(photo by Kelsey Blackwell)

Though I’ve never studied architecture or usually take notice of such things, I know something cool when I see it, like this old Greyhound station on main street in Jackson, Tennessee. From what I could gather from locals, it’s one of two in the country to have retained its original art deco design and is still fully operating. A few calls around town and random Internet browsing place that other at anyone’s guess. When I strolled over to check this one out, along with the design it didn’t seem like much else had changed.

(Photo by Gary Clark)

The Outer Banks. Ah, just saying the name makes me feel pleasantly far from reach. North Carolina's 200-mile string of Atlantic beach towns - Kitty Hawk, Hatteras, Nags Head, Manteo, Duck, and several other coastal hamlets - all offer summer sunrises with your toes in the surf. Roam Carolina's east coast while the long days last.

(Photos courtesy Audubon of Florida)

Parting the humidity and swatting mosquitoes and other buzzing bothersomes, folks are heading to a swamp in Florida for the rare chance to see a flower so valuable it cannot be priced. The elusive ghost orchid, the bloom that launched a bestseller, box-office stunner and countless pilgrimages through gator infested waters, dangles from the trunk of a 500-year-old bald cypress in Corkskrew Swamp Sanctuary in Naples. The big deal here is not how the plant looks (kind of like an old man with close-set eyes and a long Mark Twain moustache), but how rare it is. It takes perfect weather conditions and a prayer to get this sucker to come out.

(Photograph via the National Archives)

Sometimes you have a celebrity sighting of a famous Southerner, and it makes for an interesting blip in the day. Other times, you see a legend, and it sticks in your mind for a long while. We had the latter experience this week, on a Southwest plane from Louisville to Chicago, when Muhammad Ali sat across the aisle from us.

(Photo taken by Kelsey Blackwell)

Fresh off the Letterman show, Birmingham’s homegrown Wild Sweet Orange played to a sold-out crowd at Workplay in downtown Birmingham last Saturday. Amid the smell of lingering cigarette smoke brought in on the shirttails of the audience, and the mélange of sweat and aftershave from the dude curiously overheating in front of me, was the faintest scent of success. In addition to late night, the group’s had a track featured on Grey’s Anatomy and embarked on a nationwide tour that includes a stop in Chicago for Lollapalooza. Folks from the ‘ham, though, can say they knew them when . . .

(Photos by Jennifer V. Cole and Kathryn Cole)

This week, on a twisty stretch of Highway 21 outside Philadelphia, Mississippi, the 119-year-old Neshoba County Fair celebrates the very essence of Southern hospitality (July 25-August 1). I've been going since I was 3-months-old, and I can tell you, there's a reason it's known as "Mississippi's Giant House Party." For seven days, folks do a lot of eating (fried foods required), drinking (you might find some 'shine), front porch sittin', and late-night pickin'. It's a time to slow down. To forget laptops and cell phones. And to practice the art of conversation and storytelling on a lazy summer day. I just spent a weekend at the Fair catching up with friends and chasing around after my nieces and nephews (I've got the red-clay-stained feet to prove it), and I can't think of a better place to be in the month of July. If you've never been, add it to your list.  If you have been, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

Here are a few photos of life at the Fair:

(Photo courtesy of Galatoire's Restaurant)

The New York Times published a story this morning about the return of Times-Picayune restaurant reviews for New Orleans, a missing part of the daily since Katrina nearly three years ago. First up for hometown scrutiny: Mr. B's Bistro in the French Quarter. The look in the mirror for NOLA means much more than an extra column in the paper. It means normalcy.

photos courtesy of Cochon

I see a menu with things like "bacon," "pork belly," and "fried pig's ear," and, friends, I become giddy. I am aware that there are others (bless their hearts) who don't share this enthusiasm. But I'm a little zealous. So when I recently sat down to lunch at Cochon, chef Donald's Link's porcine ode and one of New Orleans' most buzz-worthy restaurants, I whipped out my cell phone to immediately text all of my friends about the feast they were missing. Pork cheeks with a cornbread cake! Oyster and bacon sandwiches!  Pork ribs with watermelon pickle! The vegetarians weren't amused. But, my dear carnivores, get thee to the Crescent City.

(Inside the Spotted Cat, as seen from the back wall.)

"It's the best 100 feet of live jazz on the planet." I tell my friends this, relishing the hyperbole, a no-no for a writer, but convinced that if you gave me a jetplane for an evening I'd fly here, the 600 block of Frenchmen Street. Snug Harbor, dba, and the subject of this post, The Spotted Cat, puts out  jerk-your-head, smile-to-your-neighbor, tap-along music every night. The nine-year-old club, a former oysterhouse, ranks easily as my favorite.

It's often said that the word "cocktail" originated in New Orleans. That it is derived from the French word coquetier, an egg cup that was used to serve spirited beverages in the Crescent City in the early 19th century. Whether New Orleans is the official home to the "cocktail" or not, a visit to NOLA (as the city's affectionately called) proves, if anything, that they take their drinks seriously. And now, the city has been honored with its own official cocktail--the sazerac. Laissez les bons temps rouler!

(Photo of Charleston's Beard-winner, Hominy Grill, by Shayna Anne)

Foodie powers-that-be recently announced this year's James Beard Awards, the highest culinary accolade out there, America's meal medal of honor. The shindig, which you can see via pictures on the JB Foundation website, looked to be a real tony affair, with the tops of our nation's restauranteurs/chefs/food writers toasting their love of cuisine. And once again the  contingent who call our proud region home showed up bigtime at the celebration.

(Photo courtesy of the Weinstein Company)

Shreveport? Really? Kevin Costner loves Shreveport? Jack Black craves the poboys at Cush's Grocery? Denzel chose here to film a project near and dear to his moviemaking heart. Head's up, Shreveport is making real waves. This former oil man's hub is winning over Hollywood bigtime. One newpaper writer gives us the scoop.

*This post contributed by Travel Editor Carolanne Roberts

If you know Rosemary Beach, you’re saying aaaaaaah right now and nodding your head as those-in-the-know often do. If you don’t—and it’s still something of a secret, even in Southern reaches of Florida—then you’ll want to this place the rest of us rank high on our Beaches to Sigh For list.

(Photo courtesy of Texas Parks and Wildlife)

Matagorda Island - rugged and untamed, sea-oat-pure, populated by whooping cranes, wild turkeys, and white-tailed deer - lays 5 miles across the Espiritu Santo Bay from mainland Texas. If cowboys were sailors too, this is where they'd roam.

George Rodrigue's Blue Dog paintings and silkcreen prints have nosed their way into our American visual iconography. Ask anyone anywhere if they know the Blue Dog and chances are you'll get a bright-eyed yes. In recognition of such a colorful, distinguised, and massive career, the New Orleans Museum of Art and Rodrigue gather a 40-year retrospective "Cajuns, Blue Dogs, and Beyond Katrina," showing until June 8. What visitors realize when roaming the multiple rooms and viewing the 200 plus original works: this man treasures Louisiana. And, judging by reception in NOLA, the feeling is certainly mutual.