Father's Day & Q-Mart

When I said I was going to post every day, what I MEANT to say was every weekday. I will only write on the weekends when the mood strikes me and this morning it did.

Happy Father's Day.

Thinking about my father, Joseph (Jerry) Morton Spivak, 12/9/28-10/5/84. We all miss him very much, especially my daughter Katie, his first grandchild, who he never met. She thinks about Jerry and Sally quite often. I was just getting to really know him when he died, I often feel his presence when I drive through certain areas. He was a child of the depression and was eternally careful with money because of it, although as he became wealthy he did enjoy the things and experiences that became available to him, especially his world famous sewn in pants crease. I need to start putting pictures in my blog, I have some great ones of dad.

As I sometimes do on Sunday morning, I think about dad and I decide to head up to Q-Mart in Quakertown. Quakertown is the gateway and closest shopping to where we lived in Durham Township in the far Northeast corner of Bucks County from 1972 to 1982. We moved there from Monterrey County (Pebble Beach, Big Sur) California where we had lived for a year and a half, and had moved there from the Rittenhouse Park area of Philly. Arriving in Bucks County was this wild family of 6, soon to be 7. Vegetarians, rock & roll promoter/restaurateur dad, hippie chick eastern religion seeking mom, 420 friendly, Jewish heritage, coming to an area with a majority of German ancestors who had farmed since settling there, and thought I might be an American Indian because I often wore my hair in a braid that went halfway down my back. Culture shock?

Perhaps the quintessential experience that made us aware that we were no longer in California was Q-Mart. This place actually used to scare me. It seemed like the people were characters descended from the Grapes of Wrath families I was reading about at the time. It was very funky and not appealing to me then.

Fast forward to the 21st century and it is called the Quakertown Farmer's Market. I love this place now, a combination of 120 indoor, permanent vendors and 400 outdoor flea market vendors. It's a great place to buy almost anything really cheap. If you haven't been there, check it out. I'll be there at 10a when it opens, meet me there this morning and I'll buy you a $1 pair of sunglasses!

Website: http://www.quakertownfarmersmkt.com/

What's all this have to do with catering? Nothing, but it's my blog. I hope you all have a great Father's Day.

Love & Harmony

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Catering Governor Rendell's Inaugural Ball January 21st 2003. Part One.

Image
I intended to write this post about 6 years ago as the event's tenth anniversary was approaching. I didn't. It's still a fun story and hopefully my memory will entertain and inform you about what was the biggest and maybe best event we ever undertook and executed at Max & Me Catering. As Governor Wolf prepares for his second inaugural, it marks 16 years since we took over Harrisburg's Farm Show Complex and turned a tractor and animal manure laden event hall into a fancy full on high end catered event for Pennsylvania's movers and shakers. Governor Ed Rendell and his wife Midge at the Inaugural Ball A little background. In December 2002, Max & Me Catering had been on a 3 year run of growth and winning venue contracts, and earlier in 2002 it was announced (after having to keep it secret for almost 9 months) that we had won the plum contract perhaps in Philadelphia catering history, the National Constitution Center. Integral to our success was the addition
Read more

Bryce's Catering & Me!

Image
Simeone Automotive Museum. Bryce's Catering's top venue and a very cool space. It's been over three years since I have written in this blog. Lots of news and changes. I have been looking for a catering company to partner with for over a year now. In making my decision many factors came into play, other than compensation the most important was autonomy. So I made the decision last Friday to join Bryce's Catering out of Haverford. Having done some type of consulting/sales work for probably 18 of Philly's top 20 caterers, I feel I am uniquely qualified to teach event planners the landscape, and strengths/weaknesses of the local catering market. If you know me, you know I'm a straight shooter. Smoked Salmon! Yum! Bryce's is a full service on/off premise and drop off caterer with an over 15 year history of excellence. I would NOT join a catering firm that I can't endorse 100%. Alan Brody, the founder and owner, looks at things differently, as I do
Read more

Reminiscences of Max & Me Catering. Part VIII

Image
As we continued the process of growing Max & Me as a premier corporate catering concern in Philly, a new venue that was under construction came into my awareness in the Spring of 2001. Jaisy Styles, who at the time was with PGI, a major event planning and destination management company, told me about the National Constitution Center and that I should contact a Phil Castellano to find out about the plans for catering in the venue. Well after many calls and emails that went un-returned, I eventually found out how to get in the door. Rather than rewrite what I have already written, I'm going to regurgitate three separate Facebook posts that I wrote last year. These are what prompted me to do this series on the history of Max & Me Catering. After these three Facebook posts, (which I tried to write on anniversaries of the occurrences) I decided to just write the whole history as a blog series. Now I have reached this point, and I feel like just cutting and pasting and sharing.
Read more