Happy Southern New Year 2018!

New Year’s in the South means fun and unique — sometimes weird — happenings. Here are a few to consider:

Mount Olive Pickle's New Year's Eve Pickle Drop

Watch a pickle fall from the sky in Mt. Olive, North Carolina, at the annual Pickle Drop. At 7 p.m. Eastern Time (midnight Greenwich Mean Time), the New Year’s Eve three-foot lighted pickle comes down the flagpole into a redwood pickle tank while thousands celebrate. Naturally, there’s music, refreshments and more. 

Razorbacks and MoonPies

Other weird New Year’s Eve drops include the MoonPie falling 34 stories from the top of the RSA Bank Trust Tower in downtown Mobile for the Mobile New Year, and the Late Night Fayetteville celebration, which includes the Hog Drop in addition to live music, family fun, Sacred Somatics performers and much more. If you're wondering why a MoonPie, the southern Alabama town throws the Chattanooga-based sweet treat at Mardi Gras. As for the hog, Fayetteville is home to the University of Arkansas Razorbacks.

Rat Pack New Year’s Bash

Ring in the New Year at Messina Hof Winery in the Hill Country of Texas with the winery’s Texas Sparkling wine, music and contest for best dancer at the Rat Pack New Year's Bash. Dress in your best vintage outfit and bring your dancing shoes. General admission is $30 and you can stay at the Messina Hof's Manor Haus Bed & Breakfast. 

Jack and Music

New Year’s Eve in Music City means music at the Jack Daniel's Music City Midnight event. Look for the likes of Keith Urban, Maren Morris, Cheap Trick, Carly Pearce, Jonny P, Larkin Poe, and the Fisk Jubilee Singers in Nashville this New Year’s Eve, along with the midnight Music Note Drop and fireworks outside the State Capitol building. Need more convincing? Watch Keith Urban urge you to visit.

Courtesy of http://www.visitmusiccity.com/

Weird, Wacky and Wild South is written by travel writer Chere Coen who loves a strange and unique Southern place or tradition. 

Saints fans even in death

            We love to decorate our cemeteries in the South.

            Along the Gulf Coast, tombs are mostly above ground due to the high water table that makes it difficult to place our beloved departed into soil. Visitors will find simple crosses denoting graves or elaborate tombs that resemble small homes. In New Orleans, we call these collections of above-ground tombs “Cities of the Dead.”

            With all this grave architecture, it’s no wonder people like to enhance them a bit. And in South Louisiana around All Saints Day (Nov. 1), residents spruce up their family tombs and give them a fresh coat of whitewash as well.

            So throughout this month of October, we’ll be spotlighting some interesting tombs we’ve found over the years.
            At right is a grave found in St. Louis No. 3 in New Orleans, just outside of City Park. Not only did “Mother” get her share of Mardi Gras beads, but a nod to the Saints as well. The living ones who play football in the Superdome, that is.