The lovely bartenders at the pool hall where DH plays always remember me. As I walk in the door they are already pouring my glass of wine with a tall ice water on the side. It rocks that they remember.

No, really?

I know, it's crazy unbelievable.

I feel like in this city service familiarity happens a lot. I've rotated among 7-8 coffee/bagel carts on my way to work to avoid creating some kind of expectation. I can't even go to the starbucks in my building anymore b/c I'll get shit for my long absence!

When I was at the bagel shop in NC, we totally would start making up the order as soon as we saw someone's car pull into the lot.

It's kinda' amazing how much getting drunk figures into small town culture in Wisconsin. Also, drinking and driving was no big deal when I was growing up (although I never did it myself). OK, it was not a big deal until kids got killed in drunk driving accidents - then people talked about the problem for a few weeks. But nothing would change.

I always love the cranky diner/convenience store people. The crankier they are, the more I love them. Inevitably, they always turn out to be really nice.

There was more discussion of drinking in Wisconsin when I grew up. But it revolved more around drinking age. I grew up near the Illinois state line. After Illinois raised is drinking age to 21, a lot of people came into Wisconsin (where the age was still 18 at the time) to do their drinking.

Also, a lot of people liked to talk about cracking down on the liquor stores that would sell to underage kids. But if anything was done about it, it was after I left.

I can't even go to the starbucks in my building anymore b/c I'll get shit for my long absence!

I got that in my deli when I started working full-time again. "I thought you moved! We never see you!"

So, my little desktop weather thing keeps making noise at me and distracting me from work conversations -- first there was a tornado warning (!!) in my old neighborhood, but then it got cancelled. Phew!

I do think I'll make it so the thing doesn't actually make noise.

the servers

Okay, so, skimmy, I realize, but -- anybody else get very far into this discussion thinking it was a conversation about one's close personal relationship with one's tower of internet data storage and processing capacity?

Just me then.

I've never called a waiter a server, because my brain has to work double-hard when words have that many everyday meanings. Cleave, okay, it's a trivia thing and anyway I don't use that word very often. But server, like nose, needs to have only one meaning for me.

I keep complaining to my office-mates about the sounds that Weatherbug makes. They turn off the sound, but then a few weeks later, the sound is back on! Very annoying.