Supporting Friends Friday: Frederick Ingram’s Christmas Groove

Today is the day of the big Christmas concert at school, and despite some moments of despair earlier in the week, I am feeling cautiously optimistic about the whole thing.  The kids are going to do a wonderful job, I am sure; I’m more worried about getting all of the tech stuff done in time, but it will happen, one way or another.

That said, it’s going to be a short Supporting Friends Friday this week—at least for me.  You, dear reader, get to listen to six minutes and twenty-four seconds of an excellent new Christmas track from my good buddy Frederick Ingram.

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Lazy Sunday CXXXIV: Friends, Part IV

Well, I’ve finally gotten enough new editions of Supporting Friends Friday to do another retrospective.  This weekend’s posts include the most recent three editions, and they’re all writers:

Well, that’s it for another Lazy Sunday.  Here’s hoping yours is relaxing, too!

Happy Sunday!

—TPP

Other Lazy Sunday Installments:

Lazy Sunday CXXX: Friends, Part II

The friendship rolls on this Sunday, as I continue to look back at past editions of Supporting Friends Friday (read last week’s here).  Introducing the (nearly) weekly feature has been a real joy, and it’s quickly become one of my favorite of my regularly recurring series.

The three installments featured this Sunday are a bit of a mixed-bag, unlike last week’s heavily musical selection.  We’ve got a professor and her book of poetry; an organization dedicated to helping bull terriers; and another musician buddy of mine:

Well, that’s it for another Lazy Sunday.  Thank you for being a friend!

Happy Sunday!

—TPP

Other Lazy Sunday Installments:

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Supporting Friends Friday: photog

After honoring Mogadishu Matt last Friday, I figured I should pay tribute to my staunchest blogging ally, the venerable photog, proprietor of Orion’s Cold Fire.

I discovered photog after he ran ads on The Drudge Report, back before Matt Drudge sold out to the Bidenistas (photog is now a WhatFinger News man).  I’m still blown away that he had the cash on hand to buy ads on Drudge, which I think he told me was the result of having money to burn on his hobby.  Hey, more power to you, photog.

photog gets his lower-cased, e. e. cummings-esque nom de plume from his love of photography.  If you’re a shutterbug, he writes a number of technical articles about various pieces of high-end camera equipment that he tests out.  If you’re like me and just want to see the pretty pictures, he has plenty of those, too.

In addition to photography, photog writes some hilarious and detailed reviews of everything from episodes of The Twilight Zone and Star Trek to classic movies, as well as science-fiction novels and country musicHe’s even written a review of a cheesy sci-fi flick for this blog.  My attempt at offering a little bit of something for every interest is inspired, in part, by his generalist approach to blogging.

But where photog really shines is his political commentary (I will hasten to add that his photography really is great; I hope he publishes a book of his nature photography soon).  He writes broadly on everything from the importance of family to Deep State perfidy to what conservatives should do in a world that wants us destroyed.  I often find myself agreeing with his conclusions.

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Supporting Friends Friday: The Music of John Pickett

The local music scene in the Pee Region of South Carolina is surprisingly robust, with some truly stellar musicians.  The creative heart of this scene rests in several open mic nights at local coffee shops.  Currently, the two big open mics to have resumed are at The Purple Fish Coffee Company in Darlington, South Carolina, and at Crema Coffee Bar in Hartsville, South Carolina.  The Fish hosts its open mic on Friday evenings, and Crema hosts its on Tuesday nights.

The other major open mic—probably the most enduring of the current Big Three—was at Lula’s Coffee Company in Florence, South Carolina.  Lula’s, however, has not resumed its legendary Thursday night open mic night—an open mic so artistically fervent, it inspired an entire book of poetry—much to the chagrin and bafflement of its most devoted performers, yours portly included.

But before there were any of these establishments, there was Bean Groovy, a now-defunct coffee shop that used to occupy a magical little bit of strip mall in Florence.  I know the former owner of Bean Groovy—himself a studio engineer in the distant past—and despite some attempts to reopen the establishment at other locations, it’s never made a return.

Nevertheless, Bean Groovy was where I got my start in local music in the Pee Dee, way back in the hazy, halcyon days of circa 2012-2013.  It, along with The Midnight Rooster in Hartsville (still in business, but it’s shifted from being a quirky coffee house into a frou-frou upscale dining establishment) were my old stomping grounds as I broke my way into the region’s open mic scene.

It was at Bean Groovy sometime in probably 2012 or 2013 that I met one of my best friends, John Pickett.  John is an excellent guitarist and singer, and he possesses one of the best ears for music I’ve ever encountered.

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Supporting Friends Friday: Jeremy Miles’s New Book is Out Now

One of the joys of blogging and creating is the opportunity to support my buddies’ work.  I’ve been blessed to be associated with quite a few prolific and ingenious individuals, and while I have spent many a Bandcamp Friday hawking my digital wares, I’m excited to take this Friday to showcase a friend’s work.

My real-life buddy Jeremy Miles (who also maintains a blog) has released his latest book of poetryHindsight: Poetry in 2020.  It’s available in paperback, hardcover, and Kindle editions, at (as of 8 June 2021) $15, $25, and $2.99, respectively.  I’ve ordered the paperback version and eagerly await its arrival.

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