The Great Leveler

So far, one of the things I’ve noticed about Leesburg that’s different from Ashburn is that when I go out into the world I encounter a lot more people who speak English.
Kind of.
I say “kind of” because the English I’m hearing is so thickly drawled as to almost be another language entirely, a language that I would call Trashlish.
It’s based on English but has developed in trailer parks in West Virginia and is slowly migrating eastward.  I don’t think I’ve heard quite so many “y’alls” in my life as I did in the twenty minutes or so that I was in the grocery store today.  For a little while I was beginning to think that I’d stumbled into an episode of My Name is Earl and was walking along behind Earl’s ex-wife Joy, though I didn’t see anyone quite that thin anywhere in the store.
I’m still getting used to the stores here.  The Leesburg Shoppers Food Warehouse, my preferred grocery store here in VA, is much nicer than the SFW (in addition to being cheaper than other places, they have big “SFW” signs on the stores, which I just find hilarious and reason enough to shop there regardless of the savings) in Ashburn, though the layout is very different.
The Wal-Mart, however, is another matter entirely.  For one thing, it’s a lot smaller than the one I went to when I lived in Ashburn.  For another, it’s located at the intersection of Ghetto St. and White Trash Blvd.
This particular Wal-Mart seems to be the great leveler; it’s the place where the poor and the very poor alike come together…and stand in front of whatever it is I happen to want to look at.
Regardless of where they stand, this Wal-Mart brings together all kinds of social strata:  the slightly overweight and the morbidly obese; the pungent and the rancid; the one-toothed and the toothless.
Being too small, to dingy, and too full of people, it’s a place I will not be likely to visit often, so it looks as though I’ll have to venture back into the old neighborhood whenever I need to make a Wal-Mart stop.
After I got home from my shopping today the exhaust fan in the bathroom – which comes on whenever I turn on the light – began making a very loud grinding noise.
The fan had obviously not been replaced or cleaned out during the renovation, so it was covered with all sorts of dust.  I did my best to clean it off, and while the grinding noise stopped, it continued to be pretty loud and various bits of dust and debris rained down from it while it was running, so I opted to simply disconnect it.
I’ve been compiling a list of things that need to be fixed for my 30 day post-walk-through touch-ups, and that’s definitely going on it.
Messing with the fan was about as exciting as the day got.  I’ve been doing some work on a new picture, which had been going very well, but I seem to have hit a brick wall.
I was invited to a going-away party for Chris tonight.  I opted not to go because…well, ultimately, I suppose you could say because I’m a jerk.
Then again, it does say right here on this page that I’m “reclusive and anti-social,” so it should hardly come as a surprise that I’m not inclined to go someplace that will be full of people, particularly when many of them will be drinking.
Kathleen called and said that she and Brian were stopping by the place – it’s here in Leesburg – but by that time I was already into my lounging around the house clothes and fully into lounging around the house mode, so that wasn’t enough to entice me out.
Besides, it’s not like I would have brought much to the party, though I suppose it could be argued that every party needs a certain amount of awkwardness and social-discomfort, which is what I would have brought with me.
Still, I did wish Chris well as we left work yesterday, and I bought him breakfast on Saturday, so I think that makes up for me not going to his party and sitting quietly in a corner talking to Kathleen.
As I’m writing this, Blogger is down for maintenance, so I think I’ll just call it quits for now and post this later.