The coffee shop was re-built, and I remember sipping coffee with Simona and talking about Congo, before Congo was a place I was going to, had gone to.

The coffee shop is still there, but Simona is in Atlanta now, and it’s been a long time since we’ve talked Congo, and there’s a grocery store called Carolina Farmin’ that sells sourdough bread, local jams and jellies, produce I wasn’t impressed by, locally made hummus, lots of organic food, and pigs’ feet. (Not the pickled kind. The real thing–the raw feet of pigs, on a foam tray, wrapped in plastic wrap.) The grocery store is California meets Carolina. What impressed me most was their selection of drinks–flavored waters, sodas, teas, and so on. I saw the root beers we drank in Maine last summer. They also sell HINT, the slightly flavored water I bought in SF to take with me to Muir Woods. I had raspberry-cucumber. It was okay, but made better by the environment I drank it in, the fog-wrapped redwoods, the clean and cold California air, talking about the career prospects of English majors with Claire, my new-found SF friend.

Walking through the grocery store yesterday, I felt pangs of what I can only call a variation of homesickness, but it was oddly mixed with the curiosity I often feel here. What would one do with the feet of pigs?

In the end, I bought an avocado, a bottle of ginger ale made with fresh ginger and Jasmine tea (it was a little odd), and a bottle of sparkling Martinelli’s apple juice for Jesse. The store is, ultimately, too expensive for me to regularly shop at, but it was a fun excursion, a little step outside the ordinary. And for that I was greatly appreciative.

Now I too can buy in bulk!

I got a Costco membership today. It being February 1st, the day when the budget resets and I can go grocery shopping again. (Actually we went over our grocery budget this month. And our eat-out budget. In our defense, we just this month lowered both of them, so we’re still adjusting.)

This was the first time I’d ever been in Costco as a member. It was like suddenly being part of an exclusive club. A club that charges you money in order to let you buy things! (Wait…)

I wandered the aisles, in awe of what I could now buy. Stewed tomatoes, anyone?

You'd never run out.

If I wanted, I could get a tub of  mayonnaise large enough to bathe in. Pounds of crushed red pepper flakes. Vitamins that would last me seven years. I wanted to buy a giant sack of Israeli couscous because I’d recently tried it at the Vetters’ house and liked it. I drew the line, though, and told myself I needed to prove I would regularly eat Israeli couscous first before buying enough to feed half the Israeli army.

When I was in college, I had a Sams membership. I once bought a six-pound bag of pancake mix. I didn’t even eat pancakes that often. Do you know how many pancakes six pounds of mix makes? (Neither do I. I ended up throwing out probably half the bag after I graduated college, got my first job, and then got accepted into grad school.)

I took my time wandering the aisles. The trip had been my reward to myself for having finished some work this morning. I wanted to see all the things I could buy in bulk. I needed to know my options, now that I had so many. Also, I don’t know when you all usually shop at Costco, but the other times I’d been in the store were always weekends. Costco is lovely after lunch on a Tuesday–there are no crowds, and everyone in the store is over 65 (except for me, and one or two moms). In the book aisle, an older man stopped me to ask which of the two children’s books he was considering would be better suited for a second grader. I gave him my opinion and carried on, slowly pushing my cart through the quiet aisles, listening to nothing but the rhythmic sounds of the building, the freezers humming, the heater softly blowing, the lights buzzing.

Slow, peaceful, uncrowded. Never thought that's how I'd describe Costco.

In the milk and cheese aisle, I stopped to do some math on milk (three half gallons, divided by…) when another older man said to me, “Darlin’, you’re going to have to shop a little faster if you’re ever going to get out of here.” I laughed.

The only disappointment was in the meat and fish section, I must say. The Costco I visited in Charlotte with my aunt had meat everywhere, stacks of it, and loads of fish and seafood–crab legs, whole crabs, several varieties of salmon, everything. Our Costco had chicken seventeen different ways, but only a couple varieties of fish (all farm-raised). And I couldn’t find any fancy cheese. Perhaps I just missed it. Or perhaps all the weekenders snatch it up, and there’s little left for us Tuesday shoppers.

