Gideon, blow that horn!
10:10 a.m.
Buddy Boy finally got his haircut yesterday. Mr. Beattie�s Barber Shop was chock full of customers who had missed him during his absence, so we weren�t able to have our usual conversation. Instead I wandered over to Janice�s place of business and browsed through the used books. Lo and behold, she had a hard-cover copy of Weaveworld by Clive Barker, for $5.00! Joy and rapture!
Janice used to run a second-hand book store in L�ville called McRat�s in the old Georgian Hotel, which disappeared while we were away in Greece five years ago and was replaced by a hole in the ground, which has just recently been filled by a fine commercial and apartment structure owned by the second pharmacy in town. She left to do a Masters in Library Science, and her establishment was replaced (still in the Georgian) by one run by a shaggy-haired hippy who somehow didn�t realize it was no longer 1974. There I found a paperback copy of Weaveworld, held together with an elastic band and priced at $2. It was the best couple of bucks I ever spent. I just loved that book. But it is in such a state of decrepitude that I dare not remove the elastic band for fear it will burst into a thousand loose pages and flutter away on the breeze, never to be seen again.
Imagine my delight when I saw this hardbound edition in her present place of business. I was so happy that I plunked down my $5, no questions asked, and even if I never open it to reread it, I will always have the knowledge that it sits on my shelf and is available should the desire arise. I also bought a second book, The Law of Love, by Laura Esquivel, who wrote Like Water for Chocolate, which I adored. The cover illustration is gorgeous and itself enough reason to buy the book, which also contains a CD of Mexican music to read by! At only $4, what a bargain!
I may have mentioned earlier that the music department was awarded its third position, a tenure-track, full-time job, and is presently in the process of trying to fill it. I think I also mentioned that we originally advertised it as �with senate approval�, and so received only ten applications. Because the new collective agreement has now been ratified, a part-time prof must be on the search committee, and we are having a helluva time finding one who a) wants to do it, and b) is not disqualified in some way because she is married to one of the full-time profs. The Duchess and I are both out for the latter reason, and neither Vlad nor J-Y want to do it. I have been in consultation with our part-time union representative, and explained that it is important that we find out what the music tutors really want in terms of a colleague. Our chair would like to do this job selection toute suite, probably because the students will all be leaving in a couple of weeks as soon as their exams are over, and the search committee also requires two from their ranks on it. It would be nice if we could drag this out so long that they have to readvertise the position in the fall, and wait for a greater number of applicants. Ten is simply not enough, unless of course the most fantastic person is among those few.
This whole thing is like the pail of worms my brothers and I dug up for one of the few fishing expeditions we ever went on, on the occasion when the conservation area would stock the river with fish and open it to families for one day of sport fishing. You know, all brown and wriggly and you just don�t want to stick your hand in there to pull one lone worm out for impaling on that evil hook. Ugh. I had to come up with that image, didn�t I?
<~~~ * ~~~>
