Move over Friday, Sunday's lookin' good

Sundays are consistently the best day of my week. We sleep in for as long as we can go, 9 am, typically, and get up for our standing appointment at Mimosa Cafe. It's about a 1/2-mile walk down there from our house, which is just enough to get our blood flowing and hunger to set in. We have been on this routine for months now, whenever we're in town on a Sunday. We resist making any other plans for that time slot because it's worth so much to us. When we get to Mimosa we sit down in a table hugging the wall. There are only 10 or 12 tables and most of them can't fit any more than three comfortably, and even three is a stretch. Kelly greets us and comes by with a pot of fresh Peet's French Roast. We know her by name now, which is nice. That exchange happened early this summer. She recognized our repeat appearance in little ways until we eventually introduced ourselves formally one day. One of the next mornings we were there she sent us each the cafe's titular cocktail, complete with freshly-squeezed OJ. With her sweet, mother-with-authority demeanor, she is entirely welcoming to anyone who steps foot in the place. Kelly prides herself on her ability to take care of someone when they are ready to enjoy a meal, and she deserves the recognition. Kelly gives the place her special flare, but it doesn't hurt that the kitchen has her back, pounding out incredible breakfast after breakfast. I get the same thing almost every week: the Curry Tofu Scramble. I did not convert to tofu lightly, believe me. Honestly, I still consider eggs to be the single greatest food item in existence (which is quite the roadblock on my path to veganism.) But in Mimosa's medley of thin strips of bell peppers, coarsely-chopped mushrooms, with a dose of cayenne and curry powder, tofu simply stands up to it all better than eggs. Week after week of spice-induced sniffles, the Curry Scramble has yet to disappoint.

When we are done ordering and chatting with Kelly we play Set. It's our trademark at this point. I always lose the first game and maybe the second, but when the coffee perks me up I can school Andy all morning. We are not only tolerated, but encouraged to stay after we eat for as long as we'd like. In fact, we are not the only regulars who spend our mornings at this spot. There is another couple, baby-boomer aged, who bring the paper and take their times eating. They are often there when we arrive and there still when we leave. I'm glad they are there; I've been too trained by New England standards to feel blindly invited to take our time in a restaurant. I'm still not sure if Kelly is an anomaly or a fair sample of Northern California food service, but I'm happy that we have at least one Set-haven in our neighborhood.

Disclaimer: These photos are crappy due to what my camera phone can offer. It's the price I pay for spontaneous picture taking. Click on the picture and then on "all sizes" to see bigger versions.

Sick of Trader Joe's Produce , we've recently expanded our Sunday programming to include a trip to Whole Foods after breakfast. I have learned why it can get away with a nick name like Whole Paycheck and still dominate the alt-grocery market: aesthetics. The place is gorgeous. It is a true pleasure to shop there and I try to savor as much of the experience there as I can. The place is practically a city-block in size, and it has a two-tiered parking lot tacked onto the back. We always park on top and walk right into the building into a column built to house the stairs and the elevator. There are cut outs in the wall in there that let us see out onto the floor of the store. We can see the Starbucks at the far corner, the front wall facing Bay Place is lined with cash registers adorned with striking magazines about health and enlightenment. In front of the check-out is a food-to-go buffet the size of an Olympic-length pool. We can also see the bread bakery, the fish market, and the disappointingly lit floral section.

And then, ahhh, turn right and peer into the the produce section. It takes up the length of the north-eastern wall in all of it's mind-controlling glory. I just stand in awe of each beautiful mound of peaches/lemons/cantaloupe that is laid out in perfect symmetry. This effect does not come easy to Whole Foods, that much is apparent when it takes 4 employees to carefully stack the display of corn like Lincoln logs. Once each display is constructed, there is at least one employee on the floor at all times to maintain the delicate piles. One morning we stood and watched one gentleman in an official green apron pick up watermelons one by one, considering the shape and size of each carefully before placing it deliberately in a place I can only assume he had been trained to see as maximizing the sale value of that melon. Whole Foods needn't over staff the produce section, as they know, because they can depend on patrons to self-police themselves. It's all part of the Whole Foods business psychology.

Left: CarbonNYC on Flickr Right:My crappy cell camera

The produce on top of the bins (not in, that would be an ugly Safeway thing to do) are stacked Jenga-style. No self-respecting shopper wants to pull out the bottom plum, no matter how mouth-watering it may appear, if it is going to cause the entire mound of them to avalanche all over the floor of the dimly-lit showroom. There are more of these brilliant gems of visual manipulation up and down every isle of the store. But they do it so stunningly, and nothing feels so egregious that they are breaking my standard of ethics (in this superficial sense, that is. I can't speak for other corporate policies.) So as long as the continue to carry Brown Cow yogurt and let me enjoy my surroundings in peace, I'll continue to give them my business on Sundays indefinitely.