I know every time I visit Easton Town Center I say something along the lines of, “The guy who thought this place up is a damn genius,” but I’m going to say it again.

The gist: Easton Town Center is a faux-town, an open-air mall, stores laid out on a grid of narrow streets, with squares and fountains and sidewalks just narrow enough to be crowded, just wide enough to be passable. It sounds like a concept that wouldn’t work north of North Carolina, but friends, it works like gangbusters. It’s an upmarket Stepford Bedford Falls, like your memories — it’s all the good things you remember (or think you remember) about shopping in your hometown, but none of the bad stuff. No bums. No shuttered storefronts (not yet, anyway). No dusty inventory at old man Gower’s drugstore, just Pottery Barn giving way to Smith & Hawken giving way to Cosi giving way to Nordstrom’s giving way to the Apple store.

I always chuckle when I go there, because Fort Wayne has a similar mall, smaller, now two years old. The metro editor at the time swore this was an utterly crackbrain idea that would never, ever fly. “It’s too cold in winter,” she said. “Sure it’s full now — it’s August. Wait until Christmas.”

It was packed at Christmas. Wait until January. It was packed in January. Etc., etc. Soon she was insisting it would soon be a “ghost town,” just mark my words. Well. It’s not.

People don’t mind going into nippy temperatures between stores. They like seeing the sky, feeling the Christmas in the air. They like the atmosphere. Atmosphere sells, more so than comfort.

We went on Saturday. Standing on the corner of Spend Too Much and Charge Your Limit (the streets have names, but I’m blanking on them now), waiting to cross from in front of the jam-packed California Pizza Kitchen over to Williams Sonoma, standing shoulder to shoulder with my fellow Buckeyes, it occurred to me I’ve seen this scene before — in urban downtowns, before the malls sucked all the people away. I wasn’t in a downtown; I was in a replica downtown. But it still felt festive and merry. Entirely false, but in a good way.

Hey there. We spent the weekend on the road, which explains the unfortunate, er, spareness of the joint these days. Sorry about that. I thought I’d have time to update, but I indulged myself in turkey, retailing and Bugdom. Mostly at my sister’s house, in Columbus.

Columbus is having a run of bad luck of late. If you watch CNN, you must know there’s been quote an unexplained rash of highway shootings on the city’s outerbelt unquote. Quote officials are unwilling to call the shootings the work of a sniper but worried residents are still traveling that stretch of I-270 with increased awareness of the potential dangers unquote.

See how well I can talk that journalese shit? Just made that stuff up. Just now.

Anyway, the not-sniper has hit perhaps as many as 11 cars in the area, although ballistics link only two cases yet. In one, a 62-year-old woman was killed. But police don’t know too much more than that (that they’re telling). It’s early in the investigation, they don’t want to start a panic, etc.

All this leads to an involuntary shudder in those of us who’ve worked for new-style flood-the-zone editors. I’m imagining the staff meeting in which editors sit around and brainstorm half a dozen or more story ideas. These stories may or may not match the facts at hand, but any mention of this will be considered the mark of a disloyal worker not ready for management. Reporters will be sent out to chase them down, while graphic artists stay back in the newsroom to come up with an appropriately terrifying map/headline package: CITY SHOT BY FEAR, maybe, or “NOT A SNIPER” — YET. At the end of it all will be an impressively wrapped fact sausage, along with some heavy seasoning — in-depth coverage of the victim’s funeral “‘She was a saint,’ said the victim’s best friend.”), a slice-of-life piece on motorists who drive through the FEAR ZONE or something.

Two reporters will call in sick the next day. One will consider a career change to telemarketing. Another will drink late into the night and stare at the wall, wondering how it all went so horribly wrong.

So it was nice, after watching TV reporters wave press releases in live standups, to see the Big D, the Columbus Dispatch, the city’s non-flashy daily, do a mere two logical stories for Saturday, the news update and a sidebar on motorists’ avoidance on the area.

“Just wait until Sunday,” Alan said, grimly.

On Sunday, the lead story? EMERALD ASH BORER CONFIRMED IN CITY TREES. The shootings were played down, stripped down the side of Page One. The funeral picture was inside, shot from a discreet distance, and the news of same mentioned in two paragraphs.

