Customers 34

A woman, late 20's or early 30's, long dark hair and wearing a red sweater came to the counter to purchase two books. One was SEX 365 positions. The other was Melody Beattie's CODEPENDENT NO MORE.

             

"Is there anywhere else in the store where I'd find books like this?", she said, pointing to the sex book. "It's for a bachelorette party."

"You got this in the Sex and Love section?", I asked. "That's pretty much where those kinds of books will be. Our bargain section might have something like that and there is a wedding section and that has some bride and groom game kinds of things, but mostly related to weddings."

"No, it's for the bachelorette party," she said. "This will be great, I just wondered if there was somewhere else to look. This other one is for me. I'm getting divorced and this was recommended to me by my therapist."

"Well, it's a good one," I said. "Melody Beattie is really the pioneer on codependence." I paused.

"It's kind of weird that I'm buying them both together, isn't it?", she said, smiling.

"I guess," I said, smiling back at her. "Would you like a bag?"

"I'm going straight back to work, I need a bag!", she said, blushing a little.

As I put the books in the bag, I saw that the cover of the sex book was visible through the plastic. "Here', I'll turn this over so no one can see it."

"THANKS!", she said.

***********************

A woman with light brown hair, wearing a light blue shirt came to the counter. She had two children with her. She looked tired. She was buying a set of two mini lap desks, one blue and one black.

"If only they were the same color," she said.

"You want them the same color?", I asked. "With different colors then they can tell which one is theirs."

"No," she said, "With different colors they fight over who gets which color. Having them the same color is better."

"Now that you mention it, my cousin did that with beach towels. She got the whole family the same color and design, and that way she could easily scoop them up at the beach or the pool. It made it easier for her," I said.

"Exactly. When the kids were littler? We had all the different sets of plates? Some were Toy Story, some were Disney, some were Winnie the Pooh. The fighting never stopped. I got rid of those. Now? The dishes and plates are blue."

"Well, good luck with the lap desks" I said.

"Thanks," she said.

Clicking on the book cover will take you to Amazon's web page for the book. Clicking on the underlined title may take you to Barnes and Noble's page for the book (it's been glitchy). Purchasing through these links helps support the blog. You can send us email: 2of3Rs(AT)gmail(DOT)com. Thanks for stopping by!

Swearing...necessary?

I answered the phone at the bookstore where I work. "Do you have the April issue of PCGamer magazine? It has a beta game. The April issue."

"Let me check," I said. After walking over to the newsstand, I looked at the current issue of PCGamer. "No, I'm sorry, I don't. I have the May issue. As soon as the new issues come in, the old ones go out. We don't have any back copies of magazines."

"Are you sure it's not the April issue?" she asked again. "There's a game in there that my son really wants."

"I'm holding it in my hand, and it is the May issue," I said.

"Well that sucks," she spat. "My son really wanted that game."

"I'm sorry," I said. "We don't all get our shipments on the same day. You could try calling another bookstore and see if maybe they still have the April issue."

"Fine. I guess I'll have to do that then." And she hung up.

Another phone call had a young woman calling and asking if we had a specific textbook in stock at the store.

"We don't usually carry textbooks, and we don't have that one in stock" I told her.

"SHIT."

"Ah, we can order it for you, or you can order it online if you'd like," I offered.

"No. never mind," she said right before she hung up.

A third call came from a man. He wanted me to order a book for him. I was having a hard time hearing him and had to ask him to repeat things several times. I asked if he'd like to be notified by email when the book would be shipped and he said he would. He stumbled several times over his email address, and I had to ask for clarification on some of the letters. "F" can sound like "S" over the phone, "B" can sound like "P", and so on. Evidently I asked for clarification one too many times for him and he said "GODDAMNIT" pretty loudly. We did ultimately get through the call with his order complete.

sigh.

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Customers 24

Dr. Johnson (see May 17, 2011 blog post, Customers 22) came in. As usual he was nicely dressed, a long overcoat (yes, it's July and yes, he needed the coat) and a bowler hat and a cane. B. saw him as he approached the counter. As he does to many customers, he offered a compliment and said, "You look snazzy today, you look good."

Dr. Johnson looked B. up and down, never meeting his eyes, sneered at him, made a sound of disgust and walked away.

************************

A stooped woman, early to mid 70's, short, slept-on grey hair, a light blue pullover shirt and jeans, comes up to the counter, faces this book toward me as she puts it on the counter.

