I know this isn't exactly a "music thing," even tho' he often sang and did some guitar pickin' on his Andy Griffith Show, but today Andy Griffith died. He was 86. Like Griffith, I grew up in rural North Carolina and I remember how things were. Um, it wasn't quite life as portrayed the Andy Griffith Show, but sometimes it was kinda close. Griffith was real North Carolina, head to toe, from the generation where EVERYONE was a cheeky character, so it ain't surprising he made being one of them characters his act!! This bit, "What It Was, Was Football," is maybe the most famous of his pre-Andy Griffith Show bits, was story telling like how I know NC folks told stories. It's dead on.

Lord knows I've sat through a MILLION of those kinda stories, told/retold by family and friends, and his passing serves as an acute reminder this style of Southern story telling is nearly extinct.