When we reached Williamsburg's city limits following my week's exile in Ohio, I wanted to drop down and kiss the historic dirt.

Unfortunately, a distressed New Jerseyite couple and their disabled vehicle precluded my desire to smooch southern soil. Although a display of good manners and the responsibility of a personalized Williamsburg license plate can feel a bit burdensome following a nine-hour car ride with a dehydrated cat and a sweltering Newfoundland, we extended an offer of assistance.

After a quick review of our rumpled rescue crew, the female, Fran-Drescher-sounding passenger liberated her lips from a Marlboro and cackled, "Thanks; we're fine." Thus released from duty we entered the colonial city, freed the animals, relieved our weary bones and numb bottoms, and mounted a celebratory assult upon our livers--but not before phoning mother to report our triumphant return.

My hometown village "vacation" featured the traditional garlic clove necklace, lit-torch greeting extended to intellectuals and vampires. Why these disparate groups are lumped together and despised, I'm not certain (especially since post-Sherlock Holmes era intellectuals usually choose Burberry's pea coat over their slightly cheaper, $495 velvet cape--very trendy at the moment).

Luckily for the village kulaks, nary an intellecutal or vampire tarries long outside their inhospitable huts. The former group requires a well-stocked library, unrestricted access to espresso, and, if imbibing salad, virgin olive oil. The latter bunch lusts for a scintillating, virgin-studded (couldn't resist), black-clothed, plasma-rich nightlife illuminated by more than a single traffic light.

Alas, some of us are doomed to roam the land on a shoeless search for enlightenment; a journey that often forces us to topple small town bullies via our incredible martial arts skills...um, wait--that's "Grasshopper's" story, not mine. Ahem. Wrong blog.

Truth is, even Williamsburg harbors a narrow-minded citizen or two, whose ignorant ire is typically directed towards our growing immigrant population, who are legally lured here to toil in the low income, dead-end jobs traditionally filled by foreigners, socially condemned ex-convicts, and those with useless Ph.D.s.

A certain, nameless organization uses Eastern Europeans to maintain its nationally-touted golf courses. The landscapers are housed in a place called the "International Village", which consists of several low-rise buildings that would frighten the socks off Norman Bates. Suffice it to say, the situation reeks of feudal serfdom, and quite probably, cabbage.

While I'll admit it's unfair to give a one-sided assessment of the arrangement--those dwelling at International Village might love the place, and after a brief sojourn home may return again and again to sample more of Williamsburg's burgeoning job market--I refuse to excuse the behavior of our very own "Chicken Woman."

On August 6th, the Virginia Gazette printed an anonymous letter (as is tradition; I've assigned her gender) submitted to its Last Word column. The segment featured local gripes about foreign workers.

The writer in question related a terrifying tale regarding an interaction involving an English language-challenged grocery bagger, and an innocent carton of eggs.

It seems that upon reaching a market's check-out counter, our citizen journalist encountered the following scene: "...two foreigners were working one register. One was bagging. I asked her not to put my eggs in with the other groceries. She looked at me, then at the cashier for the English (?) translation of eggs. I clucked like a chicken to help her figure out what I was talking about. That didn't help either. So I had to check my bags for the eggs. Only in America."

How the foreign bagger's mind must've spun while the under-priviledged American shopper stood there, clucking like a Gong Show reject ready to lay an egg. If I were the cluck-struck bagger, I would've torn my green card to shreds and flapped my way to Williamsburg International Airport as fast as you could crow "Cock a doodle doo."

When told the story, my better half suggested that to alleviate a reocurrence, "Chicken Woman" should carry a colorful rubber glove that she could slap atop her head, thus better approximating a chicken's physical attributes. My concern is that someone may confuse her with "Big Bird", whom we suspect is male and therefore might not be associated with eggs.

How anyone would correlate impromptu clucking with the need for an extra bag is beyond me; but I am alarmed that no one from Homeland Defense detained and interrogated the shopper. This illustrates, yet again, the wanton abuse of taxpayer dollars. Some things never change.

Still, Williamsburg's new motto may be: "So many new residents, so many unmet needs." While driving past Richmond Road's various construction sites, I exclaimed, "I declare! Yankee Candle! Why are they erecting a Yankee Candle store instead of building a Virginia Candle establishment?"

"Well," replied my kindhearted spouse, "Look at it this way--finally southerners get to burn something northern."

Oh lord. It's good to be home.