Beautiful day for a bike ride!

Well, not really. It was way too hot and humid for me. I did go out about 5pm-ish and it was quite pleasant, though.

My first stop was the Cozy Crop House here in Lititz, where I do massage on many weekends. If you're a scrapper you should definitely check out the link! Awesome space, delicious food, scrapping classes AND a store on site, plus you can even get a massage from me!

I was awfully hungry as I hadn't eaten since breakfast, so I decided to ride over to Oregon Dairy for chicken and waffles. If you haven't had chicken and waffles before you should probably try it right away. It's one of my favorite foods! Pulled chicken and gravy over a waffle... what could be better? Maybe corn on the cob or my grandma's pickles, but not much else.

Oregon Dairy is an interesting place and something of a Lancaster County landmark. It's a grocery store, ice cream shop, restaurant and gift shop all rolled into one. It's also an actual working dairy farm. And there'a a playground there. But one of the things I love about Oregon Dairy is this:

The bike rack! I try to ride my bike everywhere-- to work, for fun, downtown, to the grocery and so on and I can't think of another grocery that has a bike rack. It's much easier to use your bike for everyday errands and trips when you have a safe place to leave it while you're going about your business.

I ate at the counter and while I was there one of my clients stopped by to say hello, and I met someone who is related to two of my other clients. It's one of the things I love about living in a small community-- the interconnectedness of people. And it's funny; when I was moving up here I heard over and over again that the people of Lancaster County are standoffish and even unfriendly. I haven't found that to be the case at all. Is there a certain reservation? By some people and at some times, yes. But isn't that true everywhere?

Now it is true that I have heard Lancaster County natives complaining about people moving in from other places, particularly New York and New Jersey. As someone who grew up in New Jersey, I know the state gets a bad rap and there are many negative stereotypes about the people that live there. It does sort of hurt my feelings when I hear that kind of talk, but I'll usually chime in with "Hey! I'm from New Jersey!" and the answer is usually something along the lines of "Oh but you're different." The town I grew up in was very much like the town I live in out here. A bit less charming, but similar in many other ways. But to make the point about stereotypes, one time I told a lifelong Lancaster Countian that I was from north Jersey and they replied, "Oh? Are you Italian?" Hahahahaha! I think they watched too many episodes of The Sopranos!

I have a long day tomorrow, so I'll wrap up with this picture of a mule baby and its mother. The baby is blurry because it was wiggling all over the place. I'll be riding down that way again, though, and will hopefully get some better pictures.