Tuesday, September 10, 2019

Enjoying being back at Pegasus.

I'm really enjoying being back working at Pegasus Books. Bookstore customers are generally interesting people.

I had a customer yesterday who helped me fix my computer, which has been going on the fritzz for  a while now. It started making grinding noises last year, so I bought a new laptop. But I still favor my old laptop like an old shoe--besides which it has a version of Word that I like much better.

Anyway, in the middle of the day the slight grinding noise became alarmingly loud.

"Shut it down, quick!" someone said.

So this customer came forward and says, "There is a trick you might try." Showed me how to do it, and blammo, the damn thing settled down. I don't know if it's permanent.

The customer turned out to be a physics graduate major at the U of O. Obviously super-smart, and they were also gender fluid.  "They" is the term they wanted. I think a couple of years ago I might have been intimidated but because of my experience with Sabrina, I was perfectly comfortable.

I happen to be reading a book called, "The Scientists," which is a big tome about the history of scientists. I made the joke: "I love reading books about science though in most cases I don't have a clue about what they're saying."

But on the other hand, they mentioned something about Isaac Newton being a bastard and how he destroyed the career of someone who estimated correctly the speed of light, and I was able to contribute that he also kept those who thought light had a wave function from being taken seriously, so that was fun. (My knowledge is superficial but wide.)

The point being, I'm actually talking to human beings about interesting stuff, instead of snippets on the internet, which was how I was getting most of conversational stimulation over the past few years. Besides Linda, of course.

I'm working Sundays and Mondays if anyone wants to come in and chat.

No comments: