i went on a little bookstore tour this weekend. it made me not feel sad about my barnes & noble turning into a century 21, and it helped me to articulate this weird relationship that i have with bookstores. because i don't really like books. or, 99% of them. very occasionally i fall in love with a book and the world stops until i finish it. but that is very very occasionally, and it isn't until i've bought a book and have given it a good try that i realize that i don't want it. i wish it wasn't that way. but reading is really very difficult for me. i once threw a tantrum about having to read 30 pages of bridge to terabithia in one night while i was in fifth grade {i was in the car with mum, we were driving in front of carillon square}. i have this fantasy of carrying around a david foster wallace book and reading it in front of people and having people think that i must be cool. because that is what i think about people who read david foster wallace. perhaps i'll just give my moleskine a lobster considering book jacket or something ruther. i don't think i ever opened a book in college. i learned and i enjoyed my classes, usually, but reading wasn't ever my choice learning method. and, like i said, i wish this wasn't the case. because i love bookstores. i like the pretty book covers and the titles that are so intriguing and pleasing to say. the picture of dorian gray, the night circus, the immortal life of henrietta lacks. like, what the fuck, i get so much pleasure out of just the titles. and then i open one and i am immediately flustered because why should i be only reading that book when i am surrounded by thousands of others. the books i choose have to be in first person, they can't have stupid complicated words on the first page, the author can't seem pretentious, and they certainly cannot have a picture on the cover of nasty arms and hands,  à la  that tiny fey book.  i'm a judger of the cover. and the way i judge a good book store is by its moleskine selection. but, godddd i want to know shit so bad. can someone tell me what happens in on the road, and all of those charles dickens things? 
i found one book this weekend that i would like to read. eating animals by jonathan safran foer. i read the first few pages at book culture {not the one on broadway, the one off broadway} and decided that it reminded me of ruth reichl. ruth reichl is the only author who has written multiple books that i've read {besides jerry spinelli}. and in my limited knowledge of authors, i respect her writing more than anyone else's. the opening few pages of eating animals reminded me of tender at the bone. i like the name jonathan safran foer, it is a good name. and i like the name eating animals . i have an idea of what it is about, and i don't know how i feel about it. but usually what a book is about doesn't matter, i just care about how it's written. but so i went upstairs in book culture, where the used books are, and they didn't have it. i decided it was a sign and bought two moleskines instead. maybe someone will lend me their eating animal. but that would be a problem because then if i finish it i would want to keep it. like a trophy. whatever, anyways,
the other bookstores on my tour were:
the bookstore at chelsea market. it left a good impression with me because they have a nice selection of high quality wrapping papers, including one with pictures of donuts.
printed matter, in chelsea. everything had penises or butts on it, and appeared to have been written for the person who wrote it. which is fine. but not something i want to read, and not something i totally understand, and not something i am going to take the time to understand today. maybe another day. 
those book stands on the streets. i was looking for eating animals but they didn't gots it. 


-yeh