MemberlistThe Library Index  FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   RegisterRegister   ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 
CABINET OF CURIOSITIES (NEW CONCEPTS)
Reply to topic Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 141, 142, 143 ... 176, 177, 178  Next
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

I was considerably cheered by news that the Poles have shucked off their reputation for never getting anything done because of this

Twoja paczka kurierska od: Amazon EU SARL
została przekazana do doręczenia.
Przewidujemy, że trafi do Ciebie w dniu 2023-01-09.
Kurier InPost podejmie 2 próby doręczenia paczki.
Nieodebrana zostanie zwrócona do Nadawcy
- a tego byśmy nie chcieli
!

My Polish has never been that good but it looked as though they were delivering it today (assuming they're on the Gregorian calendar). But I decided to get it formally translated anyway and was considerably less reassured

Your parcel from: Amazon EU SARL
has been submitted for delivery.
We anticipate that it will reach you on 2023-01-09.
The InPost courier will make 2 attempts to deliver the package.
Unclaimed will be returned to the Sender
- and we wouldn't want that!

That's fighting talk.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

I realise it's a severe diminution in my normally overweening ambitions of world intellectual conquest but I have decided, with this book, that success is to be measured not, as previously, with such outmoded metrics as books sold, books read, books discussed on websites etc but on 'books delivered'.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

In all-guns-blazing America, they've really got the bit between their teeth

Your package is arriving earlier than we previously expected.
Previously expected: Thursday, January 19
It’s now arriving: Thursday, January 12
PIERPONT MORGAN LIBRARY AND MUSEUM
225 MADISON AVE NEW YORK, NY 10016-3405

While Britain is the land of the second delivery

Your Amazon package will be delivered today.
VICTORIA & ALBERT MUSEUM
CROMWELL ROAD
LONDON SW7 2RL

Your Amazon package will be delivered today.
NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY
2 ST MARTINS PLACE
LONDON WC2H 0HE
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Here's a good one (I know some of you collect these things). Peter Ackroyd once cited THOBR in one of his books which I deemed sufficient for him to get one of mine. I discovered to my delight his agency is just round the corner from me. Or I thought it was until I got this

Monday, 9 January
Unfortunately, we ran into an issue
when attempting your delivery. We will try again.
Peter Ackroyd
THE SUSIJN AGENCY
820 HARROW ROAD
LONDON NW10 5JU

When I clicked on the dubry

Sunday, 8 January 10:45 PM
Package arrived at the final delivery station
Neasden, GB
Monday, 9 January 11:39 AM
Out for delivery
Monday, 9 January 7:56 PM
Delivery attempted

I won't be signing up with them if they're already closed at five to eight of a weekday evening. Mind you, it's not safe on the Harrow Road that time of night so it's understandable.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Just as I feared, they were unable to deliver a book to the largest library in France. At this rate it soon won't be the largest library in France

Details of the order
Ordered on December 15, 2022
Delivery address
Ms Laurence Engel
National Library of France
Quai Francois Mauriac
Paris, 75706 France
Items: €9.46 Delivery :€3.09 VAT :€0.69
Refund Total €13.24
Transactions: Refund requested
A refund will appear to your original payment method
within 5-7 business days

I certainly didn't request a refund but, more importantly, what happens to the book? It has been printed by Amazon so maybe it goes into their available-to-buy stocks. Unless it's now deemed to be pre-loved and goes into their second-hand books listings. It might be returned to me though I hope not, I've got a boxful already.

Yes, I know, I should have put "Business hours only" in the Special Instructions box, but I'm an intellectual not a tradesperson.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

What do Maurice Gibb and Roy Orbison have in common? Is it
A. a falsetto voice
B. megastardom or
C. meeting their future wives at Batley Supper Club?

Wrong! It was all three.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Name the singer who, bored out of her skull during a week's residency at a northern supper club, crept out one day to visit the local market, where she was asked to sample the local tripe and then led the crowd in a rendition of Ilkley Moor bar t'at. Was it
A Gracie Fields
B Cilla Black or
C Eartha Kitt?

