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Tootsie Yr2: West Palm Beach Part 1
Feb. 9th, 2023 03:29 pmIt was an early travel day from Sioux Falls to West Palm Beach!
Bus call was at 4:45am.
We dragged ourselves through the airport and boarded our flight around 6:30am.
Both flights were relatively smooth and uneventful.
Stepping outside in Florida, I was struck by the fact that when we arrived in Sioux Falls it was single-digit temps with a negative windchill, and here in sunny Florida it was 80°F! If you count windchill it was a difference of almost 100 degrees in just a few days! So crazy.
Everyone was SUPER excited to be in Florida, because warmth! Sun! Beaches! Adventures!
I usually hate the humidity and heat of Florida, but in the context of Sioux Falls I was grateful for it this time.
Maybe I should be grateful for it ALL the time huh!
We're in a motel this week, a seedy Best Western, but nobody minds because it's all about location.
We're right next to a Target, and across the street is a Whole Paycheck and a huge outlet mall.
Not to mention the beaches within easy driving distance, and lots of tourist attractions.
I immediately went to both the Target and Whole Paycheck of course.
Jameson had gotten me a gift card for my birthday, and I blew it right away!
They had banana cream Olipop!!! I have been looking for this flavor ever since it was created to promote the latest Minion movie. It tastes awesome, like melted banana Runts candy!
Also, I literally cannot find this flavor for sale ANYWHERE online.
Not even on the Olipop site. I wonder if WPB is some kind of test market.
I also splurged on some vegan goodies like pre-seasoned seitan, lemon pepper tofu bites, a banana almond milk meal replacement shake, and a beet gazpacho. And I found more Four Sigmatic Golden Latte mix, AND Fage yogurt, so I'll be experimenting with that again this week as well.
It felt so nice to walk from the grocery to my hotel right across the street! What a rare thing.
Since I want to get up early tomorrow for the bakery, I unpacked and didn't do much for the rest of the night, and went to bed early.
-----------------------------------------------------
Tuesday morning was more eventful than planned.
I stumbled into the bathroom to wash my face and found
not one,
not two,
but THREE large palmetto bugs.
Now I have lived in Florida for about five years.
I am not surprised if a large palmetto gets inside once in a while (or lizards or frogs or roaches for that matter).
They can easily crawl under the big gaps in the motel door.
But THREE? Come on.
When I was done cleaning up the carnage I notified the front desk. They offered to have me switch rooms once one became available, but I declined. As long as I'm seeing large adult bugs I'm not deeply concerned; it's when you see juveniles/nymphs, and egg sacs, that you have an infestation. Otherwise they're just coming inside because they can.
After inspecting the bathroom I discovered a large hole under the sink. Since all three p-bugs were in the bathroom, I suspect they may have come in through that hole. I told the front desk, and they said they'd come have a look once I'd left for work.
Anyway, since at that point I was wide awake with pounding heart, I decided may as well head over to Aioli for breakfast.
Of course of course of COURSE, they didn't have the menu item that I wanted. Of course.
But you know what, they had did have these fantastic, flaky, delicate, crispy, amazing croissants.
I couldn't decide between the cinnamon sugar and the carrot cake (that's right, carrot cake croissant!), so the owner came over and started hilariously listing off all of the reasons that I should buy both.
Well all right, you don't have to twist my arm :p
This was the cinnamon sugar. It was so incredibly good. Very light, flaky and chewy and fluffy inside and so crisp and crunchy on the outside. You could peel the individual layers and get sheets of deliciousness, or just take a big bite and experience the textures all at once.
Here's the carrot cake croissant. Look at that beautiful lamination and the filling of carrot cake puree and cream cheese icing.
I cut each one in half and ate half of each, the other halves will be for later in the week.
It was very much worth getting both.
They also had lovely loaves of bread, but since I was indulging in croissants I didn't buy any this time.
Back at the hotel I took a moment to redo my nutrition for the day since I'd ended up eating croissants, then shared pics of my palmetto bugs to the Tootsie group chat to horrify everyone. Then I plugged away at some data entry.
The hotel is far from the theatre this week so we rode the rental car in to work.
This theatre is fairly modern, with a large pit and large backstage.
The hall itself is pretty too.
Sound check was fine, I stayed at the theatre and ate the dinner I'd packed in the green room.
The show went well, it sounded like we had a good crowd.
When I got back to the hotel I could see that my room had been gone over and spayed for insects (I had packed away my food and cookware in advance in case they did this). They had also sealed the hole under the sink with expaning foam spray. Now we will see how many bugs I end up with tomorrow.
----------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday morning and guess what? No bugs!
Not one. Hopefully the issue is resolved, done and dusted.
I had breakfast and got dressed and went to Target for sunscreen and bug repellant for the charity crop gleaning on Thursday.
From Target I walked over to the Tanger Outlets to look for black yoga pants.
No luck, but I did get some tiny Yankee Candles, a bath sponge shaped like bread, and some chunky black shoes to try with my wide-leg dress pants.
We carpooled to the theatre for the first show and everything went fine.
Company Management is doing a thing called "book of love" where we can write compliments to each other on little paper hearts.
I filled out a few but didn't want to hog the writing table, so will come back another time to finish the rest.
The show went well. Soto (our "other MD") was in town to visit and saw the show, so that was awesome!
The audience clapped for EVERYTHING, polite little golf claps. It was adorable.
Paul (drummer) and I fought traffic back to the hotel so it didn't feel like much of a break.
I finished the first episode of The Last Of Us, ate dinner, and prepped the stuff for crop gleaning, which I will post about on Monday.
------------------------------------------------------------------
A Best Western manager just came by with a gift card to apologize for the "incident" in my room!
