So I took a tour of the area last night in the muggy evening tracking down 2 things. Free donuts at Krispy Kreme(courtesy of my sister's gift card that she passed on to me) and a Nintendo DS Lite because there were reports online that Walmart & Target had broke the selling street date (June 11) across the U.S. of A.

First stop was in Dupont Circle since that was the closest Krispy Kreme in the area. Driving around Dupont, there are 2 apparent things that always grate on me when I drive in the city. Taxi drivers have no regard for the road rules or the people they supposedly are sharing the road with. I don't know how half of these jokesters got their licenses. The other thing is the amount of clueless drivers on the road. Do they have a route planned out? Do they not care that their careless driving impact other drivers around them? I used to think that Maryland drivers were the worse in the area (which they still are) but now I've amended that thought with that most drivers in this area just don't care and are completely self-absorbed. The idea of sharing the road is completely lost on them.

Getting to Krispy Kreme was relatively painless otherwise, parking was found a scant block away. After trying to figure out how much was on the card and if it was going to expire which was much more involved due to the woman behind the counter telling me to call the automated 800 number because they couldn't check my balance, only to stop me mid button pressing of menu selections to tell me that they could check the card. I planned on draining the whole 10 bucks on the account by getting a dozen assorted donuts and a frozen Kreme with coffee but found out that they didn't have any cold drinks although no explaination was offered up. So I had to be satisfied with 4 glazed, 4 crullers, 2 apple filled, and 2 custard filled chocolate glazed donuts.

After that, I had to head to Potomac Yard out in Virginia since that was the closest and only other Target I hadn't checked that was close to me. I had checked the 2, one in Falls Church and one in Bailey's Crossroads with little luck. The two that I've been to were your regular Targets that seemed to be kept up well. The one in Potomac Yard was a bit different, I don't know why but the whole place just felt a little ghetto. Its like store management weren't on top of their game, on top of which it looked like people from the city and Alexandria were flooding the stores so it was truly not a good shopping experience. Ultimately, my hunt for a DS Lite was fruitless. The only thing that I thought of was the Target that was getting built in the city in Columbia Heights, and I hope to god that they know how to keep that place up to par of all the suburbian Targets, otherwise, it'll be just like the one in Potomac Yard.

After all this driving around, I stopped by Gallery Place to pick up some dinner since MM was already asleep from her long day that I only needed to worry about feeding myself. I felt like some Chipotle and decided that was the closest one on the way home. Why do they even try to keep Gallery Place like its Chinatown? I don't think any chinese people even live there anymore. At least not at the volume of chinese folks are like in New York City. 97% of the shops in the area are non-chinese even though they have chinese characters strewn all over their awnings and windows. Add in the fact that whoever decided to try to dress the place up like its Time Square. There's just one problem, the roads are too small to justify it being like Time Square. I'm starting to avoid driving down 7th on weekends unless its absolutely necessary. Way too much traffic.

However, street parking on a wednesday evening was relatively painless as opposed to the usual times. I parked only a block away near the Coyote Ugly and walked to the Chipotle pretty easily. I realize why I don't eat there that often after I got home though, they use way too much onion and cilantro to give their food their flavor. My mouth and stomach are usually paying for it later by heinous breath and my old-man stomach gurgling and telling me its going to be paying me back in lots of gas.

I liked the fact that I got to drive around and see a lot of the area in a relatively short amount of time, but I was also just glad to get home and enjoy my overly oniony and cilantro-y dinner.