Cafe? On Aisle One.

It should have been festive as hell, but all I wanted was comfort food. One of the three platters offered on special was fish, two pieces with two sides -- I picked the kernel corn and a vegetable mix of steamed cauliflower, carrots and broccoli. The corn was hot and little more, the vegetable mix too tough for my plastic fork and the fish was stale. Later, I thought to ask what kind of fish I'd eaten, but the woman who'd served me, unlike Wendell Berry, had no earthly idea what was on the plate.

It hardly mattered. I barely put a dint in my heaping helping, so distraught was I over the loss of a favorite dining companion. Maybe I would have enjoyed my solitary meal more had I been more chipper, had a stiffer upper lip about the whole departure thing. After all, grocery stores have traditionally been, and for all I know may still be recommended as, suitable pickup joints for singles cruising the aisles. But like all pickup joints, from President and First Lady to Emo's, they can be incredibly sad and lonely places.

So if you eat in a grocery store, choose your food carefully (and go before the steam trays have crusted their contents). And for Heaven's sake, take a friend.