"Wabash Cannonball" is a folk, country and rock n' roll song that is almost 150 years old, if not older. It is the oldest song in the Rock n Roll Fall of Fame's list of songs that shaped rock music. It was based on an early train song from the 1880s called "The Great Rock Island Route". The name Wabash Cannonball dates from 1904, and the oldest recordings of the song come from the 1920s. Just how old the song is, how many writes and rewrites it had, and what the song was about are lost to the murky depths of history. The oldest recordings are by The Carter Family, Roy Acuff and Hugh Cross. Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Bing Crosby and Utah Phillips and many others have recorded versions of it. I found the song on a 45 RPM phonograph the other week. I listen to it in the morning when I am working out.

This is a train song. This might be the train song. It describes a mythical train, the Wabash Cannonball, that travels around the country. The train is sometimes described in anthropomorphic terms. There is a dead man named Daddy Clayton. This song is a jingle of atavistic memories. And it also has a good beat, reminiscent of a train, of course. What is this mythic train? Where is it going? Nobody knows.

Also, the song seems to preserve an obvious truth in it---it talks about the "Eastern States" and mentions Missouri and Minnesota as being Eastern states...an obvious truth that has somehow been lost.

A few hours ago, I fell into the Wabash River and shot down it like a cannonball, due to it being rainy season. I had just finished the latest Annie Potts movie that I'd rented on VHS when it happened. I went to the bathroom on the back side of the mountain lodge that I was staying in with my boyfriend Todd McBrandonweathers. He had access because it was his wealthy, and more important by far than yours, family retreat. It was generally where his father and uncle took the underage girls that they liked to snog before going to political fundraisers. My own father was a horrible man who hung out with Todd's father and drank willingly of his corruption. They had so many of those weekends. That is why I had to kill him. That and it was the only way for me to advance as a Sith Lord ("Sexy" is just "Darth" in Italian).

So, as I get into the very bowels of the Wabash River, I have an inkling that inkles me. I have to think about it for a minute... and then, I made it dry with the power of my mind and my explosively gorgeous titsExcept, I made it too dry. I was now in the desert.

When you have goddess powers like I do, on account of being so hot, you can do different things. I can make the setting change with the power of my mind. This is one of my superpowers. Being so hot that butter melts in a freezer three states away isn't a superpower. That is all natural, baby, and so will we be at that summer cottage this year once you wire that money to my account in the Cayman Islands (tm).

See, I fel (a word you are now allowed to spell with only one "l" mind you, in case you haven't read the updated Little Brown Handbook, the Mein Kampf of the writing world) into this desert landscape knowing what I'd done. I had panicked due to the rushing waters of the Wabash River. My clitoris was shrinking up to the point where it was heading back inside for a long winter. I overdid it. My bad.

I was walking down a road, but it wasn't paved or anything like that. It was like a road made out of the fucking desert. Like, who the fuck would ever do something like that? Who conceives of this shit? Get the fucking tar trucks out here and put some fucking asphalt down you fucking winos.

There is some kind of building ahead. A store of some kind made out of mud and brick or whatever assholes use to build shit in the desert with no apparent motivation, like dirt roads made out of the same fucking desert that they are cutting through for fuck's sake. I am beside myself with upset.

So, this store, which apparently sells maracas, ice, chihuahuas, photo sessions with someone named "Steve Buckskin" (needs to be noded), and cursed dolls, is open. There is an old guy out front wearing a flannel shirt, DICKIES, cowboy boots, DICKIES  and a cowboy hat. He doesn't even look up at me. It is like 120 degrees and he is wearing a flannel shirt and DICKIES. His balls are hanging out of the fly of his DICKIES and they are hanging down REALLY low. I am starting to throw up a little bit in my mouth just writing that. Hope you didn't puke yourself. Always good to wait ten minutes after a big meal before reading things on the Internet.

What an odd time to be alive, don't you think? With what is going on today? I dare say.

So, I'm not sure what I am going to do. There is this old guy with his balls hanging out of his DICKIES and his terrible store or there is nothing.

"Excuse me, um, sir?"

"Go inside, leave the money for what you take on counter. Fuck off."

"I'm wondering how to get out of here. Does Uber come out here?"

"Lady, you are fucking pissing me off. What happened? Your 'lectrical car ran out of room for the plug and came unplugged? Go back where you came from."

"Sir, and I use that term loosely because your balls are hanging out of your DICKIES (raise it three octaves for that DICKIES), I don't know the way back to where I came from."

"You walk all way out here? Without the benefit of DICKIES?"

"Sir, I was cannonballing down the Wabash River and then I was here. I did something with my mind."

"Shut your pie hole and fuck off. Go away, or buy something inside. Leave your money on the counter. Jar is for tips."

"I could use a jelly water."

"A what? Lady, we got water and we got beer. Take your pick. Ain't no jelly water, bitch."

This is how my day was going, but then I went inside and got a Schlitz (all they had) and saw the news on the television, this five inch by five inch black and white mess on the counter. Quite a thing there.

I head back outside. This man still hasn't put his nuts away. Still hanging out of his DICKIES (raise seven octaves on that when you read it out loud to your children). I am beside myself with upset.

So, I figure I will just coninue on down the road. There hasn't been anything for hundreds of miles. My Schlitz is dry. My clitoris is like when you throw a cherry stem in the fireplace, and for some ungodly reason it doesn't burn up completely, just gets all charred on the surface. I lie down to get some sleep.

Next thing I know, I am back to going down the Wabash River at like a million miles an hour. I am now completely naked. Perverted campers are leering at me with their little malfunctioning weenies pitching tents in their ridiculous looking swimwear. I throw up a little more in my mouth at this point. Why is my life like this?

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