Hello everyone,
We’ve been asked recently by a number of people what we will do once the bad weather comes. We have two answers for you. The first, more long term, answer is to get lots of solar panels, rain barrels and Potassium Iodide. The second, more short term, answer is that once January comes around we will drive the bus up to the Bruce Peninsula and sell books to the local wildlife. This past summer we returned to the Bruce and met a small literary society of raccoons and groundhogs. They are all vigorous readers and dumpster divers and we felt right at home with their furry pretensions. Their currency leaves much to be desired, as it’s basically trinkets and canned goods, but once you acclimate to the off-grid lifestyle it comes much easier than you’d think. Come spring we’ll return to the big city of London, Ont and resume selling books to the locals and proper, eating cooked meals like a well-educated person.
As long as it’s not snowing, we will be on the road. Everywhere we go, we meet people interested in reading. We were buying diapers just the other day at Superstore (hot off an event, we usually buy groceries with our bookbus, a giant blue marvel in the parking lot) and a young girl asked us what we were about. We told her, “We’re a used bookstore on wheels!” She purchased some Jane Austen and got to see the source of our secret shame, a pile of fabric grocery bags that is too big. It’s just too big, but we always forget our bags and end up buying more. We have SO MANY FABRIC BAGS! Aren’t these supposed to reduce waste? They double as book transport from our house to our bus, as bags are easier to carry than boxes, so thank you SUPERSTORE!!! Indiscreet price gouging AND storage solutions!
What a time to be alive.
Our bus is packed with New Arrivals. It’s positively bursting with literacy. We’ve purchased three collections this past week, one of great children’s sets, another with damned fine non-fiction, and a third of Penguin paperbacks (still to be catalogued). In addition to our usual Variety Cafe stop on Saturday morning we will be at Halloween In The Village in Wortley Village on Saturday and the Spooky Sunday Street Market downtown on Sunday. We’ll be handing out candy and selling banned books to children, like the demonic Huckleberry Finn and The Giver. We’ve decked out the bus in spider webs and packed it with all of our new arrivals as well as other boss reads.
Much love,
Jason and Vanessa
