And Yet, It’s Not My Birthday… I Don’t Think…

So, this is weird.  I got a weedwacker for my birthday from my parents yesterday.  And today I got an electronic birthday card from my aunt. I wonder if I should say anything or if this is some family secret coming to light?  Maybe my birthday really is the 15th. Or maybe I have one [...]

Bring the Boys (and Girls) Back Home

There have been two stories out of Iraq this week that have stayed on my mind.  One is that our guys, the folks in our military, don’t have water, so they’ve taken to breaking into places where military contractors store water and stealing it.  I use the term “stealing” loosely because as anyone who follows [...]

I’d Rather Not Do That Again

So, I don’t know how you spent your afternoon, but I spent the most exciting part of it vomiting into a plastic bag in my car.

Down Home Cooking

All I can say is that a book like this is both the strongest argument for self-publishing and the strongest argument against it. Also, if you own this book, please only cook vegan when I come over. Semen isn’t vegan safe, right?  I mean, if you can’t eat an egg, you sure as hell can’t [...]

Three Cheers for Barbara Mandrell

So, Barbara Mandrell is going into the Country Music Hall of Fame this weekend.  And, I have to tell you, I’m feeling strangely emotional about it, considering that I don’t know Barbara Mandrell nor do I have any personal ties to her. I do remember her from when I was a kid, though, because she [...]

My Second At-Bat

So, my second post is up at Pith.  It’s about John Work and why I’m hoping the Feds will give stimulus money to refurbish his house and how the Tennessean kind of dropped the ball when they were reporting about it. And I have to say, I really dig it.  I mean, I’m really starting [...]

Blows My Mind

So, they have uncovered what they believe to be the oldest artistic representation of a human being ever found.  And what do you know?  Thirty-five thousand years ago, our ancestors were running around with my naked body, probably on a rope around their necks. Now, granted, proto-me does also look a bit like a plucked [...]

Shorter MediaLizzy

“Not that I bothered to read any feminist blogs or talk to any actual feminists; instead I just made some shit up, because I know my readers and listeners won’t know any better.” (h/t Tiny Pasture.)

The Best Part about the 28th Avenue Corridor

Now everyone in town will be able to get to Swett’s.  (In case you’ve forgotten, the town is divided into people who can get to Swett’s easily and people who can’t.)

The After-the-Fact Fretting

Whew, so I was a lot more nervous than I thought I’d be.  Even last night, after I went to bed, I woke up a couple of times being all “Just go delete it and change your name and don’t answer the phone when your mom calls!”  and “You’re so going to be pulled over [...]

All Right, Go See

It’s up.

Come Gather ‘Round People, Where Ever You Roam

So, the Ghost of Midwesterners Past asked me to come write for Pith and I said “yes.”  Don’t worry, it’s just in addition to this, not instead of.  I’m not exactly sure how it will all work, since I can’t write about my cooter or my garden and, if I can’t write about those things, [...]

In Which I State the Obvious

In a number of different circumstances, Elizabeth Edwards’s media blitz came up and people have wondered what’s going on with that and I have been kind of dumbfounded because it seems to me rather obvious.  She asked one thing of her husband when they got married–that he remain faithful to her–and he couldn’t be bothered [...]

“Solid”

I sometimes end up at this bar that has a women’s bathroom but there’s only ever like five women in the bar, and the women’s bathroom is way on the other side of the bar, where all the guys hang out shooting pool, and I type all this just to say “Hey, dumbasses!  I don’t [...]

It’s a Strange State We Live In

So, the Hawkins County GOP had a drag show.  As a fund-raiser. I feel, as one of the few feminist bloggers in the state, like I should have some cogient analysis of this, but, frankly, I am not smart enough. So, let me just repeat that the Hawkins County GOP held a drag show as [...]

In Which I Propose a Toast to Mike Turner

Y’all may recall that Mike Turner showed up here in the comments a while back and I would just like to report that, since then, I have had my eye on him.  This has been exceedingly unpleasant because I wear contacts and he has particularly scratchy jackets, but that’s what I do for you, dear [...]

Frank James Was Not My Neighbor

So, I was doing some research last night and, thanks to Google Books, came across Frank and Jesse James by Ted P. Yeatman.  As you may recall, the big claim to fame of Whites Creek is that Frank James lived out here while he was hiding in Tennessee. Well, using Yeatman’s book to map out [...]

Mountain Dew, Throwback & Another Fun Thing

America, we picked up a twelve-pack of Mountain Dew, Throwback and it is amazing.  I was going to go all taste-testy on you and get a can of current Mountain Dew and describe them for you side by side, but whatever.  I had a Throwback with dinner and I cannot recommend enough, if you like [...]

After the Flood

Mom

I talked to my mom this morning and she told me all about the flowers she’d been planting and the flowers she was going up to my grandma’s to plant.  I told her about the Friday Night Flood here, when the creek overran its banks and came down through the yard and overturned concrete blocks [...]

You Laugh to Keep From Crying

I forgot to tell you the most outragious thing Shug told me while she was here, but I just got an email from her about being in New Orleans and that reminded me. So, Shug is going down to New Orleans right this very second to work on houses for Katrina victims with a church [...]

Two Things I’m Mulling Over

1.  Donnell Alexander says, Auto-tune is the definitive movement of our time because it makes the human voice anonymous. And how weird is that at first? After close to a decade of American Idol’s elevation of vocal histrionics, here’s a popular movement that tears the advantage of skilled vocal histrionics out of the frame. It [...]

Very Small

The main difference between being “out in the country” here as opposed to being “out in the country” in the Midwest, aside from how “rural” seems to mean a bunch of god damn people everywhere.  I’m sorry.  If you can’t run out to the clothesline in your bra to grab a shirt without knowing, as [...]

Making Money Off of Brown Bodies

Really, the extent to which I do not know things sometimes stuns me.  So, I’m mulling over this whole Windlands Center situation, where you’ve got a nursing home keeps its residents’ security deposits if they don’t give 30 days notice before they vacate their beds, even if by “vacate their beds” you mean “die.”  That’s [...]

Worth a Second Look

1.  Go take a moment to linger over the review that contains this deliciousness– The result is debut single “Runaway,” a song which boasts memorable and captivating lyrics such as “It’s been a long week/I got a slow leak/In my left front tire/I’m sick of where I work/My boss is such a jerk/Don’t care if [...]