You know the drill by now. I get customers, many of them are just after, yup, no surprise, a book, and the transaction that ensues is safe and unmemorable. I sold many books today, I was helpful and friendly. I had a good talk with a couple of strangers. I like to think that in a small way I made their day easier, friendlier. But we don't talk about them here. Nope. We concentrate on the crazy arse side of things:
I came back from my break, through a back door, and saw a man shaving, with an electric razor, over a pyramid pile of books in the fiction section. We made eye contact, and then he continued shaving his chin. And I walked on by, over to my till point, where I told my colleague.
That's...random huh? I mean, who would do that? And why? Why on earth would you find yourself in a bookshop and think, y'know, I need a shave? Why would you be carrying an electric razor?
5 weeks ago
8 comments:
You do seem to have nice customers sometimes, Sara, such as the ones who bought those short stories in the previous post. But, boy you do get strange ones as well!
The guy picking up his nose killed me but this one shaving?!!! What da heck?!
Goncalo Veiga how nice to 'see' you again. What have you been up to? You have been very quiet! And yes, the shaving man was a whole new thing to me too.
Pierre l (why can't I get a straight line like you do after the pierre?) I do have nice customers, plenty of them, but it's the crazy arse ones that we remember!
How are you by the way? How are things for you right now?
Hi Sara. The straight line is a lower-case "L" (as in L'Allier) - when I started writing comments I wanted to use the same nickname everywhere. My full name appears in my Blogger profile.
I am keeping well (thanks for asking), and reading quite a lot (more fiction books in the last six months than in the previous twenty years) - I have always read lots of books about computers and cars). I think it's because of all the blogs I read that are by booksellers or writers (or both at the same time).
Another consequence of reading your blog is that I have started to encourage the local branch of Waterstone's. Needless to say, I am very polite with the employees.
Hi Sara! Thanks, I know, it's been a while. Guess life sucked time out of my existence. I had a degree to resume and had to dedicate all my time to my day job and to the writing of a 200 page monograph. Insane business. Now, still keeping my day job in the bookshop and trying to write a novel. :P Let's see. How's it going writing-wise?
pierre: curiously when 5 do a lower case l it still does not come out straight! Oh well, I do try...
Are you enjoying fiction? What has been your favourite of the last 6 months? Very different to non-fiction techy stuff...
Gonacalo veiga - congrats on completing your 200 pages! Back in the bookshop dealing with your own crazy arse customers I see. Fun, huh?
I feel petty writing this in view of unwell you feel (see next post). Looking at the text of the comments, the only "l" that looks like a vertical bar is the one in my name. I think it's down to Blogger's choice of fonts for different areas of the comment box: I have chosen the "name/URL" option below, and the letter "l" is a straight line in both boxes, "San Seriffe" perhaps.
I have recently enjoyed "Leading the Dance" by Sarah Salway, and I'm just finishing "Pilgrims" by Elizabeth Gilbert. Among ordinary novels, I liked "Any Way you Want Me" by Lucy Diamond.
But I have a long reading queue, including Miranda July's book and film, plus my copy of "The Trick is to Keep Breathing" just arrived.
PS. I couldn't send this this as "name/URL". I just hope it won't appear 4 times...
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