In Wi-Fi Travel, One Must Never Assume

August 21st, 2009 · Tags:Cities · Restaurant · Wi-Fi

Sorry it has taken so long to post a new blog, and also, how absent-minded of me to leave up the download Ode to PotTAY. Apologies.

My Dirty Gig adventure continues, having just finished a two-week stint in a building nearly destroyed by fire. Just a few days ago I left Winston-Salem, where I met some new friends in the disaster industry. To recap, one is an overly energetic citified cowboy from Phoenix and the other is slow-talking southern wit from Georgia. Both are good at what they do, and they have given me lots of pointers.

So, as we worked in North Carolina, when I found a piece of down-home humor/wisdom written on the wall at our job site … I thought surely one of these guys wrote it.

The words of wisdom, rather, one word of wisdom was “assume.” Someone had scratched the letters on the wall, then underlined parts of the word with three strokes. They had shown their audience the old joke that “when we assume, we make an ass out of u and me.” For some reason, I just knew my buddies had used this to make a point with their teams of laborers on the job. (Falsely accused, Daniel assured me … They didn’t.)

I wish I had seen the diagram sooner. You see, I received a tip about a place in North Carolina that offers free Wi-Fi.

That is what I do — seek out Wi-Fi in new places. From time to time, I put out the word that I am in a specific city, looking for Wi-Fi advice.

So anyway, because the restaurant that was recommended is a chain with multiple locations, I ASSUMED that all of the locations had Wi-Fi. They don’t.

http://www.kwcafeterias.com/index.html

So, after a nice PR professional took the time to recommend K&W Restaurants in the Winston-Salem area, I hopped in the car with my laptop and a powerful hunger. My new buddy Kevin and I headed for one of the restaurants. Kevin is a good sport because, K&W is more of a cafeteria than a restaurant. But, among the multiple choices of meat and salads and strawberry pies … there was no Wi-Fi. We drove all the way to Greensboro for Free Wi-Fi and struck out. The location that was recommended was back in Winston-Salem. My bad!

No offense to K&W, most cafeterias are made for blue hair, not blue tooth, Wi-Fi or other wireless technologies.

But … somewhere in Winston-Salem, there is a cafeteria-style restaurant offering a free Wi-Fi hotspot. In never found it. I ran out of time.

But, thanks to Kevin we did get a quick tour of Greensboro — a cool downtown area and also on our various drives, we toured the campus of Wake Forest in W-S. Well worth the trip, even without Wi-Fi.

Here are a few shots around Winston-Salem and G-boro.