I drove the entire length of Kingston Pike today, from UT to Dixie Lee Junction. It is, indeed, the longest strip mall I've ever seen. But I was pleasantly surprised at how many independent businesses there were along the way. It wasn't all big box hell as most suburban strips tend to be. It also was much greener than suburban strips of this ilk usually are. Maybe my years in dreadfully flat Chicagoland have soured me on the possibilities of suburban beautification but I was quite surprised to see such a heavily commercialized strip with actual live trees astride it.

Oh, and the Dixie Lee Baptist Church may just be the most Southern-named place on Earth. Of course the name has to do with the old crossroads of Lee Highway and Dixie Highway and not to any particulary "Southernness" but still, the name is pretty neat in its own way.

I also saw Lenoir City for the first time. What gives the right of small villages like Lenoir City and Tracy City the right to use the word "City" in their names?