"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, Sunday, November 18, 11:57 a.m. New assignments abound. For twenty years, most of my time was spent writing about race cars. I started writing books. I taught myself to play guitar and found I had “a handy knack for rhyming,” which led to songs. I started writing novels. I never wrote about …
Continue reading How the Checkered Flag Fell at the Beauty Pageant
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, November 8, 2018, 1:14 p.m. So much is going on that I can’t decide what to write. I’m suffering from information overload. I’m drowning. Either that or I’ve fallen and I can’t get up. It’s impossible to keep up. With politics. With technology. With violence. With anger. Do this. Don’t do …
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, 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 6, 2018, 1:15 p.m. Not much of me has been literary in recent days. Oh, there has been beauty in my world. The Red Sox’ seven-run eighth-inning rally and Brandon Phillips’ ninth-inning home run against the Braves was, as Dennis Eckersley is fond of saying on TV, “a beautiful thing.” …
Clinton, South Carolina, Saturday, June 30, 2018, 4:02 p.m. I’ve been working my ass off. No, that’s not right. I’ve been wearing my ass out. Mainly I’ve been sitting down. I’m in the process of learning how to manage the county website. It’s not the official county website. It’s a news site, or two that …
Continue reading When the Roll Is Called in Homeroom, I’ll Be There
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, June 28, 2018, 10:14 a.m. It’s going to be another week that was. By definition. To quote one of my songs, “No matter where you go, there you are.” This one, though, has been particularly enlightening. I’m making a transition into a job running the county’s news site, GoLaurens.com, which also …
Clinton, South Carolina, Wednesday, June 20, 2018, 9:49 a.m. How the mighty have fallen. Okay. I was never that mighty. And I haven’t fallen. The last time I fell was on the sideline of the Clinton High School spring football game in 2017. On Tuesday, I merely wilted. On the practice fields, a half mile …
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, June 14, 2008, 10:59 a.m. Shelby Alexander barely lets the reader take a breath in this opening salvo of Craig A. Hart’s series of thrillers. Serenity is not to be confused with the noun. It’s the name of the town in northern Michigan that, based on the hero’s experience, is hardly …
Clinton, South Carolina, Saturday, June 2, 2018, 11:02 a.m. I thought I had plenty of time to get to Clinton High School’s graduation ceremonies. I got my hair cut, and I didn’t make myself an appointment online, and the lady said it would probably be at least a 40-minute wait. Haircuts are spur-of-the-moment decisions for …
Continue reading As the Thunder Rolled and the Lightning Struck
Nightrider's Lament 