Dare I say? I was impressed. Sometimes the old-fashioned way — let the story grow from the ground up, rather than the top down — works just fine.

Well, that was interesting. Today is the last day of classes before the holiday, and, if you recall your college days with any honesty at all, you know that means classes are half-empty for much of the week.

Some teachers cope by calling a holiday. My Russian teacher decided to give a lesson not in the curriculum, but worth coming to class for on a day when most people were cutting.

Kate was out of school and I only had the one class, so I took her along with me — what the heck, she’s a good kid and there’d be plenty of seats.

We arrive. We take our seats. And the teacher says, “You’ll probably not want to stay for this. We’re doing obscenities and vulgarities today. The very worst words.”

I left with the handout. He’s right. But I’m sorry I missed the class anyway.

Here’s my favorite: Na huya popu garmon? (P.S. That’s a terrible transliteration.) Translates to, “It’s irrelevant” or “Beside the point?” Literally: What the dick does the Pope need an accordion for?

I’d say I spent all day slaving over a hot stove, but I really spent all day slaving over a warm cutting board. If you had to sum up the difference between American cuisine and that of the rest of the world in a sentence, it would be this: We throw a hunk of meat on the table, add two vegetables and a loaf of bread and call it a meal, but in the rest of the world, you add a bunch of cilantro, some finely chopped garlic, pine nuts, cucumbers and an exotic fruit you have to go to three grocery stores to find (pummelo, in this case — it’s the grandfather of the grapefruit!).

The upside: It’s real damn good.

The menu: The Soup Nazi’s Mulligatawny, chicken-pummelo salad, Jerusalem artichoke salad, meatball kebab with tahini and, for dessert, a lovely bread pudding. We had enough to feed the Israeli army (at least the ones who don’t stay kosher).

It was a lovely dinner, and a lovely birthday.

We also had two presentations, and while we’re not supposed to publicly discuss what we talk about there, I don’t think anyone would mind if I linked the website of ffF Fatih, touting his book, new this fall. No English translation yet. (He tells me the title is a Turkish idiom that translates roughly to “I’ll pay two pence more, but I want it in red,” which is sort of a metaphor for bargaining — I’ll give you a little more, you give me a little more.) It’s a best-seller in Turkey; next time your travels take you to Istanbul, pick up a copy.

And now, to toddle my bulging stomach and fat-rich blood off to bed. Thanks for all the e-cards!

Just a warning: This will be my last post for at least the next 24 hours or so. Tomorrow’s my birthday, which would be reason enough to spend the day with feet up, but it’s also my designated day to cook for the Fall Fellows Tuesday Night Extravaganzas, in which two people give their 30-minute This Is My Life presentations, and two others make dinner for everyone else.

My presentation was a month ago. Tomorrow I cook. And then I can relax, except for writing 30 more pages of screenplay before Dec. 8.

What’s on the menu? It’s a secret. My partner has taken the bit in his teeth, and I’m just along for the ride. He’s Israeli, he’s a cook, he has opinions. Our shopping excursion — to Whole Foods, Aladdin’s Middle Eastern Market and Kroger — was an exercise in international understanding, proof again that you can learn more about people from examining their grocery carts than from five hours of interviews: “What is this? ‘Lite’ coconut milk? What is the point?”

“It’s the magic button,” I said. “Like saying ‘liberal’ on the Rush Limbaugh show. People think they can have as much as they want and never get fat.”

Moments later: “‘Lite’ eggnog? For what reason is this?”

Being around foreign nationals makes me realize what a titanic effort it must be to live in a different country and speak another language, how tempting it must be to seek out others like you and just let your damn brain and tongue relax for a few hours: “You do the list. I do not understand this American cooking system of ‘LB’ and ’spoons.’” I thought I could maybe help, because I have at least a nodding acquaintance with the metric system, plus I watch Nigella. I snuck a peek at his recipes.

They were in Hebrew.

I’m sure dinner will be fine. We seem to have purchased vast amounts of food for maybe 30 people, but the leftovers will be wonderful.

