Panthers, and pigs, and giant bugs...Oh my!!

It started with a low whirring sound. Sort of like the noise a badly maintained car would make while idling, far off in the distance. Occasionally, a chirp would join in for a few seconds. Then, within minutes of the sun going down, it was all around me. And it was loud.

Imagine coming from a place where crickets, tree frogs, and owls sang you to sleep every night. That's Virginia, when you're lucky enough to still have some sort of wilderness close by. Those were the night noises I was used to and had grown to look forward to. In the Summer of 1994, I learned that I had not even begun to realize the number of night critters that exist on this continent - and they all meet up and scare the religion into people in Mississippi, evidently.

My first night as a Magnolia State resident was a sleepless one.

The house that I shared with three other people in Purvis, MS was surrounded on three sides by dense woods. I grew up in the countryside of Virginia, so Purvis was perfectly suitable for me. I didn't count on hearing things within steps of my window that I had only heard in the movies, however.

Whirrrrrrrr! Chirrup! Blickity blickity blickity! Whoooooooop!!

Holy crap. I scrambled out of bed at least a half dozen times to wake my roomate and ask the dumbest question ever, "Did you hear that?!?" Of course she heard nothing unusual and waved me off to bed. Feeling foolish, I would return to my room each time, shaking my head at my silly imagination. Then:

Haaaargablable! Snort snort! Reeeeeeeeeeee!

"Christy. Christy!!", I whispered with panic in my voice, "Something is outside my window".

"Go back to sleep. I don't hear anything".

"No, really! I heard a snort and a weird whirring and a high-pitched noise. PLEASE come to my room and listen", I begged. I was starting to think that the stress of the move was getting to me and I was seconds from cracking up. Christy grumpily followed me back to my room and we stood motionless, in the dark, listening for whatever it was out there.

Whirrrrrr! Craiiiick!

"See!? Did you hear that??", I asked.

"Bugs. It's just bugs", she replied with a yawn and she started to walk out of the room.

Snort! Wraaaaah!

I grabbed her elbow and pulled her back in. "THAT WAS NOT A BUG".

"Oh," she said, "sounds like there might me a wild pig or two out there tonight. Don't worry, they can't get you in the house...you dork", and with that bombshell, she went back into her bedroom and locked the door.

I stood there for a minute. Wild pigs? Bugs that sounded like they might pick the house up and carry it away at any moment? What kind of place was this?? And how in the world was I supposed to sleep? I settled back into bed, hoping that exhaustion would win out over the night frights.

Just as I was starting to get drowsy, I heard Christy's door open again. From the other side of my door she whispered, "If you hear something that sounds like a woman screaming, don't go near the window. The panther might be passing through." Then I heard a giggle and the sound of her door shutting again.

So that's how my first night in Mississippi went down: I was awake, frightened, and a tiny bit weepy. Over the next few years, I got used to the noises and occasional glimpses of elusive panthers and ornery pigs, but I never got used to the orchestra of bugs that I heard during the warm nights.

And, on occasion, I still dream about giant mutated winged bugs flying off with my car.

Article Contributed by: Rebecca Rutledge.

Well now, what do ya think?

The Dew has a brand new look! What do ya'll think?

We have so much good stuff in the Dew that it was becoming really cumbersome to keep it all organized and accessible.

So I went out and got myself a brand new template!

Some of the pages are still being worked on, my poor little eyes and hands can only do so much before I head for the Jack Daniels so... you'll see it slowly improve as the days go by.

I hope you like it!

Photo of the Week

I'll admit that I found this photo on the web. An older blog site (2005). This picture was taken by Karen. It's in Lynchburg, TN.

I have yet to get a photo that's not from Tennessee!

How to Get a Human on the Phone

Okay, I know this is not a Southern Themed Article, but it might have been written by a Southerner, I'm not sure. Christopher Null, The Working Guy, wrote this and I'm just sure it's something we can all use in life. So I'm taking a little Southern break and putting out a purely informational article - enjoy!

Mon Feb 11, 2008 11:10PM EST

IVR, or Interactive Voice Response: It's the scourge of the western world. And even if you don't know it by its official name, you certainly deal with IVR, probably on a weekly basis. IVR is better known colloquially as voice mail jail, voice mail hell, and other, less savory terms that I can't publish in this column. But whatever you call it, everybody hates "talking to the computer."

But just because IVR exists doesn't mean you have to take it sitting down... for hours on end. If you know the right code, you can bypass the computer and get right to a real person (or at least the queue to wait for a real person) with no trouble at all.

GetHuman has compiled a list of all the methods, tricks, and tweaks you need to bypass IVR for 500 of the largest and most commonly called companies you're likely to deal with, from car companies and computer dealers to government agencies and more.

Even better: GetHuman provides the toll-free number (or a regular toll number, if no toll-free line is available) you need to dial, too. It's all on one big web page, HERE.

Full article HERE.

Cappy Hall Rearick Interview

One of our favorite writers here at the Dew, Cappy Rearick, participated in a interview over at Three Questions...and Answers.

Humor columnist Cappy Hall Rearick began her writing career in the 5th grade when she wrote a poem about a litterbug. It won a $5 prize and was published in her hometown newspaper in Orangeburg, SC. Today she has a wall full of awards and three books under her belt. In the last 25 years, she has authored five successful columns for newspapers and magazines. She came to column writing as a way to replenish her South Carolinian roots while nearly 3000 miles away.

Please go to Three Questions...and Answers to read the full interview.

