The Green Frog

I walked to the downtown location of The Green Frog this afternoon as things are calming down a little bit from the hectic move to Jackson, TN over the weekend. The Green Frog is in the downtown area of Jackson just across from the Madison County courthouse and describes itself as, "a sophisticated southern coffee café". The green frog has been instrumental in my move to Jackson. As my Dad and I were hunting for apartments over a month ago now we were nearly settled on one particular apartment that was close to where I will be working at Union University. Just to explore all the options, however, we came downtown to have lunch and see if there were any living options. We found the Green Frog and had their specialty a "Frickin Sandwich", fried pickle, grilled chicken and a special dill sauce on a croissant. It really is quite good! It was on this trip to The Green Frog that we saw an advertisement for the renovated downtown apartments that I now live in. We called the number for the apartments and my now landlord/property manager met us here at the Green Frog.



The Green Frog has Wi-Fi which is now a must for most coffee shops but what is special about it to me is that they are open until 11pm on every night except Sunday. This will prove to be a "great place" when I am have left Union and don't want to be in my apartment anymore but still have work to do. It has an assortment of coffees, teas, hot chocolate and baked goods. It will be a good place to come to enjoy something hot on a cool Tennessee evening. A friend of mine who works at Cup O Soul in Winter Park ironically recommended The Green Frog to me after I visited it for the first time.

Carpe Diem

Mobile, Alabama is the city of my birth. This past year I ran my marathon PR here and although I have never really been a part of the Mobile community I love to ride through it's winding streets and hear my Dad's stories about growing up in downtown Mobile.



Just outside of Mobile's downtown is a historic neighborhood called Springhill. Springhill's historic homes and winding avenues are shaded by tall oak trees and it is home to a small Jesuit college, Springhill College. I visited Springhill during my senior year in college before I settled on Rollins. Across the street from Springhill is Carpe Diem, a small wooden house with a front porch that has renovated and transformed into a coffee shop. When I'm in Mobile I usually try to come into Carpe Diem for a cup of coffee and chocolate covered espresso beans that I buy out of machine for a quarter. Students from Springhill and the University of South Alabama, which is nearby, seem to come through these doors often to have a cup of coffee, talk or use the free wireless. Several adjoining rooms, leather chairs, a fire place and the smell of roasting coffee give Carpe Diem an inviting atmoshpere. Even on a Tuesday afternoon in the middle of summer time Carpe Diem is hoping. This is most likely due to the fact that it is conveniently located so near to two universities and has established itself as Sprignhill's local coffee shop. Southerners are slow to change and seem to respect their institutions and Carpe Diem has become an institution that will most likely remain for some time to come.

Stacey's Drugstore

Located just adjacent from the train station in downtown Foley, Alabama is a tiny drugstore called Stacey's. The entire downtown Foley is a throwback to a time when main-street existed in America. When small downtowns were clustered around train stations. This was an age when everyone knew their neighbors an age before Walgreens, Wal-mart and big parking lots. Stacey's is an actual drug store that fills prescriptions and has a professional pharmacist on hand but it also has chewing gum, cologne and delicious ice cream sundaes. The sign above the ice cream counter at Stacey's reads Fizzsician indicating that an ice cream soda expert is ready to make a delicious creation. They also serve fresh squeezed lemonade and lime sours, this is a real soda fountain like something out of the movie, "It's a Wonderful Life". They also have self-serve coffee for just 10¢ per cup.



Before Interstate Highways, Urban Sprawl and McDonalds I imagine that America had many great and good places like Stacey's.