MD versus Bookstore

MD: I’m going to the bank. I need quarters for laundry, and the bank has those.

Bookstore: I’m right across the street from the bank. Aren’t I shiny? And you have those Hugo noms to read.

MD: But I just took for myself forty dollars in quarters. Surely I can’t afford a book right now.

Bookstore: Well, you can just skim the first pages of these books, to see who you wish to read first.

MD: What does this do for me?

Bookstore: Er. It prepares you. For when the time comes. And you know what they say: Be Prepared.

MD: I was never a boy scout.

Bookstore: It was an allusion. I figured you’d know what that was.

MD: I don’t know. I should be at work.

Bookstore: First one’s free.

MD: So you are aware, I sigh heavily as I do this.

Bookstore: Victory!

MD: You don’t have any of the Hugo nominees on your shelves!

Bookstore: Do so! I have Scalzi right there, see?

MD: That is both Old Man’s War and cheating.

Bookstore: Oh but look. I have The Book of Lost Things right here.

MD: Cheating!

Bookstore: And I have The Somnambulist here. Didn’t you want to read this?

MD: When it was out in paperback, yes!

Bookstore: But look at the cover. And the era. Just read the first page. Just a taste.

MD: [reads] “Be warned. This book has no literary merit whatsoever. It is a lurid piece of nonsense, convoluted, implausible, peopled by unconvincing characters, written in drearily pedestrian prose, frequently ridiculous and willfully bizarre. Needless to say, I doubt you’ll believe a word of it.”

Bookstore: Eh?

MD: I hate you so much.