       

"Do you have music?", she asks.

"We don't have a full music department, we do have about 30 different CD's on the display just behind you," I answer.

"You don't have music, but you have THIS," and she gestures to the book on the counter.

"Is this important? Is this good for America?", pointing again to the book. "Is music good for America? Yes it is. So you don't have music, but you have books like this." She shakes her head. "If you think you're getting my business, you can forget it," she says, walking away.

Twenty minutes later she comes up to my counter and purchases a calendar, saying nothing about music or guns or America.

**********************

A man came to E's. register. He held up his hand and slowly passed it in front of E's face. "You will give me 30% off of the item of my choice," he said, in an Obi-Wan Kenobi "These are not the droids you are looking for" voice. Unfortunately he wasn't a Jedi, so he didn't get the discount.

**********************

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The Holidays are HERE

Black Friday was BUSY. The whole week-end was busy, and yes, I worked the whole week-end. It was busy in that onslaught kind of way, where the customers kept coming and coming and coming.

"Festive" is the euphemism for crazy busy at our store, as in, when a staff person comes off the floor for a break and has that glazed look in their eyes and the manager says "It sure is festive out there."

Some of the customers are pleasant, if not always aware that other people are also waiting to be helped...

A woman comes up to the register to purchase a fancy computer lap desk, the most expensive one we have in the store. She has long blond hair, is about 5'9", and is wearing a tan wool coat. A line is forming behind her. We finish the transaction for the lap desk, and out of the corner of her eye, she sees our display of holiday CDs.

"Oh, just a sec, I need one of these," she says. She leaves her (large) bag holding the lap desk and comes back with two CDs, Elvis Presley's Blue Christmas, and a Frank Sinatra Christmas album. "Hmm," she says, "I don't know which to pick." She looks at the play list on each. "Which would you pick?", she asks.

Trying to keep things moving I say, "I'd go with Frank Sinatra. I love his voice."

"I don't know," she says, musing. She pulls out her phone. And makes a call. As it's ringing, she says in a whisper, "I just need to find out what he wants. It'll just take a second."

Normally I'd ask her to step to the side so I could help other customers, but with her large purchase, and cashiers ringing at the next registers, there wasn't anywhere for her to go.

"Okay, he wants Frank Sinatra. I shouldn't have even called." She paused. I rang up the CD and she ran her credit card. I handed her the receipt and put the CD in the bag with the lap desk. Her phone rang. She answered. "He changed his mind. It's my stepson. He wants the Elvis one. Can we just trade it?"

"I have to do it as an exchange, but I can do it quickly." I rang the exchange through and handed her the Elvis CD and her receipt. Her phone rang again.

"I'm not even going to answer that," she said. "Thank you so much, you've been very nice."

"You're welcome," I said. "Have a good day." The next person in line steps up to the counter.

Others are not as pleasant...

A man wearing a blue shirt in maybe his mid-30's approached the counter with two books and a receipt from our online store. The receipt was a gift receipt, which showed the amounts paid for the books in code so the recipient doesn't know how much was spent.

"I want to return this one (Ramona the Pest) and get this one (Ramona and Her Mother). I have this receipt."

"Great. I can take care of that." I look up the amount paid for the book he wanted to return and rang it into the register as an exchange. "That'll be $.60 please," I say.

"What? Why? You mean to tell me that that one is 60 cents less than this one? Even though they're both marked the same? What is that about? That doesn't make any sense."

"I can't tell why it cost less, but yes, according to the receipt that you brought in, whoever got it for you paid $5.39 and the one you want here is $5.99," I said. I'd been ringing the transaction into the register. "So there is a 60 cent difference."

"That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard," he said, infuriated. "Unbelievable," he spat. He swiped his card. I handed him his receipt. "Here you go," I said.

"Go to hell," he said in a mean, low voice as he snatched the book and walked away.

Taken aback, I could barely greet the next customer, a young woman with long hair and a black coat. "Retail sure is something, isn't it?" she said, having overheard the interaction. She was smiling.

"It sure is," I said, smiling back at her.

I think that that would be festive. Yep, festive for sure.

You can send email to: 2of3RsATgmailDOTcom. Thanks for stopping by!

Customers 12

A customer was checking out with her purchases. There were three booksellers close by.

She said, "I'm looking for a book, it starts with the letter "C".

"The book starts with "C" or the author starts with "C"?, one of us asked.

