50,000 Books Anyone?
We bought 50,000 books last week (gasp!) – but– not for our home library. We sell used books online and we were informed about a couple of ladies getting out of the business and selling their books, so we purchased them. Off to Colorado we went on Monday afternoon. Russell had only got about a 1 1/2 hours of rest because of staying up all night to get taxes done so he started the 13 hour drive tired. Travelling through Flagstaff we saw a highway sign stating that I-17 was closed further ahead for a few hours because of dust storms. So our first stop became a place of rest, fellowship and vittles for the body.
Thank you dear friends!
After travelling all night (Russell driving in one vehicle and my nephew and son driving in the other truck) we arrived safe and sound but weary and frumpy in body. Hmmm, what a great way to start the work day. 🙂 But, I ask you, how could one not start feeling better when they are surrounded by a ton (literally) of books? I felt better immediately, thank you very much!
What a great team we were. Everyone had a job and everyone did it well… except for the times we were distracted when we saw an interesting book. LOL
Research being done
Yoohoo down there. You’re not getting distracted and reading a book are you? LOL
How do you keep the little ones happy for long days of work. SNACKS(!) and lots of them!
With 50,000 books there are going to be many, many books that we do not want. Books that may be popular but are selling for less than a few dollars. No library would want to have this many “donated” books so they end up going to the salvage yard where they are recycled.
Unbelievable isn’t it? We had a total of 21 gaylords that went to the recycler.
It took us 5 days to finish the job and at the end the children, even though feeling triumphant over finishing,…
were so tired and took a well earned rest while waiting for their daddy to come back from an errand…
I don’t know what kind of husband you all have but mine is a “Conquer the road!” kind of guy. So that’s exactly what we did. We left the warehouse at 7p.m., had some supper and started the 13 hour drive. Straight through. Again. This time, however, the road almost conquered him. It was the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere and when I say nowhere, I mean nowhere when the low fuel light came on. Our truck doesn’t get good gas mileage anyways and pulling a trailer full of books it was much worse, so we drove slowly to help conserve what fuel we had. Nothing was around. Highway patrol was called and they said the nearest diesel would be 50 miles away.
I’m happy to report that the story does have a good ending for we saw a sign for diesel fuel on a freeway exit. We took that road and followed it for 6 miles until we came to the little town of Pecos, New Mexico. What we found was a closed gas station with only 2 gas pumps. Would this little place have 24 hour gas? Yes, they did! Big sigh of relief.
Russell was so tired and there were no lights on at the station so the first time he put his credit card in wrong. So he came and got his head lamp because he didn’t want to mess up his one chance.
As an aside, let me tell you this was the 2nd time on this trip that we were close to running out of fuel. It seems that this happens to us at least once per trip we’re on. You’ve heard people say, if you’re a painter, everyone else’s house will get painted but not your own. If you’re a mechanic, everyone else’s car will get fixed but not your own. Well my husband and his dad used to have an Exxon gas station and Russell says there were many times that he (Russell) would run out of gas shortly before he got to his own station and there he’d be walking up the street, carrying a gas can wearing his Exxon uniform. Everyone else’s car had gas but not his own.
So, there you have it – the scoop on clearing out 50,000 books and as an extra bonus, my life with a former gas attendant. 🙂
