Grocery store breakdown:

My local Harris Teeter: friendly, friendly people...I love them all including Tim the bagger who calls me "Gorgeous" or "Pretty Lady", and Miss Doris who is sweet despite what all else she has going on and I suspect it is a lot as she is raising her granddaughter. Expensive, but small, which I like, and beginning to carry quite a bit of organic stuff. I hate their deli and rarely go to it.

My local Food Lion: bleak, full of trans fats and high fructose corn syrup and no produce to speak of. But convenient and cheap as all hell. I frequent it in the summertime when funds dry up at our house. (The life of the preschool teacher and the self-employed dude - it sucks to be us)

Whole Foods: I'm always on guard the moment I enter that store. The employees are mercurial, the aisles always unfamiliar, the choices overwhelming. But I go, I sometimes find a bargain (there is no cheaper, better milk and you can get an iced tea whilst you shop), and I can pop in the yarn store, wine store, and book store during a visit.

Fresh Market: my guilty pleasure. A sample of coffee, classical music, and pretty flowers. I am lured by the creature comforts it offers. I don't think their meat is good at all. I think their baked goods are stale. I never find a dinner for the fam that is reasonably priced. But I go there, enticed by their siren song, at least once a week. There I said it, I've confessed.

Kroger: Big. Bulky. Reminds me of when my children were tiny and women accosted me for not having a hat, blanket, long pants on that baby. Depressing. Even seeing the word "Kroger" gives me the heebies.

Trader Joe's: Hello, gorgeous. Come over to Raleigh, won't you? This chain is so.....HAWAIIAN. Their foods are so tasty. The store is so manageable. Lots of white people shop there, but I never said I wasn't white. The crab cakes! The simmer sauces! The meringue cookies! I always take my own bags and they treat me like the Saviour of the Known World. That said, I can't get maxipads there. But it doesn't matter. No, Trader Joe's, it doesn't matter. I think I will always love you. We'll make this long-distance thing work.