Books!

[mamadeb]

What do you do when you've just completed a major holiday, you're waiting to hear what, if anything, your husband can eat *and* a country you hold very close to your heart is in a constant and bloody state of war?

You oversleep that day's rally at the UN and instead take a subway and a train to an antiquarian book fair and forget *all* of that. And that is, indeed, what we did. I bought three bagel sandwiches, picked my husband up after his Sunday morning class and we went to Garden City, Long Island. The trip was pleasant by itself - Jonathan the train buff loved looking out the train windows all the way there.

The fair was not as crowded as it could be - the dealers seemed to outnumber the customers - but that didn't matter. The booths were full of books - modern first editions and antiques, books with dust jackets, books with elegant bindings and books with neither, and in all categories. Just the selection is overwhelming. I love book fairs.

I came in with three categories in mind - children's books, cookbooks and etiquette books. A children's cookery and etiquette book dating from 1880 to 1930 would be ideal. I love children's cookbooks from that time period.

I didn't find any children's books this time, but I did come back with a bunch of cookbooks and one satire on etiquette books, plus some commercial advertising pamphlets - including the Gold Medal Flour one - and a book on advertising which I got at a discount. All under $100, too.
This is excellent. Last year, I came back with a *single* children's cookbook for $125, *but* that was a good price for the book and I'd been searching for it for a year, since I'd passed it up the year before, so it was all worth it.

All in all, very, very good.

Comments

[vass]

{{{{Mama}}}}

I'm glad you had a good day.

A few days ago I got an email from the green Left email list, inviting people to a rally against Israel. They just took it for granted that if you're an environmentalist and your politics are left, you'll be anti-Israel and pro-Palestine. I wanted to yell or cry or something, but I just deleted it.

Where are all the people who are just anti-*war*? Who want to see the cycle of retaliation for retaliation stop? Never mind, I know. Sitting there trying not to yell or cry.

I just finished Paul Auster's Leviathan. My brother gave it to me for my birthday some five years ago, and has been nagging me to read it every year since.

The rally...

[avivasedai.livejournal.com]

... was well attended, and sleeping was probably what you needed to do, and you got good books out of the day, so no harm no foul. Visiting Israel was a great way of showing your support. I'd go on Birthright if I could niche out the time from work... a weekend trip there is wrong.

[mamadeb.livejournal.com]

I'm very hawkish at the moment. There's supposed to be another pro-Israel rally in a couple of weeks at a more reasonable hour. We might well attend.

None of it is good, and it's going to get worse before it ends.