Sue's Blog - Some assembly required.

Birthdays

It was my birthday a couple of weeks ago.
I don't make a big fuss about birthdays but I do love to get cards.
As well as a lovely card, I also got this cute cat ornament from my father in law.
I really do love it.
Always happy to have another kitty but decorative ones only right now.

My friend, Fred, who I worked with for many years in a certain educational establishment (he was head of music and I was a peon), sent me a book.
I wasn't expecting a pressie.  We usually just exchange cards.
We do speak on the phone about once a week, often talking about old times.
He lives in Folkestone again now, but did live for a while in the US, near Boston.
He makes acoustic guitars from scratch. They are beautiful things and whilst he was living in Boston, he used to get specialist tools from a company over here.
He can't get the same things for the price in England, so I send him the catalogues, he orders the things he wants - delivered to me, and then I send them to him.
I don't mind doing this at all.
Anyway, he sent me a book for my birthday.....and I was very pleased.

I started reading it the other day.
After a few pages I noticed a glint of colour on one of the pages.
I found this.


 I was so surprised.
There stuck to a page with a post it note was a $10 bill.
How sweet of him to do that?
I flicked through the pages.
I then found this.


 A $20 bill was stuck to another page.
I was dumbstruck.
I wasn't expecting the book let alone a book with $30 inside it.
I have spoken to him since I got the book but I hadn't started reading it yet so I hadn't found the money. He didn't say a bloody word.   I would never be able to do that.
I would have been saying things like, "Oh did you start reading the book yet?".... and trying to sound innocent.
He said nothing.
He is on holiday at the moment but I shall be phoning him as soon as he returns.
I expect he is trying to thank me for sending his stuff over but he really didn't need to.
I can't help thinking :-
What if I hadn't liked the look of the book?
What if I had decided not to read it?
What if I had taken it to our local bookstore where they buy books from you?
They don't give you much for secondhand books and someone would have had a real windfall when they bought it.
Thank goodness I started reading it.

I did the review for Philip's friend's book today.
I chose my words carefully..........very carefully.

posted by Sue Banks @ 1:12 PM