Looking For Cheese

Linda Burton posting from Madison, Wisconsin – It must be true. I’ve always heard that Wisconsin is the place for cheese, and today I looked for signs of that as I drove from Saint Paul to Madison. Signs I saw, all urging me to shop; Cheese Alley, Cheese Chalet, Mousehouse. But I didn’t stop; the heat that’s been sitting on top of the northern states like a steam-pot dome was in its fifth day and I couldn’t leave the cats in the car; even a quick-stop for gas was almost too long to have the cooler off. I parked the car under a tree last night; it was shaded from the early morning sun as I loaded up this morning but the humidity knew no bounds; by the time I brought the cats out I was soaking wet. “Water!” I said, gulping down half a bottle of Aquafina before hitting the freeway. It wasn’t the best of drives. Since I was headed east, the morning sun was a glare. The windshield was buggy from earlier hits; I hadn’t taken the time to scrub it down before I left. There isn’t much of Minnesota before you get to the St Croix River, a tributary of the Mississippi; and zap, once you’re across you are in Wisconsin. I snapped a photo of my rather inauspicious entry, but it can never achieve more than “token photo” status; you see the bugs on the windshield and the glaring morning sun; the “Wisconsin Welcomes You” sign was half-hidden in the shade. “You’re Wisconsin cats now,” I announced anyhow; as tanker trucks zoomed by, seemingly oblivious to the orange cones, and the swerving lane changes as we passed through endless construction zones. I settled in the right-hand lane, looking for dairy farms, and looking for cheese. » read more