May arrives rainy and gusty but mild with the promise of sun-bathing and tank tops. It seems that I can’t bring myself to write about school, probably because our projects are quarter long and so I don’t want to blab too much until I have something to show for my scholarly progress. We’re hitting midterm though, and that is scary in itself – spring is darting by. Oh, and I’ve been preoccupied with this lovely new machine I have called macbook pro with her sexy orange Incase protector. So much to install and organize and play with…yey for new toys (expensive ones in particular) haha.
Anyway, I wanted to keep touching on the good eats in Cincinnati (or at least in the Cincinnati area) so I will start off with my relaxing Friday. After the gym, Maria and I went to Reality Tuesday, a glorious coffee shop located in Covington, KY near Maria’s dear old high school that she can’t resist pointing out every time we drive by :p Now, I know I’ve become a Portland coffee/pastry snob, but my lord, Reality Tuesday may even surpass some of the many locations I visited in Oregon. The baked goods – cookies, breakfast strudels, homemade cheesecakes, pecan bars, raspberry crumbles – everything peering out of the glass cases makes my heart long for sugar on the tongue. Lucky for me, they got smart and had some bite sized treats so I bought a 1″ by 1″ brownie topped with homemade toffee buttercream, caramel, and a drizzling of chocolate. This was not only the perfect size, but also perfect satisfaction for my small sweet craving. Of course I ordered coffee, too. I went for a white chocolate orange blended espresso drink. Thank you to Seattle’s Best for the combination idea, because it was quite GOOD. (As a side note – the vanilla chai tea here is the best in the world, end of story.)
The rest of Friday was beautifully spent reading at Devou park with Maria and Rachael. At one point there was a creepy man on a nearby bench staring at us…but other than that I got a good amount of British Lit reading finished. Sadly when we left I had no hint of color for my pale skin.
Saturday I was heading to Designs by Dana to get Mr.Leo touched up and so I figured I owed a visit to Melt. Not like “owe” is the correct word, “treat” would be more appropriate. This vegan friendly deli/sandwich cafe has a chalkboard menu full of incredibly mouth watering food choices. I wouldn’t recommend the mac and “vegan” cheese though, it looked orangey and tasted like wheat and powder…ANYWAY the sandwiches, salads, and soups are the way to go. I had a halvsies meal – half Joan of Arc Sandwich – applegate farm’s roast beef, roasted red peppers, roasted garlic, blue cheese, caramelized onions and provolone melted on focaccia (best freakin’ focaccia bread ever) and half Blue Gingered Pear Salad (my most favorite salad to date) – House Mesclun Mix topped with toasted walnuts, blue cheese and gingered pear slices, served with Balsamic Vinaigrette.
Melt also sells Jeni’s Ice Cream, a family owned business in Columbus that crafts tasty ice cream and features flavors such as Wildberry Lavendar, Mackenzie Creamery Goat Cheese with Roasted Red Cherries, Salty Caramel, and many more creamy delights…the only downside is that each pint is $10 due to the fact that the small business ships them freshly handmade from Jeni’s Columbus kitchen. Mmm, mm, totally worth the splurge though, if I do say so myself (I bought the lavender flavor a while back).
Other than great eats this past couple of weeks, I took pictures of Lucy the Bearcat at Relay for Life which ended up being a lot of fun until it got rained out (well maybe it was okay that it got rained out at 6am – that meant I got to go home and sleep)!
I also went stable cleaning and riding the day after the relay to help out my instructor who was at Rolex with a few horses. It’s that time of year when their fuzzy winter coats itch and come off in floating fluffs of chestnut and white. Lady and Luna clearly enjoyed rolling off some of their excess hair – rather in the mud than on me – as they sometimes like to do by violently rubbing their foreheads against your torso. Speaking of violent – Erin was a handful, but I brought her under control and had a good ride. I crashed soon after that by watching Avatar with my family then doing dinner with my some of my best girls from high school! I’d say this quarter is moving along quite enjoyably and I’m still so grateful to be back around friends and family…and horses! :D
