I hanker for a hunk of cheese

Chinese cuisine is governed by rules: Balance spicy with sweet; Cut food into bite-size pieces; Include a fish with each meal.

Yet one rule in Western cuisine has no place in the Asian handbook: the more cheese the better.

Diary is all but absent from Chinese food, so it should come as no surprise that trying to find cheese when one is hankering is no easy feat. Even most Western grocery stores that have cheese departments seem to have added them as afterthoughts rather than as mainstays of a deli department.

So I'm asking you, readers ... are there any good cheese shops out there? Until I find one, I'll be humming this tune ...

Shopping wears me down

Clothes Shopping: Some stores only carry up to a size US4, and they actually have a size negative 2. Even when shops have my size, the style is usually for a waif figure. Everything is a tunic. Or the pants are too short.

Why shouldn't a tall,Western girl wear Asian styles, you ask? I went to my yoga studio wearing a new tunic and was given a pass to the pre-natal yoga class - I wanted to go to Hot Yoga. I wore my gym clothes home and threw the tunic out.

Shoe Shopping: I was told by a sales clerk who just LOOKED at my feet that they didn't have my size shoe. I don't know what's more embarrassing: having sales clerks notice how big your feet are or being stared at in disbelief when you actually do ask for your size. (I'm a 9.5 for the record).

I don't know how much more shopping my ego can take!