In the meantime, and I hope this isn’t too much like inter-blogatary ass-kissing and log-rolling, Greg Beato followed the link to that Michelle Malkin column I referenced yesterday and drew his own conclusions about the girl. His take on the darling of World Net Daily is far better than mine, and worth reading.

Me, I’ll be back here on Wednesday at the latest, with some leftovers for you.

Sorry for the murk, but that’s late November for you. Above, a still from some largely unusable video of Mark the Shark’s 50th birthday party. I hope it’s a measure of how much I like him that I skipped the chance to par-tay with the undergrads celebrating the Wolverine Big 10 title — I’m not sure exactly how we would do this, but I would have figured something out — to par-tay instead with Mark’s family and friends. That’s Leah, the Colts cheerleader, doing MC duties.

This is early in what’s sure to be a lengthening series of half-century celebrations in my circle, and it seems to me this is the best of birthdays. You’re old enough to have learned most of the hard lessons life will teach you, but young enough that, unless you’ve been unlucky or utterly abused your temple, you still feel good on a daily basis to enjoy it all. You’ve lost a friend or three, but you still have most of them, and if you’re very lucky, you have enough that they can fill a room and tell funny stories about you.

Mark is very lucky. They were very funny stories.

Happy birthday!

Was it just a few weeks ago that I said most syndicated op-ed columnists are the latest Academy of the Overrated? Yes, I think I did — in comments, anyway. A day doesn’t go by that I don’t look at one of the syndi-teers and think, “Phonin’ it in in your bathrobe, babe.” Shall I make a list? Kathleen Parker, Michelle Malkin, Mona Charen, Mo Dowd, oh but I could go on and on. (If my list tilts right, it’s because there are hardly any liberal syndicated columnists left anymore, and you know it’s true — for every Molly Ivins there are five Ann Coulters, et al. Liberal op-ed editors seek them to “balance” the paper’s own editorials, and conservative op-ed editors seek them to bolster their own opinions (they consider their very existence sufficient “balance” against the OVERWHELMINGLY LIBERAL MEEEEEDIA.

I’m not one of those people who condemns op-ed columnists for a lack of reporting; I don’t read columns to learn new facts about an issue (although a few are always appreciated), I read them to learn a new way of looking at an issue. I want a voice, a point of view, a few well-turned phrases. But when the required “reporting” consists of little more than paying attention to the world, yeah, I get picky. When Michelle Malkin writes a screed condemning Jessica Simpson, the MTV airhead, I finish it not only willing to bet $500 that she’s never once watched the show, but simply aghast that any editor would run it, when it’s pretty clear what she’s winding up to:

Fortunately, parents looking for antidotes to Jessica Simpson syndrome and moron worship by the liberal Hollywood elite can find plenty of female role models in the media with beauty and brains.

Will it surprise you to learn the list that follows consists entirely of Fox News cuties, culminating with none other than chain-smoking bone pile Ann Coulter? What is the possible reaction to this, other than projectile coffee-spitting, followed by overwhelming feelings of contempt?

To be sure, there are lots of reasons this is happening, other than rampant cynicism. Newspapers are shrinking, in size, influence and relevance. If well-informed people once turned to Jack Anderson or Bob Novak or Anthony Lewis to guide their thinking over their morning eggs, they now get the same guidance on the prime-time shout shows. Who can blame an editor who gives a few square inches to Cal Thomas once a week? He’s cheap, he requires no benefits and he doesn’t bitch when he’s trimmed. So he’s boring and predictable and paints by numbers? Who doesn’t, these days?

Was this entry going somewhere? Yes, I think so.

Terry Teachout agrees with me. I don’t entirely share his enthusiasm for “the blogosphere” (a term I loathe), but it’s pretty clear that’s where the mojo is, these days. (There’s an equal amount of boring predictability and by-number painting, but at least it doesn’t cost you anything but time, and you have the satisfaction of knowing the blogger is almost certainly not getting paid for it.) You have to wonder: Why are the paid columnists in the newspaper so blah on the subject of Rush Limbaugh, while the unpaid Greg Beato, driven by nothing more than his curiosity and a quick hand on the search-engine throttle, is so much livelier?

Just a thought. If I were an editor, I know who I’d be waving money at.

