The Appeal of Uniformity

An Applebee's recently opened up here in Atlah, and it's doing pretty decent business on a strip of 125th Street that attracts scant foot traffic at night. Perhaps we shouldn't be surprised at the restaurant's success, seeing as how we praised the chain's business acumen in a 2005 Slate column. But we do find it a bit disconcerting that so many diners opt for the familiar, despite the abundance of higher-quality local joints within a half-mile radius. (Every single item on the menu at