the only grocery store I know of that has groupies

One of the hardest things about leaving California was abandoning our local Trader Joe's. Grocery shopping elsewhere felt like trying to date again after a breakup. Remember the scene in Annie Hall where Alvy is preparing lobster with some woman after breaking up with Annie, and he tries the same joke and it falls flat? That's how I feel about my local Safeway. No sense of humor. And Whole Foods? You're so vain, you probably think this song is about you.

Anyway, because we're doing without our cars on a daily basis in DC (we're keeping them with relatives in the Maryland suburbs for weekend excursions and such, but that's it), we're really limited to what we can walk to or ride the Metro to. So we were thrilled when we learned that a new Trader Joe's was about to open. It's DC's first, and in our neighborhood, no less. It opens tomorrow morning, in fact.

Now, I know that my emotional attachment to Trader Joe's is irrational, but I don't think I fully realized until tonight that other TJ's shoppers share my feelings. Tonight we happened to be in the area of the new store, so we thought we'd walk by to check it out. (Yes, knowing full well it wasn't open yet.) We got there and found a small crowd of excited shoppers gathered outside, along with a Trader Joe's employee stationed outside to answer people's questions. "Can I camp out and be your first shopper in the morning?" said one woman.

I'm going to take my camera to the grand opening tomorrow to try to capture the weird culture of fandom surrounding this store. Visions of cheese samples will be dancing in my head tonight.