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| Illustration by Rumors |
I hadn't heard about it but I guess when you are desperate, desperate measures are called for. Amazon offered 5% off on items bought from them if they would price the item at three different brick-and-mortar stores and send them the information, or $15 off if they walk out of a bookstore and buy from them. If this RUDE and UNDERHANDED practice continues, the brick-and-mortar store will only be "showrooms" until they fold. Competition will cease to exist and everyone will ONLY be able to buy from Amazon. I can't say that online pricing and no sales tax has never caught my attention and my purchase, but at least half of the buying has to be from brick-and-mortar stores, or our society as we know it AND our towns will cease to exist. We will have nothing but fast-food places, gas stations, bars, and convenience stores. Everything else will be purchased by "smart" phone over the internet.
Here is a poem written by a bookstore owner:
How Amazon Stole Christmas
Adapted from by Mike Olson, co-owner of Reading Frenzy BookShop, Zimmerman, MN
Every Who down in Who-ville liked Christmas a lot …
But the Grinch, who lived just north of Who-ville, did NOT!
The Grinch HATED Christmas! The whole Christmas season
Now please don’t ask why. No one quite knows the reason
It could be his head wasn’t screwed on just right.
It could be, perhaps, that his shoes were too tight.
But I think the most likely reason of all
May have been he was not ever read to at all.
But whatever the reason, his childhood or shoes
He stood there on Christmas Eve HATING the Whos,
Staring down from his warehouse with sour Grinchy chops
At the warm lighted windows below in their shops
For he knew every Who down in Who-ville beneath
Was busy now hanging a mistletoe wreath (which, incidentally, had been purchased at their local garden center).
“And they’re hanging up stockings they didn’t buy from ME!”
“Christmas is coming! They MUST buy from ME!”
Then he growled, with his Grinch fingers nervously drumming,
“I must find some way to stop Christmas from coming!”
For tomorrow he knew all the Who girls and boys
Would wake bright and early and they’d rush for their toys
And then! Oh, the noise! Oh, the Noise! Noise! Noise! Noise!
That’s one thing he hated! Unless they clicked “Buy now” to purchase their toys
Then the Whos young and old would sit down to a feast
And they’d feast! And they’d feast! And they’d Feast! Feast! Feast! Feast!
They would feast on who-pudding and rare who-roast-cow
Which was something the Grinch hadn’t considered selling until now!
And then they’d do something he liked least of all!
Every Who down in Who-ville, the tall and the small,
would stand close together with Christmas bells ringing.
They’d stand hand in hand. And the Who’s would start singing!
They’d sing! And they’d sing! And they’d Sing! Sing! Sing! Sing!
And the more the Grinch thought of this Who-Christmas-Sing,
the more the Grinch thought, “I must stop this whole thing!
Why for 17 years I’ve put up with it now!
I MUST stop their Christmas from coming! … But How?”
Then he got an idea! An awful idea!
The Grinch got a wonderful, awful idea!
“I know just what to do!” the Grinch laughed in his throat.
And he made a quick tax-exempt online retail monopoly with books-as-a-loss-leader and electronics and coats.
And he chuckled and clucked, “What a great Grinchy trick!
With these coats and these books, I look just like Saint Nick!”
“All I need is a storefront …” The Grinch looked around.
But since storefronts weren’t his, there were none to be found.
Did that stop the old Grinch … ? No! The Grinch simply said,
“If I don’t have a storefront, I’ll use theirs instead!”
So he made an app, Price Check. Then he took some red thread
And he tied two big horns to the top of his head.
Then he marketed Price Check as the way you should buy
“It’s cheaper and easier and convenient!” The lie.
“Why pay overhead costs and state taxes to them?
I have none. Buy from me. It’s the smart way to spend.”
And with Price Check in hand, the Grinch started down.
Towards the homes where the Whos lay a-snooze in their town.
The shop windows were dark. Quiet snow filled the air.
All the Whos were all dreaming sweat dreams without care.
