a little matter of bookcases
With my offer letter in hand, I am well on my way with the lease paperwork for the new apartment, discovered this Saturday in a tired haze. (My feet still hurt. Ow.) And thus begins the cataloguing of my assets, what has come from previous apartments, what needs to be purchased, what has disappeared into the caverns of my parents' garage never to be seen again....
Not surprisingly, I have a desperate need for bookcases. (IKEA, you are forewarned. Stock up.) I've been making do, but the piles in front and next to the units I have are becoming precarious, to say the least. But as I'm assuming that people would like to sit on something in my new living room, I've also done a small tour of furniture stores. One of these stops was quite notable, because I had this nice elderly gentleman who reminded me terribly of my grandfather, pointing things out and being generally helpful in that stifling, I-need-the-commission kind of way. When I told him that in addition to a couch I was looking for bookcases, I'm afraid I rather stumped him.
"Bookcases? What's a nice girl like you need bookcases for?"
Right. How silly of me. Bookcases! What was I thinking?! I had meant to ask for a vanity table to hold all my lipsticks. Durr. I explain as politely as possible that I have a lot of books that need proper homes on shelves.
"You can leave things like that at your parents' house. (We'd gotten quite chummy, obviously, by this point.) I left my books at my parents' house until I married my wife."
Not only is this an unacceptable suggestion because of the lack of room at said house, but more importantly... live without my books? Surely you must be joking.
"Bookcases, huh? Well, I never... You don't hear that from kids these days."
Guess not. (Eventually, he did show me their bookcase section, which consisted of two units, that came in three different sizes: three shelves, four shelves and five shelves. He has no idea.)
Not surprisingly, I have a desperate need for bookcases. (IKEA, you are forewarned. Stock up.) I've been making do, but the piles in front and next to the units I have are becoming precarious, to say the least. But as I'm assuming that people would like to sit on something in my new living room, I've also done a small tour of furniture stores. One of these stops was quite notable, because I had this nice elderly gentleman who reminded me terribly of my grandfather, pointing things out and being generally helpful in that stifling, I-need-the-commission kind of way. When I told him that in addition to a couch I was looking for bookcases, I'm afraid I rather stumped him.
"Bookcases? What's a nice girl like you need bookcases for?"
Right. How silly of me. Bookcases! What was I thinking?! I had meant to ask for a vanity table to hold all my lipsticks. Durr. I explain as politely as possible that I have a lot of books that need proper homes on shelves.
"You can leave things like that at your parents' house. (We'd gotten quite chummy, obviously, by this point.) I left my books at my parents' house until I married my wife."
Not only is this an unacceptable suggestion because of the lack of room at said house, but more importantly... live without my books? Surely you must be joking.
"Bookcases, huh? Well, I never... You don't hear that from kids these days."
Guess not. (Eventually, he did show me their bookcase section, which consisted of two units, that came in three different sizes: three shelves, four shelves and five shelves. He has no idea.)
6 Comments:
Live without books?? Oh my...the horror! ;-)
My bf once suggested that I box up my books instead of buying a new bookcase. My shocked look and then insane laughter made it clear that his suggestion was just not an option.
It's getting to the point now that I'm thinking of moving to a bigger place so that I can buy more shelves and more books! I hope you get everything set up just the way you want it.
Tania
What does a "nice girl" want with bookcases? Oh, yes - I forgot. Everyone knows that nice girls wouldn't do anything unladylike like, oh, READ. Reading leads to thinking, and thinking leads to opinions, and opinions lead to old men with sexist notions gettting told where to get off (right here, buddy, and right now).
Grrrr.... jackass. You seem to have handled this much more politely than I would have. IKEA has some decent couches, too...
- Jill Smith
I have four Billys. That's not nearly enough so I have a row of shelves and .. er.. piles on the floor.
And that was Ms Bookish, btw. The proud owner of 4 Billys.
Despite his inability to comprehend the intense relationship that some people have with their books, Furniture Salesman Bob actually was very nice and lost the patronizing tones rather quickly (the hallmark of an experienced salesman...) ;)
But I can't blame him for it when my own family does it too. (My mom has reached acceptance; my father believes that I should open my own library in Crazyland. I suppose he has some right, considering he's helped me through all my moves with the same job: lugging the really heavy book boxes up the stairs.)
Proud bibliomaniacs unite!
I have three of the Ikea 72" Expedit bookshelves, and I love them. They are easy to assembly, very sturdy, they look nice, and they hold a ton of books.
If you're pressed for space, they might be too big. If you have space for a 6' x 6' bookshelf, I'd highly recommend it.
--Justin (beautifulstuff.org)
Post a Comment
<< Home