Copied and pasted from and email from my father:

Fort Nashborough must be agreeing with you.  I was surprised to learn that the town was founded by Capt. John Donelson, as I remembered there is a Capt. John Donaldson/Donelson (both spellings are given) in our family tree, who was the progenitor of the Tennessee branch of the family, including Abram Rodgers, my dad’s great-great grandfather.  I checked a little further and the Nashville founder is one of the elder John Donelson’s children, but it was another son, William Donelson, that’s our direct ancestor.  Still, you ARE related to the founder of the town.

So there you go, when people ask why I love Tennessee so much, I can tell them it’s because it’s my town!

My sister is here.  So far it’s been like summer vacation (except where I have to work every night).  I think we’re either hitting up the pool or the museums today.  See?  Summer vacation.

Tonight my mom took my sister and me to see John Waters speak.  I tried to take notes, to share all the brilliance with you all, but it was too hard to listen and take notes.

I can tell you that there was a high number of chicks with flamingo pink hair.  Some to good effect, some to very bad.  The price of admission was worth look on my mom’s face as she watched a fabulous drag queen walk past.  She checked his dress, his shoes, his amazing wig, and when he turned her face showed the same amount of shock we all felt and the amazing amount of back hair that the guy had.  My ma loves a good drag queen as much as I do, but really, he perhaps should have had a more concealing dress.

They showed the John Water’s no smoking in this theatre thing before he came on.  I do believe seeing that was my first ever encounter with John Water’s when I was a pre-teen, I saw it at the Harvard Exit before a film and I remember pretending I got it when everyone talked about how cool John Waters was.

Well, he is cool.  Damn fucking cool.  Here are some clever, utterly out of context bits from his talk tonight:

“Let them in for free, make them pay to leave.”

“S&M looks stupid at the beach.”

“I hate that I have to tell you this.  I know you thinking ‘my ears aren’t garbage cans, John’ but tonight they are.”

“I think I lead exactly the life you think I do.”

He talked about revolution and anarchy in the ways we thought of them in my youth and yes he’s right.  From John’s mouth to the country’s ears: Hey assholes, if you care so much about Bush being a bad president, don’t buy a watch that counts down the time ’till he leaves office, instead go tip over a car or start a riot.  Yeah.  We are all apathetic now.

It was awesome.  Cross another perfect icon of my youth off my list of people to see in person before one of us dies.

On the way home my ma asked if I was going to drive over [Capitol] hill, and I said no, around it.  She then wondered if I was going to take the “Red Robin Speedway” to get to the 520 bridge.   I swear, I have never heard it called that, but as soon as she said it I knew exactly what street she meant.  Driving on Eastlake, towards the U.Dist, it’s the last turn before the bridge.  My sister and I laughed so hard over the “Red Robin Speedway,” but alas, I suspect everyone who will find it as hilarious was in the car at that moment. It was an excellent reminder of why I love my ma and sis, and how funny we all are, at least to each other.