Lights of the Ozarks

Zoomie asked me to say more about Arkansas. I arrived one evening, conducted some business, and left in the afternoon the next day so my exposure was brief. The evening we arrived, we had dinner at a restaurant near "The Square" in Fayetteville. The Square enthralled us with its Christmas finery -- the entire area was decked out with lights and Christmas displays, and there were Christmas carols playing from speakers in the night air.

Fayetteville is home of the University of Arkansas, and there are Razorback mascot images everywhere! I didn't take a snap though.

Fayetteville is also known as the "Track Capital of the World" because of the numerous awards won by the University of Arkansas track team.

Everyone I ran into was charming and helpful. That certainly put a shine on the already positive experiences there.

My business took me to the RFID Research Center of the University of Arkansas. It was quite an amazing place, and this gadget-girl really enjoyed the tour after the business aspects were done. There were amazing applications of this technology demonstrated in several areas of a very large laboratory. Imagine taking a dress into the dressing room where there was an interactive screen where it 'knew' what you brought in and could suggest accessories, or you could press a button for someone to bring you a different size of the item(s) you had? Or a smart jewelry case that keeps a constant, automated inventory and locks things up tight at the end of the day?

The countryside on the way to and from Northwest Arkansas Airport, when out of the city, did look like yesterday's photo with gentle rolling hills, lots of grass and winter-scene bare trees.

I was charmed by it and thought it would be a interesting place to explore if you like peaceful prairie environments. My intuition tells me that the quality of life here is pretty high. I look forward to returning there.