Greetings From The Mid-Atlantic!

I'm currently vacationing in the mid-Atlantic, now parking my ass in Wilmington, NC. It's been a relaxing vacation marked with nights of sleep stretching 9 hours, beer, food, and general lazing. A day-by-day recap of my vacation thus far would make boring blogging and reading, so I'll list some observations and such:

1. Old people at airports are well worth watching. An old couple occupied the seats across from me in land-of-the-dead terminal in Madison. The old guy, stereotypically, couldn't hear for shit and his wife kept trying to talk to (at?) him. She would yammer away with periodical bursts of "Did you hear me?" to which the old guy would respond "enh?" At one point, when she was mentioning the grandkids or some plot of Matlock, he loudly proclaimed that he wanted some chocolate. He also managed to clear his throat three times per second. As I said, old people at airports are worth watching.

2. I -heart- mass transit, especially the train kind. Adam and Susan live just off of the Orange Line that made my stay convenient. I used it to get from the airport (with Adam's guidance and company) to his place and to downtown Washington. The mix of people was interesting given the Madison is 83% white. Being the capitol of the free(???) world, many kinds of people live there and fill the subway. This helps my main goal of blending into the background much easier, because I'm just another white guy instead of a rather German-looking guy who dresses like he livess on the east side of Madison. The less identifying adjectives that bounce around people's heads when seeing me, the better.

3. North Carolina people can't drive. They suck! They ride your ass for ten miles while the left lane is wide open, run read lights not out of a rush, but from pure stupidity, don't understand simple principles (like move to the middle of the intersection while waiting to turn left) and generally are obstacles.

4. Eastern North Caroline looks like central Wisconsin. I saw a lot of trailer.. uh, mobile homes, pine trees, winding highways, and random towns featuring an old gas station/repair shop and three houses in various states of disrepair. Oh, and an ice cream shop. The only difference is most homes, except the mobile variety, are made of brick and there's cotton instead of soybeans.

5. Like Wisconsin, when you get to the end of the road, you find exaggerated accents. I went the wrong way on Carolina Beach Road and ended up in... Carolina Beach! When I asked for directions, I had to dust off inner reaches of my brain that decipher heavy accents. That part of my brain expanded quite a lot when I worked in a noisy pub in Scotland. I half expected a banjo to play in the background, but before you worry about my safety, they were squeaky clean and quite accommodating.

I'm sure the next three days will provide more intrigue. We'll see.