A month or two back, walking with Jess through Central Park, we passed through Time Warner Center on our way back home. And as we needed to buy a few ingredients for dinner, we headed downstairs to Whole Foods.

A mere eight blocks from our apartment, that Whole Foods had still, previously, seemed needlessly far to go for groceries. But, perusing produce and inspecting butchery, it became clear that Whole Foods’ foods were indeed wholly better, quite possibly worth the trip.

So, since then, we’ve been buying food there. But not all our food, and not our non-food items. Because, for many basics, the price difference for the same thing at any of our more local supermarkets seems too offensively large for me to stomach. And also because, for countless other items, such as plastic cups or Coke, the only available Whole Foods versions appear to be made entirely of hemp.

Of course, as soon as you diverge from the American supermarket model, from the idea that the best way to buy food is to have it all collected in one central place, you instead begin sliding down the slippery slope of preferring quality, and of consequently convincing yourself that shopping three different places for a meal isn’t any crazier than two, which isn’t so much saner than four, then five, etc.

Pretty soon, aided and abetted by the (aside from this weekend) warming weather and your central location, you find yourself, Sunday afternoon, not only at Whole Foods but also the Food Emporium and Amish Market and Duane Reade and that place with the good cookies on Ninth Avenue and the mochi ice cream you can pick up the next afternoon at the place near your office and also don’t forget to stop at the Stiles Farmer’s Market while it’s open because they have such great local produce for so cheap.

And the worst part is, it self-reinforces. Because, after all that walking around, you’re so completely starved that the foods you’ve assembled from across the City taste like – whether or not they really, actually are – the best you’ve ever eaten.