Hotlanta!

I'm sitting at a faux mahogony desk at the Westin - Perimeter Mall Atlanta looking over a "lake" (read industrial cooling pond). My meeting starts at 11 (1.5 hours from now). Atlanta and I don't really get along, though this trip might start tipping the scales in the right direction.

A couple years ago, I was in Atlanta over my spring break for a service trip. A group of 15 of us volunteered at a refugee resettlement center outside the city. One night we decide to check out downtown Atlanta: see the Coke Factory, Capitol building, etc. While walking down the sidewalk, men sitting high up in their black Escalade spit on us. Yep. They spit on us. I cannot for the life of me figure out why, but I can tell you it's one of the most disgusting and demoralizing events in my life (not a tough life some would argue and that's true, too).

However, the scales are starting to tip. When Lauren Z. and I got off the plane last night, it was in the 70s! Welcome to the South and welcome global warming. To big oil's credit, it was in the teens here last week.

Ok, time to practice the preso some more. And wait for my yummy $22.50 yogurt parfait & green tea. Oh Westin.