How I ended up with my copy of the GEB, something I'd been looking for for quite some time at that point.

One day my friend Maureen and I happened upon a previously empty store downtown, which was currently being used for some cheap book sale. We wandered around picking up this and that. I went to the checkout first, she wasn't done yet, so after I payed for my books I wandered over to where she was, a section I hadn't bothered checking because it contained books that were on a topic I couldn't have given a rat's arse about. So I just stood there waiting for her to finish her perusing, and I leaned on the table, putting my hand on top of a pile of books. When she was done I proceeded to stand up straight, and happened to look down under my hand, and lo, there it was - the GEB in all its fine, hard-covered, perfect condition glory - and what was so odd about it was that it was in a section of books that it shouldn't have been in, some area with either cooking or trite, historical fluff fiction.

I immediately snatched it up (it was only $4.99!) and flew like the wind to the register to purchase a copy of the GEB which I, many years later, left in England by accident, and which is now in the possession of my friend Anna who, after hearing I'd lost my copy of the GEB, sent me another as a gift - this before the lost GEB was found somewhere in the depths of our friend Tal's house along with a pair of boots I'd also forgotten.

That's about the only thing I dislike about travel besides the crampedness of airplanes - you always forget something. My first trip to France I left behind a copy of the Bhagavad Gita and Milton's Paradise Lost. I really should get them back one of these days - it's been about 20 years. My how time does fly. In Hungary I forget a batik housecoat my mother had sent me from Africa.

Still, the whole story had a satisfying ending, and my old, serendipitously found copy of the GEB is now in the hands of one of the few people I know who could truly appreciate it.