Of course it was our Eartha. Shame on you. Batley's own.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

I have just done a cunning thing. Now that the budget has been reimbursed for the non-delivery of the book to the Bibliothèque nationale, it has been freed up sufficiently to send it all over again. Same recipient, same address. But this time I have ordered it via German Amazon not French Amazon! You can see what will happen: the French dare not upset the Germans without evoking memories of 1870, 1914 and 1940. It's Marketing 101.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

I've been widely criticised for soft-pedalling my comments on Islam because of fear of fatwas. That is perfectly true (the bit about being widely criticised isn't, nobody's got that far) but here's someone who does get it in the neck serially

Ordered 14th December
Shipped Friday 13th January
Delivering Wednesday
Vatican Museums
Vatican City
Rome 00120

Do I have anything to fear? It depends whether you agree with Stalin "How many divisions does the Pope have?" or with M J Harper more recently

Most remiss of the Sûreté de l’Etat, the second-oldest security service in the world (after the Vatican’s).
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

I made a nice design discovery when converting the book to Kindle format. Making things cramped can be a compelling way to direct attention.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

It's day one and Leonard Cohen is laying down tracks for his new album being produced by Phil Spector.

Cohen: We've been at it all day, Phil, let's do the next one tomorrow morning.
Spector (putting gun to Leonard's head): We'll do it now.
Cohen: We'll do it now.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

I don't know what to make of this.

Revisionist Historiography
Used - Very Good £25.20
£2.80 delivery January 20 - 24.
Dispatches from WeBuyBooks
Sold by WeBuyBooks
(697999 ratings)

I sent out a few early doors to family and friends, mainly to test distribution, but they mostly had Do Not Distribute straps and in any case they wouldn't dare. Of the rest -- a coupla dozen to assorted bigwigs and opinion formers -- they must have been quick off the mark, they only got their copies in the last week or so. If it's the BnF's returned copy, that is dazzlingly efficient. Bit of a mystery.

Twenty-five notes is a hefty price for a secondhand book -- and of course none of it goes to me which is why I'm raising it here. Soon there will likely be multiple copies available for anything down to a penny and at the kind of sales figures I'm looking at, it is doubtful if anyone will ever need to buy it new. For all time. It's just a slow churn as the super-efficient Amazon recycling machine swings into action. An unintended consequence but not a good one for authors. Unless getting read is more important than making money which, for 99% of us, is the case.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

As I was writing that, the French were on the phone again. This time the driver did agree eventually to speak in English. Yes, he knew where the Bibliothèque nationale de France was; no, he couldn't deliver it to Mme Laurence for some reason he wouldn't explain. He did agree to leave it with someone at the front door though, which is definitely progress. And it's actually open at the moment, I checked.

"Mais ouis, mon brave, donnez ce ici. Nous sommes les collecteurs officielles pour WeBuyBooks."
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

What Would You Do?

You are the head honcho of a national institution of international repute that is responsible for collecting and curating your country's historical record. You have been sent a book which has some of the trappings of scholarship and claims inter alia that your institution was founded on the machinations of someone who might have been a serial killer but was certainly a mountebank of epic proportions. The book sets out the case, in some detail, that virtually all your most prized -- certainly most valuable -- possessions are not only fake but likely known to be fake, if not by you then in all probability by your predecessors. It argues, with chapter and verse, that the history -- indeed the religion -- of your country is largely fake.

Do you read the book? Do you open the book? Does the book reach your desk? These are the big imponderables.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

They've finally brought the killer Alec Baldwin to justice for shooting someone dead on a film set. "I didn't know it was loaded," he said, "nor did I pull the trigger, it just went off." Yeah right, Al, you liberals are all the same when it comes to gun control.

He hasn't got a prayer anyway because the assistant director has already pleaded guilty to 'handing a loaded firearm to a third person' (i.e. Baldwin). Though, to be fair, I didn't know that was a crime in the Land of the Free.
Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Reply to topic Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 141, 142, 143 ... 176, 177, 178  Next

Jump to:  
Page 142 of 178

MemberlistThe Library Index  FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   RegisterRegister   ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group