Thank you very much to the one person who donated to support the Alzheimer's Association Memory Walk while I was away. You have my very sincere thanks and gratitude.

A very good time was had in Seattle. Several of my friends who live on the West Coast made the trip to Seattle as well so there was lots of time spent with friends, lots of good conversation and lots of good food eaten in addition to the normal tourist activities. Unfortunately B and I both brought nasty summer colds home with us so my brain is fuzzy and I'm on cold medication. So forgive any long, meandering stream of consciousness thoughts I might share.

So this is the last post before I head to Seattle. Don't leave the refrigerator door open and keep your feet off the coffee table while I'm gone please.

If you find yourself missing me while I'm gone perhaps you'll considering making a donation to support the Alzheimer's Association Memory Walk. The walk isn't until September but I have ambitious fundraising goals this year so I've already put a button in the sidebar and I'm mentioning it to you now. This is the one big fundraising event I participate in each year and the only one I beg shamelessly and often for donations for. You have my deep and sincere thanks and appreciation for any support of this event.

Fondly,
Michelle

As I mentioned last week I'm flying out on Saturday, as an aside thanks very much Michael for acknowledging my fear of flying and encouraging me to drink to cope with it, I very much appreciate it. Anyway, I leave on Saturday and will be gone for most of next week. Since I'm preparing for the trip posting may be light this week and I won't be posting at all next week while I'm gone. Apparently you aren't supposed to work on "vacation." Even if you love your work. That's what they tell me anyway.

I'll be back to the normal schedule on Monday June 23. Miss me terribly cause I'll be missing you.

Michelle

Well actually it turns one on Sunday but hopefully you'll forgive me for celebrating the birthday a couple days early.

On April 6, 2007 I said

After four years in Indianapolis I'm returning home to the city I love. I couldn't be more excited. Louisville is in my heart and my blood and I can't wait to get back home.

During my exodus to the north I developed a site called Consuming Indy. My reasons for starting the site were purely selfish: I wanted to convince myself to love Indianapolis. I started combing the city for cool restaurants and shops, cultural events, art openings, independent businesses, all the things I enjoyed in Louisville. I thought if I could dive into Indianapolis and find enough things to fill Consuming Indy with then I'd grow to love Indianapolis and not be quite so homesick for Louisville. While Consuming Indy grew to be a site I was proud to run it never helped me love Indianapolis. Indy just never fit me. Why on earth did I stay there so long then? Job commitments. My partner was doing a medical residency in Indianapolis so we were committed to being there four years. Now that her job commitment is ending we're very lucky and happy that B has found a great job back in Louisville. So we're house hunting in the Highlands and are just excited beyond belief that we'll be settled into our new Louisville life by summer.

As soon as we started finalizing plans to move back to Louisville I knew that I wanted to bring Consuming Louisville to life. Since I love Louisville so much the impetus is obviously not the same as it was for Consuming Indy. In fact it's pretty much just the opposite. There is so much amazing art, culture, independent businesses, and just all around cool stuff happening in Louisville I just want to help get the word about all of it out. I want to be part of the great vibe the city has and I want Consuming Louisville to be an asset for the community at large.

I've worked hard to make Consuming Louisville that asset for the community I described and I hope that at least on some level I've succeeded. I have more plans and ideas for the site and hope its second year is even better than its first year. I can't sincerely thank enough the people who have read, subscribed to, linked to, sent tips to and supported Consuming Louisville in anyway. I really appreciate all the support you've given me and the site. This is a passion project for me and it really makes a difference to know that people enjoy it or find it helpful.

P.S. Metro Mapper just turned two. Spring is apparently when thoughts turn to new web ventures in Louisville. Happy birthday Metro Mapper! 

I absolutely love running this site and try very hard to keep it full of interesting, useful information. I spend quite a bit of time digging up information, writing, dreaming up and producing original content for the site and thinking of ways to make it better. This I do because I love Louisville and sincerely want Consuming Louisville to be an asset for the city. I want to help people find cool things to do, great restaurants to eat at and great art to buy among other things.

All of that is a preface to saying that the Google AdSense ads I run on the site are doing ok for me in terms of offsetting some of the costs (both actual and time spent) of the site I'd really love to get rid of them. No, I'm not looking to ditch ads completely. What I am looking to do is replace the current ones with ads from local businesses or national companies that are specifically focusing on Louisville or the region. To put another way: I'd like the ads I'm running to actually be of interest to the audience. If the ads are of greater potential interest to the audience then they're much more useful to both the audience and the advertiser.

So if you have a local business or artistic venture I'd like to urge you to consider advertising on Consuming Louisville. The rates are reasonable, the audience intelligent (just look, you're reading it) and geographically targeted.

