Getting Fat, Custard Creams and Nostalgia

After seeing my first prize-money check above, you probably assumed the picture and the title of this post were related. After all, with the exchange rate the way it is right now, €200 has some decent buying power in the U.S. (about $320). However, my race in Ireland has not provided me with uncontrollable bulkiness in my wallet region. The fat that I am referring to is one that was routinely promoted by my coach (albeit primarily during the few weeks immediately following the end of the season). I often half-heartedly listened to this suggestion, opting to interpret it to the less literal "take it easy for a while". Recently, I have taken his words verbatim.

What has led to this temporary increase in mass? The culprit has been a small sandwich cookie, generically dubbed Custard Creams. They are similar to Oreos, but square instead of round, vanilla instead of chocolate.

They are available in every grocery store for the same ridiculous price of €0.39 for a 400 gram pack. For those of you who aren't familiar with the conversion, that is almost a pound of addicting cookies. They also have trouble sticking around at 44 Gleann Dara, as the last few packs Kelly and I have bought have failed to make it 24 hours. On Monday, I found a 10 cent piece on the ground towards the end of my long run. Despite being very tired and having my senses significantly weakened, I was still able to do some quick Custard Cream calculations. That 10 cents provides the following:

• 1/4 package (or 100 g) of cookies
• 500 calories

The Bourbon Creams are also widely available in Galway. One of my goals for the rest of the summer is to find the elusive Coconut Creams and Coffee Creams. For more information, please see the always accurate Wikipedia link below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Custard_cream

On a more serious note, my schedule is becoming increasingly more concrete for the remainder of the summer. Race week is nearly upon us, which means that I will be working (starting tonight) nine out of the next ten days at the Greyhound Track. That leaves only a few more days off while Kelly and I are both living in Galway. After race week, he will be leaving for a two week trek across Europe.

On August 4th, I will be flying to Scotland for the beginning of the week. In the never-ending search for cheap flights, I was able to find a "free" flight from Shannon Airport to Glasgow, in the end costing me a mere €20. I will spend a few nights in Scotland before returning to Galway to prepare for the arrival of Alissa and Lindsey, who arrive in Dublin on August 7th and Galway (hopefully) later that night. Strange as it may seem, they are actually going to be able to see me race August 9th in the Streets of Galway 8K.

I have also penciled in another race to my schedule, shortly after noticing the Saint John's CC schedule was posted on the website. I will finally have the opportunity to win a T-shirt that has intrigued me for the past four years. The famed Fall Finale is slated to be run on November 7th, with this prized shirt, owned by only a select few, available to certain top finishers.

Last week, anticipating a book shortage in the near future, I took three random books from our house and set off for the used book store. After a little bit of negotiating, I made a three for one swap, the one being Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon Days. It was odd finding this book in an Irish book store in the first place and even more odd when I delved in and found references to Minneapolis, Avon, St. Joseph and Collegeville, places I lived for the majority of the last four years of my life. Obvious nostalgia was brought about by some of the stories and references of the book. Besides the obvious things (family, friends, home-cooking, etc.), I have been missing quite a few things that I took for granted living in the U.S..

• Real pizza - frozen pizzas just aren't the same here and delivery is unbelievably expensive, making that option merely it a pipe dream
• Sportscenter - the sports channel here has a lot of variety (hurling, Gaelic football, horse racing, rugby) but I miss seeing the "American" sports on a regular basis
  
• Driving - I haven't driven a vehicle since the middle of May, probably the longest stretch since I got my license
  
• Root beer - I normally don't have it often, but I had a craving recently and haven't been able to find it anywhere, so naturally, my craving increased
• Mosquitos - I don't actually miss them, but I saw a Discovery Channel show that was talking about an area in Africa where they were terrible and it reminded me that I don't think I've seen or been bitten by a mosquito in nearly a year
  

As of yesterday afternoon, I have officially run out of books to read. So, I either have to wait for my sisters to bring in some reserves or I have to buy/trade for a few more. If you have any suggestions, please email me (cjerichsen@gmail.com)!