Book Shops are like Shit Libraries

When I have nothing to do on a given high street, I always head for the book shop to spend my time. I never look at books I want to buy, only those I have no intention of buying.

The Waterstones I went to was very reader friendly. It had tables and chairs and sofas. People loafed and read brand new books. They sat with their legs stretched and elbows on armrests. They were careful not to break the spine and opened just enough to read. I started reading a book about how to write a novel. I've looked at several of these books and I've always been annoyed by the same thing.

They always say: "There are no rules to writing a novel." It's like buying a cook book and it says on the first page: "There are no recipes for cooking." Or a book on calculus and it saying: "There are no methods for deriving the rate of change from quadratic equations."

Book shops also have a limited selection of books and piles of same books. You have to pay if you want to leave with a book. There aren't enough seats to sit. People are surprisingly quiet and always polite. I had the great pleasure of flicking through fresh unread pages, the smell of printed book paper hitting me with every leaf turned.

I thought: "Book shops are like shit libraries." Then I went to McDonald's, just to use their toliet.*

(*This isn't true, but couldn't think of a way to end this post.)