Wednesday was a busy day spent in a series of meetings and following up on necessary correspondence. The highlight of the day was lunch with—and those of you who follow the blog will understand—the Mysterious Myra McKenzie. Three other members of the Wal-Mart legal department joined us, Susan Klooz, Sonya Dodson, Jan Sturner, and I’m grateful to them for taking time out of their busy days to come for an informal lunch.

We chatted about what’s going on at the law school and ways in which we might work together in the future. During our lunch at Ella’s at Carnall Hall we also talked about the new thinking in legal education, including the Best Practices in Legal Education book and the Carnegie Report. I updated them on the law school’s strategic planning process and how we are responding to those reports,and thinking about the notion of creating more experiential opportunities for students. I shared with them our excitement about adding an immigration law clinic and the growth of our pro bono program. I also expressed my gratitude to them for the fact that Wal-Mart has graciously agreed to sponsor–along with SBA, BLSA, APALSA, and the Hispanic Student Bar Association—our Student Networking Event. This is our first annual networking activity on April 17 during which our students will be able to network informally with members of the Bar. Many thanks to Wal-Mart for sponsoring this event for us.

We also visited a little bit about our internal competitions and the need for judges. Sonya Dodson graciously agreed to pass this need on to Wal-Mart lawyers and also to follow up during the course of the year with the competition schedule as we need judges. Thanks again to Susan Klooz, Sonya Dodson, Jan Sturner, and Myra McKenzie for lunching with me, and I look forward to our future collaborations and appreciate the support.

After a busy day, I was able to have a quiet dinner at Bordinos with Henry McLeish, a visiting professor and former First Minister of Scotland. He spoke to the Arkansas Committee on Foreign Relations on Wednesday at the Little Rock Club in Little Rock earlier that day [Arkansas Busniess Article]. Henry was the second minister of Scotland from 2000 to 2001, was in the British Parliament from 1987 to 2001 and in the Scottish Parliament from 1999 to 2003. He has a visiting professorship here at the University, and lectures in both the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences and the Law School. As you might imagine, he’s quite an interesting person and it was good to be able to take time to relax with him.

With the onset of spring and the end of Spring Break, things start to get really busy around campus—and the law school is no exception. Tuesday was really busy. We had a number of activities in the law school and we also had some wonderful visitors stop by.

Before I get to all of that, I just want to say thank you to my colleague of many years, Robert Laurence. Back before I even accepted a position at the University of Arkansas, Bob sent me a picture of daffodils along with a warm note encouraging me to join him and the other members of the law school community here. He has been sending me daffodils at the beginning of spring every year since. Despite his retirement, I returned from a trip to find a vase of beautiful daffodils and another warm and caring note. Thank you so much, Bob. It is because of that warmth from you and others that I remain committed to the University of Arkansas.

As for the day’s activities, one of our alums from California visit stopped by. Doug Fee, his wife Mary and his children, Houston and Dana, were with him, and Dean Miller took them on a tour of the building. It was great to meet him. Professor Emeritus John Watkins came up to the school to visit with Doug and his family as well.

At noon we had our Academic Deans Group Luncheon and, although I took my camera, I forgot to take pictures! It was hosted by Dean Ashok Saxena of the College of Engineering. We discussed a number of potential changes in policy and various reports from central administration with the Provost.

I was delighted to be able to have an unexpected visit with Sid Davis early that afternoon. As you may know, Sid has been a wonderful supporter of the law school community. Professor Mary Beth Matthews holds the “Sidney Parker Davis Jr. Professor of Business and Commercial Law” professorship. It was great to see him and to spend a bit of time catching up. We talked about the Judge Robert Fussell study room and he was able to see the beautiful art that Bobby donated to hang in law school, for which we are so very grateful, for the first time. We spent some real quality time together, and I appreciate him taking time out of his busy day to stop by. Sid, it was terrific to see you! I’m already looking forward to your next visit.

