Wednesday, March 13, 2013

To Return or Not to Return - Or, My Life as a Wimp

February 15, 2012

I don't know if it's just me, but do any of you find it difficult to return a book to the bookstore?  It seems wrong on some level, akin to returning a package of underwear.  It's just unseemly.  Like I'm trying to return something that you've used "just a little bit."  You see, the trouble is that I had placed "The Scorpio Races" on hold at my local library and then completely forgot about it.  Around ten days later, I was meeting my girlfriends to go see "One For The Money" (that's a whole 'nother story).  I had a couple of minutes to spare, so I dashed into my local Barnes and Noble and BOUGHT a copy of "The Scorpio Races."  The next day, I swear, I received a notice from the library that my request was in.  I had completely forgotten I had placed a hold and rushed over, head full of anticipation for the mysterious book that awaited me on the hold shelf.  Imagine my dismay when I discovered it was the exact same book I had just spent twenty bucks on!  Alas, here is where my dilemma occurred.  Do I take the book back to B&N for a refund?

Can you return a store-bought book?  I honestly I had no idea.  The logical part says, "Of course, you can. You can return anything. You can return loaded software, altered dresses, bad cheese. Why not a book?"   Because, for me, it felt like returning sexy lingerie.  There is something so intimate about a book that to take one home and then return it felt, I don't know, dirty.  Needless to say, I wussed.  I sucked up the twenty bucks and chalked it up as a loss, head hung low in embarrassment.  I could say that the moral of



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