So yesterday I sat down to write a fun sort of weekend post – on the bike at the gym, as always – and got a couple hundred words into a saved draft. When I went back to finish it off, it was gone. THANKS, WORDPRESS APP.

Anyway, the general gist was that the amount of choice available in this country is astounding.

Even after seven trips out here, I’ve never become acclimatised to having so many options presented to me at something as simple as breakfast.

“How do you want your eggs? Turkey, Canadian or regular bacon? Wheat toast, white toast, bagel? French toast or pancakes? Home fries or hash browns?”

I inevitably end up with only three of the options I wanted, and something I’d never order in a million years, because I’m so flummoxed and flustered that I just answer each question with the one choice I can remember the waitress saying. In other news: I’m an idiot.

Now that I’ve been here and have been shopping for myself for a couple of months, I’ve started to feel less intimidated by the nine million different brands of everything on offer. I finally have some preferences. And without further ado, here they are:

– Skippy peanut butter (creamy);
– Poland Springs sparkling water (Lime Essence, the raspberry one tastes like garbage);
– Quaker flavored oats variety box (Apple Cinnamon wins out, then Maple Brown Sugar and lastly Cinnamon Spice);
– TGIF Potato Skins chips (Cheddar Bacon, DUH);
– Dietz shaved rare roast beef;
– Bolthouse Farms green juice (there’s nary a better feeling than a glass of that for breakfast);
– Slim Jims (don’t judge me…please);
– Dietz cranberry horseradish (oh God get in my foodhole).

Okay, I said “a few” things. It’s impossible to name them all, but suffice to say I need to spend four days a week in the gym to “afford” those calories.

But damn, it’s worth every second.