," said sophomore Ashley Dammen, 19. "We move around a lot."

With all the advantages, including carpet to sit on, classmates to socialize with and even Bruce on a megaphone announcing a raffle, no one was complaining.

"It's not like it's fun or anything," said sophomore Niket Thakkar, 18, "but it's more convenient than a polling place."

"It's also a place to get educated," said sophomore Sarah Tatum, 19, noting a student walking around handing out pamphlets that explained the ballot propositions.

Tatum voted early because she has a 13-hour day of back-to-back classes and meetings on Tuesdays. She had also done her homework, both on the propositions and how much faster early voting is, even with a more than two hour wait.

"I heard it can be five hours at a polling place on Election Day," she said.