Thursday, February 21, 2008

The End of a Dream

Conversation with Mus last night, over beer:

"I never read a book more than once after I've bought it"
"Nikki and I joined the library"
"Really? Hmm, you know I'm thinking of setting up a service like netflix except you borrow books instead of movies."
"Like a library?"
"No, you get the books, you read them and then return them"
"Like a library?"
"No, a service, for like five bucks a month, but you can order books online"
"Order books online, like I can do with the library, except for free?"
"But you can keep these as long as you want"
"I thought you said you only read them once?"
"OK, but, I'll ship 3 books to you"
"Really, how much does it cost to ship 3 hardbacks?"
"Why hardbacks?"
"Libraries have hardbacks, paperbacks must get trashed"
"I'll have a bigger selection than the library"
"The library can get you any book in any library anywhere in the city through its online system."
"Hmm, maybe I need to think about this some more"

4 comments:

Jen said...

Mus was telling the husband and I of this plan of his back near Christmas. I didn't think he was serious.

I love Mus for the fact that he says these things without thinking the whole thought process or sentence(s) through. Oh, I dunno, for example a few years back he mentioned to me, "you're sure you're the same person? You look good - like, so much better, you know?"

me: ***blink, blink***

gotta love the Mus!

shanksi said...

I just thought this was going to have something to do with last night's footie.

I actually think there might be something in Mus's idea because you actually have to go to the library to get books which is more effort than a lot of people can be bothered with.

Just wondering, do you get drive-through libraries? You get drive-through everything elses just about.

Vikki said...

We had drive-thru at Winchester (Mass) library for returning books, Iain you don't remember cos you never returned the books!!
Life's too short to read a book more than once; there are so many other books to read, I mean, people keep writing more all the time...
Less said about the footy, the better. I only heard it on Northsound which was probably a blessing.
I've typed this while breastfeeding- got to multitask!

Ian said...

Jen: I still prefer his chain of fast food curry places idea.

Shanks: The footie was still in progress when I posted. I was just waiting on the comeback, thinking '3-3 will get us through'. We don't have a drive through library. I have to park and walk 15 yards to the box. Could be worth $5 a month.

Vikki: If you think Northsound was bad. Try the BBC text commentary. Nice multi-tasking, by the way. Though, wasn't Magnus doing a lot of the work on one of those tasks?