Also, I want to suggest you bookmark Three Questions. It's an interesting site where Amy gets authors to open up and share a little with us. I think you might see some interesting tidbits there as we go along.

In her words:

"My intent is to offer information about writers and for writers in all areas: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, scripts, songwriting and more....So if you have a question or 3 you'd like answered, let me know."

'It's not a doll - it's alive!' Extraordinary survival tale of baby hurled 300 feet in tornadoes

At first, lying motionless in a field of bodies and debris, it looked like just a child's plastic doll, hurled mercilessly face down in the mud when tornadoes struck Castalian Springs, Tennessee.

But as rescuers, disheartened by the deaths of 54 people as tornadoes sheared through the southern U.S. this week, worked their way through the field a second time, they realised they had stumbled across a miracle.

"It's not a baby doll - it's alive," called out David Harmon, 31, an emergency worker from nearby Wilson County.

According to the Washington Post, he had first thought the boy was made of plastic. Then, he said, he saw the baby move.


Scene of devastation: The tornado tore through houses and felled trees across Lawrence County

The 11-month-old, dressed in a T-shirt and diaper, was lying in a field of tall grass nearly 300 feet from the duplex where he once lived.

He was face down in the mud, covered in bits of grass like many of those who had been cast about by the dozens of tornadoes that had careened across the South.

Tornadoes and thunderstorms ravaged parts of the southern U.S. Hardest hit were Tennessee, Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi and Alabama, with unconfirmed sightings of 69 tornadoes on Tuesday and yesterday.

A baby diaper is seen at the wreckage of a home near where Kyson was found, miraculously alive

The storm system stretched as far north as Ohio. Trucks were crumpled and houses, factories and shops were flattened.

But unlike at least 54 people the baby, named Kyson, had survived. He was tossed by winds that had not only flattened the brick post office next door but that had killed his 23-year-old mother, throwing her several yards in the opposite direction, into some fallen trees.

Medics on the scene said Kyson was " cold and scared, and he had this blank look in his eyes". Rescuers described their relief when the baby, mute as he was picked up by rescuers and cradled in a fireman's jacket, finally began to cry.

"It's a miracle they ain't both gone," Doug Stowell, 45, Kyson's grandfather, a carpenter and tile worker who drove up to the scene last night and found his daughter, Carrie, dead and his grandson alive, told the Post last night.

"He was found over 300 feet from his home, and that was demolished - I mean wiped clean."

It was a welcome miracle among the devastation.

------------------------------------

Article from: The Daily Mail - go HERE for full story

"Cow Traffic"

Photo Courtesy of Hidden Mahala's Web Site. Not an "official" reader photo, but I liked it enough to grab it! (It's attached to an amusing "5 ways to know you're in the South" list.)

North Alabama boy protests loss in spelling bee on `kudzu'

North Alabama boy protests loss in spelling bee on `kudzu'
1/29/2008, 4:28 p.m. CST
The Associated Press

FAIRVIEW, Ala. (AP) — Krystian Doss says he knows how to spell "kudzu," and he's positive he got the word right during the Cullman County spelling bee. Just like in the NFL, though, the final call came down to a video replay.

Christina Oanca was named the winner of the annual competition on Monday when judges determined Doss spelled "kudzu" with a "c" where the "z" should have been. After an initial protest they reviewed a video of the event — a byproduct of a past miscue.

Doss was named the runner-up, but he isn't budging on whether he was wronged.

"I know I spelled it right," said the boy, a student at Good Hope Elementary School.

Doss was on stage when the judges asked him to spell "kudzu." The boy responded right away, said father Kevin Doss.

"He did not hesitate one bit, he knew that word and he spelled it correctly," Kevin told The Cullman Times.

Judges didn't hear it that way, however. They said Krystian spelled the word incorrectly — and that led to a review. While "c" and "z" can be similar sounds when voiced, the judges said the video upheld their belief that he got the word wrong.

Following Krystian's elimination, Christina won the bee by correctly spelling "cilantro." She now is eligible to go on to the state bee in Montgomery.

Denise Schuman, the system's elementary curriculum coordinator who oversees the annual spelling bee, said the video recording was reliable "because you can see the facial movements and sounds and everything."

Unfortunately, problems have mired past spelling bees.

Organizers began videotaping the competition a few years ago after a TV station's videotape revealed that a contestant who was declared the winner actually had misspelled a word.

"It was so traumatic we implemented the automatic replay so we can avoid that in future bees," Schuman said.

Krystian said despite the bittersweet experience, he plans to be back. "Hopefully I can go to state next year," he said.

Schuman said it was unfortunate the event ended in controversy.

"If I could play this out differently, believe me I would," she said.

___

Information from: The Cullman Times

Article submitted by Jane-Ann Heitmueller

Love's Voice

The words, I love you, are just that,
They're simply words alone.
But I believe that love's not love
Until it's truly shown.

It's shown when we take time to listen
To another's heart, or when we leave out path
To help another with his part.


We see love in a caring touch, or in a
Sincere tone.
It's shown when someone changes pace,
So we won't be alone.


Love can be shown with misty eyes, a hug
Or just a glance.
It's even seen by the mere posture one
Shows in his stance.


A simple pat, a nod, a smile, these things
Have silent voice;
Yet they speak loudly of their love, because
They're made by choice.


So just remember, every day, your love is
On display,
With all your deeds and actions... not just
By the words you say.

****
Jane-Ann Heitmueller