You Don't Know Me ... Don't You Know Me????

So I'm sitting here at Damngoode Pies on Kavanaugh, which I must say is the best location in Little Rock simply for nostalgia's sake. I sat down here to simply enjoy a couple of beers on my own, just to chill. Then Little Rock showed its happy face just as it does every time I come home. My refuge away from my folks house quickly turned into a barrage of "Don't I know you?"'s and "Do you know [fill in the blank]?"'s. I call this the beloved Arkansas "yackity-yack". You know it when you encounter it. And you encounter it before you even get into town. It usually starts on the flight into town. The simple question on a Southwest flight, "Are you going on to Dallas or stopping in Little Rock?", depending on the answer, will inevitably lead into an hour long conversation about someone's cousin you went to school with. I always forget how warm and fuzzy that feels, or how intrusive and annoying it can be.

For the most part, I LOVE the Yackity-Yack and welcome it at any time and any place in town. But is there some strategy that one can employ to avoid the Yackity-Yack without coming off as rude or without avoiding leaving the house altogether? I think there should be an understood code word that you can use so that approaching Yackity-Yackers get the drift and don't get insulted. Because headphones and a laptop don't seem to cut it in Little Rock. Hmmm, any ideas?

In my ears at the moment is the album So Jealous by Tegan and Sara, and unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be Yackity-Yack resistant.