Does this only happen when you're in this store? And what is it about the cheese section that's setting you off?

Just curious. Hope you feel better.

Our Yuppie Market is Whole Foods, and the cheese and wine sections are my eternal downfall. I proudly buy the under $5 a bottle wines! They actually have a nice selction of those.

I wasn't very clear about the cheese section--I only cry because there are all these beautiful cheeses I can't afford. Similar I guess to how women who are into handbags cry at the sight of Prada.

It's not just this store; it's anywhere I feel intimidated. I don't feel intimidated by anyone or anything in Wal-mart (would that even be possible?), so that place is fine. Petsmart is fine. Target is fine, etc. It's when I start asking myself, "What's someone like me doing someplace like this?" that I start to lose it. Which is stupid, because Central Market is really just a haven for the housewives who don't like visiting the farmers' market on account of there being too many Mexicans there.

They're not better than me, I know that, but at some sub-rational level, I guess I still think they're better than me.

It's just stupid.

Ah, class panic. I hear you. A Whole Foods store just opened in Union Square and not surprisingly the lines are long long long. No way I'm going, though; I'd feel way too self-conscious in there with so many bobos and Beautiful People walking around.

My most memorable experience with class panic was when I was 19 and my college girlfriend came to visit. I took her to dinner at the Four Seasons in Manhattan and it was clear from the look on the maitre d's face that we weren't exactly valued customers. I don't know how I made it through dinner. Oh wait, yes I do: I was thinking about how the $150 dinner bill was almost certainly going to get me laid afterwards.

I was right.

Class panic. That's perfect.

I took her to dinner at the Four Seasons in Manhattan

Okay, that's probably another place I'm never gonna go, even if I pulled an Anna Nicole and hooked up with a dying oil baron who wanted to take me there. It wouldn't matter that I wasn't paying the bill. I would still freak.

I was right.

Yeah, yeah, score another one for Allah the cynic. Hey, but she was your girlfriend before you ever took her to the Four Seasons, apparently.

The Four Seasons was the only place where we got dirty looks. I took her to the Rainbow Room, the Russian Tea Room, plus a few others and everyone was polite. At the end of the day my money's as good as anyone else's.

In fact, for that very reason, I feel a lot less panicked when money's involved than when it isn't. Send me to the Whole Foods store and make me shop with the bobos? Unpleasant but do-able. Send me to a cocktail party and make me hobnob with Manhattan's alpha males? No way. Without currency as the great equalizer, I've got nothing to justify my presence there.

Re: the g-friend, yeah, I probably could've gotten some even if I'd taken her to McDonald's. But why take chances? Besides, I get enough cynicism from reading things like this.

Thank You, Lord.

At least I know it isn't just me.

Not the wine, not the cheese, but to this day I go all woogedy if I have to buy tampons.

Yes, really, and me an MD. And if the check-out person is male, then well, you can just forget it. I'm sure I could spend all day explaining it to Dr. Freud, but really who wants to??

I'm sure I could spend all day explaining it to Dr. Freud, but really who wants to??

Okay, I admit it: I'm not getting that one. I mean, I would, but I know you're someone who can post about intestinal parasites and not even flinch.

But everyone has her thing. My favorite was this R.N. in the TB clinic I worked at in AZ. She said, "I don't know what I'm doing here. Some nurses hate blood, some nurses hate shit, but I hate spit. Why'm I working in the department of spit?"

Mine is, don't talk to me when I'm shopping for food, because my first reaction is "What? WHAT!?! Did I do something wrong? You hate that I didn't buy the organic lettuce, don't you? DON'T YOU."

We've got Harry's Farmers Market here. Same deal - all the best food you could stuff in your gullet. In fact, they were acquired by Whole Foods a couple of years ago.

I love that store. I mean I really LOVE that store. As Margi would say, I luuuurve that store. I get a chubby every time I go there.

Cheese. Oh, the cheese. And they give samples of it! Which is oh so cool because even though I'm a cheese lover the chance that I'll ever taste a $20 per pound cheese because I bought it is just about absolutely nil. But the (relatively) more reasonably priced ones have become Jim's Treats For When He's Been An Especially Good Boy. Old Amsterdam is a particular favorite.

We don't go there very often though since we can't seem to escape the store without dropping $50 more than we can afford.

Y'know, I have the exact opposite feelings in one of those stores. I laugh at the yuppieness and sometimes very loudly speak the prices (in shocked tone) like, "They want WHAT for this?"

I go there for fresh produce, generally. Sarah G. and I go to The Yuppie Store in Yuppie Central in Richmond regularly during the summer. They don't make me blink.

Wal-Marts, now--those stores can creep me out. Sometimes, the clientele has obviously just been released from prison. Sometimes the employees have, too.

So of course, when I need something from a 24-hour store, it's the Wal-Mart I'll go to, eyeing the customers suspiciously. But surreptitiously. Don't want 'em following you out to your car.

Heh.

I can totally relate, it's not going to send me out of the store but if I were in the wine (or cheese) section and an employee approached me I suddenly have no idea what I'm looking for.

I'm otherwise comfortable in the local Yuppie Markets but I'm a cullinary trendiod, though I'd like to think I follow trends with some thought and fiscal prudence.

(Funny thing is when I start comparing prices... organic plain whole milk yogurt is the cheapest option at the nearby Whole Foods while the same item is the costliest at Safeway... while the Whole Foods charges a lot more for the non-organic national brands that Safeway puts on special every month.)

The Four Seasons story reminded me of the time I went to Chicago and had some time to burn after I landed. I decided to check out Marshall Fields and was browsing the store dressed in a t-shirt and jeans and carring an empty-looking bag (my carry-on bag emptied of everything but reading material for the train). I had so many attentive staff members come by and ask how I was doing and if I needed help finding anything... don't think I ever got so much attention in a store.

You could try this: next time you're asked if you need help, shrug and say "nope--just browsing" while giving them this contemptuous look that says "you think *you* are in a position to help *me* with wine?"

Jerky, but it might work. The best defense is to give offense. Or something.

once you master the yuppie store, please tell me how to master the yuppie salon...

or any salon for that matter.

if i could just get my hair cut by walking in, sitting down and not moving during the experience it would be a good day.

I actively judge tony establishments by how they treat me/my mom if she/I go in looking like a snob. If I get weird looks, or anything but the best service, they aren't the real thing.

Real class lies in how you treat people. If I'm wearing jeans I'd better get the same damned service you've give me if I were in a suit--or you just lost my business for good.

But I'm an Angeleno: we get weird about it if people demand that we dress up. There's a strange kind of anti-snob snobbery around here that's hard to explain to people outside SoCal.

My reaction in Yuppie stores is similar to Meryl's. I look at and listen to some of those customers and think, "That's someone who lives in a gated community". Those gates should have guards on both sides. One to let those twits in and one even more selective to let them out.