21 July 2008
Dang Capitalists!
Posted by Dirk under: books; musings .
The local Friends of the Library hold a used book sale every Saturday. People bring in books they don’t want anymore and the FotL use the conference room at the library to sell the books. I like it. I like books and libraries and I’m on a budget so getting a new paperback for a quarter is better than getting it for $7.99. It’s pretty random what you find but that’s part of the fun too. This is a college town so there is all kinds of odd and random stuff that moves through the book sale.
We go to the book sale nearly every Saturday morning. It’s sort of a tradition. (and for any burglars reading this and thinking “aha!”, I warn you, the dog stays home, and though he looks like a simple Australian Cattle Dog, he was raised by an inbred pack of Pitbulls that guard a meth lab in south Oroville. He’s had to fight for every scrap of food since he was a pup, so don’t discount his ability to guard the homestead. He’s killed 8 people so far.) I think the most we ever spent is 15 bucks and we usually come home with a bag full of books.
Recently though, a blight has descended upon my FotL book sale. Various capitalist running dog types, with cell phones and PDAs hooked up to bar code scanners. They go through the boxes of books, scanning each one, and when their little machine beeps or flashes or whatever, they take that book and put it in the big box or cart they lug around with them.
They aren’t buying the books because they love books. They aren’t buying the books because they love to read and want to support the library. They go through cherry picking the books so they can resell them on ebay or amazon or some other place.
And they annoy me. Do you profit mongering assholes have to intrude upon everything? Can’t we have anything nice without you scuzzballs coming around and finding some way to make money off of it?
Perhaps I shall sic my dog upon them.
2 Comments so far...
Arcanum Says:
21 July 2008 at 2:35 pm.
While I find the very idea of these jackasses raiding the library book sales somewhat appalling, the worst aspect is the sense of entitlement they feel. I’ve volunteered at a few library book sales in the Bay Area as part of paying for my room and board when I visit my folks. For the most part it is a fun experience: helping the community, interacting with other book lovers, etc. These “collectors” can absolutely ruin it. For some reason they are under the impression that they have more of a right to be there than everyone else. They’re pushy, rude, arrogant, impatient. I actually had to kick one of them out of a sale for cutting in line prior to the opening (they jockey for position before the opening bell to make sure they get in to the sale before everyone else).
Dirk Says:
21 July 2008 at 3:02 pm.
You should beat them. You’re a young and healthy man. A few years in prison for assault will toughen you up and teach you valuable life skills and the beating you inflict might deter a few of these library pirates.