Life is what you make it

I went on a tiny shoppingspree to IKEA recently, and finally renewed my livingroom a bit. I'll let the before and after photos speak for themselves.

Before: Small two-seat sofabed, oversized coffe table and a large space mostly used for drying clothes or just left empty.


After: Large two-seat sofa with a lounge, two small coffee tables where one can go under the other to make more room, a carpet, a small shelf for pictures above the couch and a dining-table with four chairs.

I usually travel to the US with my twin brother, but this year i had to go without him (for various reasons i won't go into). The trip started with a visit to my older brother in Seattle for a three days. I didn't do much there other than walk all over the place and see the sights. I guess the most interesting things were going up in the Space Needle, and Pike Place Market.

After three days in Seattle i picked up a rental-car and headed down the coast. Here's my route:

I spent the first night in Albany, after about 5 hours of driving. I got a late start, and wanted to be sure to have a place to stay before it got dark. The next day i drove to Eureka, i think that took about 9 hours since i went the scenic, coastal route. After spending the night in a shabby, but cheap motel i drove for about 7 hours until i reached Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco.

I had already booked a hotel for the first night, and a motel for the second night, so all i had to do was find parking. Well, finding a free place to park in SF is nearly impossible, so i ended up paying $35 for 24 hour parking. The next day i parked the car at the motel, which offered free parking. Other than my parking-woes i just did a bunch of sightseeing; I walked up to the Coit tower, rode a cable-car, walked through Chinatown, ate at the Fisherman's Wharf, went through various stores in town, etc.

After two nights i got up bright and early, and hit the road at 7 am, before the rush-hour traffic set in. Thanks to my retarded GPS i drove across the Golden Gate Bridge again, which was wrong, so i drove back over it (that's a $6 fee, thankyouverymuch). Once i was out i got back on highway 1 and stuck to it for most of the trip down. This trip is really special, and I'd recommend it to anyone (with a driver's license, at least!).

After about 12 hours i finally arrived at my grandmother's house in San Clemente where I spent 12 days just hanging out and enjoying life

Last night i finally tried the Mashed Potato Bowl from KFC. It's mashed potatoes, corn, small pieces of crispy chicken (which wasn't crispy at all), gravy and cheese.

It looks pretty good on KFC's website, but the reality rarely matches the PR photos. Here's what mine looked like:

OK, maybe that's not too bad... But unfortunately this meal was just as salty as the Double Down sandwich which i ate just before i ate the bowl.

The meal is eaten with a spork that came with the meal, as the meal is sort of a porridge. Sounds good, right? Well, it wasn't really. Another for KFC.

Before i left for my US vacation i heard rumors of "the unhealthiest drink in America". With some investigation i found out that this was the PB&C (peanut butter & chocolate) milkshake from Cold Stone. This shake comes in three different sizes, where the biggest one is called "Gotta Have It" and is approximately half a liter (826 grams). Why they don't just call it a "Large", i don't know.

The nutritional information (pdf) for this shake is mildly disturbing. For only $5.79 you get 131 grams of fat, 153 grams of sugar and 46 grams of protein, which all add up to about 2010 calories. Naturally, i HAD to try it!

Here i'm having my first sips:

It tasted amazing, with a mild taste of peanut butter and a more strong taste of chocolate. Thick and creamy.

I continued drinking during the drive home:

The sugar hit me about half way through:

After less than 10 minutes i had downed the entire thing. I felt full.:

A few minutes later i was in a sugar-induced coma:

Naaaah.. just kidding!

It actually went down pretty fine. I think felt the sugar a bit, and after a couple hours i started getting fairly tired. Hard to tell if it was a sugar-crash or if i was just tired from the day's shopping-spree. After a total of three hours i was actually hungry again, and had dinner.

Although i wouldn't recommend this drink on a general basis, i think it's ok to indulge yourself once in a while. And hey, you don't HAVE to get the largest one, you could get the smallest shake which only contains 1280 calories instead. It tastes the same!