The business was clearly in a prime location, however. The then newly-built Palmer Place apartments, a student-oriented complex with rooms for about 250 tenants, and located just across the street, was just about to open its doors for Ohio University's fall quarter.

"I was doing some paid chef-ing and catering when we bought it," recalls Markham, who rechristened the store as the Busy Day Market. "One of our goals was that I could put a commercial kitchen in here, and do that directly out of the store."

After taking over the business, Markham began gradually to stock the shelves with a wider variety of items.

It's still not a full-blown supermarket with long aisles full of fresh produce a la Kroger's, or even the former Bob's grocery store that was across the street. But Markham said she has accepted the fact that a big chunk of her sales will always come from beer and wine.

But the store can be a godsend for the shopper looking to pick up a few staples without making a trip out to East State Street, and also offers "Gourmet to Go" frozen prepared meals that can be thawed and heated up in the oven at home.

These have proved quite popular, Markham reports, with some customers stocking up on them so as to always have a good, quick-and-easy meal as near as their home freezer. "There are a lot of people here who want to eat good food, but don't want to fix it," she said.

As of July 26, Busy Day has also offered that commercial kitchen that has been part of Markham's plan from the beginning.

The store's newly installed deli/kitchen, which offers a variety of subs, sandwiches and salads, provides a new spot where people can grab a midday meal, in a neighborhood where lunch options are "the Farmacy or fast food," she said. (Stimson is home to the Farmacy natural foods store, which has a lunch counter, as well as drive-thru/eat-in spots such as Sonic and KFC.)

Markham's experience prepares her well for such a venture; she started out in retail down South, and ended up at one point working for the Viking company, which makes kitchen ranges and also offered very popular classes in how to use them in cooking. "We had classes day and night," she recalled. "You get totally absorbed in food, and preparing food, and talking about food, and watching food shows."

Ideally, Markham said, she would like to have Busy Day become a specialty market like Zingerman's, or Katzinger's Delicatessen in Columbus's German Village.

"I'd love to have specialty olive oils, and cheeses, and all of that," she said though she admitted that she's not sure if that will ever be commercially feasible.

In the meantime, she and her staff are concentrating on ramping up the kitchen and deli; while sales have been "decent" since it opened, Markham said, she's looking forward eagerly to when the students return in the fall. If her sales of Gourmet to Go meals are any barometer, she said, that's when the store's new lunch business will really start to hit its stride.

"I have to work all day to keep the freezer full when school is in session," she said.