Gluten Free Haven

Okay, if I have to relocate for job reasons, I want to aim for the Fort Collins/Denver area. Why? Well, let's see... Whole Foods Market, in both cities, has a large gluten free sections and even stocks items from local gluten-free bakeries in its bakery section (which I wouldn't have noticed except an employee mentioned it when I asked about finding a certain GF flour), there are at least three gluten-free bakeries (one in Fort Collins, two in Denver), plenty of GF-friendly restaurants, and a store devoted to selling only GF items (Granny's gluten-free, on the outskirts of Loveland as you head into Estes Park).

It was incredibly bizarre to walk into Deby's GF bakery in Denver and realize that I could actually eat anything in there that I wanted. She does use some soy, but that's all clearly labeled. Incidentally, this is the source for Beau-Jo's GF crusts, and apparently the reason they improved wasn't because the formula changed, but because Beau-Jo's employees got better at working with the GF mixes. As it turned out, Deby herself was running the cash register while I was there, and, not surprisingly, tried to get me to buy some of her own GF flour mixture. I asked if it made good white cake, as that was one item I had not been able to get to turn out well. She said that it would, and suggested adding a can of pureed canned pears to it, as well as beating the whites separately before adding them. I haven't tried it yet, and I already knew about beating the eggs separately to improve texture, but I'll be curious to see if it works. I can only assume that the pears will add moisture to the mix, as GF flours do tend to be a bit drier than whe*t ones.

Incidentally, King Sooper's, one of the more prominent grocery stores in the area, also stocks gluten-free items, though I did not go in to see how much variety they had.

So for celiacs, the Denver area is looking pretty good. If you ever take a trip down there, there's very little worry about finding stuff you can actually eat. Now, off in the Northeast Corner, there's more to worry about, but even there the Wal-Mart has a gluten-free section. I checked the Chubbuck Wal-Mart, and did not find one, but the two I went to in Colorado both had pretty decent selections.

I still don't want to relocate, but that area is looking awfully darn good right now. Maybe one of the GF bakeries needs another cook...

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Lightning, or Something...

I may have more to say about the rest of the trip later, but we just got back. We drove something like 640 miles today. I expected my mom would want to stop in Rock Springs; she didn't. Then I figured she'd give out at Kemmerer: nope. We made it back at about 9:30 pm, just as it was starting to get dark. I think we were both sick of hotels and wanted to be in our own beds.

Anyway, that has little to do with this post, other than the events occurred on the trip. I suspect that if it weren't for the ruddy "terminal" notification, the only result would have been a wave of regretful nostalgia, which would have been over almost instantly. But being under stress already, something just snapped inside me when we were in Grand Lake. The moment itself was more one of shock (mixed in with other stuff), but afterwards it felt as if something had broken loose, snapped, inside me.

There was a little bit of buildup to it: nothing major, nothing that one might expect to lead to someone snapping: my mom hates miniature golf, and I've always loved it. There's a miniature golf course in Grand Lake, and we walked by it, and I jokingly suggested we could play. It would have been better, I think, if she'd just said "no." Instead, she came up with all sorts of convoluted garbage suggestions, including that I "adopt" one of the little kids already playing to play with. At that moment, I was annoyed, but otherwise fine.

Then we finished walking down the one major street of Grand Lake, and drove down to the lake itself. There were kids out learning to sail, people in rented pedal-boats, kids building sand castles: pretty typical of the place. What wasn't typical was that I was suddenly angry. Not with the people there, not even with my mom in particular, but just angry. It took me a while to figure out why. I have always, always, wanted to rent one of those pedal-boats, or take a sail-boat out, or...or any number of things, and I've never had an actual opportunity. My mom won't consider any activity even remotely physical, and, when my dad was saner, he just thought it was a waste of time.

