Odds and Ends

I have a random collection of images from the past couple of weeks that don't really go together or tell a story, but I like them and want to share. This being Tennessee, some of the "odds" are very odd, but I'm saving the best one for last. Skip to number nine if you want, but remember that some things, once seen, cannot be un-seen.

1) The Most Smartest Class Ever

Admissions has been telling us all year that the freshmen class that came in this fall is the smartest class ever, but I think they meant to say "most smartest", because I keep seeing things like this around campus:





Is it ever too early to start weeping for the future?

2) Trying Too Hard

This car was in front of Jeannie and I for a while on the way to the Auburn game a couple weeks ago:



One bumper sticker might be funny. Two, plus the "Fear This" graphic, plus the hanging skeleton in the back, plus the hologram skulls in the side windows (not pictured) is just too much. You just know the guy driving has double-dyed black hair, skinny jeans, and eyeliner, and his girlfriend's name has a Y where an I should be.

3) Sunrise, Sunset





Sometimes the sky is really pretty.

4) Jack O' Pepper

I saw this on the counter at lunch and it made me smile:



5) Golf Among the Ruins

I'm not sure how I found the website originally, but every month or so I check Roadside America for anything new in my area. In September, someone posted that there was a peeling hillbilly/pirate statue on Dollywood Lane that no one had noticed before, and sure enough, they were right. One of the dozen or so mini golf places closed, and is rapidly rotting in the heat and humidity:



I think the thing in his upraised hand was a sword, based on the hilt that's left. You can see it better here:



Even though the place is closed, the gate was partially open, and there wasn't a sign or anything, so I went in and poked around. The motel next door, the River Chase Motel, has been using it as a dumping ground for broken furniture, and most of the golf attractions are gone, but there's still a little to see and contemplate:









Someday I'll have to talk about my fascination with urban ruins. Probably with a therapist.

6) Gorilla Fireworks revisited

The first time I went to Pigeon Forge after moving here I drove past Gorilla Fireworks and snapped a quick picture from the car:



I don't usually take that route home from Pigeon Forge, so I haven't been past the store again, but I did today, and decided to pull in and see the gorillas up close:



I know this sounds odd when discussing a peeling concrete statue of an eyeless fuscia gorilla, but it seems oddly regal.

7) Sexy Stuf



I can't think of anything less sexy, as a noun or a verb, than the word "stuff". I'm not going to go all Miranda Priestly and give a ten minute lecture on "stuff" and how much it offends me and diminishes whatever it's talking about, but I would have liked to be a fly on the wall at the marketing meeting where they decided to call the store that and then decided to spell the word incorrectly.

8) Viva los Vols!

I don't usually approach the used bookstore from the interstate, so I never noticed this mural before:



Sadly, the restaurant it is painted on the side of is closed:



More urban ruins.

9) I laugh every time I look at this picture

I've noticed the Smoky Mountain Fantasy Golf before, and noticed that they had a pegasus in their waterfall. I never noticed before today, though, that the pegasus has dragon wings, and that it's anatomically correct. How on earth could you focus on golf with this staring at you?



It's like the side of a '70's era conversion van gone horribly, horribly wrong.

The guy at the booth wouldn't let me go in and walk around to take pictures without paying full price, but I saw everything I needed to from the parking lot.