Monday 18th July 2022
Around the beginning of April, this year, I happened to be reminded of the Paul Screeton book, 'Quest For The Hexham Heads', and - being a subject that had fascinated me from an early age - I decided to check online prices. Being a miser, I genuinely balk at paying more than a couple of pounds for a book (99% of my purchases are from charity shops), so, with the ridiculous prices constantly found online for such things, 'internet shopping' has never really ever been a consideration for me. (In all honesty, I think I've only ever bought a small handful of books online, over the years). Having previously looked at the Screeton book, I'd found asking prices to be far-too-much for my tightness and, in searching again in April, the same results appeared once more... £16 and upwards for a paperback copy.
Somewhat fortuitously, my partner had - at that point in time - happened to ask me what I might want for my birthday in early May. Pretty much never knowing what I want, I decided to 'kill two birds with one stone' and asked her to buy the volume for me. The matter ended with her placing an order with the popular High Street shop 'Waterstones', some 3 weeks before my birthday. I can't recall the suggested 'waiting time' now, but there was one, and we had been informed that - when the order came