The next little town I visited had its own personality. This was Branchville, SC. The old train depot houses a train museum. It was obvious that there had been a lot of work put into making this a show piece. I took several pictures, rode through town noting a Dairy ??? Bar, and new construction, and stopped briefly beside the road to start the upload of the recently taken pictures. I became aware that there was some traffic on this side road which apparently led to the local landfill. Well, two vehicles pulling up to the Stop sign within a few minutes connotes traffic congestion in a small town.

As I left Branchville, my eyes found a beautiful old renovated light purple home. I did have to round the block to take a few pictures just so I would know, “Yes, it was a purple house.”

I do not recall the exact name of the next town I passed through, although I could google, or look on a map and determine which one it was. The name was something like Rowesville, and what captured my attention was a sign for the Rowesville Bridge Landing (which apparently, from the color of the sign, was a State boat landing). I whipped my car around and headed down this incredibly straight, unpopulated road. Roads tend to be straighter for longer distances where there is little population. I guess people make road builders “go around” their important property rather than straight through it.

The longer I travelled down this road, the more that I thought it would surely end at the river (or lake) and I would have to back track. I eventually crossed a small bridge and there did appear to be a one lane dirt ramp beside it where a pickup truck was parked. I guessed that some landings are more prominent than others.

Not too long afterward the road came to a T, and I turned right heading (as I guessed correctly) toward Orangeburg.

I had been through Orangeburg probably a couple of times. Hwy. 301 travels through the town and there is a “black” institution of higher learning, Clafin, located there.

I drove through the old part of town and pulled off to google for the nearest BI-LO grocery which happened to only be .4 of a mile from my current location, and also just right of where I had passed through a short time ago (if I had looked more closely).

There were black and white customers going into and out of the BI-LO and I walked into a very vibrant store with a wonderful produce section. I bought some small sweet multi-colored peppers, a box of shredded wheat, and some NC blueberries. When I came to the checkout counter, the woman directly in front of me was also buying some of the same brand of sweet peppers. I told her that I had bought some previously and they were very good.

I’m not sure why I took a picture of this McDonalds in Orangeburg, but here it is. (looks like major renovations since I took the picture)

I then drove back to Santee noting that gas prices at a couple of locations were down to $3.19 a gallon.

Well, I enjoyed my mini-Memorial-Day-Weekend-vacation in which I performed a reverse crescent through the State of South Carolina. I headed down I95 on Saturday morning, stopping outside of Dillon for $3.249 gas at a

Loves. I then stopped in Florence long enough to do some grocery shopping at a Piggly Wiggly. I bought some Feta cheese, which I ended up not liking for the texture (and somewhat the taste). I bought a jar of baby pickled tomatoes, which I also did not like after trying them. I did get a 15 oz. jar of Hannons Garbanzo beans, and a Mt. Olive Pickles jar of Roasted Red Peppers.

I think it was a little after 1pm when I arrived in Santee, SC at Clark’s Inn & Restaurant. I had made a reservation for one night’s stay in the inn, and got a discount with my AAA membership. The total came to $96 for the room, with a complimentary breakfast at the restaurant the next morning.

There were only about 8 other diners in the main room, two waitresses that I saw, and one young black busboy, who I learned was a local high school student, by eaves dropping another diner’s conversation. My waitress, an older white woman, came and gave me a menu, and asked what I would like to drink. I asked for water with lemon.

I opened the menu and started to look at the choices. With my change in eating habits, I knew I wasn’t going to order the fried chicken (although I knew that would be good), and my eye soon fell on a prior favorite, the liver & onions. I like liver & onions, but rarely eat it in Fayetteville, or cook it for myself.

And, then one of the oddest little acts of rudeness happened. The waitress returned with my water, and without a moment of hesitation she reached across my left arm and placed the water directly in front of me, and in front of the menu that I was holding in both hands. The act caught me by surprise, but I continued, as she asked if I had made a decision on what I would like to eat. I asked for the liver and onions, and then asked if they had a baked potato (it wasn’t shown in the menu), to which she replied, “No.” I then asked for the “dirty” rice, and coleslaw.

My waitress then left, and I said out loud, but under my breath, “That was incredibly rude.” The middle aged couple, at the next table, might have heard me, but I did not make eye contact with them. I had to sit there a while and ask myself if she (my waitress) had intentionally tried to insult me. Had I done anything to peeve her in the short time that I had been there? I just ordered water with lemon. If I had ordered sweet tea, would that have altered her actions?

When the waitress returned with my meal, she set it down quickly, and without a moment’s hesitation continued on to the next table (the middle aged couple). If I had wanted to ask her something, or request something, I would have had to interrupt her mission onto the other diners. Needless to say, I started watching how she treated the other guests. I wanted to know if she had singled me out for her rude acts, or if she treated everyone in the same manner.

I didn’t think that she treated the others rudely, but I still looked to give her the benefit of the doubt, and just chalked it up to an uncultured woman that, although working as a waitress in an upscale establishment, really lacked some of the experiences in formal manners that were necessary for the job.

The liver & onions were delicious. The dirty rice wasn’t quite as flavorful as in previous times. The coleslaw was sweet, and enjoyable, although I knew that the diabetic in me didn’t need to chow down on this item. There were also two homemade biscuits that were flavorful, and had slightly hardened crusts… but, in this case, I gravitated toward eating the crustier parts and left the innards of the two biscuits in their basket at the end of my dining experience.

I left a 10% tip for the waitress. My normal amount is 20%. If I could have proven to myself that she had been intentionally rude, I would have left her nothing.

While waiting for my meal, I had walked into the hallway and tried to call the local masseuse to see if I could get a massage. She was listed in the web site, but I thought it might be pushing it for her to work on a holiday weekend. I got no answer and returned to my table before the food arrived.

After lunch, it was still only 2:30 pm, so I decided to travel about the country. I found a small town, Bowman, a short distance away on the map and headed off in that direction.

Bowman was indeed small, but as I passed by a gas station (or maybe a convenience store), I looked down the block, to my right, and there my eyes fell upon a flying saucer. Actually, there were two shiny flying saucers, one much smaller than the other, and on top of the larger. I slowed down, and turned at the next block between a church and the local grocery. I circled the block and indeed there were the flying saucers, but from the back side. They were in a state of corrosion & decay, and both metal and wood were sagging and light shining through some areas. It was obvious they would not be able to return to any heavenly region in the near future. I took several pictures and then drove away for the next small town on the map. As I left, I felt a mild melancholy briefly descend upon me. I did not know who might have built these vehicles, or why, but surely they were meant to be transportation from this small town.

ADDENDUM [02/02/2022]: I just googled for this image and now see that it is not two flying saucers, but what I thought was the lower, larger vessel was probably meant to be a ray or beam coming down from the saucer at the top.