First there is a mill, then there is no mill, then there is. {Starkville, MS}

A few years back, I got lost in the Cotton District {what?!?  How is that even possible?  Trust me, there are lots of lil dead~ends, one way streets, and cul~de~sacs just waiting for the unsuspecting driver to get stuck in the never ending loop of right of ways and do not enters}.  As I topped the hill on Maxwell Street, I was faced with the looming, mammoth brick building facing me across Russell.  Yes, I knew that it was the EE Cooley Building for MSU, housing the physical plant facilities.  But when I first faced that central tower, full on, a lil eerie voice popped up, “ooooo, spooooky” with glee and I immediately had visions of possibilities, involving movie sets and novel locations and Stephen King and John Saul and children’s orphanages {or boarding schools, same difference} and old abandoned mental asylums.  Obviously, horror fiction is fun for me; if I actually did encounter any horrific oddities in real life, I’d probably piss my pants and do other unspeakably disgusting things like squeal like the lil girl I used to be and attempt to stuff all ten of my fingers into my mouth to stifle the screams that were sure to follow.

It’s all fun and games til someone loses an eye.  Or a mean spirit rises up, drives you mad, causing you to run into oncoming traffic, impaling yourself on a car’s hood ornament, and you die with an appalling death rictus that never shows up on CSI.  But in the meanwhile, it’s cool to imagine what these older buildings housed and oh, if only walls could talk.

Around that same time, my childhood friend {from Pennsylvania} and her family were planning to come spend a week with me in Mississippi.  I wondered what each of the children found interesting, so that I might be able to find something in this area for them as well.  The teenage girl was into spooky things, ghost stories, and hauntings.

Perfect!  My inner eerie clapped with relish, squirming and wriggling.  Amongst the other places to show her, like Waverly, cemeteries, certain roads, and such; we drove into the paved parking area in front of the EE Cooley Building.  It was hotter and more humid than the Okefenokee Swamp in August 1995 {different story}, so none of the five of us wanted to muster the energy to get out of the lil yaris and then squeeze back in {a notion that is akin to putting toothpaste back in the tube}.  So I took a picture of the name plate by the entrance, which listed all the members and their positions on that very first board of the John M Stone Cotton Mill.  Then the teenage daughter and I talked about how that building just begs for a good story or two.

Sure you could make one up, but a good story based on even the barest smidgeon of truth deserves to be researched some.  Get the facts straight and then venture off into fiction.  Or perhaps, a good juicy urban legend already exists in connection with the old brick building.

So over the years, I've done a lil digging here, and a tad searching there.  What I've often read is the same sorts of facts, rearranged from one article to another.  Sometimes there are more data included, like the actual measurements of the behemoth.  But for the most part, accounts agree with each other and reflect a fairly comprehensive history of the building, from its conception at the turn of the last century, to the present, over 110 years later.

to be cont'd

oh so wrong...

Once again, gov'ment agents have astounded me with their smug ignorance.  A loooooooooong story somewhat shorter, mom had stopped at the Social Security Administration offices here in Starkville to see if she could get her mother's ss#, to include on a form which is requesting her mother's death certificate so that she can then send that to the insurance company.  There is so much laughably wrong with the entire story, like why the insurance company is just now wanting a death certificate for a woman who died 36 yrs ago.  But I'll just stick with one element of what occurred today.

The SS Gov'ment agent insisted that my mom was not spelling her mother's name correctly.  Why?  Well because he entered the name three different ways into the system and could not track the number down.  So mom suggested that it might be possible that her mother never had a social security number {after all, Grandma would now be 100 years old, had she lived}.  OH no, ma'am, that's not possible.  Why, it's the law that babies are sent home from the hospital with one.  Well, since the lady was born a full two decades before the Social Security Administration was founded, and since she was NOT born in the hospital, and since it's most certainly not the law to send babies home with one....but the Gov'ment Agent assured my mom that he knew that her mom had to have a number.  And he was also sure that if my mom contacted her mom's school that she graduated from, they would have the number on file in their records.  Mom, who knew that continuing the conversation was an exercise in futility, made one last attempt to reason with the pompous ass:  mom pointed out that her mom only finished eighth grade, that records were most likely not in existence anymore, especially since the school does not exist and has not for at least 75 yrs.  Well, if mom wanted to, she could request a number for her mother, all she needs is the death certificate.  WTF?!?

{sigh}  Ya can't make stupid shit up like this.

The Sweetest Lil Girls

 I know that every parent is biased toward their children.  Even those of us who've adopted lil furry babies of other species are prone to think our babies are the bestest ones of all; the pick of the litter, so to say.

But really, how can you not think these two are adorable?

These two lil girls get along nicely and are constantly curled up together.  When not faux~fighting in that snarly way they have of playing, that is.

Sophie, our chiweenie, is now three and altho she is now an "adult", she still gets very puppyish and playful.  She is our watchdog of sorts.  She has a big bark, especially for a relatively lil body.  For a chiweenie, she is a bit on the bigger, denser, broader side.  But for a dog, she's on the smaller side.

Then the lil'st one, Chiquita our chihuahua, is about ten months old.  She was born the first day of spring last year and came to live with us July 3rd. She's pretty much adjusted to our home and all of the occupants.  There are still the occasional mishaps, the poop that doesn't make it onto the pPad when we are not home.  But for the most part, she loves her sisters and her humans.  She is not a yappy yippy yuppy dog, tho we do have to remind her from time to time to use her inside voice.