Now I feel bad for saying this hotel is "seedy"! That was very gracious of them.
Bus call was at 4:45am.
We dragged ourselves through the airport and boarded our flight around 6:30am.
Both flights were relatively smooth and uneventful.
Stepping outside in Florida, I was struck by the fact that when we arrived in Sioux Falls it was single-digit temps with a negative windchill, and here in sunny Florida it was 80°F! If you count windchill it was a difference of almost 100 degrees in just a few days! So crazy.
Everyone was SUPER excited to be in Florida, because warmth! Sun! Beaches! Adventures!
I usually hate the humidity and heat of Florida, but in the context of Sioux Falls I was grateful for it this time.
Maybe I should be grateful for it ALL the time huh!
We're in a motel this week, a seedy Best Western, but nobody minds because it's all about location.
We're right next to a Target, and across the street is a Whole Paycheck and a huge outlet mall.
Not to mention the beaches within easy driving distance, and lots of tourist attractions.
I immediately went to both the Target and Whole Paycheck of course.
Jameson had gotten me a gift card for my birthday, and I blew it right away!
They had banana cream Olipop!!! I have been looking for this flavor ever since it was created to promote the latest Minion movie. It tastes awesome, like melted banana Runts candy!
Also, I literally cannot find this flavor for sale ANYWHERE online.
Not even on the Olipop site. I wonder if WPB is some kind of test market.
I also splurged on some vegan goodies like pre-seasoned seitan, lemon pepper tofu bites, a banana almond milk meal replacement shake, and a beet gazpacho. And I found more Four Sigmatic Golden Latte mix, AND Fage yogurt, so I'll be experimenting with that again this week as well.
It felt so nice to walk from the grocery to my hotel right across the street! What a rare thing.
Since I want to get up early tomorrow for the bakery, I unpacked and didn't do much for the rest of the night, and went to bed early.
-----------------------------------------------------
Tuesday morning was more eventful than planned.
I stumbled into the bathroom to wash my face and found
not one,
not two,
but THREE large palmetto bugs.
Now I have lived in Florida for about five years.
I am not surprised if a large palmetto gets inside once in a while (or lizards or frogs or roaches for that matter).
They can easily crawl under the big gaps in the motel door.
But THREE? Come on.
When I was done cleaning up the carnage I notified the front desk. They offered to have me switch rooms once one became available, but I declined. As long as I'm seeing large adult bugs I'm not deeply concerned; it's when you see juveniles/nymphs, and egg sacs, that you have an infestation. Otherwise they're just coming inside because they can.
After inspecting the bathroom I discovered a large hole under the sink. Since all three p-bugs were in the bathroom, I suspect they may have come in through that hole. I told the front desk, and they said they'd come have a look once I'd left for work.
Anyway, since at that point I was wide awake with pounding heart, I decided may as well head over to Aioli for breakfast.
Of course of course of COURSE, they didn't have the menu item that I wanted. Of course.
But you know what, they had did have these fantastic, flaky, delicate, crispy, amazing croissants.
I couldn't decide between the cinnamon sugar and the carrot cake (that's right, carrot cake croissant!), so the owner came over and started hilariously listing off all of the reasons that I should buy both.
Well all right, you don't have to twist my arm :p
This was the cinnamon sugar. It was so incredibly good. Very light, flaky and chewy and fluffy inside and so crisp and crunchy on the outside. You could peel the individual layers and get sheets of deliciousness, or just take a big bite and experience the textures all at once.
Here's the carrot cake croissant. Look at that beautiful lamination and the filling of carrot cake puree and cream cheese icing.
I cut each one in half and ate half of each, the other halves will be for later in the week.
It was very much worth getting both.
They also had lovely loaves of bread, but since I was indulging in croissants I didn't buy any this time.
Back at the hotel I took a moment to redo my nutrition for the day since I'd ended up eating croissants, then shared pics of my palmetto bugs to the Tootsie group chat to horrify everyone. Then I plugged away at some data entry.
The hotel is far from the theatre this week so we rode the rental car in to work.
This theatre is fairly modern, with a large pit and large backstage.
The hall itself is pretty too.
Sound check was fine, I stayed at the theatre and ate the dinner I'd packed in the green room.
The show went well, it sounded like we had a good crowd.
When I got back to the hotel I could see that my room had been gone over and spayed for insects (I had packed away my food and cookware in advance in case they did this). They had also sealed the hole under the sink with expaning foam spray. Now we will see how many bugs I end up with tomorrow.
----------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday morning and guess what? No bugs!
Not one. Hopefully the issue is resolved, done and dusted.
I had breakfast and got dressed and went to Target for sunscreen and bug repellant for the charity crop gleaning on Thursday.
From Target I walked over to the Tanger Outlets to look for black yoga pants.
No luck, but I did get some tiny Yankee Candles, a bath sponge shaped like bread, and some chunky black shoes to try with my wide-leg dress pants.
We carpooled to the theatre for the first show and everything went fine.
Company Management is doing a thing called "book of love" where we can write compliments to each other on little paper hearts.
I filled out a few but didn't want to hog the writing table, so will come back another time to finish the rest.
The show went well. Soto (our "other MD") was in town to visit and saw the show, so that was awesome!
The audience clapped for EVERYTHING, polite little golf claps. It was adorable.
Paul (drummer) and I fought traffic back to the hotel so it didn't feel like much of a break.
I finished the first episode of The Last Of Us, ate dinner, and prepped the stuff for crop gleaning, which I will post about on Monday.
------------------------------------------------------------------
A Best Western manager just came by with a gift card to apologize for the "incident" in my room!
Now I feel bad for saying this hotel is "seedy"! That was very gracious of them.
