Last day in Wisconsin

[gordonzola]

Our Wisconsin trip ended with a min-coop tour since our flight didn’t take off until about 4 hours after all the South Bay folks. Luckily, we were in Madison so we got a tour of Madison in a Union Cab!

Union Cab is a worker-owned cab company that started during a taxi strike in Madison during the ‘70s. John is currently president of Union Cab, a member of the Board of the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives (I met him because I hosted him in my apartment during an annual BOD meeting held in SF) and does a great co-op blog here: rochdale

Look, Union Cabs even has an ad in the Madison airport baggage claim! (security questioned me nicely after I took this picture)


First we went to Rainbow Bookstore Cooperative where we stocked up on books for the plane. John tried to sell his buddy who worked there on my (not yet printed) book and we discussed the contrast in the new interest in food books between the buy-your-way-out-of-the-system folks and the true politicos. Still, I don’t think he was impressed with the idea of a cheesemonger memoir. Oh well.

Then we drove past the Willy St. Co-op and to union Cab where we saw the state-of-the-art computer tracking system and a lot of yellow automobiles.

I wish I had more time to spend in Madison. Every visit I have had there has been quick and rushed. It seems like a really awesome little college town. Oh yeah, we went to Fromagination earlier in the trip. It’s a pretty awesome little cheese shop. I happily spent $20 (full retail!) on cheese ( Blue Mont Dairy’s bandage-wrapped Cheddar) and the folks working there definitely know what they are talking about. I have never seen a store give out smaller samples, but they were happy to give as many as you want.

Comments

[und1sk0.livejournal.com]

I'd like to meet with you publisher.

I've always intended on writing a memoir and calling it "Datacenter Confidential".. After the last 12 days, having made it into the MSM and onto the front page, I think I might be able to sell that book.

[gordonzola.livejournal.com]

email me backchannel: gordonzola at livejournal.com

[wild-irises.livejournal.com]

Madison! Lots of great cheese; there's a Brunko baked cheese at the farmer's market that I love, and the Bleu Mont Dairy is an old friend.

It's an awesome town.

[gordonzola.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that Brunko cheese was awesome... and everywhere!

[imnotandrei.livejournal.com]

When we were last in Madison, we noted Fromagination as a place for your book tour -- I cannot now recall whether we remembered to mention it to you. ;)

[gordonzola.livejournal.com]

I think you guys did. Other folks who live in Madison recommended it too.

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you had a chance to check out Fromagination. I stopped in at the end of my annual Madison trip in May and thought they were very nice. I even picked up their card so I could pass it on to you for possible book tour purposes.

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

Oops! I see imnotandrei beat me to it :)

[gordonzola.livejournal.com]

thanks for that!

[touchyphiliac.livejournal.com]

Any book recs that don't fall into the "buy your way out of the system" category?

[gordonzola.livejournal.com]

well unfortunately the other category tends to be written better. ;)

Stuffed and Starved by Raj Patel is a good one. Vandana Shiva's food writing.

Thanks

[rochdale.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the plug! It was great seeing you and Kiersten again. I wish that we had more time as well. I would have loved to have stopped at WORT-FM or Just Coffee--or even Isthmus Engineering.

Sorry about all the anti-California comments, but now that Farve has left cheese is all we got--well, beer too I guess--(and they do advertise California cheese on our local television-ouch)!

Do think about a book tour. We really are crazy about cheese here and you could probably move a enough books to take your time and enjoy Madison.