IF SEPTEMBER 11 was like a bad action movie, the remainder of the year has come across like a doorstop novel, one with interconnected characters and subplots beyond the combined abilities of Dickens, Tolstoy, and Michener. The front page of the New York Times still has a dozen or so bylines, but now it seems written with one voice, with each story carefully chosen to play off all the others. (No wonder the Onion seems obsolete!) There’s fighting in Afghanistan, there’s anthrax in America, and, beautifully understated, there’s the subplot about Republicans trying to sneak through tax breaks for their favorite corporations during this time of " sacrifice. " There’s also comic relief, in the form of absent-minded passengers bringing nail clippers and handguns onto airplanes. The whole thing is a literary triumph, right down to the letters to the editor denouncing people who use tragedy as a way to get their names in print.

But if you are in the habit of reading newspapers, you know that only a few months ago there were chinks in the grand narrative edifice. Before the iron editorial hand came down, newsworthy events were cast on the page in more random fashion, leaving openings here and there for the next Big Story to emerge — for better or worse. The saga of Gary Condit and his missing intern dominated the news during the summer, yet it was bound to fade into the back pages with the onset of the new TV season. Just a glance at the Web archives of the major dailies on the morning of September 11 shows they were already testing new shocks and outrages. If not for the attacks in New York and Washington, one of them could have blossomed into the next Story We’re All Sick Of.

So what have we missed out on? Here’s a September 11 headline from USA Today: 21 indicted in mcdonald’s game case/value of suspect prizes at $20m. In case you’ve forgotten, it seems that the security chief at the hamburger chain’s promotions company swiped winning game cards and gave them out to friends and family members. Could there be a more American scandal? McDonald’s, maker of scalding coffee and lava-filled apple pies, is possibly the world’s best-known symbol of Western Civilization — in 1995, in fact, political scientist Benjamin R. Barber wrote a prescient book titled Jihad vs. McWorld (Times Books). Coming in the wake of Eric Schlosser’s recent exposé on slaughterhouses and French-fry factories, Fast Food Nation (Houghton Mifflin, 2001), and a series of reports on how obese Americans are getting, the sweepstakes scam could have capped off an annus horribilis for Ronald McDonald. Instead, the chief target of anti-globalization activists is now assisting in our patriotic duty to consume as much, and as quickly, as possible. If you can’t finance a new car, piss off Al Qaeda by getting another Quarter Pounder.

Just to show that greed isn’t limited to the super-size set, the Boston Globe had its own eatery headline on September 11: suit contends restaurant skimmed from tips pool. Two former waiters at L’Espalier, where dinner for two typically costs $200, said they were fired after complaining that managers were shaking them down for their sizable gratuities. After the terrorist attacks, the problem was solved: no customers means no tips.

Workers at Output Technology Solutions, in South Windsor, Connecticut, had bigger concerns than getting an extra 10 bucks for fawning beyond the call of duty. The New York Times reported on September 11 that 25 employees had tested positive for tuberculosis, shortly after a mail carrier in the same town contracted the disease that was enjoying a comeback in the film Moulin Rouge. Half of Connecticut may have TB by now, but we won’t care until we find out how a 94-year-old invalid died of anthrax in the same state.