September 11, 2016

 This morning I kind of slept in and then got ready and went to get gas before picking my sister up and heading to my Dad's house. Ten or fifteen minutes after that, we headed out of town. I drove my car with my sister, brother, and his girlfriend, and my Dad and step-mom drove together. I'm not a big fan of following someone. I knew how to get to our first stop so I ended up going around my Dad and going at my own pace just for a little bit of freedom. Last time that stop was just a quick bathroom break but this time we ended up eating lunch at Popeyes. I had red beans and rice and a couple biscuits. The main flavor was sodium. They were both so salty. The red beans and rice were nothing special and the biscuits were pretty good but the saltiness was too much. They would be good every now and then but I would need to chug some water afterward to flush it all out of my kidneys.

For the second half of the trip I went back to following. But then we made it down to see my aunt and grandma. Tomorrow is my grandma's birthday so my aunt made her a three layer angel food cake with fruit filled whipped cream topping. I'm a fan of plain angel food cake but the fruity topping was pretty good.

We stayed and talked until a little after four o'clock and then parted ways so my grandma could relax a little bit before her dinner. It sounds like as early as the end of next week she might be able to go home, which would be really nice. A neighbor who is a contractor pulled one of his carpenters off a job and they designed shallower steps for the garage that will be easier for my grandma to go up. They are also longer to accommodate her walker on each step. Pretty cool.

Instead of driving back to our first stop and eating dinner, like we did last time, it was decided that we would eat in town. I wasn't really hungry because it was only 4:30PM but by the time we actually got food it was around 5:00PM, so that was a little better. We went to P.F. Chang's and I had the pad thai with tofu. It smelled kind of bad but it tasted pretty good, so that's what's important. I also had strawberry lemonade, which is always good times.

I followed my Dad out of town and back to our first stop, where we took a brief stretch break, and then my brother and is girlfriend moved over to my Dad's truck so my sister and I wouldn't have to drive back to their house to drop them off. And then my sister and I headed out. At this point I knew where I was going so I didn't have to follow anyone and I was able to drive at my own pace. It was glorious.

I ended up getting home a little after nine o'clock. Thanks to the lunch and dinner stops the trip was extended by quite a bit. It would have been nice to have more time to do my own thing today but it's not like I would have done anything productive, so I'm not complaining. I also got to eat at two new restaurants and hang out with my grandma. So it was a pretty good day.