Wisconsin is for Mothers

Once upon a time I was scouting out venues for a friend's bachelorette party. I recalled from my childhood, partaking in a delightful little restaurant by the name of "Bobby McGee's." The place was packed. I remember waiting foooooooreeeeever for a table. Once seated, I observed that all the waiters were different characters. I think ours was Peter Pan. Somehow in this magical restaurant, it was everybody's birthday. Every table seemed to have a towering birthday dessert extravaganza sitting in front of a lucky little birthday boy/girl wearing a Herculean headdress constructed of tin foil in the shape of some animal. And if you didn't think it could get any better than that, there was a cart that resembled a horse the birthday prince/princess would sit on as the staff pushed them around the restaurant for everyone to see. Why was it not my birthday?! Oh and did I mention there was a dance club attached to the restaurant?

No this was not a dream. This was real life. And it was f-ing amazing.

So anyway. In my quest for the best bachelorette dinner, naturally I took Danny to check this place out. Friday night 7:30 pm- EMPTY. A round, middle-aged woman in a poodle skirt waddled up to our table. "Hi I'm Rockin' Robin. Welcome to Bobby McGee's. What can I get you?" Rockin' Robin could not have been less excited about her job. Ugh.

There had to at least be a birthday going on in here. Half way into an order of onion rings a plastic cart with a horse head attached could not have rolled any slower around the corner. Atop- a terrified 7ish-year-old. Behind- a sweaty, bargain-basement Captain Hook. Ughh.

As we finally paid our bill and were making our way out, I spotted the one other family in the restaurant. Horse-cart scared birthday kid's family. On his plate- a pile of "birthday dessert," and on his head- a mass of tin foil in the shape of an elephant.

"See Danny! Fun?!"

At this point Danny was about to fall over he was laughing so hard. I attempted to swiftly escort him out of the restaurant only to have Bobby McGee twist the knife in further as we passed the "nightclub" just getting going for the night with what looked like 7 cholas and 5 middle-aged drunk divorcees.

Bobby McGee's closed 3 months later.

I've had a good amount of Bobby McGee's moments in our relationship- "See Danny! Fun?!" And I was expecting Milwaukee to be one of them. But it wasn't. Except for maybe the Mars Cheese Castle...





"See Danny! Fun?!..."



Belle refused to even open her eyes for the lameness.



I wish I had a picture of the scenario that welcomed us inside: 6 burly Hells Angels looking bikers at a bar nibbling on crackers surrounding a giant goblet of liquid cheese.



Attached to the bar is a sandwich shop and a convenience store of cheese-stuffs and weird cheese-mouse effigies.



Back-pocket bottle. Haven't given up the dream.



Mars Cheese Castle. What a hoot. I guess that's what I get for trusting a list I found online called "100 best things to do around Milwaukee" that included "#17- take a roadtrip to Ikea in Illinois."



30 minutes later, Milwaukee welcomes us with sun rays and a spacious room in the Marriott Residence Inn on the River Walk.



I wasn't going to force a museum into this short trip, but then I realized it was the beginning of the month. *Little tip for fellow Museum enthusiasts: Museums can be expensive, but almost all have free days and usually those days are the first Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday of the month. Check their websites. Most are open to the public, some are for locals. If its for locals- just memorize a local zip code- they almost always only ask for that and almost never ask for ID. Anyway- this museum is free first Thursdays, so I thought it would be a waste not to just drop in for a minute.



I'm glad I finally got to see this one. There was a big controversy my sophomore year at BYU- a traveling exhibit featuring some of Rodin's sculptures were to be temporarily on display in the museum. This one, The Kiss, was decidedly removed- not because of the nudity- because of its sinful content. (It represents a story from Dante's Inferno about two adulterers now in Hell.) The art history department was pissed. But. No matter how valuable- adultery is NO laughing matter at BYU- just ask Brandon Davies.



More Rodin.



The museum was mostly lesser works of big names. Waw waw. But, after visiting the Louvre, Met, Art Institute, Getty, Guggenheim- like my mornings post-Oprah, all I have left in my life is let-down.











Lichtenstein. And Belle's go-to pose. Arm out, serious face.



Belle did pretty well. But she did let everyone know when she was bored and it was time to go.

We saw a commercial promoting Milwaukee tourism on a plane once and we laughed that just about the only "attraction" they showed was this Arthur Fonzarelli statue on the Milwaukee River Walk. (I guess Happy Days was supposed to take place in Milwaukee. Who knew.) Turns out it was right across the river from our hotel, all alone, next to a deserted Chinese restaurant. Weird.

Thumb grab



Oh...gross

Danny's favorite part of the trip: Dinner at The Safe House

I remember seeing this restaurant on the travel channel, so when I realized it was in Milwaukee I decided we HAD TO go. And it met all my expectations.

You have to walk through a back alley to get to its unmarked entrance. This led you up a flight of stairs to a small room with a gypsy woman seated at a small desk. She asked for the password. I couldn't find it in all my google searching online- so we didn't have it. She said we had to flap our wings and make bird noises while flying around the room. So we did. A bookshelf behind us opened up and we followed another staircase to the restaurant.

Once inside we notice all over the restaurant TVs of the gypsy room displaying shmucks like us tweeting around the room or worse.

Moving puzzle wall

Finding a bathroom...

Ughhh I had to touch it....

A gunshot goes off. A siren alerts the entire restaurant. The bar heckles me outside. Danny is hiding. Belle cries at the gunshot...or the fact her mom is a pervert?

We asked how to get out the secret exit.

A payphone call in a secret room opened a wall leading to a secret passageway out to another back alley.

Anyways. I'm glad I have all those pictures to prove that wasn't a dream either.

Almost done...

When I travel, I like to feel like I did everything there is to do there. I like to feel like I conquered the place. So although they weren't that cool- visit to "The Domes"-check.

Jon-teen sweet pictures of Belle-check. (In the Francis household Jon-teen is the highest number- even higher than infinity.)



"Flower Show" dome





Go-to pose. Followed by giggles.



Desert dome





Jungle dome

Milwaukee- almost conquered. Let's buy some cheese and get out of here.

I guess we could eat lunch first...



The Midwest is reallly into "pretzel rolls." Every restaurant has a burger on a pretzel roll. I hated it at first. Now I think I'm acclimated.



German stuff









Oh ok.



Finally.



MVP ("P" being picture) from the trip.

Our purchases. "Chocolate Cheese Fudge." Yes it tastes like chocolate and cheese at the same time. Just get over it.

Ok let's get out of here.

Trip Home

I've been to San Francisco 3 times in my life and every time I want to go to the Jelly Belly factory and every time it just doesn't happen. So when I found out there was a Jelly Belly Factory on the way home- how could I resist?





Turns out you don't tour a "factory" per se, rather, you ride a train around a warehouse watching TVs showing the factory process...and awesome things like this:





















Alright vacations over already! Back to real life.