Free Michael Vick!
January 22nd, 2008
Blood and Grits wrapped up my Harry Crews obsession. At least for now. That don’t mean I won’t be reading more of his work — I never did make it to A Childhood: The Biography of a Place, for instance — but I’ve read damn near ten books by him in that last few months, and I’m getting a little burnt.
That said, Blood and Grits couldn’t have sent me off on a better note. Reviewers like to paint Mr. Crews’ fictional characters as the product of his whiskey-soaked, fever-ridden imagination. It ain’t the case. His characters walk. They inhabit our world. You just don’t see them in the sorts of places book reviewers are likely to frequent. Which is probably why Crews is so much fun to read.
The subjects include Charles Bronson, dog-fighting (Free Michael Vick!), fatherhood, taking LSD with rednecks, alligator poaching, saving a wounded hawk, and, of course, drinking beer. Particularly drinking beer while hiking. Something which made me damn near tearful in gratitude at seeing such a glorious topic on the printed page.
There’s a cult of horror-filled little shits in these parts who think they know something about walking in the woods. They wear space-age fabrics and pedometers. They leave, as a friend put it succinctly, pointing out the indents made by hiking poles, yuppie tracks. As with most things, they miss the point. I was raised as rural as it’s possible to get, and I’ve lived most of my life in the woods. There are few necessaries when taking a walk, and one of them is a backpack full of beer.
It’s a spiritual necessity. And in this world of assholes who treat the woods like a treadmill, who live their lives in a training regimen, it’s a fucking moral necessity.
Anyway, I’m in the middle of a Hitler: A Study in Tyranny by Alan Bullock, Pattern Recognition by William Gibson, Hayduke Lives by Ed Abbey and Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon, for the umpteenth fucking time.
And as soon as I’m done with that set, or at least any one of them, I’m moving on to Larry Brown.
Snippets to follow.
January 23rd, 2008 at 2:13 pm
For another amazing ride through America’s honkey heartland, try Joe Bageant’s “Deer Hunting With Jesus.” Fuckin’ awesome, I say.
January 23rd, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Just added to my wish list. Thanks for the tip. You read “The Redneck Manifesto,” I’m betting?
January 23rd, 2008 at 8:04 pm
“Particularly drinking beer while hiking.”
Better make your hikes short, stay on flat land and be prepared to piss until you are dehydrated.
” I was raised as rural as it’s possible to get, and I’ve lived most of my life in the woods.”
Well, now, last time you talked about your pre-Colorado life, you lived in the Big City with plenty of crime, dirt, drugs, etc, which you missed terribly. Just because you look like an extra in “Deliverance” doesn’t make you a woodsman.
January 23rd, 2008 at 8:39 pm
Heh. I was betting that post’d pinch your mouth, Laurie. The “Big City” you’re referring to is Cincinnati, where I did live for a couple of years. It’s a fine city besieged by suburbs full of pinch-mouthed, helmet-haired, vicious old horrorshows where you’d fit right in.
And, dear, if I were you, I wouldn’t be about criticizing anyone’s appearance. Not to put too fine a point on it, but you’re about as appealing as an infected clit ring.
January 23rd, 2008 at 10:00 pm
First “Fred,” and now she’s “Sybil,” too?
Wasn’t that the title of a really bad book—and an even worse movie, I think—about a woman with multiple personalities. Suppose maybe Laurie’s trying to tell us something?
Actually, all I meant to say was that I read the Bageant book a couple of weeks ago and highly recommend it.
January 23rd, 2008 at 10:39 pm
Ben, I’m nearly twice your age. I still look better than you. Makes no difference. If I were still young and pretty, you’d find something else disgusting to say.
I thought you lived in Dayton.
January 23rd, 2008 at 11:20 pm
You make it easy, ma’am. You waddle around here looking to pick a fight, and then start whining when someone actually takes you up on it.
And I did live in Dayton for a couple of years. A lovely little rustbelt burg. Your point?
January 24th, 2008 at 9:27 am
My point is if you lived most of your life in the woods, in as rural an area as possible, you should have learned some things. I’m trying to picture you in the back country and all I come up with is you’ve fallen off a cliff in a drunken stupor, your neck is broken and your last three beers too far down hill to reach. Please, Ben, stay out of the woods!
January 24th, 2008 at 10:17 am
You’re definitely on to something, Metro. Witness that the Scrunt has taken to opining on how “pretty” she used to be, and how good she still looks. Really classic symptoms, those. Makes you almost want to feel sorry for the ol’ crust-bucket.
January 24th, 2008 at 10:27 am
Maybe the Scrunt got into some bad acid, Billy.
But, yeah, Metro’s probably right about her bein’ an all-round mental whack-job. Her attempt to come off like the reincarnation of Dan’l Boone pretty much convinced me of it. I mean, she’s obvious a real pro at bein’ a woodsman, eh?
Next thing y’know, she’ll be setting us all straight on what it really felt like to be Christopher Columbus.
January 24th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Yuppies in a park with beer can be sort of scary. This park is 2miles across
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4176/is_20061201/ai_n16909247
January 24th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Anyway, I think she’s in love with you, Bennie. Sitting at home, eating a powdered donut with one hand and fingering herself with the other. Thinking about some of them things you’ve learned.
January 24th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
Maybe you could make a deal with Benjamin, Laurie. Like he stays away from the woods and you stay away from the donut shops.
January 25th, 2008 at 6:40 am
Hilda, that’s probably the funniest thing I’ve read in weeks. Just so you know.