At 3:30 p.m, the Hartman Hotz Trust hosted a program with Henry Schaefer in the E.J Ball Courtroom. The lecture was entitled, “The Big Bang Theory, Stephen Hawking, and God.” (I don’t know where the pics are for this Macey took them) It was a very well attended. Afterwards, there was a reception in the Six Pioneers Room, followed by dinner at the Greenhouse Grille. The Greenhouse Grille is a relatively new restaurant in Fayetteville that serves environmentally friendly and organic menu items. Don Bobbitt and his wife Susan, Barbara Taylor, Peter Pulay (professor of chemistry and biochemistry), Dave Fredrick (professor of classical studies and the director of humanities), Jeannie Wayne, Steve Sheppard, myself and Henry Schaefer attended the dinner. The conversation was relaxed and covered everything: science, recent occurrences and issues on campuses around the country, the current political race, the war in Iraq, organic food and sustainable agriculture. It was an enjoyable evening at the Greenhouse Grille and good to be with my colleagues on the Hartman Hotz Committee.

For you foodies out there, I had a quinoa salad with yellow fin tuna, black beans, mandarin oranges, carrots, scallions and cilantro citrus vinaigrette dressing. The entire table shared appetizers of vegetable egg rolls stuffed with sauteed carrots, cabbage, onions and peppers served with a ginger mustard dipping sauce, and crispy crab cakes served with a roasted red pepper cilantro tartar sauce. Professor Sheppard, I just have to share, had a goat cheese buffalo burger with roasted garlic aioli sauce and bacon, topped with goat cheese and served with a side of sweet potato fries. It was a bit more substantial than a salad, but the best part of his meal was the sweet potato fries which he was very generous in sharing.

Monday started as every Monday does at Studio Pilates with Claudia. I can tell that I’m getting a little bit stronger, but I have a long way to go to be Fabulous at 50. The rest of the morning was filled with the very important task of preparing for the law school’s budget presentation.

At noon we had a faculty meeting, and directly afterwards it was time to go over and deliver the budget presentation to the Budget Committee. Lynn Stewart, our Budget Director, goes with me each year. This was my second year presenting, and I think I was a lot more nervous the first year. We submitted a modest proposal and spent the majority of our time updating the Budget Committee about developments in the law school, some of our priorities and goals and explaining what we would do with the budget we requested. We shared the fact that we feel the changes we are making will benefit the broader University as well as the law school. The presentation went well. Thank you, Lynn, for your hard work!

Later that day, I went over to observe a piece of public art. The artist, Kelsey Felthousen, constructed a house inside out in the Union Mall for her masters art thesis. She is sleeping, eating, and living in the Union Mall for 13 days with no walls or ceilings around the bedroom, living room, kitchen or bathroom. When I first saw it, I had no idea what that was…it just looked like a house sitting out on the Union Mall, so I went over and took some pictures . The inspiration for her project, entitled “My Space,” is to demonstrate to people how internet social networking sites like “MySpace,” “Facebook” and “YouTube” are allowing people to give away the last remnants of their privacy. To demonstrate this, she has set up cameras around her project, which feed to a viewing area in the Fine Arts Gallery, so everyone can observe her life. She is quoted as saying, “You’re not just telling your friends an inside story; you’re telling the world.” It’s very interesting, and has recieved quite a bit of publicity.

Because I haven’t been able to lately, I took my mom to Taste of Thai for dinner Monday evening and we had a wonderful, quiet meal. For an appetizer, we had the chicken pot stickers that are grilled and served with homemade sauce on the side. For dinner, mom had the Pad Thai Lay Puk. It’s a seafood dish with prawns, fish and scallops stir-fried with mixed vegetables in Thai brown sauce. I had the house combo: sauteed chicken, pork and prawns with baby corn, snow peas, onion, green onion and fresh mushrooms. We spent a relaxing evening together and I was able to catch her up on all my recent travels. My mom had never been to Taste of Thai, and she enjoyed it very much (especially the fact that she got to keep all the leftovers from both meals).

Friday of Spring Break – a time to relax and to reflect. It’s also Good Friday in the church year and it turned out to be a very good Friday spent with friends. Dan and Deb Coody and I took a ride out to their cabin in Madison county near Kingston, Arkansas. It was a beautiful day, the ride was lovely and the view was very scenic. When we arrived, we did a bit of walking around their property. They have a small stream with a waterfall on their land that was just absolutely beautiful. The scenery, the bluffs and the view of valley were just breathtaking.

