Today at Logos

I came into Logos hoping to find a Harlan Coben book I had just finished as an audio book.  I was sad that I did not.  I was listening to it while I was fixing breakfast for the dogs this morning when Lizzie, in her excitement, leaped up alongside of me, caught the earbud cord in her foot and pulled the buds out of my ears.  I missed a sentence which, as it turned out later in the book, was crucial to understanding what the whole thing was about.  Now I have to try to go back through the recording and see if I can find the spot again.

Sandy didn't stick around today, as she had an appointment with Cindy (we share a dentist) and I kind of automatically rang up the first customer of my shift without noticing him or the book he was buying...all I know is that it was Contemporary Fiction and cost $5.97.

The next customer was a woman pushing a walker, but I suspect it was more as a shopping cart than an actual walker (though Lord knows I use shopping carts as walkers, so who knows).  Anyway she had two boxes on the seat and grumbled "I should have known better than to stop by here." The bargain book that caught her eye was "The Secret Life of Louisa May Alcott."

A guy came in and bought 2 Malcolm Gladwell books on success for $15.73.  Gladwell has been a writer at the New Yorker for the past 20 years and now I'm curious to read some of his stuff.

A guy wearing a Goonies t-shirt came in and checked out travel books, but didn't buy anything.

A woman came in.  She said she's also a Logos volunteer and she just wanted to check for a book. She knew we frequently had it.  She went to the Contemporary Fiction section, and then to the Fantasy section.  I just knew she was looking for Diana Gabaldon.  When I asked her what she was looking for, she said "The Outlander Series."  I asked if she was trying to read Book 2 before the new series starts on STARZ Saturday night.  She said she was recording it because she hasn't read the book yet and wants to read it first. We talked about Season 1 of the TV series (too violent, she shuddered).  Fun to meet another Outlander fan...and I just loved that I knew instinctively what she was looking for!

An Oriental guy bought both French-English and Spanish-English dictionaries.

A group of young men, who might have been college age, stood outside while one of them read aloud from a book on the bargain table, with much gesticulation, but they didn't buy the book or enter the store.

Bruce came in looking relatively normal for him.  No hat again, his white clothes were relatively clean and tidy and he had a package under one arm and a drink in the other hand.  He picked out a book on Aboriginal art from the display table and sat down to look through it, then asked me to hold it ("put it somewhere safe") and that he would be back in an hour to buy it, but he had not returned by the time I left.

A young girl was wearing a VERY short skirt and I sincerely hope that was a pair of shorts under it because with the back pack pulling the skirt up in back, there was very little left to the imagination.

A girl with long blonde hair, who looked older from the front than from the back, asked if we had "classical fiction."  I directed her to the Literature (vs. Contemporary Fiction) section and she was thrilled that she found all three of the books by Greek philosophers she was looking for.  After I told her about the store policy of donating to charity, she was interested in volunteering, but since she will be gone all summer, she will follow up on that in the fall.

A woman with reddish-purpleish bronze hair in a tight ballerina type bun bought a Latin dictionary (it was "dictionary day" around there!)

A guy wearing a UCD shirt that said Cal Aggie Tenors came in.  I asked about his shirt and learned he's a saxophone player in the Cal Band.  We talked about the upcoming Picnic Day, the biggest event of the year in Davis.

While I was talking with him, I noticed a band walking by the front of the store, about 6 guys, each carrying black instrument cases of different sizes and shapes.

A couple came in and the woman bought 3 children's books in Korean (she and her partner were discussing the Korean language, so I assume the books were Korean) and a contemporary fiction book.

A guy came in with a bargain book and asked "What does this say?  I can't read it."  It was an anthology of writers on writing, so he took it back outside to where he'd found it.

A couple came in with a big box of books to donate.  "Probably most of them were bought here," the woman told me.  She then bought a cookbook and donated 50 cents of her change to the store.  Nice people.

My friend arrived at 4:30 and bought a book of Grimm's Fairy tales and two bargain books.

Two young women were walking around, one of whom was looking up something on her phone.  She then put the phone in her back pocket.  I noticed that it was one of the newer/larger phones and wondered if manufacturers of slacks are making back pockets wider these days to accommodate the new cell phones!

Two guys I decided must be gay came in and went book hunting in different directions.  I later noticed that one had a gold band on the ring finger of his left hand and thought maybe I was wrong, but when he turned around he had 3 rings on his right hand and his friend was a bejeweled wonder, so I guess my gaydar was accurate after all.  The jeweled one bought the 3 books of the Gormenghast Trilogy by Mervyn Peake.  Apparently this was a PBS special awhile ago.

A guy wearing a pink Aloha shirt with earbuds in his ears saunters in looking much like Matt LeBlanc (from Friends).  I didn't notice when he left because I was noticing the shoes of a girl who came in.  They were cream colored tennis shoes, very clean, with brown shoe laces, very neatly laced (without a bow) and grey anklets.  I just thought she looked very nice.

Peter came in to relieve me at 5:58 and Walt arrived to pick me up at 5:59, both very prompt.  I won't work next Thursday because I'm going to a volunteer luncheon for Sutter Davis volunteers, but I will be working at Logos on Saturday of that week.