When he came to the first little shop on the square.
“This is stop number one,” The old Grinchy Claus hissed
And he peered through the window, his app in his fist.
Then he squeezed through the keyhole, a rather tight pinch.
But if the devil could do it, then so can the Grinch!
“A bookstore,” he chuckled. “This’ll be a quick night
They won’t see it coming. Why would they? I’m right!”
He looked at “our favorites” and even “staff picks”
Why these do sound like good ones! I’ll add those to my “Wish list”!
Then he slithered and slunk with a smile most unpleasant
And he placed his app, Price Check, beside every present
Mysteries! Fiction! Romances! Manga!
Even puzzles and games like Story Cubes and Jenga.
When the Grinch was all finished undermining the store
The Grinch very nimbly crept back to the door.
By the time he was done, he had quite a long list
Of the things he would add to that warehouse of HIS
The bookstore was quiet again, just like before
But now his app, Price Check, was inside their door.
When he dropped to the sidewalk from the keyhole above
He heard a small sound, like the coo of a dove.
He turned around fast and he saw a small Who.
The keeper of the bookstore he had just slithered through.
The Grinch had been caught by this Who bookstore owner
Who’d come back to town. He had sales to go over.
He stared at the Grinch and said, “Amazon, why? Why are you taking my business? Why?”
But you know, that old Grinch was so smart and so slick
He thought up a lie and he thought it up quick!
“Why my sweet little man,” The fake Santy Claus lied
“I’m not harming, I’m helping! Driving customers inside!”
“They’ll come to your store to do some good dealing.
If they buy from me, why, that isn’t stealing.”
And his fib fooled the man. Then he patted his head.
He got his sales numbers and went back to bed.
And when that little merchant went to bed with his numbers.
The Grinch gave a wink, said “Goodbye!” and “Good Slumber!”
And the last things he took were the signs from the door.
“This store’s now my showroom,” said the Grinch. “I want more!”
Then he did the same thing to the other Who-storefronts
Turning their shops into fully staffed Amazon-storefronts.
It was quarter past dawn… all the Whos at their houses.
All the Whos, still a-snooze
When he filled his warehouses
He stocked with their presents! Their ribbons! Their wrappings!
Their tags! And their tinsel! Their trimmings! And their trappings!
He went home to his mansion outside of Seattle
With the products and prices to start this new battle.
“Pooh-pooh to the whos!” he was Grinchishly humming.
They’re finding out now that no Christmas is coming!
They’re just waking up. I know just what they’ll do.
Their mouths will hang open a minute or two.
Then the Whos down in Who-ville will all cry BOO-HOO!”
“That’s a noise,” grinned the Grinch
“That I simply must hear!”
So he paused. And the Grinch put a Hand to his ear.
And he did hear a sound rising over the snow.
It started in low. Then it started to grow …
But this sound wasn’t sad!
Why, this sound sounded merry!
It couldn’t be so! But it was merry! VERY!
He stared down at Who-ville! The Grinch popped his eyes!
Then he shook! What he saw was a shocking surprise!
Every Who down in Who-ville, the tall and the small,
was SHOPPING! Without any Price Check at all!
He hadn’t stopped Christmas from coming. It came.
Somehow or other, it came just the same!
And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow,
Stood puzzling and puzzling, “How could it be so?”
“It came without Price Check’s new orders galore.”
“It came without any more sales from their store.”
He puzzled three hours till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before!
“Maybe shopping,” he thought, “does come from a store.”
Maybe storefronts … perhaps … mean a little bit more!”
And what happened then … ?
Well, in Who-ville they say
That the Grinch’s small heart grew three sizes that day.
And the minute his heart didn’t feel quite so tight.
He disabled Price Check and stopped the whole fight.
He gave back the neighborhoods, friendships and commerce.
And he … he HIMSELF! The Grinch Read No Monster Here!, by Colleen Thomas, illustrated by Alyssa Thomas, to a group of pre-schoolers at a real live author signing at Reading Frenzy BookShop in Zimmerman, Minnesota.
