Lunchtime in the garden of good and evil - day 1

Last fall, our associate director Janice Swiatek-Kelley handed me a flyer for a conference to be held in Savannah March 13. At her urging, I made a proposal to talk about our digitization projects in Irish history. In December I found out that I was, indeed accepted, so we prepared for our first trip to Savannah. I had read about the city for years as the symbolic last stop in Sherman's March to the sea, and my wife was a big fan of the book Midnight in the garden of good and evil. As I learned more about the conference, I noticed that my proposal was very unlike any of the others - the typical presentation involved some aspect of Yeats or Joyce. I was, though, happy to see that a presenter on my panel was also discussing the Famine.

When the day came, we were happy to find out that the weather would be fine in Savannah. Not so much though in New York. The weather was awful as we headed to LaGuardia. The limo driver was doing fine until he turned in to the Cross Island Parkway, which was a complete mess. Two lanes over, a driver was shouting at us. He was taking two people to the airport and his car was billowing smoke. He talked my driver into stopping and taking on two additional people, who turned out to be a delightful couple from Huntington. They were headed to Florida first and then Savannah for the weekend. It was a slow day at Delta, so we made our flights just fine. Out plane turned out to be a Lilliputean commuter jet with a 6 foot ceiling and leg room for leprechauns.

The weather in Savannah was great, as advertised. We got on our walking shoes and began to explore the squares on Savannah, starting with Chippewa Square which was used in the filming of Forest Gump. We then headed down to the river to find a restaurant. Our strategy for the trip was to have lunch as our main meal of the day and then do light snacks at night. There were 3 famous restaurants with lunchtime buffets, and we eventually hit 2 of them. On our first day, we found a seafood restaurant called Tubby's and had a wonderful lunch of fried oysters and Crab Louie.

Then it was back to our walking tour of the city. We found the Mercer House on Monterey Square - central location of what locals refer to as "The Book," but missed the last tour of the day. Afterwards, we walked up to Forsythe Park and sat by the fountain. Somebody walked by with a Lhasa who resembled our Yuji and we were instantly homesick. Fortunately, the woman and Sugar stuck around and talked to us for a spell, and we had an entree into the thriving dog society at the park. We walked north again and found the Colonial Cemetery, one of the city's major historic spots. Then we made one more trip to the river and had a light meal at a New Orleans restaurant. Then we went back to the Hampton Suites and collapsed.