Snobbin: Beautiful Trash in the Pop Culture Gutter

When I was a kid, my family and I would travel from Park Falls to Minocqua, Wisconsin to go shopping. On these trips, I would look out the window when I was not reading. We would drive an hour across State Highway 70 through the scenic Riley Lake Wildlife Management Area, a 1,252 area of bogs, spruce trees, and acidic Muskeg soil. I always distinctly remember the Tamarack bogs, where spindly yellow trees contrasted sharply with the green grass they grew past. Sometimes, I imagined these bogs would overtake the earth, spreading the thin trees across the globe, their full tops seemingly overshadowed by their lank trunks. Yet, somehow, they would overpower, despite great odds. These bogs contrasted sharply with conifer groves of blue spruce trees and balsams. Swatches of poplars were also common, as well as stands of maple and alder thickets. I marveled at the different trees and grasses and felt an affinity for the boggy landscape. I used to walk through similar bogs with my grandfathe...

The clouds started forming at five o'clock pm The funnel clouds touched down five miles north of Russellville Sirens were blowing, clouds spat rain As the thing came through, I swear it sounded like a train -- Drive-By Truckers, "Tornadoes" A massive F3 tornado came through my hometown of Park Falls, Wisconsin in the summer of 1985. My family and I were spending the night at my grandparent's cabin 20 miles away riding out what we thought was a typical summer storm. Mostly all I remember was reading comics at the cabin and the usual fights I had with my uncle (he is only three years older than me). I kept my comics at the cabin, but after this tornado I got into reading them more. I put them in boxes and I would have to hide them in the basement with each passing summer storm. In the morning my dad went to survey the damage of the storm. We used to have big, sheltering trees in the front yard and these were gone now. They had been toppled over by the winds. On...

When I was a kid, long before I began delving into folklore, collecting stories, and thinking about how differently stories are told in an oral form than a written one, my friends and I used to visit Holy Cross Road in an effort to experience supposed supernatural phenomena. This concept is commonly referred to by folklorists as Legend Tripping. Adolescents tend to venture out at night to explore places that are considered supernatural or haunted. Often certain rituals are carried out in order to either prove that kids were there, or just to prove that they aren't scared. Holy Cross was definitely the premier place for teenagers to go when I was in High School. I'm not certain it still maintains this status, but we certainly had fun going there. Our first trip there was an adventure in itself. I had heard many stories about the place -- it maintained quite a reputation. These stories ranged from the tame (unexplained noises) to the truly bizarre (gnomes, floating men, shot ...