Hi there.

I had been thinking about starting a blog for a while now. I even took a class on it. But I wasn’t sure what I had to say, or even what specifically my blog would be about; I wanted to talk about books, and style, and food, and feminism, and travel, and literary theory…basically a lifestyle blog for hungry, well-dressed nerds (hm..that sounds like a tagline). But that didn’t seem very marketable. Then, this past weekend I attended the Cherry Bombe magazine Jubilee, which was advertised as “a day of celebration and conversation with some of the most inspiring women in the world of food.” Here’s a tiny bit of background on me: I’m a woman. I like celebrating and conversing. And I am both personally and professionally involved in “the world of food”; I love to cook and bake and eat, and I spend my 9-to-5 hours editing cookbooks for America’s Test Kitchen. I also went to graduate school to study women’s writing and feminist theory, so in many ways this conference sounded made for me. I have a subscription to Cherry Bombe and follow their podcast and their social media posts. I think they are doing smart, interesting, and aesthetically pleasing things. I was pretty much all in. What’s not to like, right? I was ready to be challenged and inspired and celebrated. New York City, here I came.

But of course, a mind-blowingly perfect and beautiful experience wouldn’t really make a good opening blog post for my new project. So here’s where the story takes a turn.