Johnnie’s Bar has been serving whiskey in downtown St. James since the Irish laborers built the railroad through here. Even from the outside, Johnnie’s looks foreboding, with its big neon Stag Beer sign over a doorway into cold, smoky darkness. … Read More
Tighten Up
It’s tough when everybody wants a piece of you. It might be because you’re pretty, or rich. It might be because you’ve left a trail of bad deeds. But it’s especially tough when people want you just because of your … Read More
Spinal Flap.
Two agonizing pages into The House of the Seven Gables, the spine on my book fell off. Should I keep reading? The book itself was old and brittle, stiff as its author’s language. But I kept reading, whereupon from the … Read More
Johnny and Elvis
It was late Friday when Jack the tow truck driver dumped Erifnus and me. Handshake and Jack was gone. University Garage had an alternator waiting, and slapped it on in minutes. On the way home we heard a radio wag … Read More
Scariest Cave Names Ever
Caves are fissures where evil seeps. And some of these must’ve been named by people who were scared shitless. In Texas, don’t stumble into Toad Frog Falling Floor Fissure, Left In a Lurch Cave, Coon Crap Cave, Putrid Pit, and … Read More
From Dark into Darkness
The wind picked up intensity, blowing loud as a Texas liar. I had forgotten the sound the wind makes when it ratchets into a cyclone. It whistles through the rigging, singing in a voice that rises in pitch with each … Read More
Bleach on the Streets
“Sedville will shine tonight, Sedville will shine. “When the sun goes down and the moon comes up, “Sedville will shine.” The old high school fight song rang true as we rolled into Sedalia. The sun was down, the moon was … Read More
Omar and the Phillies
The hotel staff dropped candles by our room at three pm. The satellite TV in the hotel breezeway lobby began cutting out late afternoon. Heavy storm interference. Islanders and guests took one last chance to squeeze out reassuring emails to … Read More
Strange Mussell Forkers
They were a ragtag gaggle of patriots. Somewhere north of Bynumville and Bee Branch, in the middle of an unicorporated area named for the Mussel Fork creek that runs through it, I met a most diverse group of Mussel Forkers. … Read More
Gustav Meets Kehde
Just outside Windsor, Gustav’s guts started spilling. Gustav had slammed into Louisiana as a Category 4 hurricane, and plowed north through Arkansas into southern Missouri. By the time it reached Sedalia, the storm had devolved into an extratropical depression, which … Read More