Thanks for your consideration,
Michelle

Hopefully you've noticed the new logo around here. If not take a moment and cast your eyes upwards. There you'll see the brilliant and creative work of John Wurth of Hatch Creative. Despite having what was I'm sure an absolute brat of a client John did fantastic work within my crazy parameters and needs.

I wanted to keep an iconic reference to Louisville, the fleur de lis, but wanted it to stand out a bit amongst the sea of fleur de lis icons and graphics that float around Louisville. John suggested playing off the Consuming in Consuming Louisville. I thought that was a great idea. So the finished logo you see is a beautiful fleur de lis that's had a bite taken out of it, literally part of the Louisville icon has been consumed. There are even a few crumbs thrown in for good measure.

I love the concept and love the finished logo, I hope you do as well. I can't possibly thank John enough for all his thought and work on the logo. He was really great to work with and I highly recommend Hatch Creative for any design needs you might have. Just in case Consuming Louisville's new logo isn't enough to convince you of John's brilliance you should also know that he's the genius mind behind those great Derby City Roller Girls posters (Love Hurts and Open Skate are my favorites).

I hope you enjoyed the nearly every weekday posting of One Thing I Love About Louisville during the month of January. I very much did. Finding out new and interesting things people love about Louisville was terribly interesting to me, so much so that I really want to continue the series. Not, everyday but weekly if possible, if not, then monthly. So if you or anyone you know would like to participate please let me know. In the meantime look forward to a new "One Thing I Love About Louisville" next Monday February 11, 2008 from Shelly Zegart. 

Look, I'm not going to lie. I think you should show your beloved how much she or he means to you every single day. I think you should kick up the romance frequently, not just one day in February when everyone else is doing the same thing. That being said I know that Valentine's Day is very important and special for lots of couples so I'll be passing along info about any cool Valentine's events (including special dinners) that I get and adding them to this post.

• White Castle is offering its yearly Valentine's evening of romance. This year they've even got a take out package specially for those who want their White Castle romance in a little more private setting.
• Sweet Surrender is putting together a special Chocolate is for Lovers Gift Box that includes all kind of delectable items sure to warm your beloved's heart.
• Proof on Main is offering up a four-course prix fixe costing $50-$65, depending on choice on entrée. The highlight of this menu definitely looks to be the "chocolate three-way."
• Park Place is offering up a special amorously inclined meal that includes a lobster bisque, truffle "mac and cheese", Rock lobster tail with lobster risotto and a tasting of signature desserts among other decadent choices.
• The Valentine's Day night hike and romantic retreat at Jefferson Memorial Forest sounds just lovely. Highly recommended.
• It's not just for Valentine's Day but Morton's 4 Course Special is a great deal for surf and turf lovers
• You and your beloved can make ceramic goblets together at the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft's workshop with Suzy Hatcher
• Hit Graeter's on Valentine's Day to get a free a sundae for yourself when you buy one for your sweetie.
  
• Primo has a nice special Valentine's Day menu that is $45 per person
• Avalon has a special for Valentine's Day that not only includes excellent sounding food (including a vegetarian entree selection) but also the option of having a gift from Luna Boutique wrapped and waiting at your table for companion.
  

  
  

You know that when I'm not toiling away on Consuming Louisville in my cave I'm a photographer right?

When I showed my partner a print of this photograph she said "I love this because it reminds me of how I feel driving downtown early in the morning when the streets aren't crowded yet. It's like the day and the city are full of possibility." We'll ignore that this scene was at sunset instead of sunrise but other than that we'll go with her sentiment. Louisville is a city full of possibility so I called this image Possibility City. 

Many of the One Thing I Love About Louisville essays we've seen thus far have echoed that sentiment and many of the ones I've yet to publish do as well. People here believe anything is possible, that in this great city anything can be accomplished. So it pains me that the so called Possibility City campaign, put together by, I think Greater Louisville Inc., doesn't really tell any stories about how great Louisville is or how it really is a city full of possibilities. It's possible I'm too critical of the campaign but I want everyone to know how great Louisville is and how it's a unique and creative place. I just don't think the Possibilty City website conveys that information at all.

So consider this piece a tiny little effort to influence the conversation. Perhaps if someone Googles "Possibilty City" they'll stumble here as well as possibilitycity.com. When they get here they'll see an image that shows our beautiful downtown and lots of information about the great city of Louisville.

I'd love to hear if you agree that Louisville is a city of possibilities and if so why. I'd also love to hear what you think of the "official" possibility city campaign.

Prints of the image Possibilty City are available for purchase. Please contact me for more information.

When I explain Consuming Louisville to people the most frequent question I get asked is “where should I eat?” This comes both from Louisville newcomers and from those who have been here a while (and sometimes even forever). Food, it seems, is the great uniter. We all love to eat. Lucky for us there is an incredible amount of good food to be had here in Louisville.

