{"id":1750,"date":"2012-04-23T21:35:42","date_gmt":"2012-04-24T01:35:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.old.caraghobrien.com\/book\/?p=1750"},"modified":"2012-04-23T21:35:42","modified_gmt":"2012-04-24T01:35:42","slug":"food-and-books","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/miscellaneous\/food-and-books\/","title":{"rendered":"Food and Books"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Food and Books, Union CT<\/p><\/div>\n

One of the coolest landmarks in the quiet, northeastern corner of Connecticut is the quaint and quirky Traveler Food and Books directly off exit 74 on Route 84.\u00a0 It\u2019s part restaurant, part used bookstore, and when you visit, you\u2019re invited to pick a used book to take home for free.\u00a0 Black and white photos of famous writers line the walls, and you\u2019ll find stands of jigsaw puzzles, coffee mugs, and shrink-wrapped sets of National Geographic dating back over decades.\u00a0 We like this place.\u00a0 It feels like home.\u00a0 They make turkey club sandwiches with toothpicks in the wedges, thick French fries, and Shirley Temples with maraschino cherries.\u00a0 The lower level is a tightly packed warren of bookshelves, where hiding and browsing are synonymous, and all your old book friends await you.<\/p>\n

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Pick a free used book to take home.<\/p><\/div>\n

But beyond the place itself, I\u2019m intrigued by this concept of Food and Books, as if they\u2019re a team, or interchangeably precious.\u00a0 Food is to the belly what books are to the mind, and I\u2019d argue we need both to be well and happy.\u00a0 I\u2019m reminded of Frederick Douglass, who traded his scarce supply of bread with the white boys in Baltimore so they\u2019d teach him to read.\u00a0 He was so hungry to learn, he literally starved himself for it.<\/p>\n

For those of us who can\u2019t get enough, is there a link today between over-reading and over-eating?\u00a0 Not according to a recent Canadian study<\/a> of sedentary habits and obesity.\u00a0 The research by Statistics Canada showed that not all sedentary activity is the same, as readers are less likely than TV watchers to be obese.<\/p>\n

Besides, books make us happy.\u00a0 They contribute to immediate and enduring happiness, the way good, nutritious food does. \u00a0For me, few indulgences are sweeter than curling up with a favorite book and a nibble of fudge.\u00a0 That\u2019s what I\u2019m up to tonight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the coolest landmarks in the quiet, northeastern corner of Connecticut is the quaint and quirky Traveler Food and Books directly off exit 74 on Route 84.\u00a0 It\u2019s part restaurant, part used bookstore, and when you visit, you\u2019re invited to pick a used book to take home for free.\u00a0 Black and white photos of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[63,160],"class_list":["post-1750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-miscellaneous","tag-ha","tag-reading"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1750"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1760,"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750\/revisions\/1760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caraghobrien.com\/book\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}