For several years I’d been joking about the number of Publix grocery stores in the greater Kennesaw area. You’ll go past two driving from one end of Barrett Parkway to the other, and a third if you keep going all the way into Marietta. There’s another on Wade Green, and yet another on Bells Ferry.

Today I went out main street from my house and went north up 41 and immediately noticed something: there’s a fucking Publix there! Right at my street corner! How I had missed that the last six or so times I’d gone up 41 I don’t know, but today, there it was. And as I drove up to my intended destination of Lowe’s to spend a lovely 10% off coupon I passed by something I’d noted before with my mother but not really paid attention to: a Wal-Mart Super Center. Having moved two miles down a single road my previous assumptions as to which grocery store and which Wal-Mart were closer were completely shattered in an instant.

Not only was this Wal-Mart closer than the one in lower Kennesaw, it was also bigger and cleaner! My erroneous assumption that the Publix on Wade Green was my home Publix, just like it had been at the apartment, was also thrown in the dumpster. Forget the fact that I live on Cherokee Street, which becomes Wade Green road. Less than a mile from my house an entirely separate Publix had been lurking…waiting to be discovered. Neither this new Publix nor the new Wal-Mart were on my way home from work, lessening their utility very slightly, but less than might be expected.

As I shopped for my groceries at this strange new Publix (why not?), I decided I’d write a feature about how even someone who made jokes about the number of Publixes in Kennesaw couldn’t hope to ascertain just how many of the damn things there were. I grew up in Canton, you see. We were a one Publix town. The concept of a five Publix town was just…astounding. And two Wal-Marts!? Plus a Target? Canton just got a Target, like, yesterday. Even after living in Kennesaw for three years, it was still shocking.

But wait, dear readers. There’s more.

An emergency lack of parts meant I hit the dusty trail at 7:30 for the Home Depot right up the street, which had decided to close at 7. Seeing as this Home Depot is right across from Jiles road, and Jiles also hits 41 if you follow it out, and I knew Lowe’s closed at 8, I decided to take a road never before traveled to its end me. I knew where it started and where it ended, but the course it took was a complete mystery. And halfway down its length, what should I pass?

A fucking Publix.

God only knows how many are still lurking. I’m up to six.