We were there to spruce up the cabin because they had some friends coming to stay, but we also just spent good quality time together. Dan and Deb are the kind of friends with whom you can be quiet and share the glory of nature around you. I really appreciate my downtime with them. I could feel the stress just melt away. We shared a lunch of brats, potato salad and beer and then sat on the front porch looking at the views, watching the bird, and listening to the trickle of the stream in the background. It was absolutely fantastic.

After a while at the cabin, we took off and went to the low-water crossing on the Buffalo River. It was packed. It seemed everyone was ready for spring and was out enjoying the lovely weather. We also came across a number of elk that had come out of the woods to eat with a herd of cattle, and we got some nice pictures of that. It was all just majestic and beautiful. From there, we went to Steel Creek at the Buffalo River. (we got some really beautiful pictures of the scenery there) It was just outstanding, and it was neat to see everyone out enjoying the weather—some people were even canoeing.

Right about that time we decided it was time for chocolate pie, so we went on the great chocolate pie search. We began in Kingston,and searched to no avail. From there we went to Ponca, but we couldn’t find a restaurant open so we left there empty-handed as well. On our way to Hindsville in search of pie we saw elk again, and they were so close to the side of the road that we got out and took some additional pictures of these really majestic and beautiful animals.

We arrived in Hindsville in time for dinner so we stopped at The Valley Inn Café and had a wonderful home cooked meal followed with—you guessed it!—chocolate pie for dessert. For dinner, I had some brisket with mashed potatoes, green beans and a salad. Deb and Dan had catfish. For dessert we had wonderful, wonderful chocolate pie. I highly recommend it. Our dinners were good, simple, delicious and filling, and the pie was fantastic. After that we drove back to Fayetteville.

There has been a lot of controversy about the construction on the Square in downtown Fayetteville, but I really hadn’t been down there to see for myself. I mentioned it to Dan during the ride back, and he invited me to tour the square and offered to show me why the city is undertaking the construction. As we walked around the sidewalks, it was clear that they are in very bad condition and actually pretty dangerous, especially for women in heels. In fact, Dan mentioned that a few people had fallen. So, while I know it’s an inconvenience, it seemed sensible to redo everything. It also needed some serious sprucing up aesthetically.

After our walk around the square, Dan and Deb dropped me off at home. I really appreciate having spent a wonderful relaxing day with friends. Again, they are the kind of friends that I can just be myself with. Indeed it was a “Good Friday.”

On Wednesday afternoon, Teri Stafford, Malcolm McNair and I left for Jonesboro to visit with the Craighead and Greene County Bar Associations to update them on law school events and news. We got to the Jonesboro Holiday Inn Express about 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday and had a little time to freshen up before heading up to Paragould. The meeting was held at the Candlelight Steakhouse. We were in a small, private room in the back of the steakhouse, and arrived ahead of time to set things up before our guests arrived. A number of our alums came out to see us, along with Senator Robert Thompson, Donis Hamilton, Jay Scurlock, King Benson and Bob Young. A special thanks goes out to H.T. Moore, who wasn’t feeling well but stopped by to say hello anyway, and to our hostess, Lorie Whitby.

During the cocktail hour, Donis Hamilton recommended that I try a local delicacy, so out came a platter of rooster fries. They look a little like fried okra, but without the green. When I asked everybody what it was, they would say it was a local delicacy and nothing more. Donis said, “You must absolutely try it, Dean Nance,” and as you foodies know, I’m pretty game for anything. He scooped up several of them on a plate with some marinara sauce (sauce makes anything better) and, as best as I can describe it, they had the consistency of a heavily-breaded scallop with a very light chicken liver flavor. Not the best; not the worst, just sort of okay. Once I had eaten my rooster fries they told me what they were. It turns out—and there’s just no delicate way to say this—that rooster fries are actually rooster testicles. In fact, you can get an entire rooster fry platter at the Candlelight Steakhouse, which needless to say I did not.

Dinner was not as eventful as the appetizers, but it was very, very good. There was a salad with an unusual–but delicious!—wine and cheese dressing, a Cajun crusted grouper which was rubbed with Cajun seasoning, stuffed with seafood, covered with Cajun sauce and served with wild rice and seasonal veggies. As everyone ate dessert, we started the presentation and update.

This was a lively, fun group of alums, and we’re glad we could visit with them. They had lots of questions and gave us a good deal of feedback. By the way, many thanks to Robert Thompson, our alum and state Senator for joining us. I spoke with him about the possibility of restructuring the IOLTA trust accounts so that more interest would be generated for the legal services and other activities they fund.

