How many, two?

Walking from the village to the lower east side relatively early this morning, I saw a few people standing around a blue post box, staring at cakes in a window. They were waiting for a bakery to open up. The cakes looked very good. Walking back along the same street this evening, I saw a still larger group of people, lined up along the same window, backing up all the way around the corner of the block. A young man wearing a smock and pastry chef's hat stood at the door with a cell phone in his hand, directing people inside as other customers left. This is the first bakery I've seen with a door policy.

Not long ago, by contrast, I found myself eating meals with a rail-thin New Yorker, a well-intentioned person, though hardly unusually socially conscious. He has, however, seen movies such as Super Size Me, and is painfully aware of America's reputation for, among other things, excess and wastefulness. Consequently, he prefers not to eat anything made with any amount of fat, grease or oil. Likewise, any culinary effort at manipulation or artistry is unacceptable for its overtones of decadence, the stuff of empire. As a result, his diet consists, for the most part, of raw grains.

I couldn't help but think of him as I passed back by the bakery this evening.