"The author starts with "C". He has a new book out.", she said.

"Clive Cussler?", I asked?

"No, not him," she said.

"Do you know any titles of any of his books?"

"No, I don't know any titles of his books. But he's very good looking, he and his wife are a lovely couple. He has sort of a partial beard," she said.

This is not helping.

"He died today," she said.

That's better, but it's still not coming up for any of us. We were trying.

"Tony Curtis died yesterday, I know he's more of an actor, but...," said a bookseller.

"Oh no," she said disgustedly. "It's not Tony Curtis, I don't care about him."

Finally one of the booksellers surreptitiously pulled out her cell phone that had access to the internet.

"Stephen Cannell died today, is it him?", the bookseller said.

"Yes! That's it! Oh he was a wonderful writer, he was in his 60's. How did you ever come up with his name?"

***************************

"Do you have a restroom in here?", a customer asked.

"We sure do. There's a green sign on the wall just over there." I gestured toward the direction of the restroom.

"And the sign says restroom?," she asked.

"Um, yep, that's what it says," I said.

(I wanted to say, "No, the sign actually says Free Hot dogs". But I didn't.)

You can email me, Bibliophile, at 2of3Rs@gmailDOTcom.

Purchases and Requests...

In an hour, customers asked about...

Three Questions by Muth (children's, hardcover)

Anything on gnomes (there is a large hardcover book on gnomes, has been out since the 70's or 80's, plus a couple of gnome mini-kits. They bought the book and one of the mini-kits. They'd already purchased the other one.)

"Do you know where there's a Safeway near here?"

Language of Life: Life, DNA and the Revolution in Personalized Medicine by Francis Collins (featured on a table)

dog food cookbooks (pets, bargain, there are several)

Big Leap: Conquer Your Fears by Gay Hendrix (self-improvement)

Yo Yeow Ma, Wisdom of Cats (bargain)

Supervision Concepts and Skill Building by Certo (didn't have, textbook)

Wizard of Oz (many versions throughout the store)

I Am America, and So Can You! by Stephen Colbert (humor)

anything on Japanese or Chinese tattoo (several places in the store, bargain, cultural studies, art, photo essay)

books on yoga (health and fitness, yoga)

Mastering Unreal Technology, Volume 1 (web/game design)

"Any books, preferably a mystery or fiction, where the protagonist is a personal trainer. Or an athlete. It's a present for my personal trainer and I thought it would be fun to give her a book that has a personal trainer as the protagonist." (I don't know, I couldn't think of one off the top of my head. Another bookseller did some more research.)

"Do you have Neurotic Styles, it's by Shapiro, published in 1965? You should carry it, it's a classic, therapists everywhere use this all the time." (No, don't have it, and neither I, nor Therapist, have ever heard of it)

A family came up to the register. One spinner display near the registers has little mini-kits, among them a desktop aquarium, a 3 inch high Snoopy, a Stewie from Family Guy doll, all in small boxes. One of the children in the family, a girl about three years old grabbed one of the boxes and told her dad, "I want this one!". He held it up for me to see. A purple box, with a drawing of a couple kissing on the front and the title...Great Sex: Lovemaking Techniques to Blow Your Partner's Mind.

Kind of a college-jock looking guy, short haircut, polo shirt, shorts that sagged a little, tan, pretty buff, bought The Four Agreements and a biography of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The purchase just seemed a little out of character, but then again, one shouldn't judge a book...

Customers 6

At customer service yesterday I answered the phone. A woman wanted to get the book, The Christian's Secret to a Happy Life. Originally published in 1870, it is still being published. We didn't have any in the store, so she wanted to order one. There were many different versions to choose from. I was describing some of the versions to her so she could choose. Someone came up to the information desk wanting some help. The woman on the phone chose which version she wanted. After that all I needed to do was to get her contact information so we could contact her when the book came in. Someone else was coming up for help too. Should I call for more help at the desk? I thought I'd be okay, I got her name, phone number, I was almost done. Then she said, "Can you tell me if this book is available in Hungarian? I'd like to get it for my mother, who is older. Hungary is a country in Europe..." I called for backup.

