Yes, it’s true, the new Safeway on Hawthorne – the one that replaced the older smaller set-back-from-the-street Safeway on Hawthorne that seemed to be having too few customers – has a sushi bar. And Ric brought some sushi home and it really wasn’t bad. We had it for dinner.
I confess I’m a little concerned about this new Safeway. It looks like they are trying to do the more sustainable natural organic thing, but not as much as other nearby options. You really can’t outorganic New Seasons, and there are two of them within 15 or so blocks south and east of this new store. There’s a semi-outdoor vegetable and fruit and fresh fish market just a couple of blocks west of Safeway, with a lot of produce that is fresh from Kruger’s Farm on Sauvie Island.
Then there’s the remodeled Hawthorne Fred Meyer just down the street to the east, with so many green features I’ve lost track of them all. I do know there are more electric car charging stations than there are disabled parking spaces on the roof parking lot.
And there’s a Zupan’s 10 or so blocks away to the north, and it carries more locally sourced food.
In other words, that’s one heck of a lot of places to buy groceries. This is a densely populated neighborhood for the west coast, but I wonder if even our collective mass can support all these options. I think they better have a whole lot of those club card deals planned.
It’s a pleasant enough environment, but some of the neighbors are still angry at the store because it’s so big. I noticed a window had been broken within a few days of the grand opening. Every time I’ve been in there (four times to get a latte at the Starbucks, we’re not really buying that many groceries now without a kitchen to prepare food in), it looked like there were more employees than customers. I do like the new sustainability features and the covered parking when it’s pouring rain, but that employee/customer ratio sounds unsustainable for the bottom line.
As my mother always used to say, we shall see.
On the home front, the mudder is here mudding again. It turns out he is also doing the sanding, which will happen this weekend. Just in time, even though the doors to the space are sheathed in plastic, dust is somehow getting through and making the rest of the house somewhat more unpleasant than it already is.
But in a few days, that will be over and Ric can paint. I believe I chose a wonderful color. 🙂
ran dum thots 