Explaining the myriad delights of a football Saturday in the South to anyone who has not enjoyed them may be impossible – like trying to describe the ocean to a blind man.

I am often asked “Why do Southerners still care about the Civil War?”… Because it is unique in the American experience. Defeat was total, surrender unconditional and the land still occupied.

I am often asked “Why do Southerners still care about the Civil War?”… “Because defeat was unconditional and the land still occupied.

Magic of Southern expressions? Similes and metaphorical allusions. They are the yellow highlighter of conversation.

To living in the South: If you've never had a Porterhouse, everything tastes like baloney.

The American South is an authentic American Culture. Maybe the last. The north is just a Casserole Culture – a tasteless vat of leftovers, frozen peas and stale crumbs.

In the South, history clings to you like a wet blanket. Outside your door the past awaits in Indian mounds, plantation ruins, heaving sidewalks and homestead graveyards; each slowly reclaimed by the kudzu of time.