One of those good days ... with books.

Yesterday was pretty ideal. I started with my Thursday morning writing buddies at Barnes & Noble; not very productive, but we had good tea and coffee and consoled each other about major revisions happening with our novels. I ate lunch at Jason's Deli at the Shoppes at Friendly. They have a wonderful salad bar, with those giant croutons of buttery crunchy air. Then I hit the annual St. Francis Episcopal Church book sale. Ahhh.

Of course, I started in the vintage book room. They had a 1940 For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway, at a high first edition price. I chatted with the man who was running the room right then, and we both agreed that it probably was not a first edition (I confirmed later that it wasn't). He marked the price down substantially and I took it. He even threw in an extra copy, apparently wanting to get rid of another one in worse condition.

For history, I bought
- a Greensboro coffee table history book because it has two pictures of the Hockett (Hoggatt) family, near cousins of my ancestors.
- a bound volume of Harper's magazine. The cover is in even worse shape than the volume I have, but the pages are good and I figure 1864 will be an interesting year.
- a 1919 pocketguide for trappers (a gift).
- and The Randolph Story, a bound collection from the Randleman Rotary Club that includes their well known booklet about Naomi Wise (a local tale of 19th-century murder).

Here are a few that I just couldn't resist because of the unusual books themselves (vs. content)
- a 1900 history book consisting entirely of illustration plates, most of them in color.
- Ships and Havens, a thin 1898 book with fuzzy felt cover, printed in two colors.
- An illustrated Keepsake Album - an autograph book, containing several handwritten notes to someone named Jennie.
- and a 1939 Bible picture ABC book (Q is for quail ...).

Just for reading I found a Tony Hillerman book that I didn't have and a book about the leper colony on Molokai. After looking and looking, I found several Elizabeth Peters books, including the next one in the Amelia Peabody series that I wanted to read! I also picked up some Russian flash cards and a dictionary of Russian naval terms. Why would I need to know that poo-le-myot is machine gun? Now I see that this neat little book has everything from ranks, to dialogue skits about coming aboard, to polite little letters to write. All in cyrillic.

Time flew by, people were nice - if you mention an author to somebody you've been doh-si-doh-ing around for the last two tables, they'll let you know if they find it. I came home with a heavy crate and a lighter purse, victorious and content.