Arizona Day 2

In addition to eating lots of good food on Day 2 in AZ, I also went to an arboretum (sp?).  I saw some cool stuff including:

 

We also saw:

 

 Afterwards, we went out to lunch.  Next to lunch was the World's Smallest Museum.  Our plan was to eat, then visit the museum.  Unfortunately, when we were done with lunch the museum was closed.  :-(  So sadly, I cannot say I went inside the World's Smallest Museum.  I did however, peek in the window so technically, I saw some things in the museum.  We are all ready compiling a list of things to do on my next visit so perhaps that will have to go on the list.  :-) 
 

 

After not visiting the museum, we went to the mall and did a little shopping.  Do you know what I bought?  A sweater!  It was 90 degrees in Arizona and I bought a sweater.  Who does that?!  But it was only $8.00 and it will be cold next winter so I'm sure it'll get worn eventually.  But yes, such a ridiculous thing to buy on a 90 degree day.   

Donuts, Cookie Dough, and bye bye extra room in my jeans

On Day 2 of my Arizona trip, I was treated to a delightful (and large) breakfast.  Options included: donuts, French toast casserole, fruit, bagels, juice, bacon, and I think I could have had eggs if I'd wanted.  I like eggs, but there were plenty of options as it was.  I confess I ate too much (1 donut, a small piece of French Toast casserole, 1 piece of bacon, and fruit).  Normal breakfast for me is either: a serving of Cheerios (I actually measure it out) or a bagel or English Muffin with some sort of spread (usually cream cheese or peanut butter).  Once in a while on weekends, I'll splurge and make scrambled eggs or pancakes or French toast.  But not all of them.  On days when I want to be healthy I'll have a spinach pineapple smoothie (it's actually quite good, though I know it sounds weird).  I hadn't had a donut in months, in fact it's possible it's been longer than that.  I ate 2 while I was in AZ. I'm lucky I only gained one pound that whole trip with all the delicious unhealthy food I ate.  Hopefully, I don't gain any more!  Speaking of food, lunch was grilled cheese and French fries.  Dinner:  Crock-pot orange chicken, zucchini (okay that part was healthy), rice, and a glass of wine.  Dessert:  cookie dough.  Yes, cookie dough.  Natalie had a recipe for eggless cookie dough that was safe to eat straight.  There were five of us in her house and one of those people didn't eat any.  She doubled the recipe and still the cookie dough was gone before Wednesday.  I fear I am no longer going to be in first place in The Biggest Loser contest I am participating in because I have to weigh in in less than one week.  I'm going to have to eat lettuce for the next 5 days!  By the way in case you are wondering why I only blogged about food and not about any of the fun things I did on Day 2, the truth is I haven't uploaded my pictures yet, but I had time to blog so I figured I'd get a post in.  I'll try to load the pictures soon so I can blog about things besides food.  I ate a lot of good food on vacation, but I did fun things too.  In the mean time, I need to go burn some calories.      

Visiting "Famous" Places and a Vacation of Food

So as I wrote in my last blog post, I recently went to Arizona to visit a friend.  The first day I got there was kind of low key, which was fine with me since I'd been up since before sunrise in order to catch my flight.  My friend who I visited has a blog and unlike mine a lot of people read hers.  She's semi-famous (okay I may have made the famous part up, but she has a lot of followers).  Her blog is great and she often writes about things in her house so I felt like I was visiting a historic site or something because I kept seeing objects, rooms, etc., I'd read about in her blog.  It's like when you see a famous place on tv or read about it in a tour book and then you go there.  Anyway, the theme of this vacation was too much food and that began right away on my first day.  Natalie's cousin (who I'd actually met the last time I was out there) was having a party at her house so there was a bunch of food out when I got there and as I'd been up for 12 hours and only had a bagel, the standard mini peanuts and pretzel bags they serve on the plane I was starving.  Natalie had made me special blondies too.  Delicious!  Despite eating all this great food, we still went out for Mexican food later (also good).  And not too much later I crashed.  It had been a long day (mainly because of my crazy flight plan) filled with good food.   

I'm Not the Only One With a Bad Sense of Direction

So I recently went to Arizona to visit a friend from college.  I had a great time and you can (eventually) expect to read about it in future blog postings.  For now, I'd like to whine about the flight out.  The flights themselves weren't terrible, a little bumpy and one was late leaving (but I managed to make my connecting flight--thank goodness it was close by, and at a smaller airport--flash back to the two times I've had to RUN through the terminal in Atlanta), but I'm not sure how the airlines think sometimes.  They made me go south to go north to go south again.  Does that seem confusing to anyone else?  I'm fine with not having a direct flight, but you'd think they could at least head me in the right direction and stop somewhere in the middle instead of all over the places before heading me in the right direction.  I suppose it could be worse.  I once met a woman in Seattle who had to fly from Seattle to NY via Atlanta (um, what?!  I know my geography isn't that great, but come on, that's a little ridiculous).  I also don't know what my deal was, but I was getting RESTLESS on the flight.  I had a book, my music, etc., but I was struggling.  There are places I want to visit that are more than 12 hours away and if I was getting restless on a flight that wasn't really that long, it makes me wonder how the heck I'll manage a 12 hour flight some day.  See I can't sleep on a plane--even if I'm exhausted and woke up BEFORE 5am, I still can't fall asleep on the plane.  Fall asleep in a car, no problem (don't worry, I wasn't driving), but put me on a plane, make me tired, and still the sleep will not come.  Even if it's a red eye, but I am getting way off topic so good night for now.   

A Wedding Tid Bit

Not a whole lot to report on the wedding front, but I figured since I hadn't given any updates yet, I'd get on it.  And give you a break from the recipes.  We are meeting with photographers soon.  We also got some stuff for the table when people sign in.  We saw this cute idea where people write you a note on a postcard and put it in a suitcase (in lieu of or in addition to) a traditional guest book so we're working on that.   We have the suitcase and I've been going through old postcards, which has been kind of fun.  That's all for news now on the wedding front. 

Dish 30 Peanut Butter and Banana French Toast

So the title sounds tasty, right?  Yeah, not so much.  Peanut butter tastes good, bananas taste good, and French toast tastes good, but put them all together and it wasn't that great.  It was a bit of a let down.  :-(  I didn't finish eating it.  I will not be making this dish again. 

This is a little late in coming, but just want to send thoughts and prayers to Boston, one of my favorite cities (and once upon a time my home).