I Absolutely Love Bookstores

@manly We need more of them and every member of the cabinet should be imprisoned for a year per bookshop that ended up closing as a result of lockdowns.

Ok where shall we start, insofar as I can be bothered dealing with the risible?

Perhaps with the observation readily apparent to everyone else reading this (all 3 of them :P ) that we have here a prime specimen of the categorically terrfied male who encountering something that contradicts his assumptions (and desperate unfulfilled hopes, one suspects) about women, assumes that actually it's all splendid because he stills no best. Witness the condescension, members of the jury.

We may next consider the sort of men one may find around the two ancient universities, I suppose.


And while that is admittedly top shelt material vis a vis college boat clubs, I'm certainly in a position to have observed enough strapping and powerful men reasonably close at hand to know that while admirable in other ways, they don't get Murmurs whimpering. Certainly not a murmur.

Having dealt with that one, and steering clear of the weird race thing you have going on, we may continue.

I've no real need of national libraries. I refer the gentleman to https://similarworlds.com/8918105-I-Love-the-Library/2417848-Ill-admit-my-first-university-choice-was-at-least . So, among the bountiful collection of fictional and real-life library-havers, who is well-known enough that he or she will ring a bell with anyone reading my post, and is sufficiently unserious enough to raise a wry smile? Oh yeah: the guy who decidedly isn't fiction's most out and out insecure and desperate overcompensating man ever created (Gaston). Casubon, for instance, will have most people reaching for monsieur Google (just as soon as they've yelled at Dorothea for marrying him). So: the Beast it is.

Why marriage? Well I think we can best answer that by returning to the idea of humour. Clearly, sarcasm is either lost on one good reader (his Gaston complex again), or he gets it, and immediately leaps to defend his wounded pride by making the assumption that a nice girl (I can only hope) could only possibly not be attracted to him because of the unattractiveness of other men in general putting her off the sex for life.

It's also worth pointing out that while I have some particularly happy Oxford-based memories, it hardly forms the basis for my entire world of experience and so assuming that my lack of desire towards the desperate over-gymmed little men of the wider world is simple because I've not enough of them yet is unsafe at best. Certainly it's incorrect, thanks very much.

So let's be honest, in the hypothetical world of my looking for a man in my life, and given I strongly believe in building from a good solid foundation, we all know by now who will be right at the bottom of the list.

Your desperate desire to be noticed by women is hillarious to me <3

@Murmurs This is a truly fascinating and absolutely brilliant response if I may say. 👏 In fact, I will reread it at least thrice

@Murmurs Mission accomplished? You're back! 👋

@Harriet03 I was off nobbling Corbyn. Or something.

@Murmurs I'm not sure he needed help!

@Murmurs Once my dad found a set of, I think, 14 big volumes that were a weird and whimsical collection of unrelated genres. Fairy tales, Shakespeare, Arabian Nights...and most of the pages were still uncut. That was magical for me.

@Mamapolo2016 oh gosh what an amazing find! 💕

I love trawling through second hand bookshops you can find such wonderful treasure

I don’t miss real books at all. I much more interested in the content than carrying books, and bookmarks, and a nightlight around everywhere. I do really miss good used bookstores, great one in Austin. Some of the coolest stuff and people in those. @Murmurs

@MarmeeMarch Monticello is rather bigger than my flat though. Storage is an issue!

@Murmurs maybe time to switch to e books ?