"Why do they [write] for their money? Why do they [work] for short pay? They ain't getting nowhere and they're losing their share. They must have gone crazy back there." — Michael Burton (paraphrased)
Clinton, South Carolina, Friday, November 2, 2018, 9:56 a.m. Election Day is Tuesday, and I can’t remember the last time I ate a McRibs. I don’t think there is any relation between elections and McRibs except that both are being enthusiastically advertised. The best meal I’ve had in the week to date was a hamburger …
Continue reading Things that Are Close and Things that Are Far Away
Clinton, South Carolina, Tuesday, October 9, 2018, 1:57 p.m. One consequence of working for a news website while writing fiction at the same time is the constant clash of styles. I even have a style for this blog. If this was on GoLaurens.com, “South Carolina” would have been “S.C.” and “October” would have been “Oct.” …
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, September 23, 2018, 10:45 a.m. I fell asleep with the TV on last night, which is not unusual, and it awakened me this morning, when I wanted to sleep longer, because, in a semi-conscious state, I got irritated. Mark Twain said, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and …
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, September 20, 2018, 11:40 a.m. I had jury duty but wasn’t selected. Since every day, I put together arrest reports and talk to law enforcement officers about various crimes, I suppose this is hardly a surprise. In this part of the state, Florence, which hit the Carolinas coast as a hurricane …
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, September 13, 2018, 1:55 p.m. Florence is coming to town. In fact, it looks like it’s going through Florence (the city) on the way. Not Florence Nightingale. Not Aunt Florence. They are both no longer with us. Hurricane Florence is very much alive, but I hope it’s on its deathbed by …
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, August 26, 2018, 2:42 p.m. I listened to a Johnny Cash song that had slipped my mind. “See Ruby Fall.” I feel I know exactly how Cash wrote it. He was in his tour bus, heading through the country, probably in the mountains of the Appalachian chain, and he saw an …
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, August 23, 2018, 10:11 a.m. Two days ago, I ate at KFC for the first time since the horrible commercials started. I bought a three-piece, Original Recipe, Big Box Meal. It was all dark meat. I like white meat. I deserved that. Why do I hold silly commercials against restaurants where …
Clinton, South Carolina, Friday, August 17, 2018, 10:54 a.m. This morning I learned about the wet-bulb thermometer. So enriched was I that I moved on to wet-bulb temperature. Am I a man of boundless curiosity? I’d like to think so, but the short-term answer was that I was trying to figure out why Clinton High …
Clinton, South Carolina, Wednesday, August 8, 2018, 11:38 a.m. It seems there’s always a hill. It might be a plateau above a practice field, with a town’s young men busily preparing to represent their school and town in battles for football supremacy, scattered a week apart throughout the fall. It might be a manmade hill, …
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, August 5, 2018, 10:22 a.m. People seem habitually, chronically and incurably mad at one another. They are divided into warring camps. My theory is that everything is slowly becoming a sport. My team is made up of incredibly gifted student-athletes who will follow up a national championship by huddling up to …
Nightrider's Lament 