After the dinner and presentation, we went with Donis Hamilton (our local guide) to Roy’s, which is an institution in Paragould. It’s a bar located in an old, remodeled chicken coop. When we walked in, it felt just like a scene out of an old Western movie—you know, where someone walks into the bar, the piano player stops and the place goes silent? When we stepped into Roy’s it was just like that. It was certainly a sort of “you’re not from around here, are you?” moment, but it turned out to be a blast. All the beer was bottled and apparently Roy’s has really good cheeseburgers, but we had already eaten.

I took a little tour with Donis of Roy’s and noted the sketches. There used to be a man who hung out there and made wonderful sketches of the local patrons. We tried to find Donis’ picture and couldn’t, but it gave me a chance to look at the sketches and all the signatures on the walls. Thanks very much to Donis for being such a wonderful tour guide of Greene County. Not only did he show us around, but he spent a great deal of time giving me the history of the lawyers in Greene and Craighead counties, and Arkansas politics. It was very, very helpful to me and also quite interesting. I appreciate Donis making the time to hang out with us.

After leaving Donis, we went back to our hotel in Jonesboro. The next morning Teri and I visited a couple of alums in different law firms. First on our schedule was Womack, Landis, Phelps, McNeill & McDaniel where we visited with Jared Woodard, whose brother Chris just got admitted to our law school, Raney English Coleman and J. Nicholas Livers. After a nice visit, we headed over to Mixon, Parker, and Hurst where we were able to chat with Harry Hurst and Don Parker. Then it was off for our lunch meeting.

The Craighead County Bar Meeting lunch was hosted by Mike Mullaly at the Jonesboro Country Club. Those attending included Jared Woodward, Chad Olham, Brandon Harrison, Jason Milne, Judge Lee Fergus, Val Price, Lucinda McDaniel, Troy Henry, Megan Henry, Don Parker and Sloan Rainwater. A special hello to Bobby McDaniel, whose room we will dedicate next week. He was also in attendance and we enjoyed our visit with him. Lunch was pleasant and we were happy to give an update on the law school. After lunch we went to visit the Barrett & Deacon Law Firm and Barry Deacon was a wonderful host. There we visited with Barry Deacon, Brandy Brown, Brandon Harrison, Jason Milne and Shane Baker.

We headed back to Fayetteville right after that last stop, though we’re already excited about visiting Jonesboro and Paragould again. As we were driving back, it became clear how the rivers had exceeded their banks. We are keeping everyone there in our prayers, as we are expecting another few days of rain.

Monday and Tuesday of Spring Break were pretty quiet, just like the campus. The one highlight was a meeting with Sonya Dodson from Wal-Mart Legal. We discussed Wal-Mart’s wonderful, continued support for the law school. It’s always good to see Sonya, especially when she shares her pictures of her adorable daughter, Parker.

The Annual Labor and Employment Law Conference is one which I look forward to every year.  When I first came to Arkansas—the very first year I was here as a new professor—I attended the conference and was warmly welcomed by the members of the Labor and Employment Law Bar.  They are special to me and I don’t get to see all of them very often, so I look forward to this conference every year.

This year, thanks to Hope Jackson and Stacia Alvarez, my presentation was a lot better.  My sincerest thanks to them for the hard work they put in on my CLE outline, which was an Eighth Circuit update of all the labor and employment law cases in the Eighth Circuit, as well as Supreme Court cases.  They also put together a great PowerPoint presentation which was very well-received by the Bar.  So, again, thank you Hope and Stacia.

One of the highlights of the Thursday session was that Stewart Acuff, the director of organizing for National AFL-CIO in Washington, D.C., debated Michael R. Flaherty, a partner in Jackson Lewis, L.L.C. in Chicago, Ill. Alan Hughes, President of the Arkansas AFL-CIO attended that panel as well. It was lively because they were debating The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which would give unions the right to have card check recognition rather than a secret ballot election if the majority of the employees in a bargaining unit were in favor of the union. As you might imagine, there are a lot of viewpoints on that and the debaters offered two completely different and lively perspectives.

