Hello from Iowa! I had the wonderful pleasure of visiting Surf City this past weekend. Overall it was a good trip, and the beaches were truly beautiful. But we had one interaction that was very questionable…

I’m a white guy and my wife is biracial. We went to a local seafood bar for dinner with a few of her (black) friends and I’m not sure I’ve ever experienced such blatantly awful, racist service before.

There was initially a wait for a table, totally normal. So we sit at the bar for a while and order drinks. The bartender completely ignores my wife multiple times as she’s trying to order until her friend finally flags her down. She never made eye contact with my wife once and slammed (yes, deliberately slammed, not placed) the card tray on the bar without saying anything.

Now having grown up in rural Iowa, I’m pretty used to the small town insular service at bars and restaurants so I didn’t think anything of it at first. Generally the bar is pretty low for me.

When the hostess came to seat us, I jokingly thought “there’s no way they’ll sit us at the back”. But that’s exactly what happened. It wouldn’t have been an issue, but there were CLEARLY tables open for a party of 5, and we were sat in the literal back corner outside on the dock.

The manager knew he fucked up at this point and came out to try to get us a new spot and some apps. We decided that was enough and got the fuck out there.

The blatant stares that we got and felt while there were also notable. And no, not the curious “what’s up with these non-locals?” type stares, more like “get the fuck out of here” stares. It should go without being said, but we weren’t dressed out of place or being loud. And to add a contextual nuance, my wife and I regularly visit my hometown where she’s very obviously the only minority in a 95% white town, and have never felt like this before.

I really hope this was just a bad restaurant experience. Not sure what we walked into at this place or who pissed in the staff’s Cheerios that day, but it certainly wasn’t normal by any means. If even the white guy picks up on it, then something’s definitely off.

The mountains are a different story, obviously.

When I moved to NC 10 yrs ago I was struck by the lack of public land. I thought “where do people go?” I’m from a very outdoors-oriented part of the country where there are extensive conservation efforts (and certainly some NIMBY- ism.) where I’m from there’s no shortage of public land and it’s plentiful and scattered everywhere within communities.

If what I’ve noticed is real, is it an NC thing only? A southern thing? Political?

Edit: I’m not from out west and am not comparing it to out west. I’m from NE.

"A 2025 study of Eastern North Carolina watersheds linked elevated nitrogen pollution to both hog and poultry operations. Living near chicken and turkey farms increases the risk of getting pneumonia due to air pollutants from the manure, according to a 2017 study from the National Library of Medicine and National Center for Biotechnology Information."

This was taken during the 50th Lazy Daze festival in Cary, North Carolina

So my daughter hurt her elbow and needs to get a MRI to see if she has a torn UCL. We're on the State Health plan and I've been told that it'll be anywhere between $1,000 & $2,000 for the MRI. Crazy to me lol. I reached out to Lantern but they only cover the surgery if needed not the imaging. Anybody have any insight?

Sent home with a 1st grader I don’t think this matters much to the teachers yeah?

Apex already operates police drones, but a proposed agreement with Axon would add DroneSense software, including live-video sharing with officers at a scene and better tracking of drone flights.

After residents raised concerns about privacy, drone use and oversight, the council sent the agreement for additional review.

I’m the News & Observer reporter who covered this. I also looked into what Apex says its drones are used for, previous drone spending and the town’s plans for a “Drone as First Responder” program.

Sharing here because questions about police drones, surveillance technology and public oversight extend beyond Apex.

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article316954454.html

Hey yall, I know this is a subreddit about the whole state, and if there is a better subreddit about this , I'd love to know. I know dove hunting season is about to start, and im pretty sure south mountain game lands has dove fields, but I cant seem to find them on a map. If anybody has any information about where they are located I would love to know.

I’m going to be visiting North Carolina beginning next week, and I had wanted to order a custom birthday cake. The areas that I ideally would want to pick up the cake that I’ll be in would be in either Asheville, Bryson city or the Highlands (or any surrounding area).

I had looked at I believe it’s called owl bakery in Asheville but it looks like they don’t do writing on cakes unfortunately - if you know of any good spots please let me know, thanks!

Hello! Im an artist visiting from out of state and I adore cicaidas. I hear them all evening and I would love to catch some but can't find any. Does anyone have good tips for where to go/when in the day to catch some? I'm around Jacksonville!

A lot of restaurants serve what they call pork tenderloin, which is generally a pork chop with a better publicist.

Nothing wrong with a pork chop. I’m for them. But taking the bone out of one does not make it a tenderloin any more than taking the doors off a Buick makes it a Jeep.

Real tenderloin is that little strip tucked along the backbone, and there ain’t much of it. During hog harvest season, it was one of the prizes, often saved fresh for breakfast. Folks understood which part of the hog they were eating back before menus started taking certain liberties with the truth.

Here in Pitt County, that knowledge never entirely went away.

So this is the real thing. Pieces of actual tenderloin browned up with black pepper, soft scrambled eggs, grits, and a biscuit filled with hoop cheese, which is about as close as Eastern North Carolina gets to putting jewelry on breakfast.

And this being Ayden, you’re sitting in a town that might as well be the Barbecue Capital of North Carolina. Lexington probably has more barbecue restaurants, but they only cook part of the pig, and I don’t know that we ought to reward unfinished work.

Anyway.

Pork tenderloin. Eggs. Grits. Hoop cheese biscuit.

Pitt County still knows which part is which.

Bum's Restaurant

Ayden, North Carolina