I’m a South Dakotan even though I’ve spent nearly my entire life away from the place. I guess since there are so few of us we have to maintain an allegiance to the state. So I subscribe to my local newspaper, The Mobridge Tribune, faithfully following the sports activity, the obituaries (to see which of my classmates or acquaintances have fled northward, and I don’t mean to North Dakota), and the “Remember When” column that reprints news from each decade in the past. And there’s the “Cook of the Week” section that focuses on a Mobridgeite renowned for his or her cooking. Last week’s cook was Donna Billings, with details of her life and a number of her favorite recipes. I checked out one for BBQ Sauce and nearly broke up when I read her first ingredient: 1 gallon catsup. Just exactly how much bbq sauce would you be making, and why would anyone need that much? Barbecuing a whole pig or cow? And where would one even come by that much catsup? I can only imagine that Donna grew up on a farm where she and her mother had to feed twenty or thirty members of a thrashing crew. Only in South Dakota would one need that much bbq sauce for any one occasion.
I've always collected errors in diction, things people mis-hear, like "windshield factor" and "the next store neighbors." Years ago, one of my students wrote an essay in which she described the world as being harsh and cruel, "a doggy-dog world." I've since come to think she may have been more astute and accurate than those who describe it in the usual way. My Stories - Mobridge Memories -
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Most of what I've written has been published as e-books and is available at Amazon. Match Play is a golf/suspense novel. Dust of Autumn is a bloody one set in upstate New York. Prairie View is set in South Dakota, with a final scene atop Rattlesnake Butte. Life in the Arbor is a children's book about Rollie Rabbit and his friends (on about a fourth grade level). The Black Widow involves an elaborate extortion scheme. Happy Valley is set in a retirement community. Doggy-Dog World is my memoir. And ES3 is a description of my method for examining English sentence structure.
In case anyone is interested in any of my past posts, an archive list can be found at the bottom of this page. I'd appreciate any feedback you may have by sending me an e-mail note--jertrav33@aol.com. Thanks for your interest.
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