TOP TEN CHRISTMAS TIPS FROM GENERAL ELECTRIC

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10. If one light bulb goes out, replace them all

9. Fluorescent tubes make great Star Wars light sabers for
the kids.

8. Blow-dryers can be used to keep food warm.

7. Big corporations shouldn’t commercialize this blessed
season by handing out bonuses.

6. Keeping several TVs and radios on all the time creates a
feeling of warmth and intimacy.

5. We heard that Sylvania bulbs give off some kind of poison gas.

4. Same deal with Westinghouse

3. Electric toothbrushes should be left on all day to keep them loose.

2. A GE industrial turbine makes a one-of-a-kind stocking stuffer.

1. Warranties, like greeting cards, should be thrown out.

BOOKS AS GIFTS

Merry Christmas, bookies!

It's a busy season at the Acorn Bookshop, with moments of everyone being busy with customers and a half hour later the place is empty and we could frisbee without human consequence.

We're up over last year a bit, but then again, because of the Walgreen's construction, we had little parking, so that bar isn't really very high.

For the 6th consecutive year in December, I'm reading one of my favorite books, "Winter Solstice" by Rosamunde Pilcher. The book takes place in a small Scottish village where characters and events come to a wonderful convergence during the Christmas season, with a stunning resolution on Christmas Eve. It’s about how life is full of losses but also rewards and the treasures of friendships, love, and family—in all, a warm way to wrap up and think about the end of the year and Christmas.

And thinking of the year-end and Christmas, I thought you might enjoy these thoughts on books as gifts. Merry Christmas and have a great reading new year.

Bookstore George

BOOKS AS GIFTS
"People seldom read a book which is given to them." -- Samuel Johnson

"Who gives a good book gives more than cloth, paper and ink...more than leather, parchment and words. He reveals a foreword of his thoughts, a dedication of his friendship, a page of his presence, a chapter of himself, and an index of his love." -- William A. Ward

"The books we think we ought to read are poky, dull and dry;
The books that we should like to read we are ashamed to buy;
The books that people talk about we never can recall;
And the books that people give us, oh, they're the worst of all." --Carolyn Wells

"For every toy you buy a child, and a book." -- Susan Cooper

THE ATTACK OF THE STUCCO-MEN

As I was walking from my parked van in the back of our building after a PO/bank/Staples/Target run, Howard the Barber walked across Broadview Avenue to me from the Chase Bank parking lot. After initial greetings, I asked him if the scaffolding of the Stucco-Men encasing our store and taking three parking spaces to do it were bothering his business.

"Who knows?" the pessimistic barber shrugged. "It can't be helping either of us, but we got through much worse last year during the Walgreen's construction." He added, "Looks like they have your side door blocked today.

I nodded and said, "It most interferes with people trying to bring boxes of books in to sell. The books have to be lugged around to the front, and there's scaffolding there, too."

Howard gestured toward the back of the bookstore -- which is next to his shop as can be seen in the photo -- and said, "Too bad you can't just knock a whole in the wall so you have a back door like the rest of us in the building."

"The landlord told me they'd do it for $4-500."

"Whoa," he said, pulling back his head at the price.

"Tell you what; I'll let them go through the barbershop for just 50 cents!"

THE READER'S BILL OF RIGHTS

Hello, bookies,

I'd like to share with you "The Reader's Bill of Rights", from Daniel Pennac's book, "Better Than Life".

THE READER'S BILL OF RIGHTS

* The right to not read

* The right to skip pages

* The right not to finish

* The right to reread

* The right to read anything

* The right to escapism

* The right to read anywhere

* The right to browse

* The right to read out loud

* The right to not defend your tastes

Have any to add?

Keep on readin',

Bookstore George

THE DA VINCI CODE CUSTOMER: A BOOKSTORE-Y

Dear bookies,

With Dan Brown's "The Lost Symbol" at #1 on the bestseller lists, I thought you might be interested in reading my bookstore-y about Brown's first #1 book. As always, let me know what you think of this posting.

