The Earth Mother has okay food and iced tea so good I order it all year round. Plus, it’s a great place to study fads. Not only is its menu trendy (currently free-range vegetarian), but so are its waiters. Also, there’s a stand outside with all the alternative newspapers.

I gathered them up and went inside. The door and entryway were jammed with people waiting to get in. Their iced tea must be becoming a trend. I presented myself to the waitress, who had a prison-style haircut, jogging shorts, and Tevas.

That’s another trend, waitresses dressed to look as little as possible like waitresses, probably so you can’t find them when you want your check. “Name and number in your party?” the waitress said. She was holding a tablet with at least twenty names.

“One, Foster,” I said. “I’ll take smoking or nonsmoking, whichever’s quicker.”

She looked outraged. “We don’t have a smoking section,” she said. “Don’t you know what smoking can do to you?”

Usually get you seated quicker, I thought, but since she looked ready to cross out my name, I said, “I don’t smoke. I was just willing to sit with people who do.”

“Secondhand smoke is just as deadly,” she said, and put an X next to my name that probably meant I would be seated right after hell froze over. “I’ll call you,” she said, rolling her eyes, and I certainly hoped that wasn’t a trend.

I sat down on the bench next to the door and started through the papers. They were full of animal rights articles and tattoo removal ads. I turned to the personals. The personals aren’t a fad. They were, in the late eighties, and then, like a lot of fads, instead of dying out, they settled into a small but permanent niche in society.