“Hey there, ready?” I heard a low voice in front of me. It was one of the cashiers at the very low counter. He had a black beanie, well trimmed dark beard, wore plaid shirt and a leather cuff on his wrist.

“Oh! Yes. Sorry. ” I had been distracted by thoughts and wasn’t paying attention.

“One of those days, huh?” He said jokingly.

“You bet. Most definitely.” I replied.

Today was a very short day in town. The migraines were making it hard to get out of bed in the morning. I also decided I’d been spending so much on cafes and etc, I should not go out to breakfast so much, so I ate in. The only thing I wanted to do in town today was go to the Unity Bookstore. I’d visited it last week on one of my earlier days wandering around town.

Seriously, the bus rides are getting longer and longer. I start out with maybe one person on the bus with me but by the time we reach my stop it’s full and people are standing. I end up on the 83, which, as I’ve mentioned goes a long way around and up through Queensgate. It adds a whole half hour, honestly to my trip. The 81 doesn’t run after 10:30 am, and since I’d be dragging, I wasn’t going to see it again.

The rides were terrible for some reason, more so than usual. People talking, rudeness, the bus was bumping and shaking. Maybe I was just tired. I hadn’t left until 1:30, I don’t think, and then I got off on the stop before I should have, just because I wanted off. Out of the fact that I had brought my blue fake suede boots (yes..blue, “suede”, shoes) I wore them. I hadn’t yet because of all the walking, but I wasn’t going to be out long and wanted to.

So, I walked a few blocks. Then I went back up and around some more blocks.

Wait.. wasn’t the store here… no, it was definitely over by..

I was so tired I didn’t know what I was doing. I was just walking. I remembered it was by the New World Grocery store I’d gone to on Friday. There were also two ways to get to it. One through another one of those alleys, and off Manners Street. I think it was Manners street.

Low and behold!! I was right. The nice shiny yellow sign with black writing… “UNITY BOOKS” and an arrow, to the right. I found the alley! Hurray! Let’s have a party! Not really, I just wanted to find some books and go back to bed.

Down I went, and ended up inside a strange indoor alley mall with more travel stores and a bank. There were about 3 side entrances to the bookstore, and so through the middle sliding glass door entrance I went.

Again, the bookstore was crazy busy. Two days before Christmas and all, the city was packed. Definitely 15x more crowded than it was, and maybe only 4x more crowded than it usually is. I wandered over to the NZ Fiction section on the opposite side.

Now, I know I could have bought a kindle book, but I have this thing, where, I dislike reading on my iPad. I use it for the trip and quick emails. Maybe a Facebook check if needed, but it’s a computer for working and productivity. It is not for reading. I like paper books – sorry Trees, I love you too but…I need books. I didn’t want to have to carry much back, so my rule was: I can only buy books by an NZ author. And that’s what I did.

I sorted and picked, and read several summaries. I like the quirky, the weird, the dark, the cheeky, the odd, the strange, the ones that no one else might read except my Mom, and probably my Aunt. No thank you to love stories, no thank you to history, i want some purely weird and in-the-box-that’s-larger-on-the-inside-type thinking.

Of course, I went in for one, I came out with two. One strange one about a son and his father who tells no true stories from the sea. There’s a genie involved and other weird creatures, and some adventure with a character named Butt. Haroun and the Sea of the Stories, by Salaman Rushdie. Works well for me. The other was set in the 20s, about an author who lives upstairs and is dying and the people downstairs don’t know what to do with him. It’s called Max Gate by Damien Wilkins. They should both suit me well. There were a couple other contenders, and I wish I could remember them now. There was one about stories from the dead, and it had musicians and authors an actors on the list. It was either true or fake stories but I can’t quite remember. There was another… why didn’t I write them down??

I went to pay, and had my strange encounter with the nice cashier man. He eyed me a bit, like he wasn’t sure what to make of me. Might have been the hat? Maybe it was the blue seude shoes. Either way it was interesting.

Exiting through the street side, I made the decision to stop back at the store and get the sweet potatoes, or Kumaras, as they call them here, for the pies I was going to make the next day. I knew the stores would be crowded and who knows what I could get in the morning at the Pak ‘n Save, so I decided to start the pie shopping early.

Luckily, the Kumaras were on the front side, just as you go into the store. The layouts around here in the grocery stores are weird. The eggs aren’t chilled, and not all the vegetables are together, and it’s very hard to make my way around in some occasions to what I need. I also stopped and got some almonds to munch on later.

I’m really not paying attention today, because the cashier at the grocery store even had to wave a bit to get my attention. I had seen him rushing to get the customer he had out but I hadn’t expected to be going to that one. Thought the nice old man on the left would be my cashier, but I settled for the young, very anxious boy.

“Merry Christmas!” He said as I grabbed the very heavy back of sweet potatoes down from the very high checkout counter. Seriously, why was it necessary for it to be that high, no one needs that.

“You too, ciao!” I said, flinging the giant back over my shoulder like Santa Claus. I made my way back out and found I had another 45 minutes to wait, standing for a bus. GAH!

I stood there, watching some workers putting up a brand new LED sign for that particular bus stop.

They’re probably gonna finish in time to tell me my bus is here.. I thought.

“AH! ” I said as I slowly turned to see two guys carrying a large metal frame passed me.

“Oh, haha, You should have had me move!”

“Oh, no worries, Love, you’re not in the way!” Said the friendly worker. They all had to wear orange vests for city jobs.

Just as they were finishing with mounting the frame over the panel, my bus came.

So close!