Download or read book Oddball Texas written by Jerome Pohlen and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2006-02 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This amusing travel guide to the Lone Star State doesn't waste travelers' time telling them where to find antiques in the Hill Country, take breathtaking hikes through Big Bend, or gaze upon the Alamo. Instead, it guides television fans to a modern replica of the Munsters's mansion, leads the nonsqueamish to the world's only Cockroach Hall of Fame, and points the curious towards a small town filled with hippo statues. Among other things, Texas is home to Goliath-sized roadside attractions, and directions are provided on how to reach the World's Largest Six-Shooter, World's Largest Rattlesnake, and World's Largest Wooden Nickel. The accompanying photographs and maps instruct visitors on how to get to these and other extraordinary spots, including the Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, the Celebrity Shoe Musuem, Alley Oop's Fantasyland, and the Birthplace of Fritos. A dose of wacky Texas history is also included with answers to questions such as "Did a UFO really crash into a windmill northwest of Fort Worth in 1897? "and "What does an Abilene Kinko's have to do with the early retirement of Dan Rather?"
Download or read book Oddball Michigan written by Jerome Pohlen and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2014-05-01 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There’s more to Michigan than beautiful forests, shuttered factories, and miles and miles of stunning shoreline. Armed with this offbeat travel guide, you’ll soon discover the strange underbelly of the Great Lakes State. Michigan has monuments to fluoridation, snurfing, the designer of the Jefferson nickel, and the once-famous Mr. Chicken, as well as festivals honoring tulips, Christmas pickles, and a 38-acre fungus. It’s where you’ll find the World’s Largest Lugnut, the Nun Doll Museum, Joe’s Gizzard City, the Teenie-Weenie Pickle Barrel Cottage, Howdy Doody, and Thomas Edison’s last breath. The state also has its share of weird history—it’s where Harry Houdini perished on Halloween night in 1926, where skater Tanya Harding’s posse whacked Nancy Kerrigan, and where the Kellogg brothers invented popular breakfast cereals and less-popular yogurt enemas. Along with humorous histories and witty observations, Oddball Michigan provides addresses, websites, hours, fees, and driving directions for each of its 450 entries.
Download or read book Oddball Illinois written by Jerome Pohlen and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2012-05-01 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this updated edition, it's plain to see that the state of Illinois has only gotten weirder. Where there was once just a single Popeye statue in downstate Chester, today the town has monuments to Olive Oyl, Swee' Pea, Bluto, the Sea Hag, and more. The creepy Piasa Bird petroglyph on the bluff in Alton now has a roadside pullout with picnic tables, and the two-story outhouse in Gays has a new contemplative garden. With almost twice as many destinations as its predecessor, this edition boasts detailed information on each site—address, phone number, website, hours, entry fees, and driving directions—as well as maps, photos, and a wealth of regional history in the descriptions. Some new sites include Henry's Rabbit Ranch, the World's First Jungle Gym, Ahlgrim Acres (a miniature golf course at a funeral home), the Leather Archives and Museum, General Santa Ana's two wooden legs, the World's Largest Sock Monkey, the Friendship Shoe Fence, a truck stop with a marionette show, and a coin-operated fire-breathing dragon. There is more between Chicago and St. Louis than cornfields and plenty of fascinating places in the Windy City that aren't on Michigan Avenue, and here is a chance to see these underappreciated sites throughout the state.
Download or read book Oddball Wisconsin written by Jerome Pohlen and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2013-05-01 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Updated and even stranger, this new edition boasts more than 400 unique destinations for tourists looking for attractions off the beaten path. Bizarre locations and landmarks include Chainsaw Gordy's Garden of Saws, Smokey Bear's head, the World's Largest Soup Kettle, the Toilet Bowl Parade, and the world's only upside-down White House. This book offers fascinating and little-known historical tidbits and answers burning questions such as Where was Liberace born? What is a hodag, and where do you catch one? Who invented the hamburger? and Will a Polka Hall of Fame ever be built? This is the real guide to Wisconsin, birthplace of the snowmobile, the typewriter, and the ice cream sundae. The address, phone number, hours, cost, directions, and website of each oddity accompany its description.
