My New Commuter Life, Part III: Food, Folks and Fun*

*Wait a second, wasn't that a major fast-food corporation jingle?

While I was in Nebraska, I did make some time to visit with my Pokeno girlfriends, have a nice dinner out with Shannon (who took me in at her house when the Offutt Inn was booked for the week), and enjoy a trip to Trader Joe's!

Several neighborhood Moms in Bellevue get together for a breakfast pot luck once a month, and a dinner potluck and game of Pokeno also once a month (on another separate day).  The girls elected to move Pokeno night around a little so I could join them!  I shipped a box of Mardi Gras decorations to the ladies, and we had a blast dressing up and enjoying Cristi's tater tot casserole.

We have pictures of the Pokeno ladies from every month!

Guess who???

Who else would appear for the world to see on the Internet in Mardi Gras deely-boppers?  If you look closely, you can see the blinky lights...

Shannon and I also had a chance to go out together for dinner. Shannon was my adventure-buddy when I was in Omaha...she braved the 3-hours-each-way drive to the Ashfall Fossil Beds last summer! We also checked out numerous out-of-the-ordinary restaurants together, and this time around we had a hankerin' for Ethiopian food!

Shannon did the research.  She found two places, both in the downtown Omaha vicinity.  One was called "Ethiopian Restaurant" and the other called "Lalibela's".  We chose "Ethiopian Restaurant" because it was closer to the highway and the weather still wasn't great.

The restaurant shares a business space with an Ethiopian grocery, and the grocery side was very full.  The store owner -- a very pretty young lady, probably in her 30s -- came out and told Shannon and me that she was out of food.  What?  On a Friday night at 6pm???  Don't even go there with the irony of it.

We're hoping it was from the weather...we got back in the truck and headed up the street to the 2nd choice (what are the chances of that???  TWO Ethiopian restaurants within about 5 minutes of each other!!!).

The restaurant was rather empty, just two other couples at tables, eating their respective dinners. We ended up talking to one of the other couples, asking about what they were eating and getting some tips of what's good and what's not. Shannon and I each chose one entree and we grazed freely on both of them. I ordered something with seasoned lamb, while Shannon chose a vegetarian combo. I wish we had ordered two of the veggie combos, I didn't care for the meat too much, but the rainbow of lentils (on the left) was awesome!  Learning how to eat the food without utensils was also fun!

There's a basket in front of Shannon filled with injera, a flatbread that you use as your plate and utensil.  Rip off a piece of injera and scoop away!

Finally, even though I was quite tired from my 4-days in a row of work (wow, what happened to me?), I took a trip out to the recently-opened Omaha Trader Joe's and stocked up on the family favorites!

This will last us till my next trip to Omaha!  I hand-carried this home in a single TJ's reusable shopping bag.  I got crap from Jacob for not picking up some Dorothy Lynch salad dressing...sorry!

Thanks to Shannon, Cristi and Laura for helping make my weekend back in Nebraska so great!

Welcome to Omaha, Trader Joe's!!

Okay, for me personally, it's a day late and a dollar short...since we're leaving in a week.

I'm a huge Trader Joe's fan!  I can't say exactly when I first went there.  I know it was about 10 years ago and it was either the one in Commack, NY with my in-laws, or else in Falls Church, VA with one of my childhood friends, Naomi.

If you aren't in the know, then you deserve a little background.  Trader Joe's is a grocery store chain, with most of their locations on the east and west coasts.  They are unique in that they market their own brands of many foods, many of which are very unusual.

Such as pad thai kits, curry sauces, and pasta.  Beer, wine and organic milk.  They'll carry other brands too, but again, mostly on the unusual side.  It's so much fun to shop there.  The prices are very reasonable, and you know you're getting good food with minimal processing.  Their fruit and nut section is so much fun.  Their coffees are fair trade, many of them are organically grown.

About 6 months after we moved to Apex, NC, a Trader Joe's opened up right up the road from our house.  I was so excited to make TJ's our family's local grocery store.  It was awesome!

Then we moved to Omaha, and were once again without TJ's (although being near a commissary again helped).  I saw a page on Facebook called "Bring Trader Joe's to Omaha" where several folks were trying to work with the company on bringing the store to the midwest.  I guess TJ's need to put a distribution hub somewhere near here first.  Because of that page, I knew this past winter that TJ's had taken a lease on a property in Western Omaha and on November 12th they had their grand opening.

A store in West Des Moines, IA had opened a week prior, and in 2 weeks a store will open in Lincoln, NE.

So here I am on November 13th, happy about there being a Trader Joe's nearby.

From 2010 11 13 Trader Joe's Omaha Grand Opening

And this is what greeted us when we walked in:

From 2010 11 13 Trader Joe's Omaha Grand Opening

Yeah, it was crowded! Fortunately, we knew EXACTLY what we needed: coffee, pasta, nuts and wine. Large volumes of each.  We really enjoy the Charles Shaw wine and picked up TWO CASES of the stuff!  Plus Jacob's favorite veggie ruffle pasta, an assortment of nuts for cooking and baking, and several large containers of their coffee.

So I have my fix, which will carry me for several months as I make my way back into a Trader Joe's drought.

Back to packing!