The one rule of driving

Do Not Disturb.One of my favourite blogs at the moment is Crappy Pictures - it's cute, funny and right on the money. The only annoying thing about it are the commenters. Every post people will write 'OMG that's so true, you are writing about my life!!' -- EVERY POST! 

Her latest post is on eating out with her husband, before and after kids. Before kids they splurged on fancy restaurants and degustation menus, after kids they splurged on drive thru*. After I read this I thought 'OMG that's so true, she is writing about my life!'**

We went away for the weekend recently, just a quick trip down to the South Coast. Normally we would stop in at Berry and have a nice lunch at the deli, with perhaps coffee and cake. If we were with friends we would stop in at the pub for a nice lunch with beers. Travelling with Stickybeak changed things somewhat. There is one rule when driving a long distance with a baby: if they are asleep, DON'T STOP.  Any break of more than five minutes could result in an awake baby who then either: needs a feed, needs a change, or just needs to not be in the car.

So we had our fingers crossed that a stop in Berry would work out but it wasn't meant to be. Stickybeak was fast asleep and, in keeping with the rule, our options for lunch were reduced to either burger and fries or deep fried chicken and fries, all ordered through a crackling speaker box.

Before we had Stickybeak I could count the number of times we used a drive thru on one hand, after Stickybeak (and just in the space of a few months) I have lost count. Once you have a baby you start to wish everything was drive thru - supermarket, chemist, ATM, etc. But at the moment it's just food, and bad food at that, and where I live there is only one chain on offer (something I never thought I would be upset about!)

So what do I want? I wish I was so organised that I would never need to order food on the run (or in the car) ever again, but life with a baby just isn't like that. So instead here's hoping a new chain of drive-thru cafe/restaurants opens up, offering good coffee, quality pastries and fresh, healthy sandwiches that are easy to eat with one hand. More realistically, I wish petrol stations had a drive-thru option so I could get a sandwich, bottle of water and a chocolate bar without waking up the baby. Is that too much to ask?

*it almost hurts me to write 'thru' instead of 'through'.

** yes I have left a comment on her blog saying as much :)