I spent some time with my cousin, Carol, today stepping around the South Wedge. The sun was out, and it was a perfect day for wandering. The South Wedge is full of many small businesses. These are some of the places we stopped.

Mise en Place, on the corner of South Ave. and Gregory St., is a combination restaurant, deli, and corner store. The lunch we had there was good and the workers friendly. I was impressed that they had fresh produce.

I had to ask what “mise en place” means. It’s a French cooking term that literally means “everything in place.” It refers to having all the prep work done in a kitchen before starting in on a recipe.

Then we walked across the street to Thread. It’s an eclectic mixture of clothes, home furnishings and accessories. Think Anthropologie on a much smaller basis. I bought a couple of unique greeting cards and we moved on to Hedonist chocolate shop. The name there says it all.                                           

We hiked down Gregory to S. Clinton Ave. and stopped at Marianne’s consignment shop.  I was impressed by the beautiful wedding dresses Marianne has. They looked brand new. But, neither Carol nor I was in need of a wedding dress so we ended up with a blouse and a jacket, which also looked brand new.

We continued down Clinton to a natural food pet store and a new Literacy Center called Jonzey’s. There are books for sale, places to read and a lovely open mic area.

After all that walking, we needed a little refreshment so we circled back around to Cheesy Eddie’s on South Ave. Everyone in Rochester knows how good the cheesecake is there, and we were not disappointed. But, a special treat was that the owner made us a fresh pot of French press coffee.

On a day like today, I’d definitely rather be in Rochester.

Day 97: 13,372 Steps    YTD: 944,279 Steps    Goal: 913,000 Steps