Florida or Bust!

We haven't dropped off the face of the earth. We were merely swallowed up by winter. We escaped from the ice and snow for a short period of time to visit family, friends, and a place Josiah calls Seaweed.

I couldn't help but keep a running tally in my head as our "cheap" getaway began racking up. One meal for seven at Rainforest Cafe? $100

Many meals on the road for seven? sheesh, we ate pb&j with apples as much as we could, but with a long trip like this I kind of lost count of how many drive thrus we visited.

Tickets for a family of seven for one day at Seaworld? $500 (we "only" spent $200)
Thank you for loving the Military and giving us four free tickets, Seaworld, because we couldn't have done it without you! It wasn't nice of you to throw away our sandwiches at the gate, though. I protested about being a vegetarian (and a cheap one at that) and your kind guard informed me that, "It's a choice, not a medical condition." He may need some sensitivity training. I ate a soft pretzel for lunch, thankyouverymuch. Hardly giving me the stamina to continue for the rest of the day. Good thing we opted for the super gigantic refillable Shamu cup, I think the last few hours were made possible by sugar.

Dog kennel for three nights? With an online coupon the bill was a mere $65

Gas for Moby and a few quarts of oil? The skyrocketing gas prices gave us a surprise, I wasn't paying attention as I was gas station potty patrol, but I saw one fill up neared $90. Just go ahead and estimate that we get (on a good day) 15 mpg and we drove 2566 miles round trip. Ouch.

So, cheap really isn't cheap and keeping track of the costs really isn't a good idea. But it's certainly nice to try living on the other side of the tracks once in a while, even if only to realize that sitting in the sun in the backyard is just as delightful as the (fancy, heated) pool at the high class resort. When the backyard isn't under a few feet of snow and ice, I mean.