22 May 2010

BEACH VACATION, Day 1


We drag our behinds out of bed about an hour later than we’d planned because we both tossed and turned and wandered the house until the wee hours—pre-trip dislocation(?).

Anyway, we’re on the road by 7:30am with a quick trip to the ATM at Fifth Third. We’ve decided to wait until Elk Grove Village to exit at Arlington Heights Road for a couple of blocks and breakfast and coffee (free on weekends) at Jarosch Bakery.

I’ve already sequestered, in our freezer and moved to a cooler, 4 yummy brownies from Tuesday’s stop at Jarosch. There was a ½ lb of butter cookies, but I had a need for sweets mid-week, and CA stole a few, too.

We select another ½ lb of cookies to take along to the beach (which somehow never make it as far as our car--lost in translation), and look for Bear Claws before we’re informed that they don’t have any left. (They are made with almond flavored puff pastry, so they are a crumbly mess to eat and really not good in the car, so…)

CA chooses an almond and a lemon sweet roll while I indulge in a chocolate- frosted chocolate donut (OH MY! MA-MA-MIA!!!), and a cinnamon twist. The chocolate-chocolate donut is not-to-be-believed! What puts it over the top is that the chocolate cake donut is plump and moist. When has a chocolate donut ever been moist?

As we settle into our sugar/fat induced stupor we tune into Sirius NPR and Martha Stewart, with a little Wake Up With Taylor on Cosmo (CA hates it when I switch this one on, but kind of secretly enjoys Seven Things You Need to Know Before You Go, I do believe.)

Just north of Indianapolis near Zionsville we pull into a Walgreens (have I ever waxed eloquently on myWalgreens/money laundering theory?) to get some plastic cutlery so that we can eat the healthy Greek and soy yogurts we’ve rescued from expiration from our home frig. CA laps his up, but I’ve quickly discovered that mine expired on April 22nd and I’m not interested in food poisoning today, thank you very much. I re-enter Walgreens and buy a Yoplait strawberry smoothie to keep myself out of the trail mix combos I’ve concocted for the trip—1.) cranberries-milk chocolate chips-almonds-cashews & pecans; 2.) caramel chips (a new wonderful product from Kraft)-milk chocolate chips-peanuts.

We don’t stop again until late afternoon in Lexington, KY at Billy’s Bar-B-Q on Tates Creek Road near U of KY—We found this great place years ago and have returned a few times. Today we don’t realize we need to head West on Int 64 to go through Lexington to get to Billy’s and are 10 miles down the road when I decide (the current driver) we need to double back on Rt. 60 and have the early dinner we’d planned at Billy’s.

Well worth the detour, as we totally enjoy our Bar-B-Q and side dishes. CA chooses the pulled pork (even though we just had some at Dunhills on Thursday night) and I go for the ¼ chicken (white meat only). For side dishes we both have a garden salad, corn bread, and cheesy grits. At the last moment, I pipe up and ask our sweet waitress for an appetizer order of fried pickles with horseradish sauce. Talk about fun food! These pickles are waffly chips, but I may replicate this sometime for Small Group and fry up some pickle spears.

Satiated and feeling guilty about our fat intake for today, we drive on until we reach Huntington, WV, and a nice Ramada Inn just off of Int. 64. We watch some mindless television and fall into a dead sleep way before midnight EDT.

The best decision we made today (not counting the culinary-foodie stuff) was to begin listening to Tracy Kidder’s My Detachment. The author reads his memoir of Viet Nam on this unabridged CD version, and we are deeply involved in a perspective on that long-running, confusing and unpopular war of our youth that we’ve never seen portrayed in movies or read in books.

Kidder is a gifted writer and I love it when an author reads his own words—he/she knows the intended inflections and timing. You truly get the author’s full intent. Kidder is self-effacing and intelligent; honest to a fault. And, while despairing of his perceived character failings, you can’t help but root for him and for the curiously winsome characters that populate his detachment.

A great first vacation day.

I’ve spent most of my life worrying and planning ahead and forgetting to enjoy the journey. For some reason I feel particularly in-the-moment on trip. I hope it lasts.

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