Before I left for Atlanta last month, I carefully packed a bag full of perishable foods; whatever was left in the refrigerator, which I figured I would take with me on the road rather than waste. Somewhere outside of Waco, I thought, "Dangit, I left that bag in the fridge!"

Oh well, I figured I'd just throw it away when I got home. So much for conservation.

I spent four weeks going from Atlanta to New Jersey to Nashville to Checotah, Oklahoma (hometown of American Idol's Carrie Underwood, so the sign tells me). I come home and get ready to hold my nose to dump all the spoiled food, and I am appalled to find that most of this stuff looks exactly the same as I left it a month ago! What kind of preservatives are they putting in this stuff? Bread isn't supposed to last 5 weeks. Neither are tortillas or yogurt. They are pumping some scary stuff into our food, n'est-ce pas?

This is Oklahoma. Note that its governor is Brad Henry and that its capitol building is the only US state capitol building to sit on top of an oil well. Most importantly, note that it is not Texas. So here's a quick geography lesson: I-40 coming out of Little Rock will not put you in Dallas, but will instead put you in Oklahoma City. They are not close to one another. And Oklahoma is not pretty at night (nor is it pretty during the day, but to be fair that's not really the governor's fault). Do not rely on the directions that gas station attendants give you in the mid south. Oh, also, it's hard to turn around on the Muskogee Turnpike at 70 miles per hour.

Overheard on Newark-bound PATH train Sunday night, conversation between 2 females, early-20s:

Girl 1: (reading postcard) It says, "Based on the life of Ella Fitzgerald."
Girl 2: Ellen Fitzgerald? Who's that?
Girl 1: (shrugs)
Girl 2: Maybe she's famous. You should get her autograph.

If your sense of self as an artist is rooted in how well known you are, you might want to come up with a backup plan now.

I've been here in Atlanta for 2 days, looking at houses, gawking at various neighborhoods from East Point to Sylvan Hills and West End to Decatur. All of these communities are close in, which I've decided is important even though I briefly flirted with living somewhere out in some semi-rural area. (Who am I kidding, I'd never come into town if I lived out there.)

My real estate agent, Earl, is an old school kat, always chewing on a toothpick and listening to Earth, Wind & Fire on the car radio. He wears a gold chain and keeps pronouncing "Venetian" like "Venturian."

Yesterday, we saw this house in Sylvan Hills. I call it "The Farm House" even though there's no farm anywhere nearby. It's the leading contender right now. 12-foot ceilings, a kitchen bigger than the entire suite I'm staying in now at the extended-stay hotel, French doors, a garage workshop in the back. If I can get my mind around the cosmetic work that needs to be done on it, I may make an offer next week.

These neighborhoods are a breath of fresh air after Austin-style segregation. They are mixed-race or majority black, being rehabbed, but for now a lot of them seem to be avoiding the gentrification trap.

I leave for New York in the morning for a few days, but I'll be thinking back to The Farm House the whole time.

current music: The Roots, Things Fall Apart