Lilveggiepatch

Greetings from Michigan! I can tell the internet situation is going to be a problem.  I got really excited about how fast it was, and then… splat.  It’s this kind of thing that will slowly drive me insane… I remember being on the phone for HOURS at a time with tech support when we had DSL and dial-up… I had all of their numbers memorized. I think it may be all the rain that’s pouring down! Unfortunately, it looks like it’ll be continuing on through the night, which is sad (don’t know how that’ll affect our firework extravaganza) but the forecast looks good from Sunday until Friday… bring on the tan lines!

Yesterday, Ari and I had a quick breakfast at the diner before I left for the airport.  I got my usual eggwhite omelet with spinach, tomato, mushroom and feta (and about half a bottle of ketchup):

Toast with HFCS-rich grape jelly (sorry for the blurry photo… too bad you can’t see how prettily the slices were arranged! Seems like they’re experimenting with presentation…).  I had half:

The airport food was ridiculously expensive (would you pay $3.49 for a Kashy GoLean bar?!), but I needed fuel.  I was craving OJ for some reason, so I got a bottle of that, a small salad with roasted red peppers, green peppers, chickpeas and kidney beans, and a banana:

The flight was fine… I think I slept for a few minutes, and finally finished a book I’ve been reading for almost a month.  When I landed in Dayton, the sun was shining and the weather was beautiful! I celebrated seeing my friend Jenny with a couple medjools.

Check out those clouds!

After making a quick stop to feed Jenny’s puppers (she has three of the cutest dachsunds around), we hit the road to drive to Indianapolis.

Jenny thinks I’m so silly for photographing the highway, but I’m so used to the industrial wasteland of my city (which I am completely enamored with, don’t get me wrong) that I think it’s just beautiful.

We stopped for dinner at… hold your breath… Taco Bell.  Yes, that’s right.  I’ve had experience with their fresca menu from previous moments of road trip desperation… everything has less than 9g of fat, and, more importantly, there are vegetarian options.

I ordered two fresca bean burritos, which are just wraps stuffed with beans and tomatoes.  I peeled about 1/3 of the bread off of the first one, and ate it with guacamole and salsa:

I unwrapped the second one, covered the bean mixture with salsa and guac, and just ate the mush.  Not great, but not terrible, either.

When we got to Indianapolis, we made a pit-stop at TCBY on the way to visit some friends.  I got a small cup with 1/2 PB and 1/2 white chocolate mousse froyo (both 96% fat-free), topped with Reese’s Pieces.  It had sort of a weird taste, but I ate it all anyway.

We tried to watch The Dead Girl, but ended up falling asleep on the couch.  Some Tostitos were also consumed… the Hint of Lime flavor is so good but so addicting! (True story: I bought a big bag of those for myself to celebrate getting into college when I was 17.  I also baked chocolate chip cookies and ignored my homework for the night.  It’s the little things!)

This morning I slept in, and it was glorious.  After we were both showered and ready, we grabbed a yogurt snack (I missed these Archer Farms guys!) and went out to visit some more people.

When we got back, Jenny’s mom, Susan, had a lovely breakfast ready for us.

She made wonderful Meyer lemon poppyseed muffins (I ate the top):

And, even better: homemade peanut butter and cherry granola! (We brought some of this goodness with us )

Homemade breakfasts are so enjoyable, especially while sitting outside and enjoying a little nature.

We hit the road around 1, stopping at Starbucks to wake me up a little.   I got a grande skim latte:

Hoping to avoid another fast food disaster, I picked up a Farmer’s Market Salad for lunch.

The nutrition stats are pretty good on this guy…

It filled me up, and tasted great.  Thumbs up to the ‘bucks!

Health aside, we munched on some Gushers-style Sour Patch kids.  Weird.

And finally, after three hours of driving through cold, gray raindrops… MICHIGAN!

So, I celebrated with a date.  Hopefully that won’t be the last healthy thing to enter my body in the next week… I’m determined not to let it be.

Well, it has now taken almost 24 hours to type up this post.  Hope you’ve had a fantastic  4th of July!

Happy belated birthday, K!!!