if that ain't country

Real country is heart and grit and sweat and illegal liquor in mason jars. Sinnin' on Saturday night and repenting on Sunday morning and, either way, having faith that you'll be forgiven in the sweet by and by. Country songs can tell a story or mourn a loss or just sound damn good picked out on a backporch while we all drink beers and stomp our feet.

Now, I'm not talking about that twang pop bullshit you see in videos on CMT these days. No frosted hair, booty bassline Trashville throwawauy crap. I'm talking about Johnny and June singing "Far Side Banks Of Jordan" and bringing tears to your eyes and raising goosebumps on your arms (And I'll be waiting on the far side banks of Jordan/I'll be waiting drawing pictures in the sand/And when I see you coming, I will rise up with a shout/And come running through the shallow waters reaching for your hand.). And I mean Dolly and Merle and, hell, even sketchy fuckers like David Allen Coe have had their moments.

We here in Tallahassee are blessed enough to get the best of both the old and the new on a real radio station, the kind not programmed by test groups or DJed by computers. WGWD, 93.3 FM, Classic Country, turns 20 this month. You can even listen online if you ain't from here. They play everything from bluegrass to country gospel, and their DJs even still do some of the ads ("Now, when you get on down to Quincy, you need to go ahead and stop by that country buffet..."). It's the real deal, and that's in short supply.

(And in case you're curious, that photo is of Red Foley, Little Jimmy Dickens, Minnie Pearl and Hank Williams, Sr. hitting Europe back in the day.)

there and back again

Well, I rode Greyhound to DC, hung out with my girlfriend, helped partially convert an old Merz to run on veggie oil, walked all over town, rode down to Atlanta in said Mercedes, got drunk and happy at a small oi festival, ate gravy and biscuits, and came on home. Check it out:

Smithsonians ahoy! We basically did every free thing in DC.



We walked all over the National Mall, and settled down to rest some near Grant in front of the Capital. This is my gal Leila, footsore but still smiling.



Thems as know me know my fear of frogs and toads. Seriously, they scare the bejesus out of me - no idea why. So here I am saying, "Oh, no, a frog!" at the National Zoo.



Then we hit Atlanta for a big oi! show. Here I am with Kel and Perry - Kel writes for my zines from time to time and Perry's known for being in The Templars, among other bands. Class folks, they live over in Jax when not drinking heavily in Atlanta.

let the big dog run

When you ride Greyhound, strangers offer you booze out of plastic bottles and illegal drugs and sometimes sexual favors. I once saw a young woman work the same fellow for a couple hundred miles, getting lunch and sodas and attention from him all the way across Texas, only to be picked up by her girlfriend in El Paso.

When you ride Greyhound, you get to see paroled prisoners in county issue suits, newly free again, dig into huge fast food meals. They suck down milkshakes and gobble hamburgers and seldom look straight at anyone. Out west, authorities pull the bus over and go down the row asking names and where you were born, and lord help you if there's some Spanish in your English. When you ride Greyhound, you watch old men in sheepswool-lined denim jackets get pulled off and herded into trailers set up in dusty pull offs, left behind as we roll back onto the highway.

When you ride Greyhound at night through the desert, far off towns become stars in an ink spill sky. I could never go into space, because that feeling of tumbling through the void while cold lights blink at you and the only thing louder than your breathing is the engine keeping you aloft scared me witless until I opened my eyes to the dawn chasing us.

When you ride Greyhound, everything is further away than you think.

Scar Wars

Since I sort of mentioned it in the last blog, I thought I would give a heads up for this weekend's derby bout. Go out and support your local team! Capital Punishment for the win!

a little off

I feel anxious. Not for any particular reason. Well, for a couple reasons, none of them all that important.

A coworker left for sunnier climes this week, and her duties got lumped in with mine, so I'm trying to find footing in the flood. Yesterday, I looked up a band I used to like on myspace and my worst, nastiest ex is in their top 10 friends, leaving me with a sour feeling in the back of my head. I want to get out of town in a week and a half to visit a girl I dig, and money is tighter than Prince's britches. I have pledged to have a new issue of my music zine finished by the 30th, and I've barely touched the damn thing. And a bill collector's suddenly started calling me at work over something I paid off last year.

In other words, life as usual, except all at once.

The thing is, anxiety's not a regular state of mind for me. I tend to figure that things'll turn out one way or the other, and stressing about it won't help one bit. But when I've got a half dozen worries hanging over me and nothing I can actually do about any right now, well, I feel like I've had a yellow jacket and a red bull.

This won't last, thankfully. I'll burn off some nervous energy tonight playing bar trivia at Gill's (we're the loud team), and a pitcher of beer won't hurt, either. A good friend even offered to treat me this week. So I guess I'll just keep passing the open windows, and I suspect that by the time I get to the rollerderby match this weekend, I'll be back to my normal, grinning self.

R.I.P.

Poor ol' Ding Dang kicked the bucket this weekend. I kept him fed, watered, and clean, so I hope it was simply old age. He had a strangely nomadic life for a dwarf hamster and truly loved bananas.

Dear FSU Students:

I'm dissapointed.

Did you drain Poor Pauls? Was Bullwinkles finally shut for code violations? Did Potbelly's burn down? Did beer pong go out of fashion? Did all the sorority girls buy shirts that actually cover their torsos? Have red plastic cups been banned within city limits? Did Mike's Beer Barn close again?

What happened to the hard drinking, hard puking students of yesteryear? For shame, FSU. Letting UF beat you like that. Have some college pride.

Soberly,
A Local