Half Priced Books
I bemoan the passing of the half-priced books store. A few years (or a decade) ago, I would be out with friends and would happen upon a storefront in a mall that looked like it was a going out of business shop with its huge banner. But the banner was advertising a special sell-out event—the half-priced books sale. The store space was filled not with bookshelves and impulse and coffee table items all neat and alluring, but with boxes of books that would they not have had the half-priced books! Sticker and had they not been pawed over would have been brand new books, really. I would spend the grocery money to stock my already overwhelming collection of literature, oversized pictorials, and references. I would ask about the possibility of my returning next week and would be told by a temporary day-worker who knew nothing of fine reading that this was a first-come, first-serve sale that would last only as long as the books did. Then the half-priced books store would be no more in that particular location.
These random and too infrequently occurring sales made me crazy. In one respect, I was delighted to come upon such a serendipitous find. In another respect, I was shopping for half-priced books (and even more heavily discounted books for a buck or two) as one shops at Cost-Co or TJ’s (Trader Joe’s). Because the advertising for these kinds of stores is nil—to pass savings on to customers—items in stock are not really in stock. They are random goodies, random top brand items, that are there in a certain quantity only for as long as the quantity lasts. There is no guarantee, in other words, that the lemon cookie you fall in love with this week will be on the shelves (or in the same place or anywhere in the store) the next. Some items do repeat consistently, but those special deals and select items may not be, so you have to stock up on that one-of-a-kind barbecued chicken pizza the way Elaine on SEINFELD stocked up on Today sponges when she found out they were being discontinued.
Then you have to be selective about who you share the item with. In regards to those one-time finds in half-priced books sales, you have to be careful in considering who you will loan the books to. Or, if you are internet savvy, you will go online, find half-priced books (or better than half-priced) at amazon or on EBay. Now THAT’s a deal: EBay sellers have sold me Anne Rice trilogies for five dollars; hard-to-find high literature, such as Mamet plays, for less; and audio books and other obsolete or soon to be out-of-print or out-of-stock items for even less. Just gotta be patient, keep your eyes peeled, and ask the goddesses of half-priced books for luck.
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