Page 2 – SGA Mostly Mississippi 2026

Chocolate Is An Acceptable Breakfast Food

CultureJuly 20, 20260Comments 0Likes

Yup. You can get chocolate gravy for your biscuits in Mississippi.

Mrs. Terri gets up in the dark of night to make the biscuits at Abe’s Grill in Corinth. She has been doing that for 50 years. If you wanna go there before/after/during the battlefield stuff, know that they only take cash. Although the place is just pain too photogenic, it is popular with the locals.

You coulda gone to Mama 2’s Biscuits in Greenville, but you woulda been enjoying your marvelous free breakfast on the Alluvian’s rooftop terrace.

The Matrix

Now You KnowJuly 16, 20260Comments 0Likes

Out of which our dear Miss Rodhouse says our ticket procurement sprang (sprung? Anyone an English teacher?)

Your fearless leader has nubs for fingernails in anticipation of getting tickets to the Angola Prison Rodeo. Or not getting tickets to the Angola Prison Rodeo. Like any popular event, tickets are a bear to score. We have been up since midnight Wednesday doing autodial on two different phone numbers, and manual browser refresh. We finally went to sleep at two, but set alarm for every 15 minutes to check.

Having no luck and just seeing “Fall Tickets on Sale July 15” on the official website, we resorted to AI. After about a dozen frustrated back and forths with Claude, a real person with a real phone number was suggested. Having no other options we gave it a go.

Miss Smith was a delight. I explained that we had been up since midnight of the day before and wanted to know if we missed it. She told us that the tickets really were not on sale on the 15th. A phone call back was promised. Lo and behold, she did call back before the official sale time (!) Secured seats in the shade (think aluminum benches in sun as an alternative). Happy dance done.

While we are going to write about the rodeo in detail, a little on the events. These are professional animals and professional purses. The inmates are not professionals. Ambulances are on the scene.

There are normal events like bull riding (exhilarating), bronco riding (they don’t stay on for long), steer wrestling (what you’d expect), and barrel racing. The latter is done by beautiful girls, as is the opening ride out. This is sorta creepy because if you think about it these are a whole pile of men serving life sentences and no women behind bars with them. Ahem.

But there are lots of cool events you will see nowhere but here. A coupla of them involve dodging pissed off bulls. Our favorite is called Prisoner Pinball (we didn’t know it had a name), where inmates stand in hula hoops on the ground, and the last one standing (or squatting, you shall see) wins. The same few guys win it all the time. Another dodge-the-bull event is four guys playing poker and seeing who chickens out last. The best event is the last one, where a red tag is tied between the horns of, you guessed it, a bull, and the inmates try to grab it. There is a lot of money awarded. The same guy wins it every year. You have to be fast.

And did we say the participants are garbed in old-school black and white stripes?

P.S. We have been going down the rabbit hole, finding 1500 old photo negatives in an archive somewhere in Louisiana. Stay tuned to see our favorites. Remember, we went through 1500 photographs to pick the best ones so you don’t have to.

Music to Drive By

MusicDecember 5, 20250Comments 0Likes

First things first. Music. You probably cannot hear it while you are driving your Ghost, but it is a good introduction to Mississippi. Heck, you might even like it. Perhaps play it in your hotel room. Or annoy your mother.

We will be traveling in the Delta during our first week on tour. We have been advised that one must go to hear the blues performed, live, at least twice to get it. Since we will not be listening to the blues live for two nights, you are hereby assigned to keep these Spotify playlists running as your background music until you get to Mississippi:

This snippet is in the Spotify “Preview” mode. That means it will only play a few seconds of each song before going on to the next. I implore you to get Spotify. If you don’t you will be missing out on future music suggestions that you may like better, or not. Just click on the handy box that says “Get Spotify”. Isn’t that convenient?

Here are some other playlists that are not so rigidly “classic”. May be easier on the ears to newbies. The first one is more tame than the second one.

And have a little listen to Elvis as you now have Spotify. You don’t? Geez, spring for the $12 a month. You will be ostracized if you do not know your music.

This is Elvis singing the blues. Two birds with one stone.

Yellowhammer

Now You KnowJuly 30, 20250Comments 0Likes

A yellowhammer is not a tool, even for a Ghost. A yellowhammer has been the State Bird of Alabama since 1927. Consider that some states have no birds at all, this is pretty good.

But we do not care too much about the state bird of Alabama. We care about the state bird of Mississippi, and wouldn’t ya know it, Mississippi is not original in its selection.

The state bird of Florida, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Texas (and Mississippi) is the northern mockingbird. As far as I know, all those states were in the south. Whatever.

Anyhow, the Latin name of mockingbird is Mimus polyglottos meaning many-tongued mimic. We believe that is why many states mimic their official birds. It is said that they have over 200 songs, so there is plenty of room for more southern states to adopt the northern mockingbird.