Bookstore George

THE “DA VINCI CODE” CUSTOMER
A Bookstore-y

Our first customer of 2005 was a 50-ish man with a handsome head of wavy, slick-backed, gray hair. He arrived wanting to sell a few books: three on auto repair, the three-volume paperback set of Anne Rice/Anne Roquelaure's erotica “Sleeping Beauty”, and a box of “The Lover’s Tarot”, which, he pointed out, had never been opened.

After receiving more than he expected for them, he asked if I would be interested in a copy “The Da Vinci Code”, which had been the bestselling book of 2004. I assured him that we did. It was a bestseller that was very unique, and demand for it was high while available used copies were few.

“The Da Vinci Code” is a page-turning thriller with an unusual spiritual dimension. The author, Dan Brown, challenges much of the accepted history of the early Christian church, drawing from a wide variety of published sources, including the Dead Sea Scrolls/Gnostic Gospels. The protagonist – a professor of religious symbology – along with a female French code-beaker with the Paris police are chased by the same French police on a scavenger hunt-like trail of clues that lead them into the French country side, London, and eventually Scotland.

Brown provides an intriguing look into church history as the innocent fugitives flee from murder charges, going on a Holy Grail quest as the way to solve the murder that begins the book.

It is in such high demand – even after over a year on the bestseller list – that the publisher has just released an illustrated edition. I found the book interesting enough the first time through to buy the illustrated edition with some birthday (12-26) money to re-read it with all of the symbols evident along with the text that describes them.

With agitation, the customer began talking about his attempt to read the book. "I only got 50 pages into it, and then had to put it down, because it turned my belief structure upside down and inside out. It challenged everything I believed, and it seemed fairly accurate." While standing on the other side of the counter, he kept unconsciously rearranging the books he'd sold me while continuing to talk about something that obviously had deeply upset him.

"I even started reading more about the things he was suggesting, and they seemed to be realistic, too,” he said.

"The part about the church eliminating the gospels that didn't give them the power they wanted was very disturbing. I thought there were only four gospels, and it turns out that there might have been eight dozen! Why would the church tell us that every word of the gospels was divinely inspired if they got rid of the gospels that might have been equally inspired but didn’t agree with their agenda of setting up a powerful church structure?”

He was moving around in front of the counter, unable to stand still while discussing a book that had destabilized his spiritual life.

I asked him if he were Catholic.

"Yes, I was brought up Catholic, but these days I'm more interested in my spiritual development than church teachings."

Which made me wonder about his next statement regarding the popular book, “I...I...I just couldn't bring myself to read any more of it, or about it. I’m almost afraid to read it further.

"Growing up, we were instructed that the Bad Popes had done a lot of things that the church disapproved of, and now I'm learning that a lot of what we were taught just wasn’t true. Just which ones were the Bad Popes and which were the Good Popes? Or was there any real difference?”

Quite upset, he seemed relieved to take a break from talking about the book in order to instruct me to create a card for his store credit for another visit, promising to bring back the book which had exploded his world.

He returned around 4pm, carrying Dan Brown’s book, holding it away from his body, as though to avoid the physical equivalent to the contamination that had already entered his head.

He saw a children’s picture book titled “Winter Solstice” on display, one of the holiday titles we’d overlooked earlier in the day as we de-Christmas-ed our bookshop. “Will you trade me this book for “The Da Vinci Code?” he asked eagerly.

I assured him we would, and give him another $1.75 in cash or $3.50 store credit as well. “You will? You’ve always treated me good in here!” he said.

Leafing through the illustrations, he said, “My wife is gonna love this! We got married on winter solstice.”

“How long have you been married?” I asked, nursing the store-y.

“About three weeks now,” he replied with a smile.

Oh!

Before I could congratulate him, he cocked his head and said, “Winter solstice is another one of those problems with the church that I’m having since reading this book,” tapping “The Da Vinci Code” he’d laid on the counter.

“Because of the way it created questions in my head, I went to the Winter Solstice gathering they had over at the university? And it was a beautiful ceremony.” In an aside, he said, “I could have sworn that (Ohio State Athletic Director) Andy Geiger was beside me.” (Buckeye-worship is widespread around here.)

“We walked the labyrinth – is that the way you pronounce that? And they taught us that there any many paths to the center, including your spiritual center.

“I was really pleased that my new wife and I went to that. It was very moving. But in the beginning the church tried to bury Winter Solstice ceremonies, too. They tried to tell us that it was held by witches and other evil people.”

He tucked “Winter Solstice” under his arm and headed for the door, an unhappy man. As he started pushing the glass door open, he turned to me and rhetorically asked,

"How could the church lie to us like that?!"

45 YEARS A BOOKSELLER

Hello, bookies,

Linda and I are back from vacation in Lakeside, Ohio. We were doing nothing more than r&r. The biggest decision each day was whether we walked or biked the four blocks to the lake, where we would read and write the afternoon away in the pavilion, overlooking Lake Erie. Ah, luxury and indulgence.

We temporarily adopted feral cats there by carrying kitty kibble in our tote bags in case we ran into some of the many cats running around. We met others looking out for the homeless cats, an instant bond, just like connecting with someone when you're in a bookstore. It's just magic.

The magic has been with me for 45 years this very month. And I still love getting paid to hang out in a bookstore.

In September of '64, I was a sophomore at Geneva College in Beaver Falls, PA, and my mother had just been hired to manage the campus store. I was spending hours most days hanging out at the student-center shop, standing in the aisles with a book in my hand, leaning up against the slanted bookcases.

This was back in the days when mass-market paperbacks were leaping from drugstore racks to real bookstores. Up until then, hardbacks were all you could mostly find in a bookstore. It was with trepidation and excitement that regular bookstores began stocking the small paperbacks. Which were an instant hit, duh!

For college students, the ability to buy Hemingway and Steinbeck, C. S. Lewis and "Peanuts" books in a cheap, conveniently-sized format gave a spirit-freeing rush. Stuff 'em in your back pocket or purse and take them anywhere. I read my eyes out in paperbacks propped up against those Geneva bookstore fixtures.

When Mom needed help unloading a shipment of textbooks and Golden Tornado sweatshirts, or pricing and stocking the hundreds of notebooks just arrived, I'd give her a hand for as long as she needed.

Finally in October, after a month of my constant presence, she insightfully suggested, "As long as you're going to spend your college days in a bookstore, you might as well get paid for it," and I've been hanging out in bookstores ever since. Thanks, Mom!

45 years. That's a lot of books out the door, perhaps close to a million?

14 bookstores. Three wives. Dozens of colleagues. Hundreds of memories, and that's what I turn into my bookstore-ies.

I wish I'd been writing store-ies through all those years, but it took being in my own bookstore to motivate me sufficiently to take my scribbled notes and turn them into the text they deserve. Oh I've got plenty of notes from most of those stores, but if you are a journal-writer yourself, you understand why it's so tough to go back and decipher notes from many years earlier. You know you made those notes for a very good reason, but the mistiness of time wipes out all but the mere words, most of the time.

If I don't follow-up my notes with developing at least a foundation for a subsequent narrative within a few days, many times I lose the intent of the notes. And with all the notes I take, lots of store-ies slide away.

I used to have a steel trap for a memory. Now it's more like a plastic sieve.

I take notes nearly every day in the store. A bookshop is blessed with interesting characters as customers and customers with interesting stories. As I re-learn constantly, everyone has a story to tell, even if their life is generally uneventful with a personality that wouldn't have enough spark to power a nightlight.

I was reminded of that again this summer when I drove an hour north to Marion, Ohio, to do what I call a housebuy -- being invited to someone's house to buy their books. Though I had anticipated nothing beyond reviewing and evaluating what books I'd make an offer on, a 93-year-old WWII veteran entered my life and got into my heart.

The store-y that will come out of my day with Mr. Miller is called "Honor Flight". I'll work hard to bring it out in early November in time for Veterans Day. I hope to post it here first.

The ability to spend my days around books and book people seems like a huge blessing to me, especially with Linda so long and wonderfully in my life. I can share my (mostly) joy with the world beyond the Acorn Bookshop by writing bookstore-ies that illuminate one long-time bookseller's days behind the counter, out in the aisles, and always with the surrounding tens of thousands of books.

I leave you on this special occasion by quoting Will Y. Darling, an Englishman who wrote "The Private Papers of a Bankrupt Bookseller" in 1931. He described our lives thusly:

"I thank the fortune that made me a bookseller.
It could have made me anything,
but it could not have made me happier."

Go visit a bookstore, and say hello to a bookseller. At the very least you'll be spending time with everyone from Jane Austen to Robert Heinlein, from Dan Brown to Rita Mae Brown, from Einstein to Gandhi. And you just might end up in a bookstore-y.

Bookstore George

copyright2009

CLEVELAND LITERARY CENTER EVENT

Hi, bookies,

We're just back from two weeks R&R at Lake Erie in Lakeside, Ohio, one of our favorite places. I'll have some new things of my own to post once I take care of all the post-vacation responsibilities at home and at the bookstore, but for now, I do have this notice about an event in Cleveland this Saturday.

Keep on reading,
Bookstore George


The LIT: Cleveland's Literary Center
Read Local; Think Global

Saturday, September 26th, at 7pm,Join The LIT to celebrate the launch of Robert Flanagan’s punch packing new collection of poetry, Reply to an Eviction Notice. Flanagan’s journey as a fighter, educator, poet, and father come together in a confluence of lyricism and wit. Ohio literary booster, author, poet, and publisher Larry Smith will read from his most recently launched novel, The Long River Home, a masterful work of fiction that chronicles an Ohio family’s struggles to survive and prosper. Heralded as the voice of Ohio, Larry Smith’s recent release is a must read.Two of Ohio’s finest literary voices come together for this evening of reading, discussion, LITerary hob-nobbing!Cocktails and Book Signing at 7pmReadings at 7:30

The LITCleveland’s Literary CenterArtCraft Building2570 Superior Avenue, Suite 203Cleveland, OH 44114info@the-lit.org 216.694.0000
http://www.the-lit.org/page2/page2.html

UPCOMING EVENT: COLUMBUS PAPER, POSTCARD AND BOOK SHOW

Hello, Bookies,

I just received this and thought you booklovers might want to make a note of the show and date.

Bookstore George

It's that time again. Please join us at the Columbus Paper, Postcard and Book Show. Sunday September 13, 2009 at Vet's Memorial 300 West Broad St. Columbus, Ohio 43215 Hours are 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM Admission is $6.00 Bring this email and save $1.00.

Satisfy your need for old postcards, paper, books, photographs, stereoviews, maps, view master reels, old documents, comics, trade cards, and supplies to store and protect your paper collectibles. There will be silent auctions throughout the day as well as concessions provided by Vets Memorial.

We have opened a profile on Facebook. Just log onto Facebook and search Columbus Paper Show and sign uP to be a fan. We will be putting pictures and info about upcoming shows on the profile page.

Email to Terry Bigler columbuspapershow@gmail.com or call (614) 206 - 9103 if you have any questions or comments. Thank you for your support and hope to see you there.

Terry Bigler

STUPIDITY TRUMPS TECHNOLOGY, BUT SOMETIMES IT'S CURABLE.

Hello, bookies,

Very good news! Thanks to reader Michael Haynes, I am able to cut-and-paste my bookstore-ies from Microsoft Word directly to this blog-box. Well, I was able to do it before St. Michael's suggestion, but I was too stupid to know it.

Michael came into the store yesterday with daughter Crysta and son Aiden. Crysta, along with her older sister Caitlin, has kept our staff in Girl Scout cookies for years. Michael asked me to show him how the cut-and-paste wouldn't work. Christine and Brahmi were taking care of the customers in the store, so I took him behind the counter. On my laptop, I cut, I pressed "Ctrl" and "V" to paste. And it pasted. What the hell?!! Wish someone would have taken a photo of my astonished face when the text appeared. Michael laughed and said, "I'm glad I could help." Couldn't help shaking my head several times in amazement...and embarrassment.

After thanking him profusely, much to the amusement of his kids who already know daddy is a hero, I began looking forward to seeing if this magic technique would work on my home desktop, where I was originally unsuccessful at the C&P. Voila! It worked at home as well, where my store-ies are filed.

In my next post, I'll begin C&P-ing some of my many bookstore-ies.

Thanks to those of you who made suggestions with this problem -- you know who you are, Liam -- which wasn't a tech prob at all, but my techno-illiteracy: when facing a problem, reboot and try again. Duh.

Bookstore George

BOOK GREED

Hi, readers -- and you Kindle folks, too.

At Acorn we have a customer -- a writer, book-critic, and a serious collector of special books in the field of literature -- who comes in about once a month for at least two reasons: 1/To see if we've lately bought any wonderful books that she might be interested in, and 2/To make a payment on whatever book she has on layaway. There's a shelf in our backroom that has her name on it, and it's been a long time since the shelf hasn't had at least one book destined for her amazing library. Each time she buys a book or two to take with her, we always ask if she needs a bag. She laughs a bit maniacally and clutches her books to her body with both arms and says excitedly, "I want to feel these books right next to me as I walk out of here!"

One evening last week as I arrived home on Riverhill Road in Upper Arlington after an enjoyable day in Booktopia, Linda greeted me with dancing eyes, animated with good news to share. "I went to the UA library today with my summer reading list, and I was so excited when I was able to find most of the ones I wanted! They'll be the ones I'll take on vacation! I couldn't wait to bring them home and with great anticipation take them to my chair, cats all around me, as anxious to spend time with me as I was to spend time with my new books."

Linda is a professor at OSU in the Women's Studies department. As such, she's always got some interesting writing project in process. This summer's paper has been on an unusual topic -- Calamity Jane. That's right, the wildest women of the wild west being written about by the Wild Woman of Riverhill. Last year we fortunately discovered the outstanding HBO series, "Deadwood". And one of the well-done characters was Martha Jane Canary -- "Calamity Jane". This spring, when Lin finished her latest book project -- a critical study of the 1939 movie "It Happened One Night", she turned her attention to Calamity Jane and the Black Hills, the Badlands, where the Old West met the future in notorious Deadwood, where Wild Bill was shot in the head and law and education and religion and barbed wire crept in as taming agents. Where Calamity Jane perhaps experienced some of what she claimed to have done -- a colorful mountain-woman dressed anonymously in never-changed men's buckskin and never-gone whiskey fumes.

Linda has had a ball living with Calamity in books and movies, and as a longtime reader about the West and a lover of old "B" westerns -- especially Roy Rogers, I was pleased with her new interest. We've watched each episode of all three seasons of "Deadwood" again with even more enjoyment than we did initially. We've seen Angelica Houston as Jane, and even Doris Day as Calamity, which just absolutely boggles the brain. This fall Linda will get to travel to Deadwood itself, 120 years after Calamity. Where Calamity delivered glorifying half-truths about her life as a frontier woman, Linda will be delivering a paper about Calamity's life at a literature conference in nearby Spearfish, South Dakota. I suggested that she buy a replica Calamity Jane outfit -- used, of course, and hopefully unwashed, to capture the true flavor of the times. We can play cowboys and cowgirls when she gets back. Now where did I store my Roy Rogers embroidered shirt?

She's just finished the CJ paper, and now it's summer reading time for the professor as we head into the last of summertime. This fall we'll be driving up to Lakeside, Ohio, for a much-needed R-&-R vacation, with no agenda except enjoying the peaceful, old community, founded by Methodists in the 1880s. From our cozy cottage we'll go for walks and bike rides and I'll photograph the beauty and cottages of a waterside community. We'll both work on various writing projects, one of our favorite ways to take advantage of endless hours without committment.

And we'll read. A lot. We'll read mysteries and essays and memoirs. Books with spiritual insights. We might even sample Julia Child's "The Art of French Cooking", inspired by the wonderful movie, "Julia and Julie". We've already begun decorating the dining room table with the first of many possible books to take along. Last year we were a little excessive and took a box of reading material each. You understand.

Running out of reading material on vacation ranks right up there with having your plane land in the Hudson or staying in a sleazy motel in 90-degree overnight heat and a busted A/C, a filthy tub, with yellow stains on the sheets to complement the bloodstains on the floor covering, which once might have been called a carpet. At least in that godforsaken place we had books to escape into.

So Linda's trip to the Upper Arlington library was the first of her foraging for vacation reading. to check out the books she'd had recommended by friends and colleagues and reviewers. Books to entertain and educate, to read as slowly or quickly as desired. To read with coffee in the morning and tea at night, and with an afternoon bottle of water overlooking the water. After dinner I'll pour her a Diet Coke and a single malt scotch for myself for twilight accompaniment. Hmmm, what kind of book goes best with a peaty scotch? Maybe an M. C. Beaton mystery or one of Alexander McCall Smith's Edinburgh-based stories.

Lin's enthusiasm for her just-acquired library books was overflowing. "It's like when I used to belong to a book club," she said, holding a handful with the familiar library markings on the spine. "The mailman would deliver a package of four or five books" -- and Lin made as if hugging the books to herself. "I wanted to grab them all and take them to bed...my treasure.

"It was book greed."

Amen.

For a great book on the old west, you can't beat Larry McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove".

Bookstore George

PS: The photo is of Linda at the grand opening of the "new" Ohio State Library. More on that fabulous new facility later.
Copyright 2009

QUOTES OF NOTE

Hi, readers,

For many years I've been collecting literary quotes to amuse myself. From time to time I'll be posting a few of them for your enjoyment. Feel free to pass them on.

I'll start with one of my favorites, which I take to heart. I was fortunate enough to meet and visit with Bookseller Brent in his Chicago shop in 1994.

* "I had decided to become a bookseller because I loved good books. I assumed there must be many others who shared a love for reading and that I could minister to their needs. I thought of this as a calling." - Stuart Brent, "The Seven Stairs" (1962)

* "All good and true book-lovers practise the pleasing and improving art of reading in bed." - Eugene Field, "Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac" (1896)

* "Almost everyone who reads has been seduced by the charm of a good bookstore." - Frank Brady and Joan Lawless, "Brady & Lawless's Favorite Bookstores" (1978)

* "Books go out into the world, travel mysteriously from hand to hand, and somehow find their way to the people who need them at times when they need them." - Erica Jong

* "I was born in a bookshop or so close to it as to be able to claim the distinction. It was in a bookshop that I first learned the odor of books...and felt the first vague stirrings of envy, admiration and authorship. If I were not a writer of books, I would be a bookseller, selling the dreams and solutions of other writers across the counter. Books to me are the most important things after food, water, dogs, cats, girls." - Vincent Starret, "Born in a Bookshop" (1965)

* "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read." - Groucho Marx

* "I am a bookseller...I stand and look down the little avenue of books which is my shop. On each side there are shelves and on these shelves are my books. All day long, I live my life between these two parallel lines, which I know may be extended into infinity, and I am buttressed by those protecting walls." - Will Y. Darling, "The Private Papers of a Bankrupt Bookseller" (1931)

UPCOMING LITERARY EVENT

August 24, 2009

Good day, readers. I hope if you haven't done so already, that you have a book in your hands by the end of the day.

On Friday, September 18, 2009, at 7pm, a book signing and reception will be held celebrating the publication of "Bishop Daniel A. Payne: Great Black Leader". The author is Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop, professor Emerita of Education at The Ohio State University. The place to be is the Gateway Health and Wellness Center Grand Ballroom, 112 North Jefferson Ave. in Columbus.

Bishop Payne was not only a clergyman, but also the first black president of Wilberforce University. He was an activist and a leader of the AME church.

Dr. Bishop has received numerous awards for her work in the field of African-American children's literature. Columbus is lucky to have her among us.

She will also be the speaker at The Aldus Society's February program, celebrating Black History Month, and talking about African-American children's literature, and I'm really looking forward to that. The Aldus Society's program's are open to the public and free. More about Aldus and its programs later.

RSVP to 614-252-2377 if you are planning to attend Dr. Bishop's reading and signing.

Celebrate this new book; celebrate reading every day.

Bookstore George

BOOKSTORE-IES INTERUPTED

Because I've already written so many bookstore-ies over the years, I thought that I'd be able to post them on this blog from time to time for you readers to enjoy. Now I'm finding out that what was written on M-soft Word is not cut-and-pastable. That's a real kick to the ol' Table of Contents.

I wonder if the new national health care plan will cover treatment for someone who unnecessarily has to retype over 150 texts?

Are there any knowledgeable bloggers out there who know how this importing of text from other sources can be accomplished? A $20 gift certificate to the Acorn Bookshop -- applicable to our online listings as well as in-store stock -- to anyone who successfully helps me do this! Please reply to booknman@gmail.com.

Thanks,
Bookstore George

August 20, 2009

As my wife Linda and I exited the theater having just seen the wonderful "Julia and Julie" starring Meryl Streep as the irrepressible Julia Child, Linda turned to me and said, "Now, after seeing that movie, do we go home and cook...or write?!"

Both, as it turns out. She's making pasta with pesto, using fresh-cut basil from our small patio herb garden, while I am determined to research how to blog.

Except that my laptop refuses to be my usual administrative assistant and allow me access to the internet. I hate computers. I love computers.

Recently I clicked on "Upgrade Available" for Internet Explorer 8, trusting last year's computer guru when he told me to allow all possible updates. Yeah, right. Now I can't access the internet just when I'm pumped to get into this newfangled, non-old-school blog business.

I could leave this cozy sunroom with three of our four Siamese cats lounging around and go downstairs to my study to get online at my desktop, but right now the rain on the roof over the patio is such a companionable musical accompaniment that I'd rather sit here and begin a blog entry before I even know step one on how to reach all of you interested in a veteran bookseller's perspectives on books, reading, collecting, bookpeople, cats, life, and love...and baseball.
Besides, the aroma of Linda's ultra-fresh pesto simmering with garlic, pinenuts, parmesan cheese, and olive oil is too yummy for me to go further away from its source. Soon she'll serve it surrounded with slices of our home-grown red and yellow tomatoes for a fine August meal, even if it isn't in Julia Child's cookbook.

I've been blessed to spend more than four decades as a bookseller. I've been known as "Bookstore George" in a wide variety of bookstores -- on the sea, in a mall, on campuses, in an airport, and now for the last 10 years, at the Acorn Bookshop in Columbus, Ohio. The stores have specialized in college textbooks, travel books and maps, business books, current bestsellers, and in the used bookshops, anything that's ever been in print. The variety of my bibliopolic experiences has been awesome.

I was one of the lucky people who find out early in life what they want to do. When my Aunt Peg (more on her as my inspiration in a later blog) asked me in 1968 what I wanted to do with my life, I jokingly said, "Get paid to hang out in a bookstore!" She looked at me intently, her head cocked to one side and one eyebrow equally cocked high, and drawled out, "Well.....?"

Fourteen bookstores have been my professional home since that well-expressed "Well...."
As I've learned from hearing it from so many customers over the years, I was just one of the many whose dream it has been to own their own bookstore. And I won the lottery: bookstore #14 is the Acorn Bookshop, and I'm the co-owner.

Imagine being able to spend your days hanging out in a bookstore, surrounded by people who love to read and/or collect books. A bibliophilic staff and book-oriented customers that choose to spend their discretionary income on reading material. That's my very fortunate life.

"I've got a novelist's eye and a bartender's ear..." sings Jimmy Buffett on "School Boy Heart" on his excellent "Banana Wind" CD.

Being behind the counter in a bookstore is very much like being behind a bar -- you get to know a lot of your customers' lives. As they talk, I make notes, inobtrusively. I've been taking notes and writing stories about my bookstore experience for years, most recently in what I call "Bookstore-ies". Stories about life in a bookstore.

A few bookstore-ies have been published in the quarterly for The Aldus Society, Columbus' bibliophile organization. See http://www.aldussociety.com/ , and click on "Newsletters", then scroll through till you find my column, making mental notes to go back to the other articles of interest.

All told, I have 150-200 store-ies finished, and about half that many simmering in my Works in Progress folder.

I love working in a bookstore.
I love writing about working in a bookstore.

Hope you get to do some reading today. One of the most famous books about a bookstore is "Shakespeare and Company", by Sylvia Beach. Her bookstore in Paris published the first edition of James Joyce's "Ulysses". It's not well-written, but the scene of her asking back-to-liberate Paris Ernest Hemingway to clean out the snipers on the roofs of rue de L'Odeon in the Left Bank is worth the read.

Bookstore George

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