Both my wife and my son will tell you that I am completely incapable of reading or acknowledging the existence of information scrolled across the bottom of the TV screen when watching Sports or News channels. Similarly, I’m much like Clark Grisold and not big on paying much attention to signs along the road, whether they are advertising billboards or signs containing information that the Department of Transportation probably spent countless hours deciding that I need to know as the operator of a motor vehicle.
So I considered it a “sign” from above (pun intended) when I noticed a billboard advertising the SPAM Museum as we headed up I-35 (just North of I-90) on our way to our campground in Ellendale, MN. Fortunately, Beth was happy to oblige and today’s adventure was a trip to Austin, MN to visit Hormel’s SPAM museum. It was a hoot! They definitely have a great marketing department that knows how to market their pork product. They even had multiple employees wondering around offering samples of multiple flavors of SPAM (using a pretzel stick as the serving utensil instead of a toothpick).
During my senior year in college my high school buddy Tom and I elected to live off campus and we had regular SPAM based meals. Every week one of us had to come up with a new SPAM based meal (he called it a SPAM-O-Rama). Therefore, I thought I knew everything I needed to know about SPAM. Until today, I had no idea that there was so much information about SPAM that I had yet to acquire. I’m not saying that the SPAM Museum will be the highlight of this trip, but I will say that Yellowstone has a hard act to follow…
Beth in Front of the Museum 
Brian Trying to Measure Up 
SPAM Conveyor Belt 
SPAM Options 
From the Gift Shop
When we returned back to Ellendale, we stopped in at Steve’s Meat Market. What a wonderful meat emporium. We procured some bratwurst, pork burgers, summer sausage, and two steaks (a ribeye for Beth and a New York Strip for me). We were unable to source any firewood, so we cooked the steaks on the grill and ate them with baked potatoes and Minnesota sweet corn. The meal was delicious.