Greetings from 'Lina

I've never been to North Carolina but I've been through it before. In the 4th grade, my mom, her boyfriend and his youngest son and I drove from Maine to Orlando during a school vacation. Naturally, we drove through North Carolina... in a driving snow storm. Yah, we managed to hit the Carolinas during a freak storm. It was awful. There were no hotel rooms because every traveler had gotten off of the road. We were offered various hotel lobbies and conference rooms in which to sleep. Instead, we opted to sleep in the car. Happily, my mom's boyfriend at the time had a Lincoln Town Car. It was ugly as hell, but it slept four quite nicely.

Nevertheless, I've been kind of fascinated by North Carolina lately, especially since there is such a movement of people setting down roots here. One of the few still affordable areas with a decent economy, young couples are moving here so they might actually afford a house, and seniors are moving here because the triple threat of tornadoes, hurricanes and alligators that put Florida on the map has finally lost its charm. The continuing growth of this area is apparent even as I type this.. outside my window is a construction crew building new homes in what looks like will be a lovely development. Hmmm.. how many schools are down here again?

Anyway, I've been here about 3 hours, I have a program to attend tonight, but I've had so much happen to me so far I just had to get typing away. Plus, any stories from this evening will involve too much shop talk. Yuck.

My trip started off OK. On my way to the airport I was reminded of some of the things that stop phasing you after living in DC for a while. One example is the conference sign for a certain military branch's "Modern Land Warfare Breakfast Series" meeting that was going on at the hotel I walk through to get to the Metro every day. This should seem odd, right? Mmm... eggs and armored tanks. Anyway, it didn't cause me a ton of pause. Then, at the airport, I realized I was walking behind former Congressman and recent unsuccessful US Senate Candidate Harold Ford, Jr. My roommate sees these people every day working on the Hill, but even if you're not involved in politics, you get used to seeing the high powered movers and shakers around from time to time. When a friend was in town last year and we met up for dinner at The Dubliner, George Pataki was at the table next to us, with who appeared to be his very spoiled teenage son, and his son's very spoiled teenage friends.

The flight was fine, well, once we got through take off. In the past few years, I started to develop a real fear of flying. In all honesty, it was shortly after 9/11. But, my fear isn't that something like that will happen, I just can't handle the bumpiness of it. Turbulence makes my heart race, my hands shake and sweat, and I do all I can to take lots of deep breaths. It makes me so nervous. My work requires so much travel that I know I need to get through it, I just don't know how. But, after the first 10 minutes or so, it was smooth sailing, thank God. The take off was so rough had it lasted any longer.. sheesh.. I would have been a mess.

So you've heard about how the South tends to be a bit slower, have you not? Well, I can certainly confirm that. Now, don't get me wrong, I am well aware this is not the deep south. But, it's still southern and I would say things do in fact move a bit slower.. even the toilets. I had a Western style showdown with a toilet in the Raleigh-Durham airport restroom. It looked like an auto-flush, had the little laser eye and everything, but it wasn't flushing. A closer look near the "faux" auto-flush sensor had "manual flush" etched next to it, with an arrow pointing left. Except, there was no flush or button to the left. I stood in the stall, not sure what to do. Ew. I can't not flush the toilet! What do I do? I stood a moment longer. No, this is ridiculous. I made sure the bathroom was empty, and made my plan to run to the sink, wash my hands and run like the wind out of the restroom.

I crept out of the stall and threw the faucet on, just as I was furiously pumping the soap, the auto-flush went off. I could have sworn I heard faint laughter and a "gotcha!". I hate it when the toilet mocks me.

I then proceeded through the terminal to the rental car shuttle. "Shoe shine, Ma'am?" a gentleman asked to my right. "No thank you," I smiled. "No problem. You have a good day." I then took a look down at my black loafers. Wow. They really do look beat up.

I continued my walk down the long terminal corridor. This is when I start to sound cocky but don't mean it. Living in Boston and DC doesn't do a ton for a girl's confidence, so it always catches me a little bit by surprise when I go to a smaller city or town and find I do quite well. Lots of smiles, looks of glances in my direction. Not that I'm looking for the attention or another beau, I'm quite happy with mine actually.. just saying it's nice to be generally appreciated. Especially since I have a huge zit rocking my chin right now and, well, let's face it, my boss called me fat (see yesterday's blog).

As I approached the escalator to the ground level, a gentlemen turned the corner and was well ahead of me to step on. Nevertheless, he stepped to the side and waited for me to get on. "Oh.. thanks!" I said, surprised.

The best, however, was my rental car shuttle driver. Ron. How do I know his name is Ron? Because he introduced himself to me. He took my bag, asked for my name and said, "It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Ron, and this is Kathy." He pointed to the passenger across the aisle from me, just another visitor to Raleigh on her way to pick up a rental car. "Hi Kathy. It's nice to meet you." "Hello!" We were fast friends.

"That's a lovely name you have," he said to me. "A pretty spelling. It reminds me of my sister's name. She has a unique name too. Ambia." "Ambia?" Kathy confirmed. "Yes, Ambia." "Oh, that is pretty," I said politely. I, of course, immediately thought of that prescription sleep aid, Ambien, and then thought her name was nothing but unfortunate. Kind of like when Yasmin (pronounced "Yasmin"), one of the most recent birth control pills, was advertised and I watched my friend Yasmin (pronounced "Jasmine", but still) suffer through the media blitz. Oh, and now there's Yaz, another new birth control pill. Carl Yastrzemski must be rolling in his grave.

Anyway, we proceeded to have a lovely conversation and will be exchanging Christmas cards this year. Ron also carried my suitcase from the van to the inside of the rental agency - THAT I have never seen before.

All of this, of course, is to lend support to the reputation of the southern states as more courteous, chattier, and overall better at the whole human to human interaction thing. But only one evil empire is capable of shutting that image down, even in the kindest of places.

Enterprise Rent A Car.

I won't go too far with this. I can't. I've had a couple of friends work there in the past and one of my best friend's really good friend works for a rental car company and I'm pretty sure it's Enterprise so out of respect I'll keep this short. Simply put, however, I have never dealt with a sleazier, nastier, cheaper, shadier organization. The Jedi knight that is North Carolina's power of propriety cannot slay the Sith lord known as Enterprise.

Somewhere a geek is weeping.

OK, so not a ton has happened. Just a few small things that I thought were worth sharing. I really wish I had more time here. I've spent most of my afternoon catching up on work e-mails and trying to do the responsible thing. The geek in me, however, would love to be able to check out some of the campuses in the triangle, but I will hope for another time. Back to DC tomorrow and a very very busy weekend.