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I was talking to a Ukranian woman at Starbucks the other day -- Starbucks, by the way, is exactly, and I mean exactly, like it is in America -- I mean, the fidelity of that place to the mothership in Seattle makes McDonalds' franchises look like outrageous renegade outfits by comparison -- anyway, what the hell was I saying? Oh yeah, I was talking to a Ukranian woman and she asked me where I was from in the U.S. I asked her if she ever heard of Kansas. "Oh, of course!" she says. "I read a story about Kansas City."

That's where I'm from! I said. What was the story?

"There was a girl and her family," she said. "Then a... how do you say it... a big storm came, and blew the girl away! With her dog!"

Oh, good Lord.

I thought if there was anywhere in the world I could go where people wouldn't associate my home with the Wizard of Oz, it would be here. When I first got to Washington, 500 people thought they were the first to make those jokes. When I went to France, my host family grilled me with questions about Auntie Em and her barn. Now, here. God help me.

The amazing and redeeming part about this story is that my Ukranian friend actually had never seen the movie, nor even heard of it. She read the actual stories by L. Frank Baum as a girl, and associates Kansas with an almost fairy-tale storybook quality. That charms me.