of mexican food, coffee, chocolate, and bullet-proof glass

it's been too long since i have blogged. i finished my detox, what seems like weeks ago. in fact it was only a little over a week ago. hubby rewarded me by taking me out to lunch for mexican food. i had chicken with pipian sauce, refried beans and spanish rice with a mango margarita. i walked an extra mile that day and tried to eat sensibly the rest of the day. but i also got to have a cup of coffee again and chocolate... oh how i missed coffee and chocolate!

of course the next day i attended a special lunch at the highschool where i was served pasta, salad with lots of dressing on it (i'm now used to having my salads naked), and a homemade chocolate chip ice cream sandwich.

the lunch was given by the special ed department at the highschool because we have kids from one of their programs come to the church to work 3 times a week to give them experience in order to transition into the workforce after they graduate. the food was all made by them and i didn't want to offend anyone by not eating. i especially didn't want to offend any of them by not eating the chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwich.

then that night we had a dinner at church for the kids that are being confirmed this coming sunday. i made lasagna and since i haven't had any of my lasagna in years i decided i would eat a nice piece of it and walk it off the next day.

friday hubby and i drove to philly for what is called a "beef and beer." had i blogged about the end of the detox previously and then our trip this post would have been titled: "of beef and beer and bullet-proof glass."

first of all the trip was horrendous. it should have taken 3 1/2 hours to get there, but 3 1/2 hours into the trip and we were about half-way there from the bumper to bumper traffic that kept us going an average of 30 miles per hour. i felt like kissing the ground when we finally arrived.

the purpose of the trip was to go to a fund raiser for my future godchild who is going to be adopted by friends of ours (and also the silent prince's godparents). since it costs an incredible amount of money to adopt they decided to have a beef and beer which is basically a party where you buy tickets to eat pasta (though they do sometimes have some sort of beef) and drink beer. you also have autions and raffles and dancing.

by the time we finally got there all that was left to eat of dinner was some lukewarm stuffed shells and lots of dessert. i had a stuffed shell and a piece of cheesecake and something that tasted like a peanut butter kandy kake made by tastykake (another philly tradition).

still we had a great time and i even danced the twist with the mother of the mother-to-be. i was disappointed though not to be given my jack rabbit flash trophy after wards.

we hung out with the parents of our godchild after the party for a bit before sending them on their way home and us driving to our hotel. this is the part of the post that deals with the bullet-proof glass, which is what the people working at the hotel were standing behind when we went to check in.

now i grew up in philly and still love it despite the fact that this time last year it had the highest murder rate in the country. i lived in newark, nj the year it was rated the most violent city in america... but the fact that i had to hand my driver's license to a guy behind bullet-proof glass in order to check in to a hotel kinda freaked me out a little.

it got worse from there. the only ammenity in the hotel room was the tv remote unless you count the bottle opener that was crewed on to the back of the bathroom door and, ok, the shampoo and soaps they left for us in the bathroom.

it was midnight by the time we got there and we wound up staying up much too late. since there was no alarm clock hubby set his phone to go off at 7am. at 9am when we both woke up hubby said he was going to pull on his clothes and grab some coffee from the continential breakfast in the lobby.

he walked out of the room at 9:08 and returned at 9:09 to say that breakfast was over and the only thing left were crumbs on the counter. i told him to throw his things in the suitcase so that we could get the hell out of there and find a wawa for coffee and donuts.

the trip home was far better than the trip there even with the 30 minute wait over the george washington bridge. and of course i gained back all the weight i had lost, but that's ok. i'm still eating healthy, walking almost every day, and i feel great!

keep happy thoughts going for the wonderful parents of my soon-to-be godchild.

God's peace y'all