So on Friday night, I finished stuffing my remaining earthly possessions in the car, leaving little room for much of anything. (I suppose the car waged its own protest considering the additional weight.) The Mascot pretty much insisted on tagging along as well. After warning him about the lack of space, he reminded me that he consists solely of a head with some line segments attached and said he’d “fit in somehow”. It was a bad choice, but that’s a story for later.

First, I spent some time with my parents, then grandparents and aunt/uncle/cousin. For lunch on Saturday, my parents and I went to this restaurant called “Food & Thought”. All the food is organic and the fare is healthy (well, the desserts are rich). I had a salmon cake with dill sauce, veggie rice, and juice, plus blueberry cheesecake. Very tasty and fulfilling. And my grandmother gave me several muffin cake thingys, made with peanut butter, nuts, and jam or something. After that, my cuisine went completely downhill.

For some reason, long road trips cause me to get hankerings for foods that I would normally not consider in a normal state of mind. Stopping to fill up my car, I went into the convenience store to get a drink or something, when I saw a hot dog heat lamping machine. For some reason, the hot dogs looked absolutely palatable, so I bought a couple, complete with chili squirted from some machine. Needless to say, they weren’t quite as tasty what my foolish brain insisted they’d be. Fortunately, they were free, because the cashier was completely out of it mentally, forgot to ring them up, and told me not to worry about it when I mentioned it.

Other foods consumed during the drive: Beef jerky (artificially flavored), Jack-in-the-Box something or the other, and Waffle House, including 3 eggs. [The Mascot says: You cannibal!] There was some more garbage foods that I don’t remember.

BTW, there does not seem to be any Southern hospitality left in Alabama. I simply tried to get out as quickly as possible, worried at being queried “Auburn or Alabama?” and answering incorrectly.

Car before packing

Car after packing

Note my impeccable taste in movies: the original Batman and Thundering Mantis

In Mobile, the battleship USS Alabama, which I suppose is a tourist attraction. Did you know the US Navy now has zero battleships in the fleet? I didn’t realize they were that obsolete.