It was crazy in downtown Davis yesterday. So many kids
on bikes! I didn't find out until later than the high school let out
for the day at noon and I guess most of those kids decided to go downtown.
Despite the crowds, it had been a very slow morning for
Sandy, who had only about $30 worth of sales. We talked about Peach's
health, the Gaudi architecture I'm so anxious to see when we get to
Barcelona, and her trip to Vietnam.
There were 4 in the store when she left. Two women
made purchases, one a bargain book and one a book of Physics
But then came the high point of the day. A guy came in
and joked that he wasn't sure whether to speak English or Spanish. He
had just returned from Spain 2 days ago, he said. I asked where and he
said Barcelona So we had a very long chat about Barcelona and Gaudi.
He told me a lot about where to go (though I will have no control over that,
on our organized tour) and stressed that we MUST go inside the Sagrada
Familia, which I definitely want to do. In fact, I would be happy just
to get a cab from the ship and go to the church and spend the time there on
our own. He took my email information and said he will send me
additional information.
A guy asked if we had books by Robert Green and when I asked
him what genre Green wrote, he started giving me titles, which didn't help
at all. But I guess he didn't find what he was looking for. (I
should have looked Green up on my cell phone, but was still processing the
Barcelona information and didn't think of it.)
This
was the next customer. She spent most of her time on the floor looking
at the books on the bottom shelves. I thought she left without buying
anything, but she had just moved to different aisles.
When she finally came to buy the two books ($7.60)she
settled on (a literature book and a children's book), she paid in quarters
and as she was counting them out, I realized she was counting each quarter
as 50 cents. When I started talking to her, it was clear she was from
England and she apologized about the money, as she unwrapped another sleeve
of coins to give me the correct amount.
I laughed and told her not to apologize and that I
knew the embarrassment of trying to learn money from a new country. (I
told her I usually hold out the largest bill I have and let the vendor make
change, and ended up with lots and lots of coins at the end of a trip!)
Three men came in, one a large man on a cell phone who
returned abut an hour later. All three were in and out quickly and the
cell phone guy was in and out again on his second visit.
A male to female transsexual in skinny jeans, a black teddy
and a white "big shirt" flowing over the top, and slight off one shoulder.
She was very attractive with spiky hair, dangly earrings, and high heels but
she wanted a copy of a style manual (grammar, that is) and apparently did
not find what she wanted.
A girl who went to school with our kids and now works with
the local teen theater came in looking for "children's books in Spanish or
Arabic." She found Goodnight Moon in Spanish, but nothing in Arabic,
though she did buy another little kid's book in English.
And older, heavy set man wearing a faded black shirt with
big skeletons on both the left and right side of the front had a protuberant
lower lip and bought a bargain book. His wife bought a John Grisham
book from the bargain books and complained that it was a really good book
and should be on sale for more than $1.
A middle aged women in purple slacks with a large bag
covered with chickadees looked around for a long time. She disappeared
and I thought she had left without buying anything, but soon reappeared with
a huge armload of books, then a second one. Ultimately she bought 24 books
for $127.32. They were all over the place, from Japanese poetry to
Renaissance art, to children's books to mysteries. She had 2 bargain
books and said she put one back to save money ($1).
A mom and her son came in and bought 5 kids books and a book
on Buddhism for parents.
My friend arrived at 5 and just bought 4 bargain books ("The
Federalist Papers," a book of Japanese literature, a Robert Ludlum book, and
a book on Probability and Statistics).
An old man, bent over with the weight of two bags of book
donations hobbled in. Says e will bring more books another time.
My final customer was a women in a wheel chair with two
young kids on her lap. She was hoping to find "The Little Engine That
Could" so I went into the kids' room to look for her. When I didn't
find it there, I left and she and the kids looked around for awhile and
finally left without buying anything.
When I got home, I realized that I had left the book I had
brought in to read at the store. Must go down there today and pick it
up. Fun book!
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