34
Posted on December 29, 2016 at 12:00 am by Gene Ambaum
↓ Transcript
Grant: Why are you taking more books home?
Martin: I can not resist their siren song.
Grant: You have no room. You can barely move in your house.
Martin: I can still make it from my reading chair to my lavatory.
Grant: We live in the future. Just download them.
Martin: You cannot download the weight of a book in your hand, the scent, the experience of a real book.
Grant: You also can't download the germs.
Martin: Books are supposed to infect the mind. It's a bonus they also make for a more robust immune system.
Martin: I can not resist their siren song.
Grant: You have no room. You can barely move in your house.
Martin: I can still make it from my reading chair to my lavatory.
Grant: We live in the future. Just download them.
Martin: You cannot download the weight of a book in your hand, the scent, the experience of a real book.
Grant: You also can't download the germs.
Martin: Books are supposed to infect the mind. It's a bonus they also make for a more robust immune system.
I can identify with Martin so well. I never leave my library without more books than I can read ๐
And this is why my wife won’t let me visit the library. At least not that she knows anyway ๐
Smell is the most powerful trigger to the memory there is. A certain flower or a whiff of smoke can bring up experiences long forgotten. Books smell musty and rich. The knowledge gained from a computer has no texture, no context. It’s there and then it’s gone. If it’s to last, then the getting of knowledge should be tangible, it should be smelly. – Rupert Giles, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
My sister and I have this conversation all the time.
This comic is ironic to read several years after COVID-19 started. I was a public librarian at the time. At first, we sequestered returns for a week or more. I should have shared this comic with my colleagues back then! ๐