Download or read book Oddball Minnesota written by Jerome Pohlen and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2003-04 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Land of the world's largest prairie chicken, birthplace of Spam, and home of the world's oldest rock, this is Minnesota, where summers are short, winters are long, and back-road wonders abound. This entertaining guide wastes no time with descriptions of scenic lakes, pristine bike trails, or quaint cafes. Instead it directs travelers (and residents) to the spot where Tiny Tim strummed his last notes on the ukulele; to the Cold Spring chapel where two grasshoppers bow down to the Virgin Mary; and to the McLeod County Museum, where the mummy on display could be from Peru or outer space. While ordinary tourists are fighting off mosquitoes in the Boundary Waters, oddball travelers can size up the world's largest ear of corn and admire the fourth Zamboni ever built. And one last thing: there aren't 10,000 lakes in Minnesota; there are 14,215. For travelers who are in search of the unusual, there is no better reason to park the bike and hiking boots in the garage, fill up the gas tank, and hit the road to Minnesota, where weirdness awaits.
Download or read book Andy Warner s Oddball Histories Pests and Pets written by Andy Warner and published by Little, Brown Ink. This book was released on 2021-09-07 with total page 189 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The bestselling author of Brief History of Everyday Objects explores the animals we love, the ones we make use of, and the ones that make use of us in this hilarious, informative mix of storytelling and factbook.Did you know that 32 pigeons have received medals for wartime valor? And a dog named Laika was the very first creature to orbit the Earth? Did you know that there is an island in Japan entirely overrun by bunnies? And -- for a brief time -- rats adorned with ribbons were a popular lap pet in upper-class London? In Andy Warner's Oddball Histories: Pests and Pets, you can find out more than you ever thought possible about creatures both cute and weird, both large and small, while discovering new stories about human history from the perspective of our animal companions. Did you know that bees communicate with each other using special dances? Or that a popular anime called Rascal the Racoon may be largely responsible for Japan's huge raccoon population? Packed with incredible facts and charming stories like these, this is the perfect book for curious readers.
Download or read book Out of the Blue written by Elizabeth Shreeve and published by Candlewick Press. This book was released on 2024-06-18 with total page 33 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Graceful, succinct prose and engaging illustrations trace the evolution of life on Earth out of the blue and back again. Clear and inviting nonfiction prose, vetted by scientists--together with lively illustrations and a time line--narrate how life on Earth emerged "out of the blue." It began in the vast, empty sea when Earth was young. Single-celled microbes too small to see held the promise of all life-forms to come. Those microbes survived billions of years in restless seas until they began to change, to convert sunlight into energy, to produce oxygen until one day--Gulp!--one cell swallowed another, and the race was on. Learn how and why creatures began to emerge from the deep--from the Cambrian Explosion to crustaceans, mollusks to fishes, giant reptiles to the rise of mammals--and how they compare to the animals we know today, in a lively and accessible outing into the prehistoric past that boils a complex subject down to its lyrical essence.
Download or read book State Oddities written by Nancy Hendricks and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2022-05-18 with total page 407 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: State Oddities takes a different kind of look at the American nation, spotlighting the fun foibles, peculiarities, and twists in each of the 50 states that are (mostly) united under the Stars and Stripes. State Oddities is a fascinating trip through the 50 states for students studying America, teachers planning classroom activities, and general readers who will enjoy an eye-opening journey through the nation's fun side. It offers a compelling look at the character of America through the individuality of 50 very distinct states that together form the USA. This book paints a picture of the broad sweep of the American story, offering a gateway to the country as it developed into one nation filled with individual states that can be remarkably different from each other, yet unified under such national symbols as the American flag and "The Star-Spangled Banner." The author of State Oddities has become known as a master of "painless history," telling America's story in a sparkling style along with the historian's eye for fascinating detail. On the book's cross-country journey, the reader will find that it differs from other works by taking a fresh look at stories we think we know.
