Readin'/Livin': New York Times: Delta Dawn
There was an excellent article in yesterday's New York Times by Dave Gardetta about Mobile, Alabama and how the city is evolving. It's accompanied by some beautiful and telling photography by Katherine Wolkoff. Check it out here...
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Readin': Redneck Haiku
Remember those short little Japanese poems you learned to write in grade school? Maybe not? Well here's what happens when "Bubba Meets Japanese Verse." Some funny outhouse readin' at the very least.
Here's the review of the "Doublewide Edition" from amazon.com:
"This expanded version of the original cult poetry classic contains not only all 106 haiku from the first edition, but also nearly 150 brand-new redneck poems that are sure to generate the same big laughs as the original. Once again, the redneck lifestyle gets the black tie treatment through the hilariously contrasting filter of the formal Japanese haiku. Each of the nearly 250 wickedly funny verses contains just three lines and 17 syllables, yet they address the whole spectrum of redneck culture: RVs, Wal-Mart, beer, pop tarts, pickups, monster trucks, NASCAR, boats, trailers, trailer parks, barns, hunting, shotguns, Las Vegas, the lottery, and more. Readers will laugh until the cows, chickens, and, of course, hound dogs come home."
Here are a few of my favorites:
Southern Comfort gone.
Bottoms up; the last goes down.
Pickup veers to the right.
Turkey fryer bought
from cable shopping channel
burns down trailer park.
Wanda returns to
Laundromat after six-pack.
Where are all her clothes?
Rooster crows before
Mom's morning coffee and now
simmers on the stove.
Go ahead, make yer own! Three line verse, five, seven, five syllables, captures a moment.
Check this out:
Redneck Haiku: Double-Wide Edition
Posted in Readin'
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Eatin'/Readin'/Travelin': Let The Belly Be Your Guide
In Southern Belly: The Ultimate Food Lover's Companion to the South, John T. Edge travels the back roads from Texas to Virginia, from chicken shack to fish camp, from barbecue stand to pie shed, to bring you the most savory food and history the South has to offer. You'll find a South hidden in plain sight, where cooks who've been standing tall by the stove since Eisenhower was in office serve local specialties found nowhere else. The perfect traveling companion, Southern Belly reveals the stories and secrets behind this mouthwatering food and guides you to more than 200 places that have quietly become Southern institutions.
Check this out:
Southern Belly: The Ultimate Food Lover's Companion to the South (Paperback)
Posted in Eatin', Readin', Travelin'
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Readin': Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley
Just finished this book. It's the second part in Peter Guralnick's two book series on Elvis. A very interesting and enlightening read for anybody who's been touched by the King. Here's a review from Ron Hogan at Amazon.com:
Until Peter Guralnick came out with Last Train to Memphis in 1994, most biographies of Elvis Presley--especially those written by people with varying degrees of access to his "inner circle"--were filled with starstruck adulation, and those that weren't in awe of their subject invariably went out of their way to take potshots at the rock & roll pioneer (with Albert Goldman's 1981 Elvis reaching now-legendary levels of bile and condescension). Guralnick's exploration of Elvis's childhood and rise to fame was notable for its factual rigorousness and its intimate appreciation of Presley's musical agenda.
Picking up where the first volume left off, Guralnick sees Elvis through his tour of duty with the U.S. Army in Germany, where he first met--and was captivated by--a 14-year-old girl named Priscilla Beaulieu. We may think we know the story from this point: the return to America, the near-decade of B-movies, eventual marriage to Priscilla, a brief flash of glory with the '68 comeback, and the surrealism of "fat Elvis" decked out in bejeweled white jumpsuits, culminating in a bathroom death scene. And while that summary isn't exactly false, Guralnick's account shows how little perspective we've had on Elvis's life until now, how a gross caricature of the final years has come to stand for the life itself. He treats every aspect of Presley's life--including forays into spiritual mysticism and the growing dependency on prescription drugs--with dignity and critical distance. More importantly, Careless Love continues to show that Guralnick "gets" what Presley was trying to do as an artist: "I see him in the same way that I think he saw himself from the start," the introduction states, "as someone whose ambition it was to encompass every strand of the American musical tradition." From rock to blues to country to gospel, Guralnick discusses how, at his finest moments, Elvis was able to fulfill that dream.
Posted in Readin'
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