Of bookstores...

Back from travels along two seaboards .. Lake Michigan and Cape Cod. Funny how that dense mid-summer green one finds elsewhere now seems obscene, especially given the drought that has felled well over 60 percent of our oak trees. And we lived until recently in an oakland. Luckily the monsoons have started in earnest.

Back east I was however grateful to once again wander in real bookstores, where the offerings on display have been suggested by a staff of serious readers. Standing at the polar end of the spectrum is the Barnes & Noble in Marana, a 20,000-square foot stadium in which only one team is allowed onto the field and the star running back is Lisa Anne Coulter. Frankly, with no opponents in sight, does it matter how wide she is of the mark?

Marana is a densely populated de-centered city located on the fringe of Tucson. There are no true public spaces in Marana, just squeaky clean and capacious churches and super-malls that spring up on the edges of major roadways, interspersed between undulating hills dotted with planned community after planned community. The result is that all public announcements -- for yard sales and elections and blood drives and the like -- congregate like outcasts in the no man's lands of meridiens and intersections.