Blue Cheese Stuffed Olives and Boys in Envelopes

The blue cheese olive combines the pungent taste of the cheese with the salty flavor of the marinated olive. Perfect to dress up your martini, for a meat and cheese tray, the blue cheese stuffed olive can even smarten up your salad. - from "How to Stuff an Olive with Blue Cheese"

Annie Hall is as white bread as people come. In fact, in an New York deli she orders a pastrami on white bread with mayonnaise, which would be like ordering a taco with mayonnaise in an East L.A. - from "Woody on the Cusp - a Review of Annie Hall"

As we approached the Triborough Bridge the high rises of Manhattan came into full view. I was home.

We got closer and it was as if the buildings were wrapping round me, enclosing me. Welcoming me. There are few sights as appealing as the Manhattan skyline. Or as comforting

I'd been away. In the Mid-West. The American Heartland. One forgets when one has left. Typical Mid-West things get buried in the more immediate concerns of New York. Take their restaurants, for example.

But that'll have to wait. My trip to Illinois was marked by my saying goodbye to my friend of three weeks, Flat Stanley. Here he is at LaGuardia airport where we parted ways.

Flat Stanley has his own website FlatStanley.com. Flat Stanley is a drawing on a piece of paper (hence the "Flat"). He visits people all over the world, moving from place to place in an envelope. He usually stays about a week and during that time you take photos of him in landmark places and write letters to his parents, pretending to be him. In actual fact it is a child who gets the letters, and he or she takes them to school so that all the grade school children can learn about other places.

At first I was a bit concerned. How could I photograph a piece of paper near the Rockefeller Center, at Central Park, in Greenwich Village? But it turned out not to be so difficult. People were only too happy to join in and help me position Flat Stanley so that the landmarks were visible in the photos.

Here is Flat Stanley at the Admiral's Club at LaGuardia. On his way home to San Diego.

As for me. I was going in another direction. To Illinois.

It seems to me that Illinois is not much different from New York. Except for the accents. And the clothes (colored) and the food.

You are probably wondering what this photo is of. I will not keep you in suspense. It is of an olive, stuffed with blue cheese. One of the more exotic offerings at J. Alexanders, a restaurant in Deerfield, Illinois. You get three of them stabbed with a toothpick in your martini.

At J. Alexanders I was reminded of the first place I lived in when coming to America. Edmond, Oklahoma. The restaurants have identical layouts. A horseshoe-shaped bar in the middle and sit-down areas were on either side.

The food was good, though I gave the blue cheese olives a miss.

Back at the hotel (a Marriott) I asked about WiFi. No we don't have it but we might get it in the future I was told. I mosied down to the hotel's "Business Center", sure that there'd be some ethernet connected PCs for guests to use. There was. One.

Now I don't want to sound like a critical New Yorker. Because of course I am not.

I don't like Kate Miller-Heidke any more and she's from my home country, Australia. And I do like Flat Stanley, and he isn't from New York. I don't like a certain person in Spain, and he has never been to New York. I don't like people who cannot write in complete sentences, even if they ARE fans (see HERE). And I don't think I could EVER like

blue cheese stuffed olives.