Social-Media Algorithms Strike Again Dang it, y’all. Despite recent upgrades in my personal life, the Almighty Social-Media Algorithm still thinks I got a drug problem. The Omniscient One continues to market me as a lonesome, lone wolf on the prowl for love. “Maybe everyday is Saturday morning.”—Drive-By Truckers** Both of which I understand, given my history. But all this mess...
“Maybe everyday is Saturday morning.”—Drive-By Truckers** One Christmas when I was in junior high, I asked my cool, young Uncle Garrett to give me N.W.A.’s album Straight Outta Compton, at the time making headlines /infuriating Whitey for its track, ‘Fuck tha Police.’ Uncle G came through. But he wanted to listen to it with me, pointing out its Parental Advisory...
“Maybe everyday is Saturday morning.”—Drive-By Truckers* BURN, BABY, BURN I’m way too ADD to meditate.I’m well aware of meditation’s many-fold miracles and how it would especially serve to benefit someone as whack as me. Science has shown that this sacred ancient practice increases gray matter in the brain. Specifically, mindful meditation thickens gray matter in the prefrontal...
“Maybe everyday is Saturday morning.”—Drive-By Truckers* A STAR IS BORN One of my favorite new traditions at my church, First Presbyterian, is the celebration of the Feast of the Epiphany — climax of the Christmas season often brushed aside by Protestants but embraced by Catholics happy to keep their holiday lights bright on winter nights — when the Three Wise Men finally found Jesus...
“Maybe everyday is Saturday morning.”—Drive-By Truckers* A couple of decades before we declared We Do Amazing, good ole Columbus, GA boasted a fairly fitting slogan: ‘What Progress Has Preserved.” While still a solid mantra for our small big city / big small town—with genuine historic Southern charm churning inside an economic engine, with bold, visionary civic leaders as...
My Year in Screenshots “What if everyday was like Saturday morning?”—Drive-By Truckers** Looking back at the past year ain’t a pretty picture. While I can’t tell y’all exactly why my 2020 was such an ugly scene—statute of limitations dictates we’ll have to wait about 4 years to spin that year—social-media algorithms reveal a lot about my journey these last 12...
Christmas Lights & Tradition in the Time of COVID (Crane-Spotting Edition) “What if everyday was like Saturday morning?”—Dive-By Truckers** . A TWISTED TALE OF TRADITIONI walked a bitter cold block upriver Tuesday morning for my first-ever glimpse of the gingerbread houses display the RiverCenter always hosts during the holidays. It was weird. And a lil’ bit sad.This is not...