Swamp Rat

That's where I grew up y'all. 

I mean I lived in a house...went to school and church in buildings but, this is where I spent at least half of my childhood. It's Lake Cascade. We lived on Cascade Dr...a small neighborhood, that came off the truck route, made a loop along one shore of the lake and then back out.

This is where we played. When I was little, I got at least two whoppins for goin' down there without supervision. We found a dead gator down there one time...he'd been shot and hacked up. There was a baby gator that lived in one the pools around the lake. Seemed like he stayed on the same stump for a year. 

Of course, the place was the natural habitat of our arch enemy, Satan's charm bracelet...

.

I guess we just tried not to think about him.  There was a little island in the lake that was said to be so covered with Cotton Mouths that if you looked hard enough you could see it wriggling. Maybe it was a defensive mechanism...mentally we put them all out on the island. I did watch a fella kill one in the water with a bow. That was pretty cool...back to hell you go.

There were big, high banked ditches...like canals that would connect some of the pools with the lake...we never went in those. That was a strip of black water running between 6ft  walls of roots and holes. We did swim in the lake though. Out towards the middle of the lake there was a homemade diving platform built in group of cypress trees. One of my fondest memories is being out there with my brothers and their friends. I was still wearing the bubble (an egg shaped piece of styrofoam with canvas straps that chaffed and dug into my under arms)...so, I must have still been pretty little. They were trying to get me to jump off into the water. At my size it looked like were were 50ft in the air. They finally bribed me into it by promising that I could be the first to kiss Daddy when he got home from work. It was quite a race to meet him at his car in the evenings...with my tiny legs I didn't stand a chance.

One day, me and a buddy of mine come up on a fella that nearly drowned. His canoe had turned over and he couldn't swim. We helped him in the last few feet. It had to be a strange scene...two ten year olds draggin' a grown, gasping man out of a foot and a half of water. The most absurd part was that, except over sink holes, the water never really got that deep. He could have bounced off the lake bed from 100 ft out. 

It dried up every couple of years...or drained. Sink holes would drain it. The other side of the lake was near wilderness. It was crisscrossed with dirt roads...and pocked with sinkholes. Sink holes are just creepy. A perfect cone, about 150ft across and down to a pool of jet black water. Every once in a while they'll crack open in a populated area. Gainesville had a couple of big ones open up in the middle of town.

You can see the waterline on the cypress but, obviously this was taken after a long dry spell.

In its Glory.

The little cinder block house we lived in is gone now. In fact almost all the houses are gone now. The airport bought up most of the neighborhood years ago. It wasn't a fancy place to start with and now it's gone back to wilderness. 

Probably overrun with *&^^%% Cottonmouths.

Change of Plans

Being the dedicated employee that I am...I'm back on the road*. So, we just gonna do something different.




I assume y'all will have heard this classic rock....classic. Ballsy riffs and a squealing lead, hollered lyrics...classic. You should hear it on the gigantic speakers at Davis-Wade. It really comes to full throat on those arena sized speakers.

Of course, none of this changes the fact that the song is nonsense. These fella's were from New York or someplace. One of 'em might even have been a Canadian. It's painfully obvious that they looked at map and picked a town on the river...for the setting.

It's the tale of a Cajun lady that lives in Louisiana, across the Mississippi River from Vicksburg. I'm not saying a Coonass has never stopped for gas in Waterproof or Delta but, at that point on the river, you're a lot closer to Arkansas than you are Lafayette (Laugh-a-et). That's on the map. In spirit...you are in Arkansas.

She might as well have been living at the rest stop in Cleveland, Ohio where they sell Boudin.

"Boudin?"

"Yeah..it's a sausage they make in Louisiana."

"Yes ma'am," I couldn't help but chuckle, "I've ate a lot of Boudin. I just can't believe I'm seeing it here."

I was as polite about as I could be but, I immediately felt bad when I realized how disappointed she was that I had stole her thunder. I guarantee she had plenty more opportunities to wow the yokels round there. Besides, I was flabbergasted.

It weren't real Boudin anyway...you can't sell blood.

Anyway, I'll tell you what they do have in north Louisiana...the Robertsons.



A family of good'uns that have made a pile a money with handmade duck calls.

Sorry about the commercials..if the embeds even work...but, it's worth it. They play it up and clown but, between the lines you'll find the best representation of Southerners that's ever been on television.



If you live over here you've seen Duck Dynasty..or at least heard of it. I don't know how our British readers get American TV but, if you get the chance check it out.

Disclaimer for C...they hunt. They eat what they hunt though and don't eat meat if they didn't kill it themselves. I can't help but see that as a moral step up...they are off the grid and the meat Industry would go broke if it was up to these folks.




P.S. The Church of Christ is not a cult ninnies.

*Told y'all I'd go if it involved New Orleans.

A Face That Only C Could Love

I was in Glen Allen yesterday..we been there before.