The ethics hour presented by Mike Moore of Friday Eldredge & Clark, and Denise Hoggard of Chisenhall, Nestrud & Julian was great.  They were very funny and presented a really lively and engaging ethics CLE hour. That afternoon I presented my 8th Circuit Update to close out the day. A number of our alums were there including Eva Madison, Jonathan Carter, Jan Sterner, Jane Kim, Kristin Pawlik, Elizabeth Rowe, Mike Moore and John Snell.  Jan Sterner spoke the second day on the topic of diversity, representing Wal-Mart Stores and outlining Wal-Mart does to encourage diversity.  It was good to see all of them and spend time with my good friend, Denise.

I was a little sad to see the meeting adjourn on Friday, but I’m already excited about next year’s conference.

Wednesday began with a meeting in the administration building.  I was supposed to have lunch with my good friend Kathy VanLaningham in the Provost’s office, but we got our wires crossed and the meeting ran late, so I didn’t get to see her.  I did, however, get to visit with Greg Weidemann, dean of the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences.  Remember bloggies, it’s my goal to get over to visit with each of my fellow deans and hear their challenges and visions for their unit.  I’m trying to complete all the visits by the end of the fiscal year.

My visit with Dean Weidemann was a good one.  We talked about things we might work on together, about the challenges in his unit, about the history of administration in his college and the fact that he oversees five physical buildings on campus, plus a number of off campus sites.  I guess I didn’t realize the breadth of his responsibilities.  His departments include: Agricultural and Extension Education; Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness; Animal Science, Biological and Agricultural Engineering; Crop, Soil, and Environmental Sciences; Entomology; Food Science; Horticulture; Plant Pathology and Poultry Science.  He also oversees the School of Human Environmental Sciences which includes Apparel Studies; Interior Design; Human Development and Family Sciences; General HESC and Food, Nutrition and Hospitality.  He mentioned that one of the fastest growing areas in his school is fashion design.  He also said that, over the past three years, the largest increase in undergraduate enrollment within his college has been in the departments of Poultry Science and Food, Human Nutrition and Hospitality.  I really enjoyed the visit with him and getting to know him a little bit better.  Thanks to Fred White for the suggestion of meeting with the Deans from other schools.  It has been an enjoyable learning experience.

That evening was the Career Leadership Program for the Peace at Home Family Shelter at Garylord’s Café.  It was graduation day for women who, though they had come to the shelter under very adverse circumstances, had completed life skill training as well as job search and skills training.  Each of them received a computer after graduation and many had family members there to celebrate with them.  I was the keynote speaker at their dinner and gave each graduate a little gift to show how very proud I was of them.  The thrust of my talk was about the word “momentum.”  I focused on the idea that they had now gained momentum, which they should use to move forward.  I told them that they were on their way to better lives and emphasized how proud all of us there that evening were of them.  It was a very moving event and an honor for me to be there.  After that Hope and I drove to Russellville to get a start on the trip to the Annual Labor and Employment Law Conference in Hot Springs.

Tuesday, March 11th  began with the Academic Deans Group Luncheon at Hog Haus.  The host of that Academic Deans meeting was Collis Geren of the Graduate School.  The rest of that day was a pretty quiet one, but that evening was the Inns of Court meeting.

The American Inns of Court (AIC) are designed to improve the skills, professionalism and ethics of the bench and bar.  An American Inn of Court is an amalgam of judges, lawyers, and in some cases, law professors and law students.  Each Inn meets approximately once a month both to “break bread” and to hold programs and discussions on matters of ethics, skills and professionalism.  Our local Inns of Court is named for W.B. Putman who is an alumni of the University and a very distinguished trial lawyer.

At each Inn of Court there is a one-hour CLE program, and this evening’s was on trademark and copyright.  It was a well prepared program.  David Pieper, our alum, began the evening with a general primer on copyright and trademark law.  The session was set up like the game show, Hollywood Squares.  There were nine folks there.  The celebrities that they chose to impersonate were our local alum Don Elliott, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Pamela Anderson, George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Houston Nutt.

