Woodlands, Wegman's and Whatever

 

Wednesday, May 9, 2012 – Woodlands, Wegman’s, and Whatever

I prepped for today’s lunch at Woodlands, my favorite Indian restaurant, by doing a super workout at the gym this morning.  It was supposed to be Elliott’s turn to work with our trainer.  However, Elliott has been tormented by some pesky new pains for several days, and they’re getting worse.  It’s probably time for another pain injection, but Elliott is hesitant to get treatment before his pain becomes severe.  He’s still concerned about the addictive properties of the painkillers he’s using although our family doctor convinced him yesterday that he should continue taking them.  Elliott would rather avoid medication, so he tried a massage at the chiropractor’s office yesterday.  Unfortunately, instead of giving helping relieve the pain, it just made it worse.  This morning, he was hobbling around the house like a 90-year old whose broken body wasn’t glued back together right.  It was a pathetic sight. 

Poor Elliott spent a miserable morning lying down on the sofa in the family room.  Meanwhile, Kota gave me some new exercises to add to my current regimen.  They’re designed to increase the flexibility in my hips and to strengthen my abs.  This kind of workout makes me feel so empowered!   Also, I finished a wonderful book on my Kindle this morning while I was ellipticizing.  (It’s One More River by Mary Glickman, and it’s a beautifully written novel that deals with race relations and Jewish culture in the American South from the 1920s through the 1960s.)

I’d been looking forward to my lunch at Woodlands with my friend Kathy for days.  Of all the Indian restaurants in this area (and there are plenty), Woodlands is my favorite, partly because it features a strictly vegetarian menu.  The location of the restaurant, adjacent to a K-Mart in a nondescript shopping center in Fairfax City, isn’t especially promising.  But once you walk inside Woodlands, you’re transported to southern India.  The lunch buffet is an amazing bargain at $6.95 per person during the week.  My usual favorites were all there – the chats, saag paneer, dhal makhni – plus some new dishes, such as turnip poriyal with coconut and mustard seed, that proved to be equally delicious.  I also took a few nibbles of the tangy mango pickles for the first time.  And those masala dosas were the best I’ve ever eaten.  The crispy thin crepe and the melt-in-your-mouth tenderness of the exquisitely seasoned potatoes sent us both into swoons.  Kathy and I agreed that they are the ultimate comfort food, at least if we’re talking about South Indian cuisine. 

In an Indian-food induced state of bliss, I made a lightning-fast dash into Wegman’s and then drove to the mall for my appointment at the Apple Store.  It was a very productive two hours of movie-making, and I’m now ready to do some serious disc-burning at next week’s next session.  Before I headed home, I meandered through Macy’s and concluded my annual Mother’s Day mini-shopping spree.  Yes, I’m not ashamed to admit that I buy my own gifts for this holiday.  It saves my loved ones the anxiety of trying to figure out what I want.  It’s saves them the time they’d need for shopping.  And it’s good for the environment since no gift-wrapping is required.  I started this project a couple of weeks ago in Occoquan when I purchased a bracelet.  Last Sunday, I added some new sunglasses from Target.  And today I finished up this year’s support-the-economy project with earrings and a couple of T-shirts at Macy’s.  And it all came out to less than $100 – so Happy Mother’s Day to me!!!! 

Of course, I had to drop a few not so subtle hints to Matt via email about planning a Mother’s Day get-together.  Regardless, I can boast with maternal pride that when we were eating dinner together last night (at a local Thai restaurant), he suggested a repeat of last year’s very successful Mother’s Day plans:  brunch at the Whole Foods in Fair Lakes, which boasts such a tremendous range of food choices that everyone can construct a satisfying and eclectic meal.  Thoughts of spinach pizza, grilled tofu, couscous salad, sushi, hazelnut gelato, and more are dancing through my head.