It astonishes me that I ever thought the world of Anne Lamott. I think I’ve purchased 15 copies of “Bird by Bird” and still think it’s the best (or most entertaining) book about writing out there, but my God, she’s a big stinky pile lately. Her fixation on George W. Bush exceeds even my own deep hunger for Bush-bashing. And lately, even the promos for her columns read like self-parody:

Conquering small challenges, like programming the VCR, can lead to small miracles, restoration and taking our country back from the infidels.

Oh, doesn’t that make you want to click through? Gee, I wonder if it’ll be another thousand words about getting so mad it makes Jesus want to smoke crack, so I put a picture of myself into my God box and then Sam said something really simple but profound and it made me see something, but I couldn’t see it all the way until I went to my church, which did I mention is nearly all black? (But I really fit in because I have dreadlocks.) And then the cat did something and my good friend (who is gay, or black, or fat) came over and we prayed and talked and blah blah blah I hate George Bush, the end.

You know, I want George Bush out of office, too, if only because maybe, just maybe, it’ll make Anne be funny again.

I’ve mentioned here that a substantial portion of our Fellowship comes from overseas — 1/3, if you’re keeping track. Yesterday I came across two of them in the F’ship house living room, watching CNN/Fox/MSNBC. Of course they were looking for news of the bombings in Istanbul. Of course they were getting helicopter shots of the back entrance of the Santa Barbara county courthouse.

“For two hours they’ve been there!” one exclaimed in exasperation and wonder. “Two hours!”

Yeah, well, wait for the trial.

UPDATE: Well, on the other hand, it’s not like there wasn’t news going on:

After his arrival in Nevada, his SUV was stalled in traffic and TV camera crews surrounded the vehicle. Jackson did not roll down the windows.

One TV cameraman suffered an apparent heart attack and was administered CPR at the scene. The cameraman, Bill Skiba, 43, of KEYT-TV in Santa Barbara, later died. Another photographer appeared to have been struck by a vehicle in Jackson’s convoy.

I mean, ask the dead photographer’s family.

Amy writes: “Hey I keep reading about this Borders’ strike….where’s the first hand reporting???”

Well, that’s an excellent question.

Yes, workers at the original Borders, Borders No. 1, in downtown Ann Arbor, are on strike. They’re not trying to start a union, like they did in that Michael Moore movie — oh no, they already have a union. They’re striking over a lot of things, but the central complaint is — hold onto your hats — the big M. They want some more.

Well, so does everyone.

I admit to being mystified by some of this. Bookstore clerks want “a living wage” for the second-most expensive city in Michigan? I’m sure lots of people who work here would like that, including low-level instructors at the University of Michigan; the last story I read about grad-student instructors said they earn around $16K for their service, which puts my Russian teacher’s urgency to get his dissertation finished in a new light, I’d say.

The Borders workers say: If Borders is going to enjoy the reputation for service it has, and boy, it has both (service and the reputation), then management should pay their workers better. Admittedly, it is glorious to patronize a bookstore where the clerks not only know the inventory’s layout but the contents of the books themselves, where you can ask after an obscure title or author and not be greeted by a blank stare. If Best Buy is at one end of the scale (and we’ve all been to Best Buy), Borders No. 1 is the other.

“They have people working there who had advanced degrees,” an undergrad in one of my classes said. “Like, PhDs.”

I don’t know if that’s true, but if it is, it wouldn’t surprise me.

Some of the people working the floor at Border’s have been there for more than 15 years. And why not? It’s a lovely bookstore in a lovely town, patronized by people who are generally smart and eager readers.

I admit: I crossed the picket line once. (I had an urgent need for Junie B. Jones books and no time to drive to the east side B&N.) The strike must be working, because the store was nearly empty, and that store is never nearly empty. The new clerks, replacements from other stores, were polite and eager to serve, and let me leave through a rear entrance to avoid the picket line again.

I didn’t feel very bad about it. While I’m sympathetic to anyone who wants a living wage, perhaps these highly educated clerks would do better in a library somewhere. Living wage for retail clerks is simply not going to happen in this economy.

You can read more at the strike blog. I’d welcome comments from long-time A2 residents who know more about the store’s history, and that means you, Anne.