An older man, in his 70's or 80's came up to the desk. He was wheezing and breathing heavily, almost gasping for air. His skin looked grey-ish. He used a cane, and leaned heavily on it as he walked and heavily onto the counter when he got there.
     "Taliban and War is the title," he said. "I want that book."
     "Do you know the author?", I asked?
     "Mosley," he said.
     I searched, both as an exact title and just with Taliban and war as keywords, with the author's name and without...
   "I could end that damn war tomorrow if they'd just let me go over there," he said. "I could do it. It's been going on too long. Are you finding it? I also want Marley and Me. Damn war. Damn government."
     "Marley and Me we have," I said. "I'm still not finding a book with that title either with or without that author..."
     "If they'd let me go, I'd go right now. I could stop that war." (gasp, wheeze) "It's not going to be stopped by atheists though. Too many damn atheists in the government. Damn atheists. Damn government. Damn Obama. Do you have that book?"
     "I'll go get Marley and Me," I said, thinking it might be better for him if I went and got the book for him. He followed me.
     "Got any more dog books?," he asked.
     "We sure do, here's the section right here. James Herriot has one...," I handed him James Herriot's Dog Stories.
     "This is good?," he asked.
     "He is good," I said.
     "All right, if you say so. I'll take it."

A woman stopped me in one of the aisles.
      "Can you show me the 'Teenagers are driving you crazy' section?"
      I laughed. "We sure do, right over here," leading her to the parenting and childcare section.
      "Maybe there's a book called Teenagers Suck," she mused. "And I mean that in the most loving way possible."
      She was having struggles communicating with and dealing with the two teenagers she had at home. She'd already read Get Out of My Life, But First Could You Drive Me and Cheryl to the Mall?. We perused the section, and found a few...the Everything Guide to Teenagers, Parenting with Love and Logic.
      "It's like they are totally different people. My son who used to be so sweet now isn't," she said.
      "Yeah, they do that. Mine did that." "Oh, you have teenagers?," she asked intently.
      "Well, they are in their 20's now."
      "Ah. You survived.," she said wistfully.
      "I did. You'll survive too." I left her looking at several books.

A dark haired woman with bright red lipstick came up to the register. She was wearing a bright blue tank top and her fingernails were long and polished with glittery polish and there were stars on the fingernails as well. She had a big Wonder Woman tattoo on her arm, and a Wonder Woman figurine on her keychain. I'm pretty sure she is Wonder Woman. She might want be a little more discreet, so others don't find out.

...And More Customers

There's an elderly Asian gentleman that comes in few times a week to buy a New York Times and a Wall Street Journal. He's very soft-spoken, always gets the same thing. One day a very tall, not Asian man came in with a piece of paper. He asked for the New York Times and a Wall Street Journal. I told him I thought I knew who they were for. He said yes, he was buying them for a friend who was in the hospital. The not Asian man came in for several weeks, buying the newspapers for his friend. I told him to tell him that we missed him and that we hope he's doing better. A few days later the Asian gentleman came in, moving slowly, looking a little pale, but up and around. I told him how good it was to see him and hoped he was doing better. He smiled and seemed pleased to be remembered.

Since then sometimes it's been the Asian gentleman and sometimes the not Asian gentleman who buy the newspapers. This week it was the Asian gentleman. I hope he's getting better.

A middle-aged couple came in and asked for the death and grieving section. As we walked over to the section, they said they needed something about losing a child. I pointed out a few titles dealing specifically with the loss of a child. They said, "But our son wasn't a kid, he was 22." I said that he's still their child, and many of the books talk about losing one's child, and that the age of the child didn't necessarily matter. "He was killed in Iraq.", they said. "He was our only son." "I'm so sorry.", I said. They were crying. I was crying. I pointed out a few more titles, said I was sorry again and walked away. Their picture was on the front page of the paper the next day, sitting at their son's funeral.

A girl about 10 years old and her dad came up to the register. One of the books they were purchasing was a book about Stephanie Meyer's Twilight series. The girl said, "That's for my friend. She has a brain tumor. She loves Twilight." I told her I thought it was nice of her to be getting her a book she knows she'll enjoy. "She named her tumor. She named it Fred. This is the second time the tumor has come back. She's in the hospital. She really likes Twilight. This'll be great." I told her I liked that she named her tumor. And that I hope she enjoys the book. "She WILL!"