At any rate, it was a fun way to spend some time. Now, on to dinner–a spinach, fontina, and pesto lasagna that calls for a whole bunch of spinach. Sure, every other ingredient came from Harris Teeter. But I do have a giant tub of spinach from Costco, and it sure will feel nice to use it.

How come my Costco picture is so much better than the one on my driver's license?

An upscale Piggly Wiggly--who would have thought?

This is life right now:

• We spent Sunday afternoon in Myrtle Beach, exploring, and we found two places we’d not been before. The first was a trashy flea market where we walked in the heat, melting, my long summer dress clinging to my legs, and looked at cheap guitars, gaudy turquoise rings, old cast iron skillets, pocketknives. A woman was selling used books for outrageous prices and as we drove away I complained (“You can’t sell a used paperback for five dollars. It just isn’t done!”) and Jesse remarked, “You sound personally offended,” and I paused and thought and said, “Why, yes, I believe I am.” Then we drove past the beaches and the beach hotels and ended up in a ritzy part of town, a new development it seemed, where we found, to our great amazement, a ritzy Piggly Wiggly. We immediately stopped the car and went in, and then spent probably a solid half hour wandering through the store, exclaiming things like, “A whole display just for imported Belgium beers?” and “Check out these cakes!” The Piggly Wiggly in our town sells beef tongue and smells funny. This Piggly Wiggly was the nicest grocery store we’d ever been in. We bought Little Debbie snacks and milk and ate in the parking lot.

It wasn't an illusion--the inside was as nice as the outside!

• We spent that evening in a mall, talking about New York. It seems that the jobs I am both qualified for and interested in are all in New York. The fact that we’re discussing this both excites and terrifies me.

• In the event we do not move to New York, and honestly we probably won’t, I am exploring my employment options in North Carolina. They are few and far between. I’m applying for everything right now, including jobs high schoolers apply for, and this has been more of a hit to my ego than I expected. I’m three years away from thirty and have a master’s degree. I started to apply for jobs at Harris Teeter, but I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t do it. I know this blog might prompt worried emails from family members, but I’m sorry, if you can job hunt in the middle of a recession in a city that didn’t have good jobs even before the recession, if you can do that without getting a little bit depressed, then I’m worried about you.

• Saturday was by far the worst—the day I almost applied for the Harris Teeter job, the day I got the most discouraged about my employment prospects, the day before we started talking about New York. That evening, I read a blog Sabrina posted about fried rice with SPAM and I knew instantly that SPAM was the only thing that would brighten my mood, so I dropped everything and ran to Wal-Mart (you can buy SPAM at Harris Teeter, but why would you?). It’s been years since I’ve had SPAM, and I wondered if I’d be able to find it, but as I looked at the signs over the aisles I realized I needn’t worry: Wal-Mart has an aisle specifically marked “Canned Meat.” In said Canned Meat aisle, I saw a row of familiar plastic pouches and thought, “Oh, what the heck,” and grabbed two packs of Ramen noodles. Might as well. And? Turns out I was right. SPAM helped.

• I am starting a new book and I’m pretty sure it’s about zombies.

• Yesterday, Jesse came home from work early and on the way home stopped at the grocery store to rent a movie. I had watched both A. and M. that morning and was exhausted. I didn’t mean to, but I had fallen asleep on the couch, and Jesse came in and woke me up with a kiss and a rose he’d gotten for me. I love that man.

Let’s back up. The past few days have been a whirlwind—fun, nearly every moment of them, but packed. Thursday, I got up early to clean the house, wash linens, make the guest bed (er, futon), pick up a pork tenderloin and some good balsamic vinegar from Harris Teeter, and prep said tenderloin so it could marinate for the rest of the day. I watched A. for the afternoon, playing outside with him and the family’s Australian Shepherd, feeding him peas, and singing to him while stacking blocks. Every time I finish singing him a song, he claps, grins, and says, “Yay! Yay!” I have no idea how I managed that, but let me tell you, with that reaction, I’m singing all the time now. Sometimes, when I forget the words to “Hush Little Baby” (I can get started, but then I forget what order things are supposed to be given…) or run out of alphabet- or farm-themed songs, I resort to Elton John.

