Down aroun' Biloxi

Heard from my best grad-school buddy, Terrie, whose Loozian'yan and Pensacola roots nicely bracket my own Creole / Redneck-Riviera flavorings (from my days in Mobile during the Johnson-Nixon years, when I was 9-14). Anyway, Terrie reports an upcoming road trip to see her idol Jesse Winchester in Baton Rouge, which put me in mind of his song "Biloxi". Jimmy Buffett's cover really captures the feeling I remember from trips there around the Hurricane Camille era.

I once played the song -- a command performance -- to a bunch of drunk waterfront deadbeats who saw me unloading my guitar from my VW bus at the redneck marina where we often debark for Dog Island. Across the boat ramp I hear "Hey, you play that thing? Come on play us a song!" with a slight air of menace, as if I'd better damn well come over and play something for them if I had *any* balls, and that song was what came to mind as I strolled up to their rickety beer-strewn picnic table behind the bait shop.

I made one of 'em cry.

Spring has Sprung

...actually, it's barely winter, but time for Spring term to start. Teaching my first online class (and my first Comm class in too many years) and taking two: Qualitative Methods and Environmental Communication. Laura is settling into her apartment and we're prepping the guest room as an office so I don't have to leave textbooks all over the coffee table.