I'm wondering if I pissed in the wrong person's coffee - or maybe the guy who's coffee I've been pissing in for the last six months finally found out about it - because every account I've been handed lately has required travel to a "headquarters" in the industrial district of some seedy little hamlet in the nether reaches of nowhere, the kind where you catch a connecting flight from a small airport to an even smaller one, then hop in a Sopwith Camel that lands on a dirt road, where you're met by a pickup truck with a Confederate flag on the bumper, or hanging from the CB radio antenna, or tattooed on the driver.

... sometimes all three.

Then there's the long drive into "town," which is never more than a cluster of squat brick buildings on either side of the rusted railroad tracks. The driver always wants to make small talk, primarily because he can't use big words, and you simply must ask him how he lost that tooth before he starts telling you about the time jeebus saved his trailer from the tornado. So on the interminable ride to the motel (the stress is always on the first syllable) you get to listen to some improbable account involving a barnyard animal, farm machinery, or a rodent-hunting excursion.

... sometimes all three.

You arrive at some greasy spoon — where "greasy" is an understatement and "spoon" the only utensil most of the diners can figure out how to use — where there's always a five-gallon jar of pickled pigs' feet near the register. You spend the rest of the night awake, trying hard not to fart a gusher of chicken-fried meat by-product, until the rooster crows (literally) and you're off to "the mill" to explain the value of information technology to some Neanderthal who can't figure out how to operate a toothbrush — all the while trying to think of how you're going to explain to the suits back in civilization why you couldn't close the deal.

If any of my previous rantings has ever caused you to wonder why I categorically detest suits and salesmen, consider this your answer.