Mishaps on the way to the Midwest

Today kicked off extremely early. After waking up at 4:15 a.m., we shipped out to the San Francisco Airport. Upon our arrival, I HAD to eat something. I don't know about you guys, but the less I sleep, the worse my stomach feels. I barely got five hours. In order to keep on trucking all day I knew I needed some food.

By our gate we found an Irish pub that was serving breakfast and -- much to my delight -- Bailey's Irish Cream coffee. In order to be alive and functional at 6 a.m., booze was in order. Although I wouldn't have ordered it if I had known it would set me back $12.99!!!!

The day's blunders first started with our waitress at the pub. I'm not sure, but I'm just saying that maybe she hadn't finished her nighttime bar shift or something. But she asked me twice what my order was and confirmed the veggie egg white omelet. Not that I didn't want ham in my eggs, I just knew I didn't want yolk.

By the time my plate arrived, not only did I have full-yolk eggs, but there was also ham to be found. Somehow, my twice ordered veggie egg white omelet turned into a Denver omelet. Oh yeah, and while I requested wheat toast, I got a giant hunk of SF Sourdough. I didn't want to complain, but this wasn't what I ordered. Nor was it the same price as my order.

When it finally arrived, we had less than 10 minutes left until our plane began boarding. I didn't mind though, since it tasted delicious.

What did suffer was our waitresses' tip, since we asked her for the check with our plane minutes away from boarding. She took her sweet time and about 20 minutes later the check arrived. I was able to nearly finish my meal during the wait and then we hopped aboard for our 2.5 hour flight to Denver, Colo.

During the flight J.D. and I were split up and I wound up at a window seat, unable to sleep a wink. And my TMJ problems got to my neck, which also kept me from sleeping. As soon as we touched down in Denver, we wandered the airport trying to kill our two hour-layover. Eventually it was time for lunch and I still felt a little weird from waking up so early. Jamba Juice sounded like just the trick. I originally ordered the 16 oz. Yumberry smoothie which tasted AWESOME. However, I only was able to enjoy a few sips before another mishap occurred. In the middle of the airport my smoothie ended up on the floor and all over J.D. Upset and still hungry, I wasn't willing to shell out $5 for a tiny smoothie a second time. Figuring breakfast was enough, I opted out of lunch. However, right before our flight started to board I couldn't wait any longer. I guilty bought a small cheese pizza and ate about 1/4 before tossing it and hopping on the plane.

Again, the odd time zone changes and lack of sleep caught up to me an hour later when we finally landed in Omaha, Neb. We quickly collected our luggage and then made our way over to the rental car counter. While we originally ordered a mid-sized vehicle, one wasn't around. So they gave us a complimentary upgrade to a full-sized Chevy Malibu. I, however, couldn't get past the obvious cigarette stench seeping from the upholstery. Not like I'm whiny about everything, but I requested another car. So we got an even better deal with a larger, more gas efficient Camry.

And so began our 3.5 hour drive down the border of four states. I needed a snack once again at the border between Iowa and Missouri -- my first time in any of these three states by the way. We found a convenience shop and loaded up on some Munchies Mix before putting the pedal to the metal to finish out our drive.

The final destination, Kansas City, was a nice breath of urban fresh air after hours of crops and fields. Our downtown hotel is actually in the middle of a swanky outdoor mall that reminds me of Downtown Walnut Creek. Since we didn't check in and get settled until after 8 p.m., we missed out on the World Cup Wine Tasting I was raving about in my last post. That's ok though, because otherwise we would have missed out on a culinary masterpiece.

Wandering the outdoor shopping center -- without having to drive to the restaurant and bar district -- Blanc Burgers and Bottles caught my eye. After browsing the menu, we were sold and asked for a table for two.

I started off my meal with the Purple Haze raspberry wheat beer, while J.D. ordered an organic British ale.

Selecting a drink was an insanely intense ordeal, as the beer menu was quadruple the size of the page-long soda menu.

This is just 1/3 of the beer list!!

If you think that was hard, imagine our struggles selecting an entrée!! Eventually I selected the Lentil Burger, which was a lentil patty with cucumber-spiced yogurt sauce, avocado, onions and sprouts on an unfiltered wheat bun. J.D. was sold when our waitress told us their Inside-Out Burger was named Missouri's Best Burger by the Food Network!!! The Inside-Out Burger is a bleu cheese-stuffed burger with bacon and an onion ring on a brioche bun.

The Lentil Burger

J.D.'s Inside-Out Burger

On the side we split the cutest preparation of sweet potato fries EVER. They were served in a tiny little shopping cart, so adorb. Now I'm going to put this out there, this MAY have been the best burger meal I've ever had in my entire life. No joke. What I really liked about the restaurant though, is their commitment to locally-grown products. With the exception of the beer, everything comes from local farms. The lentil burger was sooooo amazingly delicious and flavorful. As were the sweet potato fries and house apricot ketchup.

Once we had been adequately stuffed, we decided to stroll the shopping center. It's so beautiful, I want to go back there for breakfast tomorrow! On every corner is a different coffee shop among which I only saw ONE Starbucks, gasp!!! I'm hoping to try a new coffee chain that's not native to California. But my real reason for wanting to go back in the morning is so I can take pictures of the downtown area in the daylight!

That's it for today. I'm about to hop in bed so I can wake up early and run. We have a full day ahead tomorrow that includes a tour of the Negro League Baseball Hall of Fame as well as a Kansas City Royals baseball game -- FREE hotdog night!!! -- in the evening. Good night everyone xx ♥