Dr. Waffle & Friends

Our guest writer this week is the fabulous Mary Miller, who reads a short essay that appeared in McSweeney's—all about how her uncle was maybe not as famous as she had always thought. She and Dr. Waffle discuss music, fame, writing, ambition, big families, the South, storytelling, and storytelling in the South.

TAGS: Cliff Thomas Trio; Lloyd Price; Elvis Presley; Graceland; Sun Studio; American Bandstand; Memphis, Tennessee; Jackson, Mississippi; Jerry Lee Lewis; George Eliot; possums; Southern storytelling

Spoilers: Who wrote “Stagger Lee”; what happened to Jerry Lee Lewis

Links:

Lloyd Price’s version of “Stagger Lee”

The Cliff Thomas Trio page at Sun Records

Mary Miller’s website

Mary’s story “Outage” in the Oxford American

Cool review of Mary’s work in the LA Review of Books

The entry on Mary Miller in the Mississippi Encyclopedia!

Fat Possum Records

Tom Lake, Ann Patchett’s most recent novel

Melissa Ginsburg’s Doll Apollo

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PODCAST WEBSITE

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It's a brand new season of Dr. Waffle & Friends! (In case you haven't noticed, a "new season" usually means that a few months of extreme busyness has kept Dr. Waffle from making any new episodes for a while....)

We're kicking off Season 4 with a corker -- a timely episode about New Zealand (for all those thinking about repatriating for any reason) and a Special Mystery Guest Friend! You won't want to miss this one!

TAGS: New Zealand; extreme sports; caving; accents; kiwifruit; kiwis; Kiwis; bats; possums; Māori language; rugby; haka; residential schools; guns; Edmund Burke; Rotorua; ADD; misogyny; cigarettes; Jacinda Ardern

Spoilers: introduction of mammals to New Zealand; current prime minister of New Zealand

The Coast to Coast race

Dee’s essay about her mother-in-law’s letters

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PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Guest writer Cannon Schmitt reads an essay about becoming a surfer later in life, and Dee and Cannon discuss the spiritual aspects of sports, what it means to give up on mastery, parallels between surfing and writing, and so much more!

TAGS: surfing; William Finnegan's Barbarian Days; spirituality; Baptist Church; Georgia; writing; academia; Buddhism; Nicholson Baker; the Levenger catalogue

Spoilers: Dee’s second academic book project

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

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PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Cannon can be reached at [email protected]

In this episode, Dr. Waffle welcomes another guest interviewer, close friend (and baker and pianist extraordinaire) Maura Glennon. Dee and Mo discuss the pains and pleasures (and pains) of home ownership, dealing with repair people, the fear of being an asshole, some light politics, and the difficulties of building community.

TAGS: Vancouver; Oxford, Mississippi; Carnegie Hall; Florence Pie Bar

Spoilers: The saga of 1616 Grant Street; the fate of Colin the Boiler Repairman

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

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PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Dr. Waffle welcomes her first guest writer, Melissa Cole! In this episode, Melissa reads an essay about writing an essay that appeared in Newsweek and the blowback that ensued. She and Dr. Waffle discuss women’s bodily autonomy, the right to privacy, the public personas of authors, the writing process, and so much more!

TAGS: Newsweek; Sandra Tsing Loh; Roe v Wade; Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization; SCOTUS; public education; SRAs; Dickens; horror films

The Haunted States of America, with Melissa’s story about North Carolina

Melissa’s most recent short story, “The Liminality of a Decent Couch,” in the Fall 2024 issue of Slippery Elm Literary Journal

Read about Daniel the Emotional Support Duck

Deanna’s essay in which she chats with her postal carrier

The Dickens Universe

Dan Blank’s Substack, The Creative Shift

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

FOLLOW us @drwafflepod on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook

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PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Check out Melissa’s website and Instagram

Welcome to Season Three of Doctor Waffle & Friends! It’s a whole new recipe, containing 50% more Friends! Beginning with this episode, our new format will alternate episodes in which Dr. Waffle reads an essay and is interviewed by a Friend, and episodes in which a guest writer reads an essay and is interviewed by Dr. Waffle.