Download or read book How to Be a Texan written by Andrea Valdez and published by Univ of TX + ORM. This book was released on 2016-05-03 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From two-stepping to tamaladas, “a must-read manual for anyone looking to learn more about the wild and wonderful state” (Texas Monthly) There are certain things every Texan should know how to do and say, whether your Lone Star roots reach all the way back to the 1836 Republic or you were just transplanted yesterday. Some of these may be second nature to you, but others…well, maybe it wouldn’t hurt to have a few handy hints if, say, branding the herd or hosting a tamalada aren’t your usual pastimes. That’s where How to Be a Texan can help. In a lighthearted style, Andrea Valdez offers illustrated, easy-to-follow steps for dozens of authentic Texas activities and sayings. In no time, you’ll be talking like a Texan and dressing the part; hunting, fishing, and ranching; cooking your favorite Texas dishes; and dancing cumbia and two-step. You’ll learn how to take a proper bluebonnet photo and build a Día de los Muertos altar, and you’ll have a bucket list of all the places Texans should visit in their lifetime. Not only will you know how to do all these things, you’ll finish the book with a whole new appreciation for what it means to be a Texan.
Download or read book Country Music written by Richard Carlin and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-02-25 with total page 516 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This illustrated A-Z guide covers more than 700 country music artists, groups, and bands. Articles also cover specific genres within country music as well as instruments used. Written in a lively, engaging style, the entries not only outline the careers of country music's greatest artists, they provide an understanding of the artist's importance or failings, and a feeling for his or her style. Select discographies are provided at the end of each entry, while a bibliography and indexes by instrument, musical style, genre, and song title round out the work. For a full list of entries, a generous selection of sample entries, and more, visit the Country Music: A Biographical Dictionary website.
Download or read book Oddball written by Sarah Andersen and published by Andrews McMeel Publishing. This book was released on 2021-12-07 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The newest Sarah's Scribbles collection from New York Times bestselling author and Goodreads Choice award winner Sarah Andersen. The fourth book in the enormously popular graphic novel series, the latest collection of Sarah's Scribbles comics explores the evils of procrastination, the trials of the creative process, the cuteness of kittens, and the beauty of not caring about your appearance as much as you did when you were younger. When it comes to humorous illustrations of the awkwardness and hilarity of millennial life, Sarah's Scribbles is without peer.
Download or read book Turning the Tide written by Tom Horton and published by Island Press. This book was released on 2003-07-15 with total page 425 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1991, Island Press published Turning the Tide, a unique and accessible examination of the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem. The book took an indepth look at the Bay’s vital signs to gauge the overall health of its entire ecosystem and to assess what had been done and what remained to be done to clean up the Bay. This new edition of Turning the Tide addresses new developments of the past decade and examines the factors that will have the most significant effects on the health of the Bay in the coming years.With new case studies and updated maps, charts, and graphs, the book builds on the analytical power of ten years of experience to offer a new perspective, along with clear, science-based recommendations for the future. For all those who want to know not only how much must be done to save the Bay but what they can do and how they can make a difference, Turning the Tide is an essential source of information.
Download or read book Pop Culture Places 3 volumes written by Gladys L. Knight and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2014-08-11 with total page 1773 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This three-volume reference set explores the history, relevance, and significance of pop culture locations in the United States—places that have captured the imagination of the American people and reflect the diversity of the nation. Pop Culture Places: An Encyclopedia of Places in American Popular Culture serves as a resource for high school and college students as well as adult readers that contains more than 350 entries on a broad assortment of popular places in America. Covering places from Ellis Island to Fisherman's Wharf, the entries reflect the tremendous variety of sites, historical and modern, emphasizing the immense diversity and historical development of our nation. Readers will gain an appreciation of the historical, social, and cultural impact of each location and better understand how America has come to be a nation and evolved culturally through the lens of popular places. Approximately 200 sidebars serve to highlight interesting facts while images throughout the book depict the places described in the text. Each entry supplies a brief bibliography that directs students to print and electronic sources of additional information.
