A Study in August, Part One

I’m so proud – our little lunatics listen to punk!

Road Trips, Mall Rats, Highways, and Evolution

If you’re going to put 500 miles on your car in one week, make them good miles. Look out the window. Roll it down if you can. Skip the Interstate, skip the mall. Turn left next to nowhere, and explore the small spaces.

Of Lunches, Dinners, and Breakfasts

Thomas Pit remains a subject of myth and legend up here in the northern climes, but it’s real, and it’s been real since 1932, when between 80% and 90% of all Huntsville voted for Franklin Delano Roosevelt and put their faith and their BBQ in the New Deal. Since then, it’s been pulled pig the best way, in a smokehouse behind the restaurant that may have seen a layer of paint on the outside, but the inside is just the same as it’s always been. You cook pigs for 80 years, you get damn good at it, is my guess.

Return to Rocket City!

There’s nothing really wrong with my hotel room, except the burn holes in the sheets and the clothes-iron scorch marks on the floors and the way the AC/heater is competing with the headboard to see which can pull away from the wall fastest and the odor that you just can’t quite place and the stains of dubious provenance in the bathroom and the lack of insulation under the door and the drawer handles that pull away in your hand and the three mismatched chairs that have forgotten the meaning of comfort and of which exactly none fit under either the desk or the table. Also, there’s a phone in the bathroom, over the shitter, presumably in case you drop The Big One and want to call the Guinness Book of World Records people. Why that bothers me more than the rest, I couldn’t tell you.

A Thankful Countdown: Day 10

I’ve decided to count down to Thinksgiving, and take a moment each day to think about things I’m thankful for. Number Ten: I’m thankful for really good customer service. Also, for the state of Indiana.