In the first episode of the new season, Dee shares an essay about Jesus Christ Superstar, and is interviewed by her (spunky) bestie Trish Tilburg. Dee and Trish discuss parental record collections, Broadway musicals, their childhood relationship to religion, Broadway musicals, political activism, and Broadway musicals. Dee confesses an embarrassing secret regarding Broadway musicals.

TAGS: Jesus Christ Superstar; Christianity; Rodgers and Hammerstein; 2024 Presidential election

Spoilers for Hamilton, Les Misérables, and the New Testament

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

FOLLOW us @drwafflepod on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook

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PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit doctorwaffle.substack.com

In this episode, Tania’s story cues us up to FINALLY talk about "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," and we share favorite moments, relationships, and themes. We also discuss watching TV with friends, TV you have to pay attention to, and people who talk during TV shows. And we say farewell to a friend of Dr. Waffle and make room for new friends.    

TAGS: Thirtysomething, The Bear, Dark, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Buffering the Vampire Slayer

Major spoilers for every aspect of Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Watch Tania and friends perform I Love a Podcast and Faith

Listen to the Santa Barbara episode of Buffering the Vampire Slayer

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

FOLLOW us @drwafflepod on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook

EMAIL us at [email protected]

PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Check out TANIA’S MANY ACTIVITIES attaniaisrael.com

In this episode, Dee shares her lifelong obsession with candy bars, and she and Tania discuss the Great American Candy Bar Hierarchy, milk vs. dark chocolate, the dynamics of sharing dessert, judgmental waiters, recovered memory, and so much more.

TAGS: Cadbury; Snickers; Zagnut; New Zealand; attachment theory

Spoilers for Thelma and Louise and The Mill on the Floss

Take the candy bar interiors quiz here

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

FOLLOW us @drwafflepod on Instagram, Twitter (X), and Facebook

EMAIL us at [email protected]

PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Check out TANIA’S MANY ACTIVITIES at taniaisrael.com

In this episode, Tania reads an excerpt from her forthcoming book and she and Dee discuss stress about politics, political parties, political polarization, Canadian politics, Mississippi politics, and dislike of talking about politics.

TAGS: Facing the Fracture: How to Navigate the Challenges of Living in a Divided Nation

Spoilers for the 2016 U.S. Presidential election

Find out more about Facing the Fracture, including a link to pre-order, here.

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

FOLLOW us @drwafflepod on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook

EMAIL us at [email protected]

PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Check out TANIA’S MANY ACTIVITIES at taniaisrael.com

In this episode, Dee reflects on the nature of good and evil and she and Tania discuss serial killers, Prince, and elementary-school musicals.

TAGS: serial killers; Serial; Undisclosed; S-Town; Civil War; Prince; Trader Joe’s; fava beans; Casebook of a Crime Psychiatrist; James Brussel; Malcolm Gladwell; Michael Hobbes; If Books Could Kill; Manichaeism; Buddhist causes and conditions; Sigmund Freud; “Mourning and Melancholia”; Purple Rain; “I Hate Emily Chase”; David Sedaris

Spoilers for Titanic and Under the Cherry Moon

Read the snarky Malcolm Gladwell essay about Tania’s grandpa here

Read the original essay about Emily Chase here

Read the David Sedaris essay about throwing his family under the bus here

Thanks for listening! If you liked what you heard, please rate, review, subscribe, and share so more folks can find us.

FOLLOW us @drwafflepod on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook

EMAIL us at [email protected]

PODCAST WEBSITE

Read DEANNA’S ESSAYS at doctorwaffle.substack.com

Check out TANIA’S MANY ACTIVITIES attaniaisrael.com

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit doctorwaffle.substack.com