Some days you just get lucky. I brought 10 fresh books in Russian out to the floating book shop, five in hardcover, five in soft. One of the paperbacks featured a single word in English that jumped out at me. It had a racy cover of a beautiful woman and seemed to be inspired by Ian Fleming's 007 series, in this case 00-Sex. Sure enough a gentleman bought it and a hardcover thriller. The other four hardcovers had a fancy script that seemed Arabic. I asked one of my regular customers, a woman wheeling a stroller who again bought a book, if it was Russian, and she said yes. I wondered if they were volumes of the 1001 Arabian Nights. I guessed correctly. Mikhail, who has purchased so many books from me, bought them hoping his granddaughter would read them someday. His eyes were glazed as he said it. My guess is she won't appreciate them until she is an adult, just as I'd failed to realize how courageous my parents had been in emigrating to America until I was in my late 30's. Herbie visited complaining about the lack of heat in his apartment, and left with a romance novel to keep him warm. A woman bought an eclectic mix: books on the Declaration of Independence, a fat flush, Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, and an English-Spanish dictionary. And Cathy, who has a special needs cat, gave me her phone number in case I hear of anyone looking for a roommate, which probably prompted her to buy Catherine Coulter's FBI thriller, Tailspin. And what would a session be without visits from the outspoken Political Man and Mountain Man. As we conversed, Political Man said to anyone who passed: "Tax the rich." Although we couldn't be more apart politically, we will both vote for Joe Lhota for mayor of NYC. Lhota is more Libertarian than Republican, liberal socially, conservative fiscally. PM and I agree that the city may revert to the lawlessness of the pre-Giuliani days under Bill DeBlasio. I also hope Lhota will bring some sanity to government spending. Mountain Man, a retired postal employee, is disgruntled with all politicians. He stopped and asked if I knew why a Canadian firm was given the contract to set up the ObamaCare website. One of its executives was a college classmate of the first lady. MM walked away, as always, outraged. My thanks to everyone who made this a wonderful day, especially mother nature. And the best thing about it was scoring the most favorable parking spot. I have to haul the crates only 20-30 feet rather than a hundred yards, and I don't have to deal with the alternate side regulation until after Thursday's session. Herbie held the fort while I scrambled to move the car.
Vic's 4th Novel: http://tinyurl.com/bszwlxh
Vic's 3rd Novel: http://tinyurl.com/7e9jty3
Vic's Website: http://members.tripod.com/vic_fortezza/Literature/
Vic's Short Story Collection (Print or Kindle): http://www.tiny.cc/Oycgb
Vic's 2nd Novel: http://tinyurl.com/6b86st6
Vic's 1st Novel: http://tiny.cc/94t5h
Vic's Screenplay on Kindle: http://tinyurl.com/cyckn3
Vic’s Short Story on Kindle: http://tinyurl.com/k95k3nx
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