Down In Mississippi

It always feels good to be down in Mississippi....
Photo by Steve Nix, Licensed to About.com


Here's Ry Cooder explaining the feeling...
And here's Mavis Staples, doing the same



Ry Cooder's show is from a Les Blanc movie "Ry Cooder & The Moula Banda Rhythm Aces: Let's Have A Ball", a film taped at The Catalyst, Santa Cruz, CA on March 25'th 1987. Band: Ry Cooder: guitar, vox Jim Keltner: drums Van Dyke Parks: keys Jorge Calderon: bass Flaco Jimenez: accordion Miguel Cruiz: percussion Steve Douglas: sax George Bohannon: trombone Singers: Bobby King: tenor Terry Evans: baritone Arnold McCuller: tenor Willie Green Jr: bass

The photo is Windsor plantation from http://forestry.about.com/b/2007/12/20/trees-of-windsor-ruin-a-photo-gallery.htm

Laggin' With Our Vocab

Even here in the swamp, we encounter new words from time to time...what a pleasurable thrill, to learn a fine new word...Below is a nice entry from the Phrase Finder web site of UK expressions, about LAGAN, our new word of the day... link is here,

PHRASE FINDER DEFINITION OF FLOTSAM, JETSAM, LAGAN
(Special Thanks to Meteora)

Flotsam, jetsam and lagan: Ships' goods which are lost at sea. Also used figuratively in non-nautical contexts to means odds and ends, bits and pieces.

Origin

Flotsam and jetsam are rarely seen apart nowadays although the words, in a variety of spellings, have separate meanings and were frequently used independently in the 17th century.

Whenever flotsam and jetsam meet for a drink they always reminisce about the family's long-lost triplet - lagan. That's the word for goods or wreckage that lie at the bottom of the sea and, like Gummo and Zeppo Marx, it rarely gets a mention.

Around the turn of the 17th century though, lagan was still in vogue.

Butflotsam and jetsam formed an alliance of their own and allowed lagan to sink out of trace in the early 19th century. Sir Walter Scott, in his Diary, 1848 (later printed by John Lockhart) mentions this:

"The goods and chattles of the inhabitants are all said to savour of Flotsome and Jetsome."

See also - phrases coined by Sir Walter Scott.

Lord Kitchener Explains It All

Calypso in the Swamp Tonight

Lord Kitchener came through the other night, it sounded like this

What it Sounds like In the Swamp

This is what it sounds like in the swamp these days, listening to Cajun radio from Larose, live all day and all night...

Part Two

Here's part two of the documentary on integration at Ole Miss:

"Reach Hither Thy finger..."

No room for doubt, here are close ups of the bullet holes in the Lyceum at Ole Miss;

DECONSTRUCTING THE UNRECONSTRUCTED

Daddy liked to point out the bullet holes in the columns on the Lyceum building at Ole Miss left over from the battle over integrating the school. Of course, Daddy called it "when the federal government invaded Ole Miss."
Here's part one of a documentary about those times; don't miss 5:30 into the show when a student allows that if the college has to be shut down to keep out James Meredith, its ok, so long as the Rebels still play their football games at home.

For My Baby

Nina Simone sings about going to ALabama for some mojo dust, put a spell on you...