Pan Seared

I love gumball machines.  I've always thought it would be cool to have one.  But then, of course, you're forced to chew bubble gum everyday.  Not that this is a bad thing, but your dentist might take issue with it.  Or maybe not, when I stop and think about it.  Maybe our dentists secretly want us to chew gum.  


Gum=sugar=cavities=visits to the dentist=dentist gets new Lexus.  -> 

2/$3.33

If this photo looks familiar, it is.  I took essentially the same picture on the third day of the project on August 22, 2010.  It was a Sunday.  

And so, on a Sunday almost a year later thus coming full circle, I returned to the same store and recorded the same subject matter. Note the price of the items increased by 11% in less than a year.  This is what prompted me to take the picture.  But there's more to the story, because the day before I took this picture I lost my uber phone.  I got it in October of last year, a full two months in to the project. Therefore I was forced to take a step back in time and start using my old iPhone (a first generation, I'll have you know) again. So not only did I take the picture using the same subject matter, I'm using the same equipment.  

The end of the project then, which is rapidly approaching (!), will be as it started: Hipstamatic application on a first generation iPhone.  

By the way, I'm SO upgrading.  I'm just holding out for the 5, which doesn't hit the market for a few weeks. -> 

Protein 4g

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Chewy

Breakfast.


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+Calcium

Well. So much for One a Day vitamins or drinking milk. From now on, I'm turning to Hershey's for all my calcium needs. ->



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Collect

I don't like Mountain Dew. At all. And 7-11 had the nerve to serve Mountain Dew Icee's for a while. What the...?

Angela's

She pushed this thing up and down the beach. And up. And down. And up. And down. All day long.... ->

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Location:N Seaside Dr,Myrtle Beach,United States

Enjoy

I took this in rural Georgia today. A bit of a back story might help with perspective. This is the big picture of my shot:



Once upon a time, you could buy a cool refreshing beverage here. Look, it was even air conditioned:



I love dilapidated infrastructure. The Geek isn't nearly as taken with it as I am, but I think it's quite photogenic.

On vacation (again. I know, I know. If that's not consumerism, I don't know what is) so the next week will be shots from our family trip. ->


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2 Squares

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Soni

Sprite

Auntie Anne's

I'm just now cluing in to the fact that I've been mispronouncing the name of this place for years. I've always called it "Aunt Annie's" and, upon viewing this picture I realize it's "Auntie Anne's".

Observant, I am. Nothing gets past me. Mind like a steel trap.

Onward.

Do you know the lore of Auntie Anne's pretzels? Without looking on Wikipedia, and if Oprah's account and my memory serves correctly....

Say you: I thought you quit watching Oprah?
Say me: Well, everyone quit watching her a few weeks ago, since, thank God, she's off network TV. But she featured Aunt Anne's once years ago. This was back before my converstion to non-believer.

...the recipe was an accident. An Amish woman was making them at a state fair or county fair or Amish fair or something and ran out of one of her main ingredients; thus she had to improvise. The result was a more popular product, and you can connect the dots from there.

I have a love/hate relationship with Auntie Anne's pretzels. I love them because they're a mound of carby, salty, fatty goodness, especially with the sweet mustard sauce to dip them in. (Or the cheese. Either one, really. Both if I'm feeling decadent and want to trade off tastes with each bite.) I hate them because the carby, salty, fatty goodness translates into about a day's worth of calories that can be consumed in five minutes. And they smell so. Damn. Good. that they bewitch you into standing in line for one without you even realizing it. I succumb about 14% of the time. 

Since malls appear to be dying, I suspect Auntie Anne's will die along with them, unless they move into strip malls. Or Target. Or Wal Mart. Now that I think about it, maybe this is why I'm seeing more and more free-standing Chick-Fila stores. They're ahead of the curve. ->

Location:Sooner Fashion Mall, Norman, OK

Stess

When I was a kid, it was Ding Dongs, not Twinkies. Mom used to store them in the freezer and it seemed to take forever for them to thaw enough for me to eat it. Sometimes I wouldn't wait and I would eat them when the creamy center was still frozen. Meaning the creamy center, in reality, was as hard as a rock. Made for a less enjoyable eating experience, but there were times I was simply incapapable of delaying gratification.

