Once every five years – or, apparently, "whenever the government feels like it" – we're treated to a jamboree of sketchy promises, stump speeches in empty out-of-town warehouses and rosette-wearing nerds knocking on your door attempting to make some sort of connection.
We had no trouble finding the Omorpho Tavernaki, two streets back from the waterfront, in a relatively empty part of town.
While terrorism suspects and militia fighters have routinely slipped away from their pursuers ever since last year's invasion, the sudden emptying of whole towns before unannounced raids appears to be a new phenomenon.
That Joey, when initially on the run here, literally falls into — and then conveniently takes over — an upscale apartment, spiffy wardrobe and, at times, identity of the empty pad's out-of-town gay photographer is almost as unconvincing as the lantern-jawed former soldier's flirtation with the mousy Cristina.
When Cerreti's escorts drove her out of Reggio, she passed a succession of empty towns, deserted villages, and abandoned farms.
This has meant not only the loss of jobs but a rapid emptying of the town.
However, as shown in the article about the 38-year-old plight of the empty town of Varosha in Cyprus ("In Cyprus, a paradise imprisoned," Aug. 2"), this type of conflict resolution rarely applies to relations between states.
For a time, well-meaning journalists reported the catastrophe, and then gradually the sight of empty towns and shuttered shops became normalised or forgotten.
The former ABC cinema in the centre of Tunbridge Wells has been empty since 2000 when the out-of-town Odeon opened at Knight's Park.
You sat in the restaurant's bar room eating these things with a cold I.P.A. to drink, and it was like discovering a new room off your apartment or a secret entrance to an empty highway out of town.
The vogue for a long time (especially in the United States) was to build stadia on huge empty lots out of town, buttressing them on all sides with car parks.
