Tag Archives: flowers

Our 2023 Road Trip #10: That One House from “The Notebook” Has a Pretty Garden

July 25, 2025 By in Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Anne in front of a road that's lined on either side by extremely tall oak trees.

Anne at one end of the mighty Avenue of the Oaks.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

Every year since 1999 Anne and I have taken one road trip to a different part of the United States and seen attractions, wonders, and events we didn’t have back home. From 1999 to 2003 we did so as best friends; from 2004 to the present, as husband and wife. After years of contenting ourselves with everyday life in Indianapolis and any nearby places that also had comics and toy shops, we overcame some of our self-imposed limitations and resolved as a team to leave the comforts of home for annual chances to see creative, exciting, breathtaking, outlandish, historical, and/or bewildering new sights in states beyond our own. We’re the Goldens. This is who we are and what we do.

For 2023 it was time at last to venture to the Carolinas, the only southern states we hadn’t yet visited, with a focus on the city of Charleston, South Carolina. Considering how many battlefields we’d toured over the preceding years, the home of Fort Sumter was an inevitable addition to our experiential collection…

It’s been a while since we had an excuse to post a basic photo gallery of pretty flowers. As it happens, our Charleston trip gives me that excuse. We came for the giant trees As Seen On TV; we stayed for the blossoms. And for some ice cream.

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Indiana State Fair 2024 Photos, Part 3: Where the Art Museum Meets the Chainsaw

August 11, 2024 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Blue cube suspended in midair with a light in the middle of it. Each metallic cube side is intricately patterned to project shadows on the surfaces surrounding it.

What if the Cosmic Cube were bigger so it’s harder to steal, prettier than a 6-sided die, and held a more enlightening kind of power?

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

It’s that time again! The Indiana State Fair is an annual celebration of Hoosier pride, farming, food, and 4-H, with amusement park rides, cooking demos, concerts by musicians either nearly or formerly popular, and farm animals competing for cash prizes without their knowledge. My wife Anne and I attend each year as a date-day to seek new forms of creativity and imagination within a local context…

Every MCC miniseries devoted to the fair has at least one chapter devoted to the works of art we encounter in the various exhibit halls. Art took center stage this year courtesy of Newfields (f/k/a the Indianapolis Museum of Art), who stepped into the role of “presenting sponsor” and brought new flourishes to old spaces.

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Disney World! Part 9: The EPCOT International Flower & Garden Festival 2023

March 16, 2024 By in Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Topiary sculptures of Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Pluto, Chip and Dale.

Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Chip and Dale welcome you to springtime, Disney style!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

Each year Anne and I take one (1) road trip to a different part of the United States and see attractions, wonders, and events we didn’t have back home. One thing we rarely do is fly. We’d much rather drive than be flown unless we absolutely have to…or are given some pretty sweet incentives to do so. Fast-forward to December 2022 and a most unexpected opportunity: The Powers That Be at Anne’s rather large place of employment recognized her and several other employees nationwide for outstanding achievements in the field of excellence. Their grand prize was a Disney World vacation! We could at last announce to friends and family, “THE GOLDENS ARE GOING TO DISNEY WORLD!”

For Anne it was officially, legally a business trip. Much of the time, she’d have to work. Not ME, baby…

One of the highlights of my EPCOT solo tour was their International Flower & Garden Festival. Each springtime since 1994 artisanal crews have bedecked the park with topiary sculptures of various characters from all throughout the Disney multiverse. I have no idea whether or not I stumbled across all of them, but I felt I captured a lot, as those shapely leaves were everywhere I turned.

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The Spring Birthday 2021 Trip, Part 7 of 8: Nature and Other Valuables

June 14, 2021 By in Indiana, Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Indiana purple flower.

Longtime MCC readers may recall I’m not great at identifying pretty flowers. This might be a thistle? the ones in Skyrim are flatter.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

For the past several years my wife Anne and I have made a tradition of going somewhere — anywhere but home — for each of our birthdays. Last year my birthday trip was among the billions of traditions ruined by the pandemic, all of which paled in significance to the millions of lives lost (and still counting). This year is a different story. Anne and I have each received our pairs of Pfizer shots and reached full efficacy as of April 24th. This past Friday and Saturday the two of us drove out of Indianapolis and found a few places to visit in our eminently imitable road-trip fashion…

Lest I fixate too much on the Bob Ross Experience, Minnetrista has more to offer the Muncie community and guests like us. Their welcome center has rotated exhibits since our last visit in 2014, but their springtime outdoor decor game remains competitive.

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2020 Road Trip Photos #4: Flowers for Hur

July 23, 2020 By in Indiana, Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments
BEE kind!

The best among Anne’s multiple attempts to catch a busy bee.

Not every chapter of every road trip tells a story. Sometimes it’s nice to relive the evocative imagery on our path. Sometimes it’s a nice change of pace not to elaborate. Sometimes pretty flowers are just pretty flowers.

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Give Our Regards to the Indiana Flower & Patio Show

March 23, 2018 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments
Tulips!

Shout-out to the wandering stranger who just had to stop and ogle the wooden reindeer at that exact moment.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

Twice per year my wife Anne and I escort her grandmother to one of two special events at the Indiana State Fairgrounds. Each November we visit the Indiana Christmas Gift and Hobby Show. Each March the highlight of her month is the Indiana Flower & Patio Show, which features numerous displays of colorful flora, booths where gardeners and homeowners can peruse and pick out their new seeds, plants, implements, and accoutrements for tending and cultivating their yards in the forthcoming spring and summer. Assorted horticulturists and lawn care companies show off bouquets, sample gardens, and ostentatious flowers you’ll wish you owned.

