Through Charlotte

I slept well and woke up at 5, 6, and 7 before finally getting out of bed. The shower was cold, so I figured I'd let it warm up, but it didn't. It just kept running cold. I called down and asked if there was a problem with the hot water, and the woman said "no." I asked if there was a trick to it or something, and she said "no, there's no trick." So I went back over and turned it on cold and left it on cold and after a minute or so, the water went warm. So the cold water handle works the warm water, and the warm water handle works the cold water. After I showered, I called down there and told woman that the handles had been reversed, and she said "yeah, I knew there was a trick to that." So there's that.

Going through Charlotte worked well, but for a few things. First: Mapquest says to take 485 West, and when you get to the intersection, you have two options - 485 East and 485 Inner. I don't know why you would have two of something, name one east, and not name the other one west, particularly if it's going west, but someone did, and mapquest didn't catch it. Second: they measure their mile markers in 10ths of a mile. So, you're driving and on mile 2, which makes sense, and then you're at 2/2, and I'm thinking that I'm at the end of the road or something, and then it's 3/2, and it looks like they've started using irrational numbers or something to measure miles. It was only about ten miles of that though.

I fueled up in Blowing Rock. The gas pump didn't have a credit card swipe thing on it - you actually had to go in and pay someone inside. It was really weird.

I pulled into Appalachian State University around 1:30. The campus is beautiful; I'm in Newland Hall. The room I was given looks like what I'd imagine a really nice minimum security federal prison cell to look like. My pillow is an odd rubber/vinyl textile, and the walls are bare cinderblock. It's kind of exciting, but I still went to Wal-Mart to buy a proper pillow case and blanket.

I have the World Cup going on my computer, and I've met a few people on the hall. The guy in the room next to me is from just a few miles down the road. Dinner's at 6:30.