On being back home for a bit

-Never having had the option of Walmart, I never looked into its viability as a place to buy groceries, but if one were to open in lower Manhattan, yeah, I'd check it out. I've kind of had it with Whole Foods being the "cheap" nearby supermarket. (Gristedes, I'm looking at you...)

-Speaking of groceries, I schlepped rather a lot of Amora mustard back from France. It's under a euro at supermarkets in Paris, but simply impossible to find in NY. Or not - it's apparently $3.99 for a large container at Zabar's. Not as good of a deal, but the Zabar's one doesn't involve having one's luggage scanned a second time upon arrival at Newark.

-Every woman in NY of a certain socioeconomic status is now wearing army-green skinny cargo pants. I googled the phenomenon, and it was apparently one of spring's big trends. If I'd missed this, it's because these were most certainly not what the women of any socioeconomic status were wearing in Paris, where cargo pockets always have and always will scream American. Now back in NY, I noticed a pair of said pants at the semi-permanent sample sale in Chelsea Market, where they were going for $140. This was the reduced price. While I suppose the same could be said of all trends, this one, more than most, strikes me as an item which owes its entire appeal to the fact that women are seeing it on other women richer and better-looking than themselves. Nearly every time I see a woman in these pants, she's paired them with of-the-moment-yet-subdued accessories and a gym-honed physique. This gives the impression that the pants are themselves flattering, which is doubtful.

-The one rich lady not wearing skinny cargo pants is Real Housewife Kelly Bensimon. I saw her, in tiny shorts, jogging through traffic - this is, as my fellow intellectuals know, her trademark - with a tiny Maltese. It seemed unfair to the dog, both to make it run in traffic and to make it run alongside a fit six-foot-tall human at all. Kelly, if you're reading, at least let the dog take the curb!