*Snippets*

Book in the dirt
Having recently had kerb-side collection, it's not unusual to see discarded scraps of rubbish still loitering around various front yards, but whilst walking the dog last night I came across something truly humorous; a book - spread out, page down, cover up and half buried in the dirt.

Being the book lover/hoarder that I am, I was quite taken aback by what seemed to be someone's desperate attempt to rid themselves of that particular book. The rational part of my brain tells me that there are several great and dignified options non-book-hoarders could employ in the effort to get rid of an old, unwanted book; one might trade it in at a second-hand book shop, give it to a charity/school book drive or maybe you might donate it to the Salvos in the hope it could enrich the soul of someone less fortunate. Of course if you really must just 'get rid' of a book you could always throw it into your recycle bin where it may be turned into another far more useful book, or last (but definitely not recommended) you could simply just put it into the rubbish bin to become landfill. However, the state of this discarded book, suggested that its owner had deemed it to be so useless it was not even worthy of the bin and had been thrown from the house to the side of the road, maybe alongside an old broken 30cm television and a 'never-been-used' ab-rocker irrationally purchased late one night from Danoz Direct! On rubbish collection day it had been overlooked by the kerb-side collectors, who would have considered it unworthy of their rubbish truck and by the scavengers creeping by with their wheelbarrows the weekend before, looking for treasure in other peoples' trash.

As we got closer I became more and more intrigued as to just what this worthless excuse for a book could possibly be and for a split second I pondered whether maybe it might like to come and live on my bookcase... and then I saw the title: 'How to solve your child's sleeping problems'... enough said!