At Roy Rogers and Burger King, they sell pre-packaged salads to make you think there's actually a way to eat healthy on the road.
Ha, that's a good one!
Look, I have eaten these salads, if that's what you want to call them. They look as if they were prepared back when Edison was alive, and they taste the way you'd expect wilted lettuce, bland tomatoes and stale carrots to taste.
Each service area also contains a Travel Mart, where you can buy overpriced magazines, paperbacks, souvenir T-shirts, candy, etc. I stop in a Travel Mart on occasion to buy a small pack of gum or candy - at which point I remember there's no such thing as a small anything in these places.
Recently, for instance, I went looking for a small York Peppermint Pattie.
I have a thing for York Peppermint Patties, which there's no need to get into here, except to say that I use them as a tiny dessert after a meal. They send a signal to my brain that tells me to stop stuffing my fat face.
Anyway, there's no such thing as getting a small York Peppermint Pattie at these places. I was looking for one the size of a half-dollar, which you used to be able to get anywhere. But at the Travel Mart, you have to buy one the size of a dinner plate.
"King-Size!" it says on the wrapper. And, boy, they're not kidding.
But I'm a junkie for this stuff, so I buy the super-sized one, eat a small piece and save the rest for later.
Actually, when I get back to the car, I place the rest in a cup holder and forget about it. Pretty soon, it'll start to melt in the hot sun and ooze onto the black plastic. Then some 30 miles up the road, I'll have to stop someplace else (maybe the Clara Barton Service Area or the Richard Stockton Service Area or the John Fenwick Service Area) and soak a paper towel in water and try to scrape the congealed chocolate from the plastic.
It gives you something to do as you travel the turnpike, I guess.
God knows there's not much to look at.
kevin.cowherd@baltsun.com
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