After a half hour of cigarette-sharing and photo-snapping, the commander led us back down the trail to a roofed, open-walled meeting area with atable where he bade us sit and brought us tea.
He looked dapper in a dark suit and tie and proved a gracious host, speaking excellent, if not always idiomatic, English for 90 minutes in his suite at the posh Carlyle Hotel, where a lesser-known novel by Alexandre Dumas lay open on the coffee table and a stack of European films on DVD sat next to a flat-screen television.
If you can book dinner on OpenTable, or a flight on Southwest or United online, then why shouldn't you be able to make an appointment at your local Social Security office the same way?