If anybody ever wanted to hold a dowsing class somewhere in the latitude of martinsburg or Berkeley sSprings I’d pay to go. I say this with the greatest respect as I have no kin to teach me and I’d love to see if my water energy would work. Not looking to site wells or that sorta thing. Maybe we could de-hex spell check tho…

IE with your knees together? When I grew up I commonly saw this as a comfortable way to sit but when I got to college it was seen as feminine or gay. My thoughts are:

• People used to be skinnier (especially Appalachians!) and things fit better.

• People used to have mostly straight, upright chairs and it works.

• Growing up in the 1960s-70s, “gay” wasn’t even considered.

So many said that FEMA was doing an excellent job in their response to Helene, that criticism of their response was all right-wing conspiracy, that critics were parroting Russian misinformation. Well...

Article from that hive of Right-wing conspiratorial thinking, Politico.

We have a full state-by-state breakdown of the responses and some added context included in a post we wrote on our substack for those interested. https://open.substack.com/pub/appodlachia/p/latch-uh-vs-lay-shuh-the-people-have?r=19p6sr&utm_medium=ios

The Devil and Caleb Black.

A story I wrote and performed a couple of years back about a bootlegger who meets a man and makes a deal.

It has my Papaw in it, but the story ain't real. Mostly ain't.

Happy Halloween.

Hey everyone,

Looking to plan a trip tomorrow thru Sunday with my girlfriend and our two dogs (big boys). We are looking for some places in the Appalachians that would have some beautiful views and allow us to relax and unwind a bit. Any suggestions/recommendations for towns and areas would be greatly appreciated! For reference, we've been to Shenandoah a few times.

Summers County, WV

One of my earliest memories of my great grandmother was her pulling off a branch of this tree that was next to her house and showing me how to use it like a toothbrush. Like that’s what she did growing up. It had properties that were useful and a taste that I don’t remember, but I remember that I didn’t think it was bad. Any idea what it could’ve been?

https://open.substack.com/pub/appodlachia/p/latch-uh-vs-lay-shuh-the-people-have?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Curious to get your thoughts on this survey done by Appodlachia. I have lived in Appalachia the past few years, but grew up outside NYC where we said ‘Lay-shuh’, so I’ll admit my Appalachian dialect knowledge is limited. I expected the Latch-uh/Lay-shuh line would have been further south. My county is marked as Latch-uh and while I have heard some folks pronounce it this way, it seems to me that Lay-shuh is more common in my area.

The view from my new jobs parking lot

How the TVA Morphed From a New Deal Miracle Into a Mega-Polluter https://time.com/7130733/tennessee-valley-authority-pollution-essay/

I was born and raised in southern Illinois. The first time I remember being in that part of the world I was 5-6. My parents took me on a road trip through the mountains and instantly I fell in love.

Since then I long to be in WV,East Kentucky or Tennessee. It just feels like home to me. My research finds that my family is from that area. My dad's side of the family originally came from WV. They were coal miners and last lived in Paradise KY before they moved to Southern Illinois to work in the mines here.My moms side of the family was some how related to the Boone family and mostly lived in Kentucky before moving to Southern Illinois before Illinois was a state.

Maybe that's why the area feels like home. I'm drawn to the area. I love the mountains. I love the air. I love everything about it. Maybe one day too I will call it home and hunt and trap the hills and hollers like my family did.