date night

Mr. Bump and I just got home after a long date. It's been a fabulous day.

After sleeping in this morning and a leisurely breakfast, we drove down to Boulder to visit McGuckin's Hardware, which is always a great place to wander around. A hardware store that's so much more than that, both of us usually find something or other we want. After that we had lunch at Smashburger and wandered down to the Pearl Street Mall. Any time we're in Boulder we generally have two stops. The first is McGuckin's, the second is The Peppercorn.  They've got all sorts of kitchen stuff, all of it interesting, most of which I covet. Today we got out of there with a few cookie cutters, a new whisk and spatula, some measuring spoons and a couple of Christmas gifts.  We found another little store on the mall that sells Toms, and since I've ravaged my last pair within an inch of their lives, I bought a pair (this time gray instead of red--hopefully they'll age better) and then another pair because they were on sale and woobie on the inside. It was that kind of day.

This evening we had a date night, which is so rare we couldn't remember the last time we had one. We had a Groupon-thingy through Amazon local for a local restaurant called Venue bistro.  It was really yummy. I had a spinach salad with pepitas and goat cheese, with a Lion Stout vinaigrette. Mr. Bump had a cheese plate with fruit, nuts and homemade lahvosh.  For dinner I had a worcestershire glazed pork chop with barley risotto with cheddar cheese, apple and pear. Mr. Bump opted for gnocchi bolognese.  Normally when we go to dinner there is a winner declared for who ordered the best dish. Sometimes we get lucky and each of us likes what we ordered more than the other. And rarely, we both love both dishes and get to share. Tonight was the night for that. 

None of the desserts, however, looked interesting, which was a pity. But I had the idea to wander down the street to Apres Dessert Bar.  You got it, a restaurant that focuses most of it's menu on dessert. You can get small dinner plates too, but after all dessert is in it's name.  Mr. Bump got the belgian waffle with butter pecan ice cream, maple syrup and maple candy.  I ordered the banana bread french toast with oatmeal ice cream, spiced apple butter, and candied rice krispie treat.  As far as I'm concerned, it was no contest. I won. Oatmeal ice cream? Ah.maze.ing. Crispy cubes of banana bread, and candied rice krispie treat? Fan. Tas. Tic.  The piece de resistance, however, was the spiced apple butter, which married it all together. Yum.  Mr. Bump's was good too, but not as good, I'm afraid to say.  If you haven't been here, go try it. It's only open on the weekends, from 2pm to midnight, but soooo good.

And now, it's 8:30, I'm already sleepy, and the skinny jeans were a really bad idea. If I'm not careful, I could pop a button and put an eye out.

How's Operation Swimsuit going, you ask? Yeah. I'm not gonna talk about that tonight. Maybe when I come down off my sugar high. I know I'm not the best role model, but you know what? Some days look like this. And you just have to deal with it.

Really, that dessert was worth it. And the pork chop risotto was nothing to shake a stick at either.