Perhaps it’s because I eat out on a very regular basis and have several favorite restaurants I sometimes forget that every one of my (and your) favorite haunts is still an undiscovered gem for someone else. Columbus "discovered" the continent we're living on and the people who were already living here. You get to discover The Irish Rover or Come Back Inn or Mayan Cafe or Impellizeri's or Twig and Leaf or Le Gallo Ross or any of countless other restaurants you haven't tried  or maybe haven't even heard of yet. So I'm going to be writing about restaurants more.

My love of Louisville is pretty apparent (*cough* I run a website called Consuming Louisville). I'm far from alone though in loving this place. I've lived in other cities where the most frequent responses to questions like "how do you like here?" are things like "it's ok" or "it's not so ad" or even flat out "this place sucks." Occasionally you'd get an "I love it here" sprinkled in but those were few and far between. In Louisville the love to hate ratios are exactly reversed. For every "Louisville is ok" I hear five "I love Louisville!" or "Louisville is great!" declarations.

All these feelings of goodwill toward Louisville got me thinking. My list of reasons for loving Louisville is long enough to stretch down Bardstown Road from Douglass Loop to Highland Avenue but why do other people love it? I wondered why other people are in love with this city. So I asked.

I made a list of smart, interesting, engaged people and I asked them to tell me one thing they love about Louisville. I asked politicians, musicians, artists, business owners, ad people, bloggers, moguls, community leaders and people from all walks of life. A fair number totally ignored my polite questions. I'll try not to hold it against them though because many other kick ass people not only said yes but proceeded to give amazing, interesting answers.

I cannot wait to share these answers and share I will. Starting tomorrow Consuming Louisville will be presenting a series titled "One Thing I Love About Louisville." I've got many "One Things" lined up to publish with more coming still coming in. If you'd like to contribute a "One Thing I Love About Louisville" drop me a line.

I'm so very excited about this series. I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I do.  Each one of us who loves Louisville  probably has a different reason for loving our city. Some of these reasons overlap, some are completely unique but all of them are interesting. I think we can all enjoy learning about other people's reasons for loving the city and we may even find some brand new reasons to add to our own personal "why I love Louisville" lists.

I've made my list of things I'm thankful for this year and being back in Louisville and running Consuming Louisville are near the top of that list. I feel incredibly lucky to be able to be a cheerleader for Louisville at large and for all the great things going on, great places to eat and drink, amazing independent businesses, artists and musicians that make this city unique and wonderful.

In the past few months Consuming Louisville has seen some nice growth in terms of visitor numbers and community support. Thank you for that. Thank you for visiting. Thank you for saying "yeah I've heard of Consuming Louisville. Cool site." Thank you for being part of our great city and giving me so much to write about.

It's my sincere hope that Consuming Louisville continues to grow. Yes, naturally I hope it attracts more visitors and gains popularity but more importantly I hope it grows into an even better, more enjoyable and useful site. If you have any requests or suggestions for making Consuming Louisville better please do let me know.

With that I wish you all a very safe and happy Thanksgiving.

Warmly,
Michelle Jones
Editor, Consuming Louisville

While doing some shopping on East Market this weekend I stumbled into the Vadis Turner exhibit at Gallery NuLu. Such a lucky find because this is a great exhibit that I hadn't heard a single thing about even though it opened October 5.

It's these kind of things that make me even more passionate about Consuming Louisville. Great, great things are going on in Louisville everyday but so many of us don't read the Courier (or are disappointed by what the Courier does and doesn't give coverage to) or wade through LEO or Velocity so we miss great events that those print publications cover. The flyer walls of coffee shops in the Highlands are great places for finding out about events but most days you just want to get your cappuccino and get out the door. Keeping up with online calendars of events? Arduous at best.

That's why Consuming Louisville is here: to help you quickly and easily find good things going on in town, good places to eat and good places to shop without spending your time poring over print or online publications.

The Vadis Turner exhibit is a very good thing going on in Louisville. People interested in any of the following should run, not walk to see the exhibit before it closes November 21: modern art, feminism, cultural criticism, mixed media works, kitsch, discussions on and artistic response to gender roles, fun art, fun art made of interesting objects.

Turner uses materials that make up the reality of womens lives, the flotsam and jetsam of every day. Twist ties, sponges, pantyhose, cotton balls, matchsticks, cellophane these are the sugar and spice that Turner uses for her box of chocolates. Office memo pads, calendar pages and take-out restaurant menus are quilted into testaments of the workday or sculpted into full-size gowns. Tabloids compete with works of fiction in other quilts and bobby pins explode into an installation. The works of Vadis Turner will make you smile in easy recognition, yet cringe at the ordinariness of it all.

