Over the Thanksgiving weekend we traveled to Bologna, Italy. An old high school friend, Todd Waller, invited us down. Todd is married to a native Bolognan, Lorenza, and she and Todd introduced us to the city.

After getting off the plane, Todd took us into the center of Bologna for lunch. We wandered around for awhile, just taking it all in. Then he noticed a place "run by a couple old men who only open it when they feel like it." There were wooden tables and a simple wine bar. When it is open, it's usually packed, but we saw a few spots open. We went back out into the markets and Todd navigated various stores for meat, bread, olives and cheese. We brought it all back to the place with the wooden tables, bought glasses of wine, squeezed into one end of a table, laid the whole spread out and spent a few hours eating it.

At the end of the weekend, Todd asked us how we liked Bologna.

We said we loved it.

He said, "We're a little insecure about it because it isn't Venice or Florence or Rome."

I said, "You had us at 'lunch.'"

Bologna is a city of porticos, with miles and miles of sidewalks underneath the arches. It's home to the oldest of the medieval universities, dozens of churches (we paid a visit to St. Dominic's tomb and to the Basilica dedicated to St. Petronius, patron saint of Bologna), and a lot of shopping. It has a leaning tower that's way better than Pisa's. Most of all it is famous for its food-- one of its nicknames is "city of fat." Every dinner we had was wonderful. Deb fell in love with the tortellini (the tiny ones) in broth; Liv fell in love with the lasagna. We also thought of Aunt Carolyn and Uncle Peter, who took a cooking class here-- and now we understand more about why we have been so spoiled by their dinners over the years.

The weather was crazy, from great to terrible, but even when it was rough, it was romantic, (and the porticos helped). The pictures will say the rest.