Considering A Move Down South?

If you live north of the Mason-Dixon line and ask for an -iced tea- at your local McDonald’s, treasure that outcome!

I moved to Virginia in 1998, due to being able to buy land alot cheaper than in NJ. I cant lie, I heard the people were more friendlier, kinder and if you were broke down stranded on the side of the road, you wouldn’t be there for long. All of that was true. What I didn’t expect was the language barrier!

I got a job in a hospital in Roanoke which I greatly loved, well except for the drive time. We lived halfway between Roanoke and Lynchburg which, depending on the hours you were working could cause you to be either on time or extremely late.

I chose to work the graveyard shift and it was still a 45 minute ride each way, let alone the deer that loved that time of night and that loved my front end of my brand new Camaro. But, that’s a story for another day.

The first day on my new job was uneventful. I trained for 12 hours, and set out on the trip home. I stopped halfway home to get some coffee. Now, dont forget, I was tired, really tired and just wanted to stay awake long enough to get home and go to bed. I started to shut down and I frankly didn’t feel like talking.

The woman at the counter said, and I quote,

“Good morning! You doing good on this beautiful morning?”.

Me, if looks could kill, she’d been dead. I stood there for a moment and said,

“Can I pay for my coffee and get a pack of Parliaments in the box?”

She kind of looked at me like I must’ve have had a devastating death at work or found out that I knew the world was coming to an end and just nodded.

“ What kind of cigarettes did you need?”

Annoyed, I pulled the almost empty pack out of my pocketbook and laid it out on the counter. She just nodded.

“ I don’t think we sell those. I’ve never heard of them, I’m sorry!”.

Great your sorry? I’m about to die!

“Do you sell Red Marlboro’s?” I asked annoyed.

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The idea behind writing this post is based on a quick call with one of my college juniors where I was trying to explain her about Artificial Intelligence and it’s possible applications in DevOps…