[larrybuck]

Wow so much Birmingham talk. A few years ago, I drove twice from home here to Birmingham and back, as I was checking out a sports car to buy, and was not going to buy it sight unseen, so I drove one of my cars at the time which was a 83 Volkswagen Quantum diesel station wagon manual 5-speed. I have to look back in retro fondness as I only spent about $450 for the full of round-trip Drive and fuel. I decided to get the car, so I drove the Volkswagen home and then change the oil and got my tow vehicle ready and took a trailer go get it and that's when I got offended in the Birmingham area. I was traveling south in the Birmingham Metro area in the slowest Lane of the freeway minding my own business when this JERKO decides to take an exit right in front of me at the literally very last Split Second. So the much last second, that I had to take the exit as well just to avoid not hitting him broadside!!! You know how it goes. Traffic was heavy took about 7 or 8 minutes just to get back on the freeway again as I had no normal intentions of ever turning off there. My remembrance of that still ticks me off. I have seen semis in LA on the freeway that literally have taken an off-ramp from three lanes further over to the left at a true 45° angle. Unreal. Within the last year, I delivered a truck which is my part-time job to the Birmingham area and then hot hooded it in a rental car to the Atlanta airport to fly back to Portland. I for the most part have grown up here in the Pacific Northwest. But I also have had the experience of living 11 years about 46 Mi Northeast of Asheville North Carolina. So I'm sure you ex Alabama guys can appreciate the fact of leaving the weather of the dreaded Eastern humidity.