We Take Ourselves With Us

We started Friday morning with a breakfast with a view.  Harper rediscovered the joy of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and chided us for never have "regular bread" in the house.  Ah, the midwest and white bread--a match made in demography!  Note that Penn's breakfast somehow included tiny candy bars.  Where are this kid's parents?! Our first goal of the day was to visit the neighborhoods of my childhood.  We started in St. Francis, which is where I lived for almost a decade, from 5 to 14.  My house was just off Kinnickinnic (or KK), three doors down from this bar: Here it is.  When I was little, there used to be a gigantic evergreen in the front yard between the "picture window" and the small bedroom window, so it didn't seem as stark.  The view from that picture window used to be a grocery store parking lot (where I learned to ride a bike), then it was a used car storage lot, then nothing.  Now, it's a huge ...

Like Niagara Falls, the Dells are a mash-up of glorious natural beauty and outrageous man-made kitsch that is somehow irresistibly American.  As exhibit A, here's our drive to breakfast: The gigantic flamingo waiting to strike unsuspecting tourists. The replica of the Roman Colosseum built around a motel because Dells. The Ducks! That old standby, the Roman Temple combined with a roller coaster. An upside down White House, helpfully labeled "White House," with a crashed limo and a T-Rex. And, then, breakfast courtesy of Paul Bunyan (who to be fair, has his name spelled "Paul Bunyon" inside the restaurant, so I'm not sure he actually works there). Although the physical evidence is pretty compelling ... For example, here's the talking, decapitated head of Babe the Blue Ox. The Cook Shanty itself is less "shanty" and more log cabin with bunches of people squished ins...