Give'm the finger

One custom of small town North Carolina that's kinda growing on me is the obligatory raise of at least one finger, if not the whole hand in a greeting gesture as you pass someone on the road. Depending on the placement of their hands (you still drive at 10 and 2?), whenever anyone passed me while in my mother-in-law's neck of the woods, they would raise at least part of their appendage in greeting.

One funny thing that I noticed about this custom was that it only applied in the most rural part of the countryside. As we passed the town of Joe (population 2) and Trust (population 16) and moved toward Asheville (population 70k+) the greetings diminished greatly. Funny thing is, as you pass up to the cities with populations nearing 250k+ and up, with traffic jams, road rage and too much extra-caffeinated Lattes, the gestures reappear... Though not in the same friendly kind of gesture I experienced. :-(