“Changing Planes” (Ursula K. Le Guin)
Some great stories, with the starting premise being the sense of alienation from the world all sentient beings feel in airports.
I’m also reading “Rise of the Creative Class” (Richard Florida), as background for Florida’s latest, “The Flight of the Creative Class: The New Global Competition for Talent” which I’ll probably review. I’m only halfway through, but so far the book seems much more sensible than the potted summaries I read a few years back. It’s much more about work and autonomy than about metrosexual urban hipsters.
I also dug out my copy of Raymond Williams’ “Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society” reviving my long-moribund Word for Wednesday feature.
John Quiggin 
I do feel alienated in airports, but at least the atmosphere in airports makes them feel like airports. Most places feel like they should, like you are in the right place, except banks.
When I am in a bank it doesn’t feel like a bank. There is no other explanation I can give. Does anyone know how and why this has happened? It is just wierd.
Read “The Dispossessed” by the Ursula K Le Guin. It is still one of my all time favourites
Ender is right. And “Vaster than empires and more slow” is a cracker of a short story too.
JQ:
Yesterday’s Sunday Observer (UK) had a review of a revised edition of “Keywords”, edited by a team. The paper’s review is here.
http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1482199,00.html
Thanks for this link, Peter. V interesting