- Description from another exhibition of Turner's work

That's a wedding cake made of tampons in the image there, just in case you missed that. Be sure not to miss the Sweet and Low gown at the very beginning of the exhibit. It's one of my favorite pieces.

In case you missed it yesterday the New York Times had a nice travel piece about our region called, naturally, Bourbon & Bluegrass.

If you're not reading this in an RSS reader you'll notice a different look around here. Not earthshaking different but different still. If something looks broken, doesn't work as you expect it to or just gives you pause please do let me know: info AT consuminglouisville.com. Thanks.

I think 37 Flood is a great blog. It covers live shows by local bands, touring bands coming through town, record releases, benefits, clubs, etc. The blogger who runs it loves music and bands and gives attention and support to both. It's an asset to the music community here in Louisville. So why in the world would a local band have this local blogger kicked out of their show?

I was escorted out just as VHS or Beta took the stage and directed not to bring my camera back in. I was told that the band didn't allow photography unless you have a press pass.**

The bassist has been blogging about their tour and they have an active MySpace page. I point that out to say they're not some old school band with no idea about social media. In other words they should know better. They should know that they have nothing to fear and lots to gain from supportive fans who want to photograph and write about their shows. Or in words that I and others have said oh so many times before "Photography is not a crime."

There was a VHS or Beta billboard across the street from Ear X Tacy. Every time I passed it I thought "I'm going to pick up the new VHS or Beta record." I hadn't done it yet but fully planned to do so. Not any more. I'm a photographer and social media advocate. If you don't want bloggers and amateur photographers documenting your shows then I don't think I need to spend my money on your records.

ETA: I just don't understand what benefit the band gets from banning photography.

** I'll leave the door open here for the possibility that the fault actually lies with the club and not the band. Maybe the security guy was overzealous and thought that if he said it was on the band's request it would go down easier. If that is the case I will happily acknowledge it.

Socializing and Networking for Freelancers

OK technically no one will be getting a free lunch. Instead we'll all be nice coffee shop patrons who buy lattes and cappuccinos and such. But I thought putting free lunch in the title would lure you in. Forgive me that dramatic license.

I am a freelance photographer, web and computer geek, writer, artist and all around creative professional. I love working for myself and working from home but sometimes I crave a little social interaction, and that vibe you get from working around and near other creative people. So I'm trying to kick start a community of freelancers, consultants, artists and other independents who have an interest in socializing, organically networking, brainstorming, idea bouncing and just all around participating in a community that's designed to support and encourage people who make a living (or are trying to make a living) doing what they love.

Ideally this group would meet once or twice a month at a coffee shop to hang out, get to know each other, work independently, work collaboratively, bounce ideas off each other, brainstorm projects, get feedback, gossip, goof off or some combination of all those.

I've tentatively planned the first meeting to be at Quills Coffee & Books on Kentucky Street near Barret Avenue Tuesday morning, August 28 and I'm inviting you to come. Please email me if you're interested in coming, info@consuminglouisville.com. If there is some interest in this fledging group but the date and time needs to be changed that's ok, that's why I've listed the date as tentative.

Thanks,
Michelle

After four years in Indianapolis I'm returning home to the city I love. I couldn't be more excited. Louisville is in my heart and my blood and I can't wait to get back home.

During my exodus to the north I developed a site called Consuming Indy. My reasons for starting the site were purely selfish: I wanted to convince myself to love Indianapolis. I started combing the city for cool restaurants and shops, cultural events, art openings, independent businesses, all the things I enjoyed in Louisville. I thought if I could dive into Indianapolis and find enough things to fill Consuming Indy with then I'd grow to love Indianapolis and not be quite so homesick for Louisville. While Consuming Indy grew to be a site I was proud to run it never helped me love Indianapolis. Indy just never fit me. Why on earth did I stay there so long then? Job commitments. My partner was doing a medical residency in Indianapolis so we were committed to being there four years. Now that her job commitment is ending we're very lucky and happy that B has found a great job back in Louisville. So we're house hunting in the Highlands and are just excited beyond belief that we'll be settled into our new Louisville life by summer.

As soon as we starting finalizing plans to move back to Louisville I knew that I wanted to bring Consuming Louisville to life. Since I love Louisville so much the impetus is obviously not the same as it was for Consuming Indy. In fact it's pretty much just the opposite. There is so much amazing art, culture, independent businesses, and just all around cool stuff happening in Louisville I just want to help get the word about all of it out. I want to be part of the great vibe the city has and I want Consuming Louisville to be an asset for the community at large. So feel free to send press releases, concert notices, save the date announcements, etc to info@consuminglouisville.com. Consuming Louisville is interested in local artists, independent businesses, cultural events, restaurants, charity, social events, the list goes on and on and on. If it's cool, happening in Louisville or involves Louisville people please let us know about.