Ep.4: McDisappointed

After Utah, we trekked down to the Grand Canyon and finally resumed driving east.
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In Albuquerque, my dad and I spotted a Circle K, which being Virginians we're not accustomed to seeing. Our first response was to wonder if "strange things were afoot." Curious, we stopped in and my dad remarked that we might find a frozen dessert there. Nothing tickled our fancy, so we left...and then we saw it: The Golden Arches.

I admit it: I love McDonald's caramel sundaes. Its simplicity isn't accomplished anywhere else. Hot caramel on the bottom, vanilla softserve in the middle, hot caramel and nuts on top. Snuggling up with one in my warm winter jacket seemed the perfect ending to our long, cold day of driving in pouring snow.

"Yeah," I moped, "but the past few times I've asked, the McDonald's I was at didn't have caramel, just hot fudge." (I've always liked caramel more than hot fudge. In fact, for a time I never didn't even like hot fudge, preferring chocolate sauce. This made me the black sheep at family birthday parties growing up.) Dad thought we'd have better luck in New Mexico thanks to the large Mexican population and given that caramel--dulce de leche, actually-- is a popular flavor in Mexico. Triunfa!

If high hopes were sundaes , my life would be a ziggy-piggy buffet, but unfortunately this time they same crashing down into little pieces, not unlike chopped nuts. No caramel sundae!

McDonald'ses around the world, I'm begging you: Bring back my simple pleasure! Bring back the caramel sundae!