How awful to see your livelihood erode in front of your and you are POWERLESS against the Amazon invasion machine!
Wonderful English from Around the World
In a Bangkok Temple :
IT IS FORBIDDEN TO ENTER A WOMAN, EVEN A FOREIGNER, IF DRESSED AS A MAN.
Cocktail lounge , Norway :
LADIES ARE REQUESTED NOT TO HAVE CHILDREN IN THE BAR.
Doctor's office, Rome :
SPECIALIST IN WOMEN AND OTHER DISEASES.
Dry cleaners, Bangkok :
DROP YOUR TROUSERS HERE FOR THE BEST RESULTS.
In a Nairobi restaurant:
CUSTOMERS WHO FIND OUR WAITRESSES RUDE, OUGHT TO SEE THE MANAGER.
On the main road to Mombasa , leaving Nairobi :
TAKE NOTICE: WHEN THIS SIGN IS UNDER WATER, THIS ROAD IS IMPASSABLE.
On a poster at Kencom:
ARE YOU AN ADULT THAT CANNOT READ? IF SO WE CAN HELP.
In a City restaurant:
OPEN SEVEN DAYS A WEEK AND WEEKENDS.
In a Cemetery:
PERSONS ARE PROHIBITED FROM PICKING FLOWERS, FROM ANY BUT THEIR OWN GRAVES .
Tokyo hotel's rules and regulations:
GUESTS ARE REQUESTED NOT TO SMOKE, OR DO OTHER DISGUSTING BEHAVIOURS IN BED.
On the menu of a Swiss Restaurant:
OUR WINES LEAVE YOU NOTHING TO HOPE FOR.
In a Tokyo Bar:
SPECIAL COCKTAILS FOR THE LADIES WITH NUTS.
Hotel , Yugoslavia :
THE FLATTENING OF UNDERWEAR WITH PLEASURE, IS THE JOB OF THE CHAMBERMAID.
Hotel , Japan :
YOU ARE INVITED TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THE CHAMBERMAID. (tell that to the ex-IMF Managing Director!)
In the lobby of a Moscow Hotel, across from a Russian Orthodox Monastery:
YOU ARE WELCOME TO VISIT THE CEMETERY, WHERE FAMOUS RUSSIAN AND SOVIET COMPOSERS, ARTISTS AND WRITERS ARE BURIED DAILY, EXCEPT THURSDAY.
A sign posted in Germany 's Black Forest :
IT IS STRICTLY FORBIDDEN ON OUR BLACK FOREST CAMPING SITE, THAT PEOPLE OF DIFFERENT SEX, FOR INSTANCE, MEN AND WOMEN, LIVE TOGETHER IN ONE TENT, UNLESS THEY ARE MARRIED WITH EACH OTHER FOR THIS PURPOSE.
Hotel, Zurich :
BECAUSE OF THE IMPROPRIETY OF ENTERTAINING GUESTS OF THE OPPOSITE SEX IN THE BEDROOM, IT IS SUGGESTED THAT THE LOBBY BE USED FOR THIS PURPOSE.
Advertisement for donkey rides, Thailand :
WOULD YOU LIKE TO RIDE ON YOUR OWN ASS?
Airline ticket office, Copenhagen :
WE TAKE YOUR BAGS AND SEND THEM IN ALL DIRECTIONS. (Just Like British Airways!!!)
A Laundry in Rome :
LADIES, LEAVE YOUR CLOTHES HERE AND THEN SPEND THE AFTERNOON HAVING A GOOD TIME.
And finally the all time classic:
Seen in an Abu Dhabi Souk shop window:
IF THE FRONT IS CLOSED PLEASE ENTER THROUGH MY BACKSIDE…
"We spend so much money on the military, yet we're slashing
education budgets throughout the country. No wonder we've got
smart bombs and stupid children.
- Jon Stewart
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