Just like on the show, there were two contestants. They would take turns picking their favorite “celebrity,” and the moderator would ask a question based on trademark.  The contestants would then decide whether the celebrity answer was right or wrong.  It was a very clever and informative session.  The group had prepared a number of slides illustrating the issues.  For example, one of the questions was whether a color could be trademarked, for example, the UPS brown.  The “celebrities” were also asked if you can trademark a phrase, like Verizon’s “Can you hear me now?”  After each question, regardless of the answer given by the “celebrity” and/or the contestant, David Pieper would give a detailed explanation of the correct answer.  In addition to an informative program, it was great to see a number of our alums and the local judiciary at Inns of Court.

Thursday started out like any other day, but during the middle of my weekly meeting with Teri Stafford, our new director of development and external relations, there was a knock on the door and in walked Frenchy LaDue, our contractor with Nabholz. In his arms was a huge basket filled with goodies based on a bet that we had a long time ago about the color of the carpeting in the old building. It was a good to see him again, and he was very humble as he “paid up on his bet.” Thanks so very much Frenchy, for stopping by and for bringing such a terrific basket of treats.

Following a faculty meeting, I took off for the Law School Admission Council Investment Policy Oversight Group (LSAC IPOG). The purpose of the IPOG committee is to oversee the Law School Admission Council’s investment portfolio, to make decisions about potential new investment strategies, to review the performance of the portfolio and to raise any questions we might have about the portfolio with our investment advisor.

Unfortunately, during the course of the day, the local weather prognosticators issued several warnings about weather (again!). It seems that my travels have been plagued by the weather lately. As it turned out, the flight form XNA was delayed about an hour and fifteen minutes, but at least it was a direct flight to New York City. We took of safely and, amazingly, arrived in New York pretty much on schedule. There was only time for a quick check-in and some sleep before the meeting began bright and early the next morning.

I am a member of IPOG committee as a liaison to the board of trustees. Fellow members on the IPOG committee include: Ellen Aprill, Associate Dean for Academic Programs at Loyola Law School; Ted Eisenberg, Professor of Law at Cornell Law School; Arthur Pinto, Professor at Brooklyn Law School; Leigh Taylor, Dean Emeritus at Southwestern Law School (but, Leigh got trapped in Atlanta due to weather and was unable to make the meeting); and Bill Wang, Professor at University of California–Hastings College of Law. Chuck Goldner, fellow Dean at UALR William H. Bowen School of Law, was in attendance along with Ellen Rutt, who you’ve seen mentioned in previous blog entries; Dan Bernstein, the President and CEO of LSAC; Marjorie LaRue Britt, the Chief Financial Officer of LSAC; and Stephen Schreiber, the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of LSAC.

Our investment advisor is Strategic Investment Group (SIG). The SIG advisors who attended the meeting were Laurie Bonello, Hilda Ochoa, Derrick Sasveod, and Stephanie Anderson. Laurie talked with us about the hedge fund market, the current economic environment as it affects hedge funds and the many issues that go into selecting a hedge fund manager. Derrick gave a presentation to the committee on private equity.

It has been my privilege to serve on the IPOG committee for a number of years – first, as the Chair of the Financial Legal Affairs Committee of LSAC (as an ex officio member, Chuck Goldner’s position on the IPOG committee right now), and then as a trustee liaison from the LSAC Board. This was my last IPOG committee meeting and, since I’m rolling off the LSAC Board in May. It was good to see everyone again, and equally nice to spend a little time with my very good friend, Marjorie LaRue (who is about to be Fabulous at 50 as well), after the meeting adjourned.

That evening we all got together—except for SIG advisors Laurie, Hilda and Derrick—to go to dinner at Eleven Madison Park. Because there were 10 of us, and because it was a rainy day in New York, it was very difficult to hail a cab. Instead, the doorman called a stretch limo for us, and we all piled in and headed to the restaurant. Now that’s riding in high style!

Eleven Madison Park was a very, very swank restaurant. The menu was a prix fixe menu from which one selected either two or three menu items. The first experience that greeted us was a rolling champagne bar wheeled over by the sommelier. The sommelier described each of the different varieties of champagne, after which we made our selection. Very shortly afterwards, the waiter came out and served us something called amusé bouches, or a tiny bited size morsels served before the hors d’oeuvres or the first course of the meal. On the plate were many small items, including sweetbreads in a little pastry, a mushroom tart, salmon tartar and foie gras sandwiched in between little cinnamon wafers. These were served alongside tiny french cheese puffs called gougères.

