Tennessee Williams may have found his calling after poring over the works of Anton Chekhov at the Rhodes College library, but Memphis, Tennessee, the home of the blues and birthplace of rock-and-roll, has never been known as a breeding ground for interesting new playwrights.
Katie Smythe has delicate features that belie her toughness as an instructor. "We're only supposed to rehearse until 5 p.m. today," she says. "It's already after 4 p.m. and everybody's tired and looking a little pale. Before we do anything else, I think we all need to do an African warm-up."
People need to know about this," says my mother. That "this" is a recipe for peppermint ice cream. The recipe is decades and decades old, given to my mother by her mother-in-law when she and my father were newlyweds. Its official title is "World War II Ice Cream." The name reflects both its era and its ingenuity.
"Old rockers" such as Bob Dylan and Elvis Costello are still reinventing themselves, writing new songs, trying new forms, challenging their audiences. If I'm looking for a longevity model for my newspaper — or any business, for that matter — that's where I'm going.
A year ago, the World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest was hoping that 2009 would be the year that the organization would put extra effort in emphasizing the "world" in the contest's name by recruiting teams from around the globe. As it happens, 2009 is "the economy, the swine flu, and days and days of rain."
