One of my biggest pet peeves is people dissing Toledo. The TOL is what you make it and I think it's beautiful, hip, and strong. There is always something to do in town. From the Art Loops, to trivia nights, to hockey games, Toledo is loud and proud and so are the people in it. Tonight I ventured to Toledo soup with a close friend from work, Liz.

Cue cute pic:



So Toledo Soup is a semi annual fundraiser hosted in the Collingwood Arts Center in the Old West End. People from all around town come and pay $5 for a small meal that includes a bowl of soup (choices are provided from various chefs from Toledo).  I had a sweet and sour soup with mushrooms made by the chef at Balance Pan-Asian Grill. IT WAS DELIOUS 😀


All of the proceeds go to a cause that is presented to the audience while they are eating their meal.

Tonight there were four presenters (descriptions provided by Toledo Soup's Facebook page):

1) Morgan Fitzgibbons is hoping to win SOUP funds to help create a Post-It mural on the interior, north side of the Fiberglas Tower in downtown Toledo. The tower has been vacant for decades. Morgan said he has received permission to create the mural.

2) Soul City Boxing and Wrestling Gym, which won SOUP in 2014, is back again seeking funding to help pay the gym's Internet bill and to send a team of eight athletes to the Elite, Youth, and Junior National Championships in Kansas City, Missouri, in December.

3) Joseph Peterson is seeking SOUP funding to put on a “Family Fued” style event at Scott High School, in which students, staff, family, and “celebrities,” will compete for prizes by guessing the responses to survey questions.

4) Jerrod Witt is hoping you'll vote for his AudiblEye project. AudiblEye provides indoor navigation to the blind and visually impared through an iOS app. SOUP funds would be used to spread the application to a larger audience.

Each presenter spoke for 7-10 minutes and at the end of the presentations, we voted for the person we believed the funds should go to.

Toledo is such a great community, but if you don't go out and experience it, you'll never know.  So next time you have a free afternoon, go to the art museum, take a walk through the Old West End, turn your phone off and explore Oak Openings, take some cash out and go shopping on Adams.  Get out there, and explore your home.  Your views might change once you actually step out of your comfort zone.