So Jesus says to God,

[Jackpine Radical]

"Dad, why did you make that bridge collapse?"

"To punish a nasty man who abused his daughter, Son."

"Michael Stoner?"

"Yes, Son."

"Well, Dad, I got some bad news for ya."

Recently, Michael Stoner and his fiancée, Crystal Manning, appeared on television to tell their harrowing tale of plunging to the Mississippi River in their car after the I-35W bridge collapsed. The couple spoke of how they had been on their way to Children's Hospital in Minneapolis to see the fiancé's 2-year-old daughter -- whom, they had told everybody, had fallen down stairs earlier in the day at their home near Spooner, Wis.

But on Monday evening, Stoner, a 26-year-old felon, was being held on suspicion of felony child abuse and a probation violation. Authorities say 2-year-old Emmaline Manning is in grave condition with brain injuries consistent with shaken-baby syndrome. "She was downgraded from critical to grave today," Washburn County District Attorney Michael Bitney said Monday evening. Bitney added: "She's on life support. We don't know if she'll survive the week."

[shain from kane]

1. Well Abe says, "Where do you want this killin' done?"

God says, "Out on Highway 61."

[Jackpine Radical]

2. Highway 61,

sometimes called the "Blues Highway," stretched from New Orleans through Memphis and from Iowa through Duluth (Dylan's city of birth) to the Canadian border. It was regularly featured in blues songs, notably Mississippi Fred McDowell's "61 Highway" and James "Son" Thomas's "Highway 61." Bessie Smith met her death in an automobile accident on that roadway; Robert Johnson was said to have sold his soul to the devil at the crossroads of Highway 61 and Highway 49 (itself the subject of a Howlin' Wolf song); Elvis Presley grew up in the housing projects built along it; and Martin Luther King, Jr. would be murdered at a motel just off Highway 61.

[iamahaingttta]

4. I hitchhiked Highway 61...

...from Memphis to New Orleans.
A few of the most interesting weeks of my life.

[Ian David]

3. Wow. That's just... wow. n/t