Month: July 2005

Here’s the August print calendar:
Letter Size
A4 Format

I launched a revamped website for my used book business, Using Books, this week. It has a new engine under the hood, some new features, and a table-based layout with an ugly green hat. Beans for Breakfast readers can have a 20% discount (shipping charges excluded from discount) through the end of August. To access the discount, type “BEANS” into the “Coupon Code” field during checkout.

Some potential deals:

• The 1965 paperback, Family Fun in Tape Recording, for $6.00 after discount.
• David & Amy Sedaris’ script, The Book of Liz: only $5.20.
• Short Stories of Wilkie Collins for $6.80.
• Ernst Ruhmer’s 1908 book, Wireless Telephony, just $260.

If this weblog has accomplished nothing else, it’s at least facilitated a protracted family reunion.

I used to work with Garrett at Amazon, now he works at the post office, sometimes delivering my mail.

This afternoon I was hauling a box of books out of the trunk of my car, when he appeared next to a postal service van that was parked in front of me.

“Hi Garrett. How are you doing?”

“Good, How are you?”

“Good.”

“You have to park all the way down here?” he asked me.

“Sometimes. But, it’s only a block away.”

“Yeah, . . . still.” He started to climb into the van.

“Well, I’ll see you later,” I said.

I carried the box up the street and Garrett pulled out and drove away. He was climbing out of the van which was parked outside my building when I walked up.

Before I could make a joke (eg: “Maybe sooner than later”), he said, “I noticed that you didn’t order Harry Potter.”

“No. I haven’t read any of those. Did you order one?”

“Yes.”

I peeked in the back window of the van. There were several tubs of mail laid out inside and almost half of their capacity seemed to be taken up with boxes from Amazon, custom-printed with the title of the new Harry Potter book on the outside.

A man with a full white beard writing musical notation in a large square sketchbook. A half-drained cup of coffee diluted with milk and an extra saucer. There’s a scattering of crumbs that I first take for eraser dust. When I squeeze past the table, I see that it’s spilled sugar. He leans his body into his work whenever someone comes near.

My doorbell rang at 7:30 this morning and I didn’t answer it. I got up an hour later, showered, and then sat down at my computer. An email prompted me to scan today’s headlines. There had been four terrorist bombings in London. I launched the IM client to check in on London-friend Fiona. She said she’d left work early, after the police had set off a number of controlled explosions of abandoned packages in the area around her office building. I couldn’t think of anything to say. I just typed, “I’m sorry.” She signed off. I decided to replan my day, choosing to do some work from a coffee shop hotspot instead of running errands in the suburbs. On the way out, I found a subpoena with my name on it taped to the outside door. I’m instructed to appear in court in a couple of weeks, presumably in a case related to my car’s theft in April. Now I’m at Top Pot plugging numbers into a spreadsheet. I ocassionally skim through the backlog of unread entries in my Bloglines account, noting the odd mix of entries written after today’s bombings and those written earlier in the week.

Sunglasses pushed up onto her head and a large pink flower threaded through a loose bun at the back of her head. Her skirt and sandles are the same green as the half-sheets of paper that she’s drawing on. Her first drawings are shapeless gesture drawings. Her last is a careful picture of a woman sitting by the window in the restaraunt across the street.

Next week at Pioneer Square’s First Thursday there’s a group show by a bunch of Seattle Photographers. Drop by if you can.

Thursday, July 7, 2005, 6-10pm
Art Squad Studios
619 Western, 5th Floor