Download or read book In the Heart of Texas written by Ginger McKnight-Chavers and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-10-25 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Named a “Top Pick” by RT Book Reviews Named a “Fall Must-Read” by RedbookMag.com * PopSugar * Parade Magazine * Brit + Co * SoulCycle Hailed as a “Best Fiction Book by Women of Color” at Bustle.com Pitched as “a poor man’s Halle Berry,” forty-one-year-old soap star Jo Randolph, has successfully avoided waiting tables since she left Midland, Texas at eighteen. But then, in the span of twenty-four hours, Jo manages to lose her job, burn her bridges in Hollywood, and accidentally burn down her lover/director’s beach house—after which she is shipped home to Texas by her agent to stay out of sight while she sorts out her situation. The more Jo reluctantly reconnects with her Texas “roots” and the family and friends she left behind, the more she regains touch with herself as an artist and with what is meaningful in life beyond the limelight. The summer of 2007 is cathartic for Jo, whose career and lifestyle have allowed her to live like a child for forty years, but who now must transition to making grown-up decisions and taking on adult responsibilities. In the Heart of Texas is a wry, humorous commentary on the complexities of race, class, relationships, politics, popular culture, and celebrity in our current society.
Download or read book Jojo s Bizarre Adventure Manga s Refined Oddball written by Frederico Anzalone and published by . This book was released on 2021-10-31 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What do Michelangelo, Clint Eastwood, Lady Gaga, Stephen King and Gianni Versace have in common? They are among the thousand and one influences of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, one of the most unclassifiable mangas of all time. This is also one of the most popular ones, with more than 100 million copies sold in Japan and a publication that has been going since 1987! Between portraits of artists, behind-the-scenes tales, in-depth analyses and a critical essay, this book investigates every aspects of this crazy work, which has become a worldwide pop-cultural phenomenon.
Download or read book Paulie Maki written by Gail Wickstrom and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2021-11-04 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Pauli Maki is born into a loving family, no one ever anticipates that one day he will become a hopeless alcoholic. Expected to go far in life, he has a healthy, normal childhood in a small town that includes his good friends, Rotten Mugga, Football, Hicks, and Magooch. As Maki gradually progresses into the disease of alcoholism, what begins as a pastime of enjoying a few brews with his chums degenerates into wholesale binges. While he experiences drunken excesses and often-productive periods of sobriety, Maki repeatedly forfeits success for failure. As the cycle seemingly never ends, an engagement to be married is broken, he is fired from promising positions as an aerospace engineer, and becomes very familiar with the inside of a jail cell. Even worse yet, there is a murder. Saddled with guilt, Maki believes he is partially responsible. As his already dark life spirals even further downward, he winds up on skid row. Is there any hope for Maki who has become completely addicted to alcohol? In this novel inspired by true events, an aerospace engineer battling alcoholism spirals downward to rock bottom where he eventually discovers there is always hope.
Download or read book Bats of the Republic written by Zachary Thomas Dodson and published by Doubleday. This book was released on 2015-10-06 with total page 471 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Archetypes of the cowboy story, tropes drawn from sci-fi, love letters, diaries, confessions all abound in this relentlessly engaging tale. Dodson has quite brilliantly exposed the gears and cogs whirring in the novelist’s imagination. It is a mad and beautiful thing.” --Keith Donohue, The Washington Post Winner of Best of Region for the Southwest in PRINT’s 2016 Regional Design Awards Bats of the Republic is an illuminated novel of adventure, featuring hand-drawn maps and natural history illustrations, subversive pamphlets and science-fictional diagrams, and even a nineteenth-century novel-within-a-novel—an intrigue wrapped in innovative design. In 1843, fragile naturalist Zadock Thomas must leave his beloved in Chicago to deliver a secret letter to an infamous general on the front lines of the war over Texas. The fate of the volatile republic, along with Zadock’s future, depends on his mission. When a cloud of bats leads him off the trail, he happens upon something impossible... Three hundred years later, the world has collapsed and the remnants of humanity cling to a strange society of paranoia. Zeke Thomas has inherited a sealed envelope from his grandfather, an esteemed senator. When that letter goes missing, Zeke engages a fomenting rebellion that could free him—if it doesn’t destroy his relationship, his family legacy, and the entire republic first. As their stories overlap and history itself begins to unravel, a war in time erupts between a lost civilization, a forgotten future, and the chaos of the wild. Bats of the Republic is a masterful novel of adventure and science fiction, of elliptical history and dystopian struggle, and, at its riveting core, of love.