We made a call in a country store and bait shop. There was an older white lady workin' the counter. She got around just fine but she weren't in no hurry. Mostly she sat on a stool, leanin' on the counter..drinkin' [iced] tea. It was a rounded but sprawled appearance...like a snowman made out of bean bags. She was sweet as she could be.

A real contrast with the noise and energy that was coming from the kitchen...where two voices mingled into a pleasant but indecipherable stream of sound occasionally punctuated by jabs of racket or an "O-Kaaaaaay?"

"Connie!" the old lady hollered back into the kitchen. Well, she tried to holler. I don't think she's got a holler in her. "Y'all, Mrs. P**** here with food." Them girls couldn't hear her no more than they could hear me now if I yelled out the window.

Not one to wait around, Mrs. P just got up and went into the kitchen, through the noise, to fetch Mrs. Connie.

"They carryin' on back there ain't they?" I said to beanbag.

"They're sisters. They go on like that all day long" she drew a slow smile, "I love to listen to em."

There was a pleasing cadence to "conversation"....not that you could pick out a word except for the Oks and the "NO...No she din' " that made it clear they were communicating with one another. It was like a secret language.

"I'm Connie...good to meet you." she held her hand out.

I shook it..."I'm Erik and I'm glad to meet you Mrs. Connie."

She could be in early 30's or late 40's, 50's. Hell, I don't know...it's hard to tell with Black women sometimes. They seem to skip through middle age with the same smooth complexion they had in their 20's. It's not til they get really older that the wrinkles start.

Then her sister came out. She did seem younger. Her hair was longer and she was wearing a wool cap that was stretched up as tall as she could get it. They were fun and complained about how the last time I brought chicken wings one of the customers had eaten them all before they could sample 'em. I promised to leave extra this time and they went back to the kitchen...back to their private chatter.

I listened to them and browsed around the store. Somebody had figured out how to stuff wine bottles with Christmas lights...there was a wall full of neon yellow and blue rubber worms...spam...then I came across this...

That's Ms. Connie...and a fish she caught, not far from Glen Allen, in Steele Bayou around Mayersville. Curious. It's a good sized fish but not a record breaker. Then there's the look on her face. Not exactly the expresson of triumph one would expect when you've caught a fish that's made the local paper....or the Jackson paper for that matter. In fact, she looks like she's tryin' to get somebody to take it from her.

Maybe it has something to do with these...

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

It's just not safe 'round here y'all...not in the wood, not in the fields and certainly not in the water.

One nightmare for each mangled tooth.

Huh?...WHAT? What the.....

I got the swimmer's ear y'all. Feels like I'm pregnant on the left side of my head...it hurts to chew. Any movement of my outer ear is a lightining strike. I guess I wont be able to give the Carol Burnette tug on my way out the door that all the clients love so much.

Maybe I am pregnant in the head or, maybe I've got one of these molting in there...



I know we've got at least one lurker who just shut down his computer and crawled under his desk. HA.

It's the annual cicades...not the periodic, red beedy-eyed, noise makers that pop up every 13 years down here. These do a pretty good immitation though. You never heard such persistant racket. Of course, these aren't the actual bugs. They'll shed their skin anywhere they can latch on. I pulled one of these off my tire.

They have to fight with the lightining bugs for space...



We got more of these in the yard than grass blades right now. Oddly The Boy will help me gather cicada skins but, he won't stay in the whole wide yard if he catches sight of one of these.

"Boy that lightining bug ain't gon' do nothin' to you."

"I think that one...he's trying to do somethin' to me."

They're freakin' lightining bugs man...of all the things to worry about around here you gon' worry about a lightining bug. It's not like it's a butterfly (I hate those things...*&^%$ creepy the way they flitter around like half of a memory).

Maybe he's been dreaming about lightining bugs or maybe it's the fact that he's not takin' naps anymore but, not matter how hard we try to wear him out during the day, he's having trouble going to be lately. This is a new one for us.

Last night he just didn't want to go down...back there cryin' and carryin' on like somebody cancelled his birthday. I went out for a smoke, to catch a break and discovered we had a visitor on the car port. One that I thought the Boy would love to have a look at...so, me and his momma decided to bribe him.

"We wanna show you somethng outside but, then you gotta come back in and go to sleep...no more whinnin."

He agreed...face all puffy. It's amazing what forcing tears will do even to a four year old's skin.

We get out there and I tell him to go around one end of the car while I go around the other...I hadn't passed the bumper when I heard him shriekkkk!

"Mom-MAH!...aghhhh...aghhhh MMOM-MUHHHH!"

He was terrorfied.



A turtle...a &^%* trutle.

"Why was he stikin' his head out?"

"He goes in his shell to protect himself."

"I hope he goes back in his shell forever...he was tryin' to crawl all over me."

It was the first thing he asked me about this morning. Got gators around here that could bite him in half...snakes that could swell his up bigger than his head and swimmers ear...just don't mention turtles around him.