When I set the goal for myself to travel to someplace I’d never been before this year, I never expected I’d accomplish it before January was over! On Saturday night, I met my sorority’s National President and the lead advisor for our new chapter starting at UVA and we departed for Charlottesville.
The drive down was pretty quick. We stopped at an Outback Steakhouse for dinner which delighted me because I knew they had a gluten free menu. I got the grilled chicken with veggies and a side salad which was delicious. We stayed at the Cavalier Inn which was your standard hotel.
Yesterday was quite the whirlwind day. We made our trip to southern Virginia to participate in the first day of formal sorority recruitment. There were 12 rounds of girls that would be coming to learn about our group’s special recruitment in a few short weeks and it was our job to share information on our organization, the recruitment, and chat with the potential new members. (did all that Greek life talk make sense?)
We ate breakfast at the hotel and I was extremely glad I’d packed an Udi’s cinnamon raisin bagel to eat. I had some yogurt on the side and was glad the meal held me over from 8am til almost 2pm! There were of course a few nibbles on cheddar rice cakes and an apple.
We picked up lunch on our short break. Everyone else got Subway sandwiches (no GF option) so I got a salad from Baja Bean Co. that was just across the shopping center. The salad had lettuce, tomatoes, fajita veggies, beans, and some rice and was amazing! After lunch I got to go check out a few other sororities and my legs, despite standing up all day, were thrilled to move and provide me with some fresh air and mountain scenery.
The day wound down and we headed to dinner with our whole group (others joined us in Charlottesville) before the drive back to DC. We went to Boylan Heights which I’d read about on Kath‘s blog. It was kind of cool to eat someplace I’d read about 
I ordered my custom burger bowl a la scantron which was really fun. It also eliminated tons of modifying and special requests which I like to avoid as much as possible when dining with people I don’t know so well.
I got a burger bowl topped with black bean and corn salsa, roasted red peppers, and mushrooms with BBQ on the side. It also came with choice of fries and I opted for sweet potato when I should have got the amazing tater tots that others got. I maybe ate 1/3 of the fries and most of my burger bowl. It was perfect!
This morning I enjoyed another day off and actually woke up much earlier than I expected. With extra time in my routine, I took advantage of a lazy morning playing catch up. I had an egg white and red pepper spread on an English muffin with some frozen blueberries and a spoonful of yogurt.
Around noon I headed to the grocery store where I discovered that all of DC was making chili today and therefore they were sold out of beans. I managed to get everything else though and they were sampling some vegetable sushi which I partook in! When I got home I added some broccoli to a cup of tomato soup and then kept being productive.
I finally headed back out to the gym for a workout which felt good after 4.5 hours in the car from my little road trip. I snacked on half of a grapefruit and some pistachios while I cooked dinner.
I utilized leftover beans for some impromptu BBQ beans with a baby baked (a la microwave) potato and some homemade broccoli soup. I topped the soup with a bit of crumbled cheddar cheese which was the perfect topper.
Now I’m watching Greek and then it’s time for a short work week, woohoo!!
