Helping the Hoi

Hello.

It comes as a bit of a shock to me, but it seems that there is a definite loss of awareness of irony in our culture. This is despite the cynical and rather argumentative claims of postmodernists and other cultural critics who see the world as degenerating into a formless, amorphous blob of subjective experience and loss of feeling. As any self-righteous cultural critic would state, the ennui and general unease felt in contemporary culture comes from, among other places, a sense of listlessness among the living and a general malaise in the everyday experience of people.

What this boils down to, at least for those consumers who enter Booth and Noble and attempt to make sense of the endless monotony of their lives, is that either a) they do not realize what asses they are being, or b) they realize and they just don't care.

My vote is for the first option.

As a case in point, the other day at Booth and Noble, I noticed a preponderance of Ironic Shopping. As you may know, when someone works in a retail book shop they must automatically be gifted with the inane trivialities of the minutiae of your life. In other words, all of us Grunts must be extremely well-versed in any knowledge that the customer requires. Am I an expert in coin collecting? Of course! Do I know everything there is to know about business/commercial real estates! I'm completely licensed, of course! Do I know what life is like for the Telugu culture? Why, I'm part of that culture, sir!

What do I mean by Ironic Shopping? What I mean is, for the first two hours that Booth and Noble was open, every single customer that approached me - male, female, tall, short, ignorant, butt-ignorant - asked me where the Self-Help section is.

Is this not Defeating the Very Purpose of the Self-Help Section?

What makes it worse is that these people all had specific titles. In order, these were the titles they were looking for (this is not a joke):

• Women Who Think Too Much


• Think and Grow Rich


• 365 Steps to Self-Confidence: A Program for Personal Transformation

What is the key connection here?

Yes, it is confidence and thinking: the irony of which is that neither was attempted in searching for the book. Even a cursory glance around Booth and Noble will reveal the Self-Help section.

Of course, the irony here is not just that some people decide to not think and grow rich (or, as it is, not-think and grow Booth and Noble rich), but that even when they don't think, they are faced with the incredibly difficult task of becoming capable of handling their own life. To this end, a gentleman comes up to me at the desk and asks for a copy of "an introduction to economics." I lead him to the economics section and give him a book that would work for him. He responds with a disgusted snort and a derisive scorn:
"I'm not looking for a book ANY one can read. I want a TEXT book."

I tell him we don't sell textbooks, but I can order something for him. He declines and leaves.

Ten minutes later I'm called to the front of the store to help ring out the customers. I work the registers for a few minutes and then who should be next in line but economics gentleman. And what should he be buying but:
the book .

I was super polite to him, but I don't think he understood.

Of course, nothing beats man who called the store at the beginning of the day.

"Hello, Booth and Noble," I said into the phone.
"Do you know anything about stamps?" He asks with neither a "hello" or a "how ya doin'?"
I respond: "I do not, but we have books about stamps if you want to come in and browse."
"Well," he says, "do you know what this might be worth?" And he proceeds to read off a stamp to me.
"Sir, I don't know anything about stamps."
"But this has got to be worth something, right?" And here are the facts from the stamp he elucidated:

"So I've got this stamp from 1707. It's got a picture of John Adams on it, you know John Adams?"
"Not personally," I admit, "But I have heard of him."
"Ok, well, it's John Adams and it says '2 cents, United States' on it. That's gotta be worth something, right?"
I stop and think. Something here doesn't add up.
"Sir," I say, after realizing the problem. "Perhaps you'd like to take this up with your nearest Philatelist.

Of course, who am I to understand the workings of the consumer mind. I'm just a Grunt.