The ol' Arkansas Eclipse
The ol' Arkansas Eclipse
It sounds like a euphemism, but it's not. Thankfully.
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I always love when the cultural zeitgest gets hold of a longstanding but generally unknown term of art, and right now, “The Path of Totality” is it. The phrase describes the route where an eclipse plunges a swath of the earth into total darkness, but does so with inspired descriptive perfection. “The Path of Totality” serves as the title for at least nine albums and probably also a made-for-Netflix low-end detective show, and if it’s not also already the name of some cheap-jack motivational at-home leadership course (just $475, or four easy payments of $99 each!), well, I’m going to create it.
In meteorological terms, the PATH OF TOTALITY (it sounds better in all caps) is a 60-ish-mile-wide area where the moon will rudely shoehorn its way completely in between us and the life-giving light of the sun, much like all the Capital One commercials smothering out the light of the Final Four right now. We are — depending on when you read this — just hours from the PATH OF TOTALITY cutting a southwest-to-northeast slice across the United States as the eclipse’s 2024 World Tour swings through here.
The eclipse won’t last long — only about four minutes or so — but while it does, it’s one of the more badass natural events you’ll ever experience. Confused birds settle down for the night, and the very air seems unsettled somehow as the natural order of light and darkness comes unstuck for just a short bit. This is not the time to be stuck on a Zoom call. (Here’s the rundown of when the eclipse will hit your area.)
The PATH OF TOTALITY will give the South a pretty wide berth — Eclipse is scared to play Bama, Pawwl! — but will nip through the northwest corner of Arkansas, where hotel rooms, AirBnBs and campgrounds have been sold out for weeks. Arkansas tourism officials have been preparing for an influx of as many as 1.5 million visitors, and are surely hoping those visitors stick around longer than four minutes while buying armloads of “I Burned My Corneas In Arkansas” t-shirts and dubiously-sourced eclipse glasses. The sun’s light comes and goes, but huckster culture is forever.
The last time an eclipse cloaked America in (temporary) darkness came in August 2017, and I captured this wild pic of little mini-eclipses spilled all over the ground:
That particular eclipse also produced one of the great images of Americana you’ll ever see:
When the apocalypse comes, Waffle House will still be serving scattered n’ smothered hash browns. And you can arm yourself there, too.
What I love most about the eclipse is that it’s one of the last few examples of shared experience that can break through our mile-high walls, our mile-thick bubbles that encase us all. You and I can have vastly differing ideas on politics, differing rooting interests in sports, differing tastes in music and TV — but when the damn sun goes out, well, we’re both dealing with the same objective reality at last, aren’t we?
Now, if this were a small-town newspaper column — probably called “Busbee’s Buzzin’s,” with a pic of me looking all contemplative with a pencil behind my ear and my hand on my chin — I’d use the eclipse as a tidy little can’t-we-get-along metaphor. Sadly, in 2024 we all know that not even an eclipse — or an earthquake, for those of you in the NYC area last week — can break through the adamantium barriers that so many of our countrymen and -women have built around themselves. (They’d say we’re the ones walled off, but they’re wrong, of course.)
I have hope and faith, though, that we can all experience an event in real time and revel in a minute of shared humanity. That we can feel the same sort of awe as our ancestors, minus the terror that the sun was being eaten by a giant slobbering dog, or whatever. That we can go outside and experience the glory of a once-in-a-generation natural phenomenon, that we can observe the stately majesty of celestial bodies that don’t even care a bit about our little earthly woes, that we can look up into a brilliant blue afternoon sky and clearly see —
Aw, dammit.
Anyway. If the clouds permit, observe the beauty and terror of nature wisely, my friends.
Song of the Week: ‘This Is Nowhere,’ The Black Keys
There’s a certain amplifier setting favored by North Mississippi blues artists that makes low guitar notes sound like they’re burbling up out of a thick pot of stew. I freaking love that sound. And the Black Keys have made it a key part of their arsenal, like right here in this song off their brand-new album “Ohio Players.” The thundering rumble kicks off a rousing tune whose ascending harmonies work at odds with the despairing message, so, you know, pick your route here. The Keys have become mainstays for me, and if you’re an old riffs-and-solos guitar devotee like me, bring ‘em into your rotation if you haven’t already. They’ve more than earned a place at the table.
Check out “This Is Nowhere” and all the other fine tunes we love around these parts at the ever-growing Flashlight & A Biscuit Spotify playlist:
Stunt Food of the Week: The Mets’ Cookie Egg Roll
Good in theory, horrendous in execution. That describes the New York Mets, and it also very likely describes their latest stunt food offering, the Cookie Egg Roll. Described as “a rainbow cookie, raspberry jam and chocolate syrup rolled and fried in an egg roll wrapper,” it’s two great tastes that just seem wrong together.
Thanks to loyal pal Dan Walsh for this submission. Seen stunt food I need to know about? Hit me here or tag me (@jaybusbee) on Twitter/Instagram. Let’s all enjoy America’s descent into culinary madness together.
As Carolina As It Gets
We’re big fans of NASCAR, moonshine and extralegal activity around these parts. Hell, I posted a three-part series on Georgia’s greatest moonshine runner a ways back. So it brought me no end of delight to see this story that an alleged moonshine cave was discovered beneath the stands at North Wilkesboro Speedway recently:
Even better? The great Jeremy Markovich, proprietor of the outstanding North Carolina Rabbit Hole newsletter, took up the challenge of proving/disproving the story here:
North Wilkesboro is a strange little star in the NASCAR universe, an all-but-forgotten track only spared the wrecking ball because it’s so far out in the country that nobody had developed anything near it. And now it’s the site of a mini-resurgence, hosting the occasional NASCAR race once again. I would absolutely believe that moonshine was brewed there, and so much more. There are tales in those Carolina hills we won’t ever know.
That’ll do it for this week, friends. See you next week from Augusta. They’re having a little golf tournament around there I’m going to check out. Peace!
—Jay
Land Cat, Georgia
This is issue #118 of Flashlight & A Biscuit. Check out all the past issues right here. Feel free to email me with your thoughts, tips and advice. If you’re new around here, jump right to our most-read stories, or check out some of our recent hits:
Our first documentary, on the famous Rama Jama’s diner in Tuscaloosa, Alabama:
Y’all want some hockey?
The Black Crowes and the groove vs. the rut
All hail the Luther Burger
“Until I see God or the checkered flag”: The greatest NASCAR quote of the decade
What does “Flashlight & A Biscuit” mean, anyway?
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