[After the 2016 show] Mamaw…expressed some concern about how many more times we’ll get to share this outing. She’s 91 years old, isn’t beautifying the plots outside her house as much as she used to, and is finding the sensory overload more exhausting than ever. As long as she’s still interested in attending her annual Super Bowl, we’re happy to keep seeing her there.

Now she’s 92. Despite our hopes for a miracle or a superpower origin or even a monkey’s paw, she isn’t getting any younger. After her medical event last November we wondered for months if she would feel up for any more public outings. Neither Anne nor I wanted Mamaw to miss out on her favorite place in the springtime…but as of right now, our annual tradition is officially not happening.

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Flowers Are Pretty 5: The Final Blooming?

March 18, 2017 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , 3 Comments

Red Yellow Purple!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

Twice per year my wife and I escort her grandmother to one of two special events at the Indiana State Fairgrounds. Each November we visit the Indiana Christmas Gift and Hobby Show. Each March the highlight of her month is the Indiana Flower & Patio Show, which features numerous displays of colorful flora, booths where gardeners and homeowners can peruse and pick out their new seeds, plants, implements, and accoutrements for tending and cultivating their yards in the forthcoming spring and summer. Assorted horticulturists and lawn care companies show off bouquets, sample gardens, and ostentatious flowers you’ll wish you owned.

This weekend was that time again! After our previous jaunts in 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016, once more we walked the springtime labyrinth at the Indiana State Fairgrounds with the intrepid Mamaw, showing her the sights and navigating the nature-loving crowds. Thankfully spraining my knee last Saturday didn’t interfere with my wheelchair chauffeur duties. Mamaw, on the other hand, expressed some concern about how many more times we’ll get to share this outing. She’s 91 years old, isn’t beautifying the plots outside her house as much as she used to, and is finding the sensory overload more exhausting than ever.

She was also disappointed that her brother — a mere eightysomething whippersnapper — has exited his role working security at the show after its ownership changed hands last year. Now that he’s no longer hooking her up with free passes, she’s disappointed that we have to (*gasp*) pay our own way into the show. We assured her this isn’t a problem for us. It’s not an upper-class political fundraiser. As long as she’s still interested in attending her annual Super Bowl, we’re happy to keep seeing her there.

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Our 2002 Road Trip, Part 3 of 5: The Meijer Garden Department

February 6, 2017 By in Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Meijer Gardens Cacti!

We’ve posted several photo galleries over the years starring just flowers and plants, but none looked as cool or as lethal as these echinocactus barrels.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: a flashback to our fourth annual road trip, a meetup in Grand Rapids with fellow Star Wars fans for opening day of Star Wars: Episode II — Attack of the Clones. Before and after the movie, we spent our first time in Michigan hitting a few key tourist attractions in the vicinity.

In between movie showings, our friends Katrina and Shannon had us detour for one of the largest attractions in Grand Rapids, the Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park. Opened in 1995 courtesy of the folks at Meijer — one of our larger big-box grocery/department store chains here in the Midwest — its 28 acres were donated to the city for use as a grand celebration of cultivated art and greenery. According to Wikipedia, Meijer Gardens has more than quadrupled in size since our 2002 visit. Our once in-depth examination is now an obsolete scratch across the surface of the flora and fancies that are surely like a standing army today. I suppose that’s what we get for arriving unfashionably early.

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2015 Road Trip Photos #46: Presidential Flowers Are Prettiest

April 2, 2016 By in Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

Hermitage Garden!

When we planned our visit to Andrew Jackson’s Hermitage in Nashville, we expected American history, Presidential burial sites, preserved or simulated 19th-century living quarters, honest acknowledgment of slavery, and maybe a few war props. We didn’t expect so many pretty flowers.

Rachel Jackson’s sudden death in December 1828 mere weeks before her husband’s first inauguration means she was never officially a First Lady of the United States. Up to that point, one of her prize works was the one-acre garden on their estate, which remains in place to this day with many descendants of the original flora as living, blooming legacies. For longtime MCC readers familiar with our annual spring “Flowers Are Pretty” entries (follow the saga here, here, here, and here) may agree this walk around the Hermitage works well as a bonus chapter in that series.

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More Than Flowers at the Indiana Flower & Patio Show 2016

March 14, 2016 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , 2 Comments
Dramatic Modern!

A variety of patio design options included this stark, eye-popping Dramatic Modern setup that can be part of your backyard for the high, high price of don’t-even-ask.

In our previous installment, you saw flowers and nothing but flowers from the 2016 Indiana Flower and Patio Show. But the exhibition, sprawled across two buildings at the Indiana State Fairgrounds, has so much more to offer than pretty flower displays. Various vendors offer gardening implements, flower and vegetable seeds, digging advice, contest drawings/telemarketing signups, garage finishing services, gutter-cleaning inventions, non-stick cookware, liquor, chocolate, nuts, coffee cakes, summer sausage, massages, eyelashes, poor abandoned pets, Indianapolis Star subscriptions, and more more more. And if you love aggressive sales pitches, DirecTV bought five separate booths specifically to irritate me, because the four booths they had last year didn’t do the job thoroughly enough, according to their anti-me tone-deaf focus groups.

But enough about marketing peeves. Let the pageantry and shopping begin!

Right this way for candy, characters, patio ideas, animals, and the little old lady who loved every minute of it!