The next course was a nage. It turns out that ala nage cooking means to poach foods, usually seafood, in a bullion. The nage was saffron mussel with anaise sauce. The next course was a winter green salad with walnuts, beets and blue cheese. After the salad, we were served a Nova Scotia lobster. It was poached with madras curry, green apple, and lemon grass and was really delicious. Finally the main course arrived, which was the Grimaud Farms muscovy duck glazed with lavender honey and spices for two with an orange puree and au jus. Duck leg confit with kumquat and fennel were served on the side of the slices of duck. For dessert we had a bittersweet chocolate symphony with caramel that included a chocolate ganache and souffle.

Just when we thought we were done, out came a tray of mignardises (from the French word meaning “pretty” or “delicate”) which are after-dessert desserts that accompany a meal. There were little cherry pistachio pastries, chocolate peanut butter desserts, grand marnier ganache and raspberry pastries. What a meal! It was great fun, and even better company. After dinner, very much sated, we piled out of the restaurant and back into our stretch limo to arrive back at the Sofitel Hotel on 45th Street for a quiet evening. The next day back to Fayetteville

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Well, that’s what I thought, anyway. It was a quiet evening, but I didn’t return to Fayetteville. You bloggies out there know that I tend to run into travel challenges, which was the case yet again. Here’s what happened: I took a cab out to LaGuardia very much in advance of my flight. As it turned out, because of the weather that followed me from Fayetteville, it was very foggy, so flights could neither arrive nor depart. What’s worse is that American Airlines put me on a different flight through Dallas (that actually took off), except that I had opted to remain on the original flight in order to avoid confusion, the original flight of course, was ultimately cancelled. After having waited at LaGuardia from1:30 p.m. until early evening, I ended up scheduling another night in the hotel, getting a cab and going back into Manhattan where I walked around for a couple of hours before eating a Cuban plate at the Brooklyn Diner. The meal was chicken with lime and cilantro covered with peppers and onions, with sides of black beans and rice and plantain chips (not really very Cuban tasting, but okay for a stranded traveler).

Saturday, I took a cab out in plenty of time because of my concerns about both my baggage and my flight. I checked in, and found out that the flight I had been booked on through St. Louis, which was scheduled to depart at 12:55 p.m., was delayed until 2:18 p.m. That meant I would miss my connection from St. Louis to XNA. Sigh. I walked back to the reservation desk and re-booked, trying to find a flight that would connect to northwest Arkansas. The new flight was a Chicago flight which would arrive in Chicago at 2:30 p.m. with a connecting flight departing for XNA at 6:30 p.m. The only other option was a 7:00 p.m. direct flight that wouldn’t get in to Fayetteville until 10:00 p.m. It definitely took tenacity to return to Fayetteville.

I made it to O’Hare and checked the flight boards to make sure everything was on track with my flight to Fayetteville (which was supposed to leave at 6:30 p.m). As it turned out, the airplane I was supposed to fly out on was still at O’Hare at 3:00 p.m., and it had to go to Nashville and come back before heading to XNA. At about 6:30 p.m. (the time I was supposed to be boarding, if you remember) it was time to get something to eat, and I have to say that it was not a Fabulous at 50 meal, more like “Frustrated at 49.”

For those of you who are true epicureans, vegetarians, or just have healthy taste in foods, stop reading here. For those of you with more pedestrian tastes, read on. I walked around to the Gold Coast Dogs and had a combo sandwich. A combo sandwich is an Italian sausage and Italian beef sandwich, which also comes with a ton of hot peppers (actually a hot pepper, onion and carrot mix – it’s very spicy), a side order of onion rings and, to make matters worse, a giant grape pop. It wasn’t Fabulous at 50, but it was pretty fantastic and reminded me of summers on the south side of Chicago when my brothers and I would walk to a sandwich shop on 79th and South Shore Drive, and then over to Rainbow Beach to sit on the retaining wall and eat our sandwiches watching Lake Michigan. It was comfort food, but I fell off the Fabulous at 50 path that night.

At least I was caught up on current events, having finished the Friday, Saturday and Sunday, New York Times, as well as the weekend Wall Street Journal. It felt great to finally land at XNA at 11:00 p.m. Sunday…more than 24 hours after first arriving at LaGuardia. What a way to end my tenure on the IPOG committee, but as always, I am thankful for safe travel.