Three Conversations I Had Today

1. A woman approaches, arms akimbo, ready for a fight.

"Why," she demands, "don't you have a Hanukkah section?"

2. "Excuse me," a gentleman says, approaching my desk, "the U of T bookstore couldn't get this for me -- can you?"

(In case you don't want to click, the book he wanted was a copy of the Physician's Desk Reference to Current Drugs.)

(I check.)

"This is the 2006 edition. It's out of print," sez I.

"That is not true! I Googled it!"

"It's true. There's been a 2007, 2008 and 2009 edition since then. I can get you the most recent one," sez I, deciding not to explain the internet.

"I need this one. It is best."

"Um. It's out of date," and I attempt, even though I rebel against the waste of my time, to explain why the Physician's Desk Reference to Currently Available Drugs goes through yearly editions.

"This one has the most information!"

"It has the most out-of-date information."

"I only want this one! AND I NEED IT. NOW." He gives me the eyes of frantic craziness.

So I gave him directions to the local library and told him that the librarians could help him buy it online. He doesn't -- unsurprisingly, given his belief in the power of Google -- have a computer or internet access.

3. (I am at the cash desk, ringing people through.)

"So, are you going to be charging for bags?" asks a gentleman.

"If the bylaw passes, yes, we will," I say.

"Don't know what they're making such a fuss about," he says.

I decide I'm game for it, since, at his request, I'm putting his 75 cent newspaper in a plastic bag -- a request which I cannot refuse, but which always makes me cross.

"Plastic bags don't break down, you understand," I tell him.

(I didn't have stats on hand, but internet research later shows me that degradable plastic bags take 10-20 years to break down into smaller bits of plastic, as long as they're exposed to light, but plastic bags in landfills are nigh indestructible, since they're buried.)

"Pffft," he laughed. "In Nova Scotia they've got a farm, see? They put the plastic on it. Breaks down in, like, 20 days. We've got a farm here, y'know. Could do the same. Don't know what they're on about."

"They've got... a farm?" I say, weakly.

"Yup. Don't know what the Mayor's on about," he said, shaking his head as he went out the door. "We've got a farm, too."