McHuston Booksellers

Rare, Collectible, & Otherwise

Tag: Broken Arrow (Page 115 of 141)

Keeping up with the Updates

October 18, 2012 /

Something made me think about it, and when I did, I realized that I had a menu posted on the website that had not been updated.

Not in a good while.

Looking it over before I updated, I could see good intentions everywhere with a heaping spoon-full of impracticality. A friend had told me after looking over an early version of the menu that I needed to remember that I was running a book store that sold food, not a restaurant with some books around. He was right.

That version of the menu was pared down to the one that I just updated. As it turned out, when the waiter, the cook, the cashier, and the dishwasher are all the same person – it has to be a limited selection of items that can be easily presented. Oh yeah – it helps if they taste good.

I’ve mentioned before that things are ever changing, which shouldn’t be viewed as a negative. It keeps things fresh and edgy. Fresh I like. Edgy? I don’t know, but sometimes it gets the adrenaline started and that can be a good thing too.

It has been fun for me serving lunch, even if it gets a little hectic at times. Those of you who have allowed me to serve you lunch, I appreciate the opportunity – and hope you’ll be back soon!

A Book from a Blog: Customer quotes.

October 15, 2012 /

Don’t get the wrong idea… there are plenty of ultra-literate, engagingly-conversational customers popping in the shop. Yakker that I am, and a true lover of books, I’m always happy to talk about authors and their works.

But…there are some people who come in and don’t quite know what to think. As someone who grew up around books, this group was a surprise to me, and apparently, there are others in book shops who have been engaged in conversations similar to some I’ve had. In fact, a woman named Jen Campbell has just published a collection of off-the-wall type remarks and questions posed to her during her years as a bookseller.

Her dust jacket material has some doozies:

“Did Beatrix Potter ever write a book about dinosaurs?” asked one customer, while another wondered “Did Charles Dickens ever write anything fun?” Someone in her store approached her and said, “I’ve forgotten my glasses, can you read me the first chapter?”

I’ve heard variations of those, but – I’ll admit – I’ve never faced this one:

“Excuse me . . . is this book edible?”

That one had me wondering if the book was leather-bound and perhaps heading for a soup pot. It’s one of Campbell’s collection called “Weird Things Customers Say in Book Stores,” just released from Overlook publishers. At 144 pages, it’s apparent that Campbell has been collecting conversations for a time.

When I opened the shop, it was an eye-opener to realize that there are lots of people who not only don’t enjoy books, but are seemingly unsettled to be around them. A gentleman once opened the door and when he stepped over the threshold, he halted his entry so fast that whiplash might have been an issue.

“Ohhhh, books…” he mumbled, and backed himself out the door as though the shelves had been filled with writhing rattlesnakes.

“How does this work?” one woman asked me after walking in and looking from floor to ceiling. “These are books, aren’t they? Do you rent ‘em out or what?” (The name on the front door is posted as “McHuston Booksellers,” but then not everyone reads the signs…)

My favorite and most repeated anecdote came from an older man who walked in and threw his hands on his hips as he looked around, clearly finding himself amidst unfamiliar surroundings.

“Books, huh?” he mused. “You know I used to have a friend who knew someone who liked to read.”

Cheesy changes.

October 13, 2012 /

You know what they say about change… Keep it! (I’m kidding. I don’t think anyone ever says “Keep the change” except in the movies.) The old saying is something like – there is nothing constant, but change. It’s a froo-froo way of pointing out that we can’t really rely on things being the same as they were last week.

It’s the same with the lunchtime menu.

The items have been changed out a couple of times already, and I’ve mentioned to folks that the cardstock menu is just temporary since I don’t want to pay to etch it in stone (or lamination) until I’m relatively certain that they are the right things at the right price.

A couple of items have been bumped. Not that there was anything wrong with the food, but since I’m still the head chef, line cook, waiter, busboy, and dishwasher – it is important that anything being offered is easy to plate up and serve. (A party of six had me worried, but the majority ordered Irish stew, of which I am a master ladler. (Spellchecker didn’t flag that as a made up word, so perhaps there is a user of ladles called such…)

The grilled chicken is gone. There won’t be a lot of lamenting among you, I know, because it was among the least ordered items on the menu. In its place is a grilled three-cheese: it is nothing fancy, but plenty tasty on the grilled Irish loaf and on the inexpensive end of the price line. The corned beef and Swiss sandwich no longer features slaw atop the sliced meat. I was trying to achieve a Reuben-like sandwich without grilling sauerkraut (which produces a distinct aroma that books love to absorb). I thought the slaw might substitute, but I didn’t care for it after all. The sandwich works as a kraut-less Reuben and is still delicious.

I’ve also fine-tuned some obvious (or should have been obvious) errors, like leaving off the price for a cup ($3.95) or bowl ($5.95) of soup. Oops.

The hours for the food service are still limited. I want to run with it, but I’m still at the crawl/walk stage. The 11:30am to 1:30pm window covers most folk’s lunch hour and gives me plenty of time to get my dishwashing apron a workout afterward.

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