The Gift of Girlfriends

I am a little late with this post. You see my birthday was more than a month ago, but I have been wanting to write about what a great birthday weekend I had this year.

 

But before I get to that I need to back up a few years and explain that back in 2006 I went through a bit of a mid life crisis. There were some pretty big changes in my "inner circle" that fall. My baby girl went away to college to spread her wings and find herself. I was ok with that, after all I had spent eighteen years preparing her to go out into the world and make something of herself. I would be fine, I still had my good friends to see my through. OH WAIT...NOT! You see, two of my best girlfriends moved away around the same time. The NERVE, the GALL!! Didn't they know I needed them? Didn't they know it was all about me?? Forget that one was going through a not so fun divorce and the other was moving her family so her husband could find work. I needed them!

Fast forward to my birthday weekend 2009. We had planned a great girls weekend getaway,  It was great to be together again. We had a blast and someone got themselves hitched! For more on that trip see this post from my friend Becca. And don't forget the surprise ending of that trip here.

Now back to this year. I had been in a funk. It was a big, ugly, unemployed, what am I doing with my life, feeling sorry for myself funk. So when my dear friends told me they would like to come for a visit and stay the weekend with me I was so excited. They will tell you they came to see other people too, but I know the truth. It was all about me! They both arrived on my birthday after all.  One brought along a little friend, the other one brought a mumu.

It was like a high school slumber party. We laughed, watched movies, ate junk food and caught up on each others lives. 

We explored Pirate booty at the museum. 

We played in the park. 

Then we laughed and talked some more and made plans for a big reunion dinner.

I didn't take nearly enough pictures to chronicle our adventures and unfortunately the ones I did take were with my phone, but I had a blast (funk officially blasted away).  We're already talking about next year. 

THANKS GIRLFRIENDS for the best birthday gift ever!

The Great Food Truck Race 2011

One of my favorite shows last summer was on the Food Network. It was called The Great Food Truck Race and it was a reality show/competition where they followed six or seven food trucks across the country. They stopped in a different city each week and competed in some crazy competitions. At the end of each stop the truck that made the least money was sent home while the others moved on to the next city. It was a fun show to watch and I was happy to hear it was making a comeback this summer.

A few weeks ago I got this picture message from Ashleigh. 

The trucks were in Cedar City on their way from Las Vegas to Salt Lake City. Unfortunately for her they were just passing through and she didn't get to sample. I had heard that they were heading to Denver after Salt Lake City so now I knew they were getting closer.

Word spread quickly on Facebook that the The Great Food Truck Race was in town on Mother's Day weekend, so I set out with a friend to see if we could find  some of them. Some of the local food trucks like The Denver Cupcake Truck and The Biscuit Bus had taken these special visitors under their wings and were updating Facebook and Twitter as to their whereabouts. 

Helen and I found three of the Trucks parked on Colfax near the Bluebird theater. The lines were long but there was an exciting buzz in the air and the food coming by looked and smelled delicious.

Our first stop was The Hodge Podge Truck. 

 

 Love that logo!!

These guys really had personality!

The team is from Cleveland, Ohio and they were serving up some yummy treats. I opted for the Lobster Roll with marinated tomatoes and a fresh squeezed lime-aide. .

 Menu photo from http://thecastlerockincook.blogspot.com

Next up was the Lime Truck. 

This California based truck had some delicious offerings too. 

 Menu photo from http://thecastlerockincook.blogspot.com

We indulged in the veggies from this one. Helen got grilled asparagus and I went for roasted corn on the cob.

Photo from boulderlocavore.blogspot.com, I forgot to take a photo before I devoured the deliciousness.

The Roxy's Gormet Grilled Cheese truck was across the street  but the lines were really long so we decided to try to find them again the next day. Sadly, I never found the Roxy truck again.

Finally, we decided to try and hit the Korrilla BBQ truck which we were hearing was parked the the Stuben's parking lot on 17th and the lines were not long.

 Seeing their car told us the truck couldn't be far!

 

We  made it over there just in time to hear them say, "Sorry folks, we're sold out. Come back tomorrow!", to which our small crowd replied with "AWWWWWW". Actually we heard them say it and made our reply four times (different takes...this is reality TV). They asked us to sign release forms and took our pictures. We were thinking, sweet, maybe we will make it onto the show. 

The next day I decided to go back on my own and try to find the Korillia truck again. When I got there there was only one poor guy working the truck. 

Apparently old #7 threw a wrench in the works in the form of a challenge. I won't spoil it, you will have to watch and see. 

Anyway, they recognized me from the previous day. They had me say something like, "This better be good I was here when you ran out yesterday and I came back".

 Another great pic from http://boulderlocavore.blogspot.com/

The menu was limited due to the challenge so I decided to try the tacos.  They  had me taste the food which was AWESOME (by far my favorite of what I tasted), and do an on camera interview. They asked me if I was from Denver and if I was a Bronco fan. They did a few takes with me saying different things and they took more pictures of me and my food (I didn't remember to take a pic). So who knows, maybe I'll be on the show and maybe I'll end up on the cutting room floor.

Either way the adventure begins on August 14th on the Food Network and I know I will be watching. 

I only made it to three of the six trucks that were in town, but I enjoyed myself anyway. 

For more info on The Great Food Truck Race's visit to Denver check out a couple of local food bloggers take's at My Kitchen in the Rockies  and Boulder Locavore  as well as this article in Westword.