Sorry Local Buissness

I'm not a good person but I do random little things that help me pretend that I am. One of those things is today I tried to support my local used books stores. There are two of them near me, one right on the way to the other and so I was excited at the prospect of being able to pick up some books I wanted to read cheaply and quickly. Instead I was bitterly let down.

BITTERLY!

I wanted a copy of The Road. I loved what I read of Blood Meridian and sasha loved The Road so I figgue I should pick it up, and I should do it for cheaper than 15 bucks, which is the price of a new book now and days. What the fuck is all that about? Both of the books stores, were, well they were just a plain old disapointment. They were both really small, and amazingly they both had an almost identical selection of books. It was creepy. I noticed something else about the both of them, they were both closed on mondays, and they both closed up at 5.

I've talked about it before and I will do it again. Small businesses can survive. They can survive things like walmart and amazon. However, they have to want it. Wanting it doesn't mean closing at 5. II mean come on I am their target customer, a crap job working ninja badass who doesn't shoplift but still hates paying 15 bucks for a book. They need to be open later if they are going to be able to cater to people like me. Subterranian books had the right idea but its gone now.

Oh well. So it looks like I am back to ordering used books off of amazon. I mean these used books come from small buisnesses so I don't feel that bad about it. And I mean nothing stops these local folks from listing on Amazon and Half.com.

See the thing is I do like sifting through stacks of books, and I do like hanging around stores and stuff. Sadly though, these stores just aren't cutting it. My eccentric needs aside, they just don't have what I need/want/desire and the interent does at the same price. I hope they wisen up enough to offload some of their stock on the interwebs. One store who is run by a little old lady will not. The other store who is run by some guy just might. I hope so. Best of luck to you kids.

In a strange side note today I was reminded of vacationing in the outerbanks with my Dad and step mom. The outer banks is an area that is almost compleatly tourist driven, and that place had more used book stores per capita than anywhere else in the world. Okay that may not be true but it certainly seemed like it. They were everywhere and they all had this dizzying collection of stuff. To be fair though there wasn't much to do on that island other than read, swim, and minature golf. I don't think most of the houses had tv and if they did there was no cable. So there were books everywhere. Out there is where I read One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Amtiville Horror, and the Excorcist. The first two books actually changed my life they were absolutly fantastic reads. The Exorcist was kind of lame actually.

Anyway, we would spend hours scouring these stores looking for things to read and I would find all sorts of stuff that interested me, but I never picked up. Like this crazy series about one man's adventure in a post apocalyptic wasteland. It was pure 70s grindhouse pulp, it was a series that went on forever, there must of been over 20 books, and they all looked terrible. I wanted them so much but I was afraid my parents would say no. They aren't around now though so I'm thinking it is time to go looking for them.