CG | It takes me a lot longer to come up with these little playlists than you might expect. I spend far too much time fretting over what you – the invisible and unknowable reader – may have heard already, and if what I’m trying to communicate about these songs comes across as earnest sharing,... Continue Reading →
SG | I live in North Carolina. It’s March. That can only mean one thing, sports fans. Time to write about football. Basketball passions run white-hot here in the Tar Heel State, but truth be told, I’m still warming up the game. As a product of the SEC, football fandom has always come more naturally... Continue Reading →
SG | It has taken me 40 years to admit this — or maybe not so much admit as to simply realize a fact — but I can't really figure out barbecue. More specifically, the sauce. If I had grown up in North Carolina, it would be all too clear: I would either foster a... Continue Reading →
SG | There is something undeniably satisfying about a sausage biscuit. For one, it unifies two distinct but delicious components of a well-rounded breakfast plate, saving both time and effort. I like to think the sausage biscuit as we know it today was born of this convenience one pre-dawn morning in a warm, Southern farm... Continue Reading →
CG | What is “The South” – capital T, capital S – and how do you know when you’re there? Elsewhere on the blog, we’ve talked about the “Pine Straw Line,” and I’ve heard low rumblings in regards to a “Sweet Tea Line,” but surely one of the truest indicators of Southerness can be found... Continue Reading →
SG | Fall in the North Carolina Piedmont comes on fast, and the leaves are usually falling before I first notice their color. It is lovely, if fleeting, but I've been spoiled. Spoiled by a fall in Asheville many years back. I have since failed to time a trip to Western North Carolina to coincide... Continue Reading →
SG | I recently read an essay by a nervous Southern transplant to California. I believe he was from Georgia. (I would love to link to it, though it's been lost to the perpetual scroll of my browser window.) Said Southerner was doing quite a bit of hand-wringing over a perceived erosion in his accent.... Continue Reading →
SG | The other day I rounded the corner to the front yard to find my five-year old daughter determinedly sizing up a Japanese maple tree. She had her climbing shoes on — that is, any foot covering ranging from flip-flops to rain boots. “Daddy, can you clear this tree for me?” she asked, matter-of-factly.... Continue Reading →
SG | Somewhere along the line, I began judging restaurants by the quality of their sides. Anyone can do a meat or a main course, I figure, but to really nail that side of asparagus and make it memorable in its own right? That takes skill. This belief truly took hold in a Nepalese restaurant... Continue Reading →
