How does he do it? On bookselling, reading at the gym and the secret of finding time! May 20 2019

How does he do it?

I recently read a most delightful book by Shaun Bythell called The Diary Of a Bookseller. Shaun owns a second-hand bookshop in Wigtown.

Wigtown for those who don’t know is a book town in Scotland, it sounds like heaven.
For those not even remotely related to the book trade the book is a gem. Shaun’s tales are hilarious and heart warming. But oh, for those of us buried in a book shop it is as if he is reading our minds.

I am sure that he has stolen tales of both the grumpy and delightful customers that we meet daily. There are those who think that the books in the boxes , (those not even bought yet or priced or even destined for the charity or the recycling plant ) are definitely much better than the exciting tomes lovingly placed by us on the shelves.
I sometimes think of hiding a rarity under a box of mouldy books that we have looked at.
The ones that have us reaching for the hand sanitizer as we stare mournfully at blackened and rather smelly books. I do not think I am that mean but you never know how I will feel on a given day.
Just saying...

Shaun’s stories are laugh out loud funny which sadly has curtailed my visits to the gym. My habit is to assuage the guilt of my lazy disposition and visit the gym book in hand, whereby I stroll leisurely on a treadmill reading and smiling. It makes the idea of exercise so much more tolerable. I may not be breaking a sweat. Okay , I am definitely not sweating but I have been known to weep or rather sob noisily and in this case laugh so much that I had to stop and sit down to curtail the hilarity.

Since I am generally regarded as an eccentricity in the gym and thus can misbehave on occasion, ( like some of the customers who enter our shops), guffawing loudly which leads to hiccups on the treadmill is a definite no no.
Give up the book ?
Never!!
So gym has become a non event. . I am not sure that it never was an event.

But now for my one and only problem with this book.

There is something that Shaun writes about that is really worrying me.
He speaks of reading in his chair in the shop.
When does this happen ?
I really want to know.

Not only that he had time to write a book!
I am doing something very wrong.
My days are spent looking at books or pencil in hand trying to price the ones that I have bought already before nosy customers get to them first!
If anyone knows please tell me the secret .
It sounds idyllic.
And tempting.
And so if it happens you do not find me hidden by boxes in one of our shops there is a strong possibility that I may be hidden in a corner in a certain shop in Wigtown reading.
And by then I will know the answer to this vexing question.