blooddirtandangels

01/10/2026

Democrat-Gazette online

12/07/2025

I don't save things any more. The digital world has trained me out of it. Everything feels retrievable with a few keystrokes. But I used to be a pack rat, saving compulsively--letters, drafts, interview transcripts, the ephemera of a life lived on paper.

12/15/2024

Richie Allen Weeps

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12/14/2024

In 1998, when the world became aware that the President of the United States had conducted an extramarital affair with a White House intern, I was alarmed that a person in such a powerful position would show such poor judgment, but I was not exactly shocked. I could be indignant about Bill Clinton’s recklessness, his willingness to risk political capital for moments of release and gratification, but I could not ignore what I understood to be reality: given the opportunity, a lot of heterosexual men would have behaved as Clinton behaved....

In 1998, when the world became aware that the President of the United States had conducted an extramarital affair with a White House intern, I was alarmed that a person in such a powerful position …

12/12/2024

On Writing

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12/09/2024

Grandpa’s Watch

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12/08/2024

It was probably almost midnight, maybe later, in a club called the Blarney Stone, near Centenary College on Youree Drive in Shreveport, when we got the word. I don’t know whether there was a general announcement—in my mind someone heard it on the radio and whispered it in the ear of one of the guys in the band between songs. I told the story that way for a while, until the bass player corrected me, someone in the kitchen in the back was watching…...

It was probably almost midnight, maybe later, in a club called the Blarney Stone, near Centenary College on Youree Drive in Shreveport, when we got the word. I don’t know whether there was a g…

11/26/2024

Bereft

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11/23/2024

Fittingly, the earliest movie I recall is 1962’s Safe at Home!, a baseball quickie made in the wake of the historic 1961 season in which the New York Yankees’ Roger Maris hit sixty-one home runs to break the single-season record that had been held by Babe Ruth since 1927. The movie stars Maris and teammates Mickey Mantle (who had also been part of that historic home run chase, ending the season with fifty-four dingers) and Wh**ey Ford, the Yankees' best starting pitcher....

Fittingly, the earliest movie I recall is 1962’s Safe at Home!, a baseball quickie made in the wake of the historic 1961 season in which the New York Yankees’ Roger Maris hit sixty-one home runs to…

11/20/2024

This is a raw mix of new performance of an old song, one we did for the Something for the Pain album in 2017. It’s not really about Taylor Swift. This is just me, on everything.

This is a raw mix of new performance of an old song, one we did for the Something for the Pain album in 2017. It’s not really about Taylor Swift. This is just me, on everything.

11/18/2024

In 2004, my wife Karen and I hosted a “open screening” for the Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival, an event where local (and not so local, we had artists from several surropunding states show up) filmmakers could screen their in-progress or un-platformed short films and get feedback from their peers. A composer named Hans Stiritz showed up with an amazing five-minute movie he called…...

In 2004, my wife Karen and I hosted a “open screening” for the Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival, an event where local (and not so local, we had artists from several surropunding states show up…