To be a New Yorker....

[judy]

Funny you should ask, Janet! I call the country stores up here "bodegas." (I don't say it out loud though).

They sell the same things, essentially. They are both quickie convenience stores, sell sandwiches, coffee, condoms, chips, sugar and beer. Plus staples like milk and oj because lots of times the beer run involves somebody yelling out the door after you, "don't forget milk for the kids, honey!" Orange juice has multiple uses....it can be used for both breakfast drinks and scewdriver ingredients.

Country stores are bigger, cleaner, have the mandatory hot junk food like hot dogs in buns rolling around on warmers in their little silver bags, pizza, chicken wings, chicken popcorn, chicken tenders, fill in the rest, and they have parking lots and sell gas, water, propane, mulch, fresh fertilizer, and sometimes Christmas trees. Country stores also have a couple of tables, and they say "is this to eat in, or take out?"

Bodegas do not sell any of the good obligatory country store hot junk food, and they used to be run almost always by Hispanic people, but now that rule has been revoked, and can be run by any nationality. They are small, usually not too clean, sell cut up fruit in containers and bouquets of flowers, have mirrors all over to check for shoplifters, have 1/4 of their inventory outside, have no parking, gas, and definitely no fertilizer. Nobody in their right mind would ever dream of sitting down and eating inside a bodega because cockroaches and city mice have rights, and would kick you right out!

They both charge whatever they feel like at any given moment, and it is not unusual to pay $4.99 for a loaf of white bread, and $22.99 for a 6 pack.

Bodegas sell cigarettes, lottery tickets, doo rags, ipod headphones, condoms and knives by the register. Country stores sell cigarettes, lottery tickets, condoms, fishing lures, live worms, and deer call thingies by the register.

Oh....they both sell ice, something I never understood. Ice should be free. It is water, only frozen, and you can just bring your own bag!