Bookstore | Rockford, IL
(Older lady comes in, doesn’t know me, yet decides to make me intimately knowledgeable about her husband’s surgery; she eventually runs out of steam when I don’t respond and looks around at the books on the shelves)
Lady: “I like books.”
Me: “Good! Anything you’re looking for?”
Lady: *ignores my question* “I saw on TV that books are good to have because they make your house look nice.”
Me: *barely stifling a smile* “Really? I heard they’re also good to read.”
Lady: (Evidently, my comment goes right over her) “And you can use them to prop up the bed.”
(Her husband buys books, and then swiftly escorts her out)
Bookstore | Sacramento, CA
Bookstore Customer: “Do people donate all these books to you?”
Me: “Yes. We show up for work every morning and there are boxes of valuable books sitting at the front door.”
Bookstore Customer: “Wow, really! I could open a book store?”
Me: “Sure!”
Bookstore Customer: “If I opened a store, how would people know where to leave the books?”
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Bookstore | London
Customer: “Excuse me, how do I get up the stairs?”
Me: “If you don’t already know, I’m afraid I can’t help you.”
Bookstore | Philadelphia, PA
Bookstore Customer: “Do you sell maps? You know, things with pictures of roads on them?”
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Bookstore | Philadelphia, PA
Customer: “Do you have that book from that movie Les Miserababah?”
Me: “Les Miserables? Yes it would be on the 3rd floor.”
Customer: “What section would it be in?”
Me: “The fiction section.”
Customer: “So nonfiction is true, and fiction is not true, right?”
Me: “Yes.”
Customer: “How can this book be fiction if there is a movie about it?”
Me: “Movies are not true.”
Customer: “Really?”
Me: “Yes. Movies are not true, movies are fiction.”
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Bookstore | Sacramento, CA
(Customer standing on top of an old, oak library ladder)
Bookstore Customer: “If I was your attorney, I would make you get rid of this ladder.”
Me: “If you were my attorney, I’d push you off it!”
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Bookstore | Philadelphia, PA
Customer at a Bookstore in Philadelphia: “I’m looking for the Boston Zagat Restaurant guide, do you have a local interest section that would have it?”
Me: “No. Boston isn’t local. The restaurant guide would be with the rest of the Boston travel books.”
Customer: “Well there aren’t any on the shelf.”
Me: “We must be out of stock. I could order it for you.”
Customer: “No. Well are there any local stores around here that would have it?”
Me: “Boston is not local. Maybe you should wait until you go to Boston and buy it there.”
Customer: “Good idea.”
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Bookstore | Philadelphia, PA
Bookstore Customer: “You have beautiful green eyes.”
Me: “They’re blue.”
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Bookstore | Philadelphia, PA
Customer (pointing to up escalator): “How do I go up? This way?”
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Bookstore | Tacoma, WA
Customer: “Do you have a picture book of dinosaurs?”
Me: “Sure.”
(We walk to the dinosaur books and I show him many books with various sketches and paintings of dinosaurs)
Customer: “No, not pictures…PHOTOGRAPHS. Photos of dinosaurs, please. Where are those?”
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