I wanted to get out of Fayetteville on Friday 13th, so I decided to drive up Hwy. 13 and go to Goldsboro for lunch at the Longhorn Steakhouse Restaurant. This is a favorite lunch time trip and I have done it many times.

My favorite meal at lunch is their Cheeseburger Special. It is a good sized burger, and I order a bowl or cup of their Shrimp-Lobster Chowder.

I also love their appetizer bread with butter. In the past I’ve eaten the whole loaf, but normally do not eat any of the burger bun.

Because I’ve visited this location quite a few times, in the past I’ve gotten into the habit of bringing two additional items to make my meal more pleasing: a couple of slices of Sweet “Vidalia” Onion and a few Mt. Olive Bread & Butter Pickles. Often the few onions on the burger are not as tasty and a little thinly cut, so the thick slices of onion I bring have great flavor and add positively to the meal. — The burger comes with dill pickle slices and although I like dill pickles, I really like sweet pickles with this burger. I forgot to bring the pickles this time, but had bagged a couple of thick slices of onion.

Once I’ve emptied the sandwich baggie, I’ve found it perfect for carrying out the half of appetizer bread that I don’t eat.

So my order to the waitress is: Your Cheeseburger Special medium-well, with all the fixin’s, and American Cheese, and a bowl of your Shrimp-Lobster Chowder, and ketchup. — And yes, I want your appetizer bread with butter. “I love the butter.”

Quite often the Chowder is warm, but not hot. Today was the exception. It was very hot and that was very appreciated. *And my slices of onion had much better flavor than those that came with the burger.

After lunch I normally have a couple of places I like to visit.

I like to stop at the Wayne County Public Library to read a magazine or two. Their chairs are comfortable, and quite often I close my eyes, and may even sleep briefly.

The other place I like to visit is a road that dead-ends beside the Seymour-Johnson AFB runway. There are farm fields on either side of the road, and a low fence runs along the length of the runway to prevent persons from entering the Base. This is a great location for watching the fighter jets and tanker planes take off and land.

When I arrived, I first went into Berkley Mall and found where their public restrooms were located and used one. They have clean facilities, although you can tell there is some age to them.

I did see that a previously empty store location was now BURLINGTON.

I walked back over to the Longhorn, and as I walked in the front door, there was no one at the register but I saw that there were about 3 small groups of people ahead of me. Two standing, and 3 others on a bench with another of their group standing talking to them.

The couple that were standing were just odd enough for me to think about taking their picture and having AI to make cartoon characters out of them. The man had a full beard but before I could get my phone out and take a picture of both of them, they had been taken to their seats.

But, since I had my camera almost ready, I snapped a quick photo of a couple that were leaving. In the actual photo, the woman’s face was blurred, and I don’t think anyone was smiling. Also the young black man that was at the register had a Curly High-Top Fade with highlights. *I just used AI to come up with the correct terminology to describe his hair. But, the AI generated a cleaner version of him. I showed him his cartoon version and he noted that it had changed his hair.

Once I saw the first cartoon and was pleased, I decided to take other photos during the meal and have the AI generate cartoon versions of each. *I think it turned out great. I added a couple of non-visit images for explanation, and one from a previous visit, but that showed my seating view.

Note that I am wearing a mask. I started doing this about a month ago when I had begun to hear the warnings about how bad this year’s flu was. Also another year where they say something like, “this year’s vaccine isn’t covering the popular strain this year.”

I’ve also temporarily stopped having a lunch salad from IGA or Harris Teeter because these communal feed troughs are where the flu (previously COVID) could be easily spread. I don’t want the flu!