A woman was looking for a baby book. She was looking for a particular baby book (that we didn't have). As another option, I told her about what another customer had done for Mother's Day. The other customer's sister was having a baby girl, so she bought 5 pink blank journals for herself and her mother and other relatives to write in about this new baby girl. I thought it was a marvelous idea. The customer yesterday thought so too, "IF people would write in it." She said her family members wouldn't write in it. She has four grandchildren and none of them have baby books. This new baby that's coming is the first one for this daughter. "She WILL keep a baby book. She's just one of those who think keeping traditions going is a good thing, so she will do it." She talked about how she kept baby books for all of her kids. Some of her kids ask her about their kids, "when did he start walking?", they'll ask her. "That's why you write it down", she says to them. She's thrilled that this daughter will be keeping a baby book, and she didn't seem to mind that we didn't have the one she wanted.

A young man wearing a leather jacket and carrying a motorcycle helmet was looking for a book for his mother. She likes thrillers, has read Michael Crichton and liked him. We chatted for a while about what she's read, how Michael Crichton kind of has his own niche, with almost biological thrillers. He then asked if I liked Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. "I loved it.", I said. "So did I." I told him that there is a sequel to it (World Without End); he hadn't known about a sequel. I told him I didn't like it, as it was set 100 years after Pillars of the Earth and all the people I liked in the first one died. I just couldn't get into it. He ended up taking Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol, which I liked and sounded to him like something his mom would enjoy.

Our store is doing a book drive for children in foster care. A young-ish man with long hair and a beard came up. He was purchasing two books of gay erotica. I told him that we're doing a book drive for kids in foster care, and asked if he'd like to donate a book. "Oh, wow, that's cool. I was a foster child." He bought Holes by Louis Sachar for the book drive. "This was my favorite book when I was a kid."

Stores Are Not Playgrounds (and Other Customers)

Last night a woman came into the store with her two children, girl and a boy about three and four years old. Mom had a big exchange to do (lots of items, kind of complicated), and the two children were left to their own devices. They were looking at displays, playing with each other and running up and down the aisles. They'd been in the store for about half an hour already, and the exchange took about 20 minutes, and when done, Mom headed out to the car with her bag and the kids. whew! Then she came back IN, without the bag, to do more shopping. Mom was looking at books and pretty much ignored the kids, who again were playing, looking, pulling things off tables and shelves. One of the managers went over and told the Mom that she needed to watch them, that it was not okay for them to be running around freely. Did that help? Did they stop? Not so much. At one point Mom wanted to go to a distant part of the store to get an item and told the kids to "stay right there. don't move. stand still." The boy stayed and the girl started following her Mom. Mom joked about it, "Who's following me? Who's following me when I asked them to stay there?" After about an hour (the second hour), she finally came up to the registers ready to check out, with a large stack of books. She was paying close attention to the purchase, hardly any attention to the kids. They finally left at about 8:30.

It wasn't the kids' fault, they were just doing what preschoolers do, run around and play with each other and whatever is around them. They weren't given any guidance or parameters for how to behave in a bookstore. argh.

All right, that was a bit of a rant.

Two young men stopped me in an aisle and asked if I could help them find a book for their Mom. They said she'd liked The Kite Runner. Three Cups of Tea was in their hands, and they asked if that would be good. I told them that it IS good, very good, describing Greg Mortensen's work to get schools built in Afghanistan, but that the version they had in their hands was the young reader's version, their Mom would probably prefer the original. I showed them the front bays of books, pointed out ones I'd read (Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (charming, lovely), Lovely Bones (brilliantly done, stunning) as well as ones I hadn't but know a bit about (Olive Kitteridge won Pulitzer Prize, heard it's a bit grim, A Reliable Wife selling well, good story, I want to read it). I found myself talking pretty fast, trying to give them many options. I said it sounded as though their mom liked good fiction, and they agreed. They ended up choosing Three Cups of Tea. They were very sweet.

A woman started to ask me a question..."Can you help me? You're going to hate this question, I hate this question. I work in a perfume store and people ask me all the time, 'What would be a good perfume for my mother?', and it's so individual, but I'm going to ask anyway, Can you help me find a good book for my brother-in-law?"

I appreciated that she KNEW what she was asking, choosing a book IS so individual. I try to find out if they know any likes or dislikes of the person, what they've read before (and liked OR disliked)...sports? politics? history? thrillers? science fiction? It's helpful to have somewhere to start.

The hardest is when people come in and want to choose something for a child. That they haven't seen in five years. Who lives across the country. And they have no idea how well the child reads, nor what the child is interested in (bugs? princesses? dinosaurs? magic?). It's a challenge but I've got to give them props for wanting to give the child a book.