Little Miss Muffett

I'm in Prescott, Wisconsin. I know some of you might be saying, but this
morning you emailed us from Minnesota - that's going backwards. The
Adventure Cycling Organization Maps took us this way, I don't really ask
questions, as I am not the navigator. Maybe that's why they call themselves
"Adventure" cycling, I don't know.

So, we left Chicago and went north. Through Northwestern and a bunch of
really posh neighborhoods. We met a couple around our age in a bike shop
who had done a lot of bike touring and invited us to stay at their house for
dinner and overnight. We said, "sure!" as they seemed quite interesting.
I asked if we could at least cook dinner, and if there was anything that
they didn't eat. Avi responded, "we're pretty much vegans (no meat, no
eggs, no dairy products) and we have lots of food at home so we'll cook."
As all of my ground beef and velveeta recipes quickly vanished in my mental
cookbook, and the realization that even kraftfoods.com (shameless promo)
couldn't help me with this dinner I quickly acquiesced. We biked the hour
to their house with Avi and he told us his story - he was dealing drugs in
Seattle when a group of people confronted him on morals and values. This
caused him to take off and ride his bike around the country for 4 years
studying religions. His style of touring differed slightly from ours - he
did a lot of commando camping - even telling us of places to camp in San
Francisco and Philly, and made the comment that "if you can't lift your bike
over a barbed wire fence, it's too heavy". Yeah, I can barely lift my
loaded bike over the curb. Anyway, he was in Iowa, spied Rachel across a
crowded street, approached her and after 7 hours of talking they fell in
love, she agreed to drop out of college and he decided to give up his life
of solitude. Two weeks later they met up again at the airport, flew to
Europe and biked around Spain and Africa for 6 months. They've been
together now for 2 years.

Over dinner they asked us where we worked and by the look on their faces as
I said Kraft, you could see them reach under the table and stamp in big red
letters on my forehead - ESTABLISHMENT. Fortunately for Melissa they never
got around to ask her about her job for I'm sure her drug sales rep job at a
company who makes genetically engineered corn wouldn't be kosher with their
year spent working at organic farms. It became apparent as the night went
on and they told us stories about arriving in hawaii with $16 in their
pockets and we made comments like "boy that neighborhood bbq sure smells
good" that we weren't just part of the establishment, no we were certainly
the spawn of satan in their eyes. Even though we weren't exactly kindred
spirits, they were certainly inspiring and educating.

The next night we were at a campground and my favorite comment was by the
woman who worked the gate - we'll call her Marge. So Marge found out that I
grew up in Pittsburgh and said that she grew up in Uniontown. My faced
showed acknowledgement of the town as she continued with her tale. "yes, I
lived near a place called Lovers' Leap", Marge said with bright eyes and a
smile from ear to ear. "That's where people would go up and jump off and
die", Marge finished without changing the expression on her face. Melissa
and I just stood there stunned as I think one of us muttered, "Well, gee
thanks Marge for that warm fuzzy thought," and slowly backed up to our bikes
without breaking her gaze.

We entered Wisconsin and rode on bike trails most of the way. We actually
rode on the first rail to trail that opened in 1967. Wisconsin is beautiful
- hilly, but really nice. We spent one night in New Glarus, also known as
little Switzerland. We had to eat at a fast food restaurant called Culver's
since they had an homage to Homer simpson on the sign out front with "mmm,
bacon" in big black letters. Inside I made melissa ask the kid behind the
counter what Dairyland (circle R) cheese curds were, and he cocked his head
a little off center, paused and deadpanned, "fried cheese." Of course we
ordered up some cheese curds - they were quite tasty. The next day a guy at
a cheese shop told us that cheese curds squeak if you eat them at room
temperature. So I bought a bag at a grocery store. I asked a woman in line
what cheese curds were, and she responded with, "you obviously aren't from
Wisconsin." We spent the rest of the afternoon eating and saying, "shhh,
did you hear that? did you hear anything???" Just when we thought that
cheese curds squeaking might be akin to snipe hunting, we asked at another
store and the women assured us that they do, but only fresh ones. They
happened to have a bag open, and allowed us to sample theirs, and yes they
do, fresh cheese curds squeak when you eat them. Hope that helps you in
trivia pursuit some day.

We've been biking along the mississippi River for the past few days. The
first glance I got of it really struck me. Last night we even went swimming
in it - we were laughing at feeling very much like Tom and Huck.

Hope everyone is doing well. Thanks again for the emails, it's a big thrill
to read what is going on in your lives and it makes me really look forward
to our visits to the library.

cheers,
leigh