We drove to Oxford, MS today….a very pretty and quaint almost touristy type of town, but without the T-shirt stores or fudge shops. It had a real town square with a huge old courthouse and city hall. Nice little shops, the oldest department store in the south (est. 1838) and even a culinary and kitchen gadget specialty store (Kathy’s favorite type of store). We just walked all around the square and poked into the various stores. We got Habanero fudge sauce (yep…chili and chocolate), pear vinegar, cabernet vinegar and an absolutely huge cinnamon roll with lots of white icing, which I’ll warm up for breakfast tomorrow . Yumm……

Oxford, MS is also the location of Rowan Oak, William Faulkner’s home. Faulkner (Pulitzer Prize winning author, i.e. The Sound and the Fury) lived most of his adult life in Oxford. His home is almost exactly as he left it, including furnishings, pictures on the wall, his typewriter, boots, etc. Very interesting. In the room where he frequently wrote, the initial outline, by day, of his book The Fable is written on the wall in Faulkner’s own hand, left there when he finished and moved on. See pic.

Tomorrow’s our last day on Columbus because the 2 closed locks are finally supposed to reopen.