Gender Bender at the Food Emporium

The Food Emporium Super Markets in New York City offer much more than just your typical groceries.

There’s one store underneath the Queensboro Bridge that’s designed to blow your mind upon entry. Twin escalators going the wrong way present your first point of interest. The one on the left goes up and the one the right goes down. It does not take long for the chaos to get rolling.

Unsuspecting shoppers who are chatting it up on the cell phone while loaded down with groceries find themselves fighting for survival against the runaway rogue stairs.

Even the most sophisticated and beautifully tailored Upper East Siders slip into a frenetic seizure-like break dance to avoid that pending escalator ass-kicking.

After making my way past these entryway hi-jinks, I made my way to the produce aisle. Upon approaching the tomato section, I noticed a very tall woman dealing with what appeared to be a wardrobe malfunction. She had her back to me and was involved in some type of tug-of-war with her little black dress. Her actions indicated that her dress was perhaps a little shorter than anticipated.

I returned to my shopping and the women in the dress moved closer to me. I assumed she did this to get a better look at the bruised yellow squash. This assumption was actually my second mistake. It became instantly clear to me that my first mistake was assuming that the person in the short dress was a female.

At this point, I also now understood why the dress in question was a wee bit too short.

He looked at me past his long dark hair, stuck out his hand and said, “Hi, I’m Leather.”

“Ummm, yes, you are,” I stammered.

He, She, I mean the person in the dress told me that I was very cute and asked if I lived in the area. I assured the person in the receding black dress that it was my first time in New York and that I was not allowed to talk to strangers.

I made a bee-line out of the store, abandoning any further attempts at shopping. Wouldn't you know it -- I barely escaped serious injury after racing onto that dreaded wrong-way escalator at about 40 miles per hour.

Now I know why everyone in this city is in such a damn hurry.