The Return of Chocolate Pussy

Sounds like a blaxploitation film, right? Trust me, it's much more prosaic. Read on...

Friday night, St. Patrick's Day. With nothing really on the docket for that evening, I decided to take the bus home instead of the stinky subway. Of course, the bus-taking was justification for walking past NYU's Palladium building to see what was up at the new Trader Joe's. Inside I could tell it was busy, but since there wasn't a line out the door to enter I decided to go inside. Oh, it was bad, and probably only going to get worse as the evening wore on. But I couldn't help myself from walking around the store to see if they still carried my greatest hits: salted almonds, chocolate covered raisins, spanakopita and Clif and Luna bars ... even cheaper than they were in Pasadena. Naturally I had to go get a basket.

TJ's East is really no different from any I've been to on the west coast. Hawaiian shirts? Check. Friendly store clerks? Check. Clanging bells and boat horns? Check and check. Where the New York store differs is in the amusing signage that accompanies weekly specials or customer service policies. For example, "At Trader Joe's, we buy direct from the source and pass the savings on to yous." Funny, albeit an obvious joke. But that's one of the things I love about the store: it's fully cognizant of its geekiness.

So I'm ready to check out and realize that this process might take a while, as the line snakes around the perimeter of the store, almost reaching the front entrance where a tiki-clad employee holds a large stick with a sign haphazardly taped to the top "End of Line". The line moves faster than I anticipated (thank God) and before you know it I'm in front of the prepared food area. Little by little more food finds its way into my basket: hummus, california rolls, fresh mozzarella. And then I see it -- buckets and buckets piled on top of each other at the end of the aisle across from where I stand.

Chocolate Cats Cookies: the staple of every car trip I went on when I was living in Los Angeles. After the requisite gab fest, after three games of Mad Libs, after stopping at a rest stop, out would come the Chocolate Cats (or Chocolate Pussy, as my brother nicknamed them on a trip to Vegas). Chocolate Pussy hasn't passed these lips in over 2 years and it's been 2 years too many. I grabbed a bucket and struggled not to open it and devour half the contents while waiting in the half hour-long checkout line.

I did indeed take the bus home, proudly holding up my Trader Joe's bag like an Oscar as I walked down the aisle. Some riders were oblivious to the battle I just fought, others were silently impressed (or jealous). "What does she have in there," I envisioned them wondering, as their eyes darted back and forth between me and the bag. Images of gourmet cheese, crackers, Two Buck Chuck and wasabe peas were most likely floating around the transom of their minds. What they I'm sure were not considering was the enormous stash of Chocolate Pussy I just scored.