I'm afraid to taste one these days for fear of all my happy memories surrounding them being washed away with one bite. I've no doubt it would a) taste horrifically bad and b) send me into a sugar coma. Some things are just best left in 1981, ya know?

Authentic

Mmmmmm.......-> 

Juxtaposition

Two for one today. Up first:



And second. These we found at a local bakery on the Island. Yes, I bought noms. Yes, they were scrumptious. With this view, how can one refuse? ->

Location:Βαρθολομαίου Γκύζη,Μύκονος,Greece

Heinz

Tootsie

Chewy goodness. ->

Nom

  

I'm not one to throw out raving reviews of food and restaurants willy nilly.  I would like to think that I have a trained palette and discriminating tastes.  

Say you: A girl can dream. 

Say me: You digress. 

So, believe me when I tell you that pictured above is quite possibly the BEST chocolate malt I've ever had.  After running four miles today, I was completely entitled to scarfing some from The Boy.  We went here for lunch after our big finish.  Yes, he did the run too.  But seeing as he's only 16, he gets to eat 4 times the amount of calories for one day.  I, in my decrepit state however, am only allowed an extra 20.  So I only allowed myself a couple (read:  four) bites. It was heaven on a fork.  

Say you: Don't you mean "heaven on a spoon"?  

Say me: No.  I mean "heaven on a fork".  Because the malt was that thick.  Need I say more? -> 

File Under: Hell No

 

The Geek brought these home from the office the other day.  Some dude is visiting from the China office or visited the China office, or honeymooned in China, or something, and brought a bunch of weird stuff back with him.

Nestle, not an American company, sells KitKit in China.  Who knew?  Here's the rub:  Those up there?  

Wasabi.  

No.  

Not kidding.  

WASABI KitKat!!  Which, I have to say, sucks. I'll prove it to you.  I have the other one in my fridge, which I will gladly send your way and you can taste for yourself.  

Six kinds of awful, those are.   

There is all kinds of goodness that we Americans are missing out on when in comes to the world of KitKat.  We get exactly three varieties here: milk chocolate, white chocolate, and dark chocolate.  (For the record, dark chocolate is the only that matters.)  The white chocolate ones are only around at Halloween when the snack-sized flavors are stuffed in a variety bag.  And the dark chocolate ones are only sporadically on the market--it's like finding an easter egg when I happen to see them on store shelves.  So really, here in Oklahoma we get one flavor year round: original.  

The Europeans, however, in addition to milk, dark and white varieties, get these wonderful things called "Chunky Caramel" (Hello?  Want.)  and bags of cute little bite-sized pieces.  I've never seen either here.  Australia has Cookies and Cream in their "Chunky" selection, and our friends up north get toffee among their chunky offerings. 

Head further east though,  like to Japan for instance, where the taste-testers and marketers clearly use hallucinogens at work on a daily basis, and wasabi KitKat seems down-right provencial.  Japan has the nerve to offer such flavors as Watermelon and Salt, Sweet Roasted Corn, Soy, Apple Vinegar, Pumpkin, and Red Beak Soup. 

Say you: You're kidding, right? 

Say me: Seriously?  You think I can pull "Red Beak Soup" out of my fanny?  

Go here and see for yourself.  

Now for the hard part of this entry:  

*Big. Cleansing. Breath*   .....   *EXHALE*  

In the interest of full disclosure (read: guilt) I didn't take this picture today.  Truth be known, I completely forgot (how is totally beyond me) and this picture is actually one from yesterday that I rejected.  I was devastated when I realized this, because I was doing so well. So my project is tainted to say the least,  but I'm soldiering on.  Although part of me feels like a failure and wants to start from scratch.  

Don't worry.  I'm not.  I don't think. 

But I still feel like a failure.  -> 

Jack

 

I never eat here.  I ended up having to work last night and got slammed.  Because I had put off taking my pic for the day, I had to scurry as the clock struck midnight.  

ER staff tend to eat out.  A lot. ->