All Comments on 'Life in the Redneck Town of Panhandle in 1969 Ch. 02'

Back in '69 we had what teenagers don't have today--drive-in theaters. What a great place to fondle your girlfriend and fog up the windows. Half the teens had no idea what movie was playing, but it didn't matter, because most of the action was on the bench seat, not on the screen. Oh yes, bench seats--not 'birth control seats' installed in today's cars. Perhaps that's one reason the current teen birth rate is down?

For the love of all that is holy . . . I know rednecks. I live amongst rednecks. The dialogue in these stories is a flat out insult to rednecks. Hell, it'd be an insult to hillbillies too, but I don't think that's the demographic what you're aiming for.

I'm trying to get turned on here. Really. I am. But more than anything I'm just getting pissed off. Not even the most dyed in the wool yokel bent on confounding some damned Yankee tourist lays it on this freakin thick. I'm surprised you didn't take the opportunity to throw in some cracks about the almost certain illiteracy of the hayseed hicks you've created here.

The worst part is, you get a lot of the colloquialisms right (though there is some bleeding over into Ebonics that I'm not sure was intentional). So apparently you write from at least SOME degree of experience or knowledge. But, if that's the case, you should know that ain't no country folk TALK as damned much as you have yours doin'. Their grammar and diction may suck, but at least they's concise. "Verbose," they ain't. Know what I mean, Cuz? Hyuck, hyuck, hyuck.

When you've got one character breaking away from the over the top dialogue and telling an actual story . . . this is good stuff. The scenes you put the characters in, and the relational dynamics between the characters makes for some pretty hot stuff. And that's kind of salt in the wound for me because, when you have characters talking to each other, you inevitably pit them to out-hicking each other. Why? As a reader, it's a total distraction.

One assumes that, if'n you hailed from hinterland from the git-go, you done gone and got yerself all "citified" now, and this is you lookin' back at (and way, way down on) yer roots. Alternatively, this just seems like the innate sense of superiority to and contempt for a life-long urbanite has for their caricature perception of the peasantry out in the wastelands beyond the city limits. (Red staters, eww! Gross! As if!)

Maybe I'm too sensitive. Maybe I'm taking it personally when, really, you was just joshin' around about all this. Jus' tryin' to have a li'l fun is all. Ain't mean no harm by it. Sheee-oot. If'n that's the case, fer the next installment, maybe remember that, like my great-great-grandpappy used to say, "Jesus, dude. A little goes a long fucking way."