Eat! Eat! Eat! (Again)

October 23

Education should not be intended to make people comfortable, it is meant to make them think. ~ Hanna Holbom Gray

This was our last chance to spend some quality eating time with Ruthie’s sister Rita before we sent her packing back to Indiana . . .

Food for us comes from our relatives, whether they have wings or fins or roots. That is how we consider food. Food has a culture. It has a history. It has a story. It has relationships. ~ Winona LaDuke

October 13

After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one’s own relations. ~ Oscar Wilde

[We decided to spend Rita’s last night eating at home before all the in-house food rotted from lack of attendance at home during meal times . . . ]

Popcorn is one of the only situations in which you eat the result of an explosion. ~ Demetri Martin

I get way too much happiness from good food. ~ Elizabeth Olsen

He was a bold man that first ate an oyster. ~ Jonathan Swift

[As we will note in later photos, this confirms that Rita did indeed go on-line to confirm her next day’s flight and pay for checking bag #2 . . . ]

October 14

The journey, not the arrival, matters. ~ T. S. Eliot

[Driving Rita to MSP down the usually dreary I-94 . . . ]

Once a year, go somewhere you’ve never been before. ~ The Dalai Lama

[Interesting cloud cover from come and go snow flurries . . . ]

Screw the caviar, I want to travel the world! ~ Hostelgeeks

A hotel room all to myself is my idea of a good time. ~ Chelsea Handler

Backpacking is the art of knowing what not to take. ~ Sheridan Anderson

Say yes, and you’ll figure it out afterwards. ~ Tina Fey

Eating is always a decision, nobody forces your hand to pick up food and put it into your mouth. ~ Albert Ellis

[The forever potty stop at Weaver Lake Road on the way to the Cities . . . ]

Adventure without risk is Disneyland. ~ Douglas Coupland 

[This is Rita at MSP airport. Happily engaged in the process of returning home to Indiana after a week with relatives in Vacationland USA. The happiness was short-lived, however, when she got to the outside check-in (that’s two hyphenated words in one sentence) which requested she pay for checking bag #2. Rita promptly advised she had checked bag #2 on-line (another hyphen) the day before and had paid for it by credit card. Naturally, the checker-inners could find no such record and told her she would have to pay (again). Well, harumpf, harumpf, harumpf, Rita and I entered the airport in hopes of finding resolution to the bag #2 situation. By then I had to leave since Ruthie had already been parked on the curb for 15 minutes. Ruthie & I were staying in the Cities for a visit to the Como Park Conservatory before heading back to Alex. We called Rita from Como Park – now they weren’t going to let her on the plane because it was overbooked. Ruthie shouted into the phone, which Rita had on speaker, that they better get her on the plane because they’d “eff’ed her over enough already” (which the airport staff heard). Now we couldn’t leave the Cities lest we’d have to pick up Rita again. Rita later called to say they were going to get her on the plane – maybe in 1st class – and she did get an aisle seat in coach (which also usually costs extra), if not 1st class. She made it home, some the worse for wear . . . ]

What a lovely thing a rose is! ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

[And then it was on to the Como Park Conservatory in St. Paul . . . ]

If you really screw up, send roses. ~ Letitia Baldrige

It is the food which you furnish to your mind that determines the whole character of your life. ~ Emmet Fox

[The Marjorie McNeely Conservatory . . . ]

No matter how chaotic it is, wildflowers will still spring up in the middle of nowhere. ~ Sheryl Crow

A flower does not think of competing with the flower next to it. It just blooms. ~ Zen Shin

The flowers of late winter and early spring occupy places in our hearts well out of proportion to their size. ~ Gertrude S. Wister

I think people need to be educated to the fact that marijuana is not a drug. Marijuana is an herb and a flower. God put it here. If He put it here and He wants it to grow, what gives the government the right to say that God is wrong? ~ Willie Nelson

A woman should be like a single flower, not a whole bouquet. ~ Anna Held

Earth laughs in flowers. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Flowers always make people better, happier, and more helpful. ~ Luther Burbank

Flowers don’t tell, they show. ~ Stephanie Skeem

Don’t hurry, don’t worry. And be sure to smell the flowers along the way. ~ Walter Hagen

[A school boy said this statue was “inappropriate.” Ruthie wanted to have a discussion with his parents . . . ]

Gardens and flowers have a way of bringing people together, drawing them from their homes. ~ Clare Ansberry

If I had a flower for every time I thought of you… I could walk through my garden forever. ~ Alfred Tennyson

We’re all golden sunflowers inside. ~ Allen Ginsberg

Destiny may ride with us today, but there is no reason for it to interfere with lunch. ~ Peter the Great

[The following nine photos courtesy of Ruthie . . . ]

Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them. ~ A.A. Milne

Let us dance in the sun, wearing wildflowers in our hair. ~ Susan Polis Schutz

When the flower blossoms, the bee will come. ~ Srikumar Rao

The flower is the poetry of reproduction. It is an example of the eternal seductiveness of life. ~ Jean Giraudoux

It’s so clear that you have to cherish everyone. I think that’s what I get from these older black women, that every soul is to be cherished, that every flower Is to bloom. ~ Alice Walker

A weed is but an unloved flower. ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox

I don’t want to be stinky poo poo girl, I want to be happy flower child. ~ Drew Barrymore

[George Clooney’s Facebook profile photo . . . ]

The intellectual is a middle-class product; if he is not born into the class he must soon insert himself into it, in order to exist. He is the fine nervous flower of the bourgeoisie. ~ Louise Bogan

Life is fair. ~ Stephen King

[Heading for home, the Minnesota State Fairgrounds was appropriately nearby . . . ]

Fair is whatever God wants to do. ~ Leif Enger

Our national flower is the concrete cloverleaf. ~ Lewis Mumford

[We weren’t on the road home yet, but this was the sky all day. We had several hard downpours on the way home . . . ]

Ice cream is exquisite. What a pity it isn’t illegal. ~ Voltaire

[We had hoped to lunch at Krewe, the cajun/creole restaurant in St. Joseph, but it closes at 2:00 (re-opens at 4:00 for dinner) and we got there at 2:01! If Krewe is closed when you get there, there’s always Bello Cucina! The one in St. Joe is the last one standing. We have been to the ones in Glenwood, Alex, Fergus, Morris, and Marshall, all now closed. The owner said he can’t find chefs or staff . . . ]

Large, naked, raw carrots are acceptable as food only to those who live in hutches eagerly awaiting Easter. ~ Fran Lebowitz

I don’t eat lobsters, shrimp, or crawfish because I don’t eat anything that looks like I should step on it. ~ George Carlin

[The daily special was beef stew soup . . . ]

A balanced diet is a cookie in each hand. ~ Barbara Johnson

[Ruthie thought these may have been nuns from St. Ben’s college across the street . . . ]

Give me liberty or … a jelly donut! ~ Homer Simpson

[The next five are Ruthie’s ambience photos . . . ]

One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if not has not dined well. ~ Virginia Woolf

Food is not rational. Food is culture, habit, craving and identity. ~ Jonathan Safran Foer

I’m at the age where food has taken the place of sex. In fact, I just had a mirror put over my kitchen table. ~ Rodney Dangerfield

My doctor told me to stop having intimate dinners for four. Unless there are three other people. ~ Orson Welles

He who does not mind his belly, will hardly mind anything else. ~ Samuel Johnson

My mom made me two dishes: take it or leave it. ~ Stephen Wright

[Outdoor dining (weather dependent) at Bello Cucina . . . ]

How can a nation be great if its bread tastes like Kleenex. ~ Julia Child

I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead. Not sick, not wounded: dead. ~ Woody Allen

I don’t always wear underwear. When I’m in the heat, especially, I can’t wear it. Like, if I’m wearing a flower dress, why do I have to wear underwear? ~ Naomi Campbell

Up Next: Still eating . . .