Howls

Some folks are with you in Rockland. I am with you in Walmart.

Jeremiah and His Brother, Wesley

I know you’re going to find this hard to believe, but in the past, whenever I have set out to “write a book,” I  have just set out to write a book, to start at the beginning and tell a story, one which ended in a way I knew not. I mistook writing for reading. [...]

The Bell Witch and Spiritualism

I’ve been actually thinking, reading about the Watseka Wonder and Spiritualism in general, that this may be a kind of missing piece to the “WTF happened with that Bell Witch stuff?” I found this skeptic’s page and, while I have some major quibbles with his approach, I think he’s right about a couple of things [...]

Watseka

I called my dad this morning to tell him I might need to go to Watseka and he paused so long I almost thought we’d been disconnected and then he asked, “Watseka, Illinois?” as if there might be some other one. “Yes, by you.” “Well, they do have a nice Walmart.” And then I told [...]

A Gal’s Changing Body

Seeing that Twitter thinks I should follow Southwest Air reminded me that I wanted to talk a little about fat. Ha, there you go, Southwest, you’ve now cemented yourselves as the airline people think of when they think of weird things having to do with fat. That must be a PR coup for you. Anyway, [...]

In Which Our Fair Blogger Learns an Important Lesson

Always check with the Tennessee State Library and Archives to see if they have maps of any old ghost towns before you go looking for them.

“Liberated of Her Ministry”

So, I’m reading Cox’s Body and Soul which is supposed to be some kind of sympathetic history of Spiritualism and, if it is, I don’t quite see it yet. It’s more a perusal around the foundations of what would become Spiritualism and I am just in the part where I have learned about Rachel Baker [...]

And Speaking of Midwestern Spiritualism…

If you’ve ever been in the Dana-Thomas House, you’ll recall that Dana was a Spiritualist and that Wright accommodated her religious needs in the design of the house (her religious needs being basically one room for seances).

Briefly on the Mad Gasser of Mattoon

It was unfair of me to mention her/him in passing and not link to something that would have provided you with a little more information. So, check out the wikipedia page. It’s interesting to consider this in terms of “hysteria”–whether the perpetrator was a woman, most of the victims being women, and the men being [...]

The Watseka Wonder

I’ll admit, I sometimes get the Mad Gasser of Mattoon and the Watseka Wonder confused. You’d think that’d be difficult since the weirdness that is the Mad Gasser is right in his/her name–Mad Gasser. If you’re sitting around wondering which one is the Mad Gasser and which one is the other thing, it literally could [...]

Woo hoo! Illinois!

I hadn’t heard this song before, because I live in an almost impenetrable bubble of uncoolness, but I love hearing all these towns–Alton, Beardstown, Pekin–and I love the way the song comes through her whole body, how she’s marching in place to keep time.

Good Weekend

I can’t even begin to capture in words how nice this weekend has been and how sorely needed it was. I talked to very few people. I dug in my garden. I went searching for Old Jefferson, which I missed by mere yards because I didn’t check the TSLA site before I left and still [...]

Not Quite to Old Jefferson

Gardening

I’m not even going to begin to tell you what bad shape my garden is. I have, quite possibly, just let the whole thing go since mid-summer. So, I’m in the big bed trying to pull out most of the grass so that I can get everything cut back and see where the soil needs [...]

A Suggested Compromise for the Hunters in My Area

Let me say up front that people hunt in my neck of the woods all the time. This time of year, I hear them every day. Far away, up in the hills. And to them I say, “Not for me, but good luck to you.” No, I am talking about the 1% of hunters who [...]

Rosemary?

I have walked by many a vehicle in this city from which the distinctive smell of marijuana was wafting. Today, though, may be a first. I was walking to Noshville past a truck that smelled so strongly of rosemary I had to stop and ask myself if that’s really what I was smelling and, yes, [...]

Things I Thought About on My Walk

1. I’m kind of ready for winter. I’ll regret saying this in a couple of months, because I always get the winter funk, but something about this summer just felt so hot for so long. 2. My yard and flowerbeds are so neglected I don’t even know where to start to bring them back up [...]

From Apple Pie to Cow Pies in One Bizarre Step

This has to be the most perplexing thing I’ve heard about all day and I hear about some perplexing crap–this author, Monica Gaudio, writes a post about old recipes she found for apple pies. And I’m talking old, like so old she’s discussing whether you’d eat the crust of the older pie or if it [...]

Good Things at the Scene!

Jewly Hight is one of my favorite writers in town. And I’m not just saying that because I know her. I think she’s just phenomenally talented in a way that feels very natural when you read her. She always does some nicely complex things in her sentences, which you are welcome to linger over, but [...]

Every Day

I had really strange dreams all night and woke up and felt a little constipated. If you know my body, you know that doesn’t happen. So, yes, lo and behold I had forgotten to take my drugs last night. Habits are a weird thing. You get into the habit of doing something so that it [...]

Javi Garcia & The Cold Cold Ground

I know I tried to make you guys dig on this band once before, but I am today begging you to listen to this song, “Needles and Thread.” I think this is just an amazing piece of lyricism–”Mother worked two jobs ’till she passed away/ They say that cancer killed her, I say that work [...]

My Awesome Pith Interview

I interviewed Christian Grantham about his new book and I think it went swimmingly.

Beale and Gotto are Right

Southern Beale says: Simply put, the Republican base was motivated. The Democratic base was not. That’s really all you need to know. Whenever Democrats run to the right they lose. When given a choice between a real Republican and a fake one, voters will pick the real one. Democrats need to show they are the [...]

Tennessee Goes Republican. Will the Bogeyman Show Up?

Here’s the problem the Democrats in this state have–they all already voted for stringent anti-abortion measures, it’s a Democrat who can tell who are illegal aliens just by looking at them, a Democrat who thinks rape is different now than it was in his day, the Democratic candidate for governor who came out against gay [...]

Terri Lynn Weaver and her Pastor are Idiots

Christ almighty, it’s 2010 and you are a grown-ass man. Do NOT dress in blackface. And, if your pastor DOES for some reason dress in blackface for Halloween, your “black patois” is entirely inappropriate as well. But most unbelievably, you don’t defend your idiocy and the idiocy of your pastor with “I’m the least racist [...]