“This nice young black boy bagged my groceries,” said Whitmore, adding a detail that would not recur or have any meaning for the rest of the story.

Whitmore went on to praise the lady who was kind enough to help her shovel out her Lincoln when she was stuck in the parking lot, but couldn’t decide on whether the good citizen was Indian or just “one of those darker Latinas.”

“I don’t think she’s trying to be racist,” reported Whitmore’s daughter Susan MacArthur. “But she is racist.”

At press time, Whitmore was calling it Oriental food again.