All Booked Up

I am wiped out tired this morning. I worked at Rhymes with Darnes and Hoble last night – which meant I spent most of the night doing everything while the lazy ass leads sat around and did very little. I’ve had it up to here with doing all the work while those lazy shmucks spend the evening hiding in the backroom, and then when you do ask them for help, they bitch about it. So my days of being a happy bookseller with Rhymes with Parnes and Woble are probably just about over. They don’t pay me enough to take their shit, and I really don’t need the money that badly. Try to find yourself a new grunt who knows that store inside and out like I do, will ya.

The problem is that I like working there, though. It’s good to see kids (and adults, too) enjoying reading; something a lot of people won’t do. I’ve always said the best gift you can give a kid is a book. Imagination is a good thing, and it needs to be fed in order to grow. Endless hours of “Full House” and “SpongeBob” reruns aren’t going to do that nearly as well as a book will. I was lucky enough to grow up in a house filled with readers, and I’ve always encouraged Miss Katie to pick up a book and read. Fortunately, I didn’t have to twist her arm on it – she’s a fantastic reader, and it’s made her a much more well rounded person than her classmates who won’t read anything harder than a Froot Loops box.

I knew this idiot on the West coast whose theory on reading was “If the book is any good, they’ll make a movie out of it, and I’ll catch it then.” What kind of crap is that? Can anyone who has actually read the Harry Potter books say that the movies are better than the books? I doubt it. I can only think of one movie that struck me more than the novel did – Jaws. Seeing the Great White on the silver screen was so much more frightening than reading about it. But Jurassic Park the Book was 100 times better than Jurassic Park the Movie. When you’re reading a great book, you’re not only reading the words but you’re building it in your mind -- the image, the background, the characters, the color of the sky, the feel of the wet grass beneath your feet. Movies work with your eyes and ears – but books work with your brain.

Christ – I should’ve been a librarian, shouldn’t I? Keep ranting like that, Tommy, and the next thing you know you’ll be telling people to shush...

So anyway, I do like being part of the bookseller world of Rhymes with Carnes and Loble. I just wish that we were a team again, like we once were. No more of this “that’s not my department” crap.

Maybe I should write a book about my adventures with them?

Nah. It wouldn’t make a very good Lifetime movie...