Fergit, Hell!

Sitting in the dining hall mid-day on Saturday, Linda sat beside me fiddling away at her knitting. I knew instinctively we were not going to be soul mates. For one thing, she was wearing her hair in a style last seen in the third grade in 1963. Linda - give it up. Move on.

Galadriel and her pals were there and out of the blue, Linda blurted, "I don't like Southerners. You just can't trust them."

I don't know why I feel a kinship with a state that was never particularly anxious to clasp me to its bosom, but I am a Virginian. I am a Southerner. Anyone north of the Mason-Dixon line is a Yankee. It's just that simple.

Pe-yew! Went my temper. I took a deep breath and said calmly (no, really),"It's interesting that you say that. *98I'd like to know why you think that because I'm from Virginia."

Linda didn't even look up at me. She scowled and said, "Well, you don't sound like it!"

No. Because I learned a long, long time ago that Southerners are mocked and thought stupid if they speak with their native accents, which to me are beautiful. I was tired of the ribbing I constantly took so I developed an accentless accent by watching the national evening news.

Since I called her out, she explained irritably that a Southern woman had taken her father for all his money. I said, "That's a shame. I'm sure no woman from New Jersey would have done that to her fiance."

Because she was fidgety and somehow anal but mostly because she was into scrapbooking (which I just don't understand), I knew we would never be friends or even friendly.

Now that I think about it, she didn't speak to me for the rest of the weekend and honestly? My scheming Southern heart is just as glad.
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Internet connection still doth suck. I hate Comcast.