Thursday afternoon, about a half hour after I came home from watching A., Beth and her mom Cheryl drove up and we commenced the requisite hugging-and-squealing phase of the visit, which we followed with a house tour (about thirty seconds is all it takes to see the whole thing) and conversation in the living room. We then started dinner, popping the tenderloin in the oven and starting in on the mashed potatoes, Brussels sprouts, green beans, and bread. Jesse came home and we poured lemon Italian soda into champagne glasses and got out the tablecloth and had ourselves a nice little dinner. Jesse ran out to the store afterward to grab ice cream, which I’d forgotten earlier, and we had brownie and hot fudge sundaes. We stayed up late playing card games and something called Speed Scrabble (fun, fun, fun).

Friday morning, Jesse left for work early and Beth, Cheryl, and I had a lazy morning at home. We took our time getting up and getting ready, and then we set up a waffle bar for breakfast. Aunt Joannie got me this fabulous waffle maker for Christmas, the kind you flip over to make two waffles at once, and it’s red and shiny and, apparently, it makes The Best Waffles Ever. I took my mom’s suggestion and separated the eggs, beating the whites separately and folding them in at the end, and the waffles were light and fluffy but with perfectly crispy outsides. Yum. We improvised a blueberry-lemon syrup and we whipped cream and served the waffles with strawberries and macadamia nuts. Beth had brought a tea called Lady Grey, and we drank nearly a pot of it as we sat around the table, making and eating our waffles, and talking—so much talking!

Beth and I have known each other our whole lives. Our parents lived next door to one another in Nitro before we were born. Then we showed up, three months apart, and we’ve been friends ever since, even though both our families left West Virginia when we were children, even though we’ve not lived in the same state since we were four. Beth is kind and mild mannered and smart. In college, she majored in chemistry and French, and now she works in a hospital pharmacy, in a place so clean she wears a hairnet and cannot wear any makeup for fear it might flake off and contaminate someone’s IV bag. That fact alone puts her job into the category of Jobs I Will Never Do, but Beth does it because she’s not as vain as I am and has a very lovely complexion anyway.

Beth and her mom had to leave in the afternoon, so we took leftover veggie soup to the church and had lunch with Jesse before they headed out of town. After they left, I did a little copyediting and then went shopping. Because it was Friday and because I had a gift card and because it was warm enough to wear a skirt and flip flops, and that made life oh-so-good. At the mall, I found sales and managed to leave with $10 still on my gift card, and I drove to Ulta to pick up some makeup I was running out of (no hospital pharmacy for me) and I kept the windows down, which made my hair unhappy, but I didn’t care, because it made the rest of me happy and my hair is unhappy so often that its desires cannot be taken too seriously.

And then that evening I nearly forgot that Jamie Oliver’s new show was on, but I remembered in time to see three-fourths of it (so good!) and found the rest of it on Hulu today. (You can watch it there if you didn’t catch it.)

That brings us to yesterday, when we got up early and left for Charlotte to help Joannie move in to her new apartment. It’s in a fantastic part of town with a shopping center across the street that has a Target, a Harris Teeter, a movie theater, just about every kind of restaurant you could want, and dozens of other shops, including one that rents out audio books. Lovely! Mom and I cooked chicken fajitas for dinner and we drove around the area to see what we could see and we cooed at Joannie’s cats and tried to reassure them everything was fine, even though they were not quite sure what was going on. Jesse and I left after eight that night and made a wrong turn, which meant we pulled into our driveway about four hours later, just about cross-eyed with fatigue. And Oliver and Gracie were waiting at the door, meowing for dinner, which, they made clear to us, was far too late for their liking.