It was like the day just died before my eyes, right then and there. I turned around and walked back to the car without saying a word, and, more unusually, without even taking any pictures of or around the lake. It took me the better part of two days to get over that feeling of emptiness and isolation. For whatever reason, the drive back home helped quite a bit, as did a hike later in the same day. On the hike, it occurred to me that there might be a career option open to me that would let me do things that I love while maintaining most of my freedom. I don't know if a year is enough to establish myself sufficiently to make a living at it, but I'd like to try: photography. Most of the later events that helped clear the angry fog revolved around light and color and imagery, too, so I think there may actually be something there. I might also just be going insane, but it's better than feeling like a rather large chunk of scar tissue has been ripped out of my heart and a piece of leather nailed in its place.

So that was my last two days. Time will tell if that was a useful thought I had after having my heart ripped open or just a desperate grab for something to hold onto.

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Sri Thai Update

I had a pleasant surprise when my mom and I ate at Sri Thai on Friday night (and not only because we barely made it into town in time to eat there). They've redone their menu, and dishes that can be made gluten-free are clearly labeled with the no whe*t symbol. One minor caveat: this does not mean that the dish is gluten free as usually prepared, some are and some aren't. It does mean that they will make it for you gluten free if you ask them to. We found this out the hard way by ordering the peanut-sauce chicken appetizer...and it arrived with toast on the plate. As soon as I mentioned "gluten", the waitress immediately apologized and explained about the need to specify if you want to be sure to get it gluten free, and then she got us another one sans toast, no questions asked.

A few of the dishes that I had ordered in the past were not marked as available GF, and one of them I had wondered about, but I'd never had a strong enough reaction to it to be certain. It was a tasty dish, so I hope they can make it available as gluten-free in the future, but oh well. I ordered their version of "Sweet and Sour Chicken" on Friday. Thai Sweet and Sour is nothing like most sweet and sour. The chicken is not breaded. The sauce is usually not thickened. The sauce usually has a subtler blend of sweet and sour flavors than typical "sweet and sour sauce."

At any rate, this is my favorite restaurant on the planet, bar none. They make the best Thai iced teas, and Thai tea floats (yes, those are marked as GF). Chang's does a decent approximation of Thai iced tea, but most other places make it so ridiculously sweet that I can barely stand to drink it.

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Floored and Iced

My mom wanted to stop at the Wal-Mart in Sterling, Colorado, today on our way down from Cabela's. They actually had a small section of gluten free foods. At a Wal-Mart. Admittedly, that's the only sizable store in Sterling, but I'm still surprised. It didn't have as much as the Fred Meyer in Pocatello, and now I'm curious to see if our Wal-Mart as anything. I'm betting not, since Fred Meyer and a few smaller "health food" stores fill that niche in Pocatello.

Oh, the new owners of the Akron hotel (which used to be the Crestwood and is now something with "Lighthouse" in the name) haven't been unplugging the room refrigerators when customers leave. This is a problem for any customers who might actually want to get anything into the freezer.

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Random Phrases from the Trip

It's a bug eat bug world... *pause* It's a car smash bug world.

It's windshield wiper eat smashed bug world.

Pick one speed! [To a car ahead of me on 287... Speed limit was 65; the car was randomly alternating between 55 and 65; at the next passing lane, I zhoumed around it]

You have to go faster to zhoum. [To a car trying to pass me in a similar passing lane. The last two pickups had zhoumed around me (I'm spelling it the way I was pronouncing it), and this one just sort of limped.]

The room just sort of rotated... the walls are kind of like echoing.

That last one was me after we finally got to Fort Collins and I'd had both food and a Thai tea float. Between the caffeine, the sugar, and the long day, I was rather out of it. I suggested that my mom should drive us to the hotel. It didn't help that Princess decided to wander off last night and not come back until midnight. On the plus side, in between calling for her and going out with the flashlight, I got almost everything done last night, so I didn't have much left in the morning. On the minus side, I was driving on not enough sleep. I took a few naps while Mom was driving, but I think my 20 minutes of meditation outside Rawlins did more good than the naps. Mom thought I was sleeping. ^/^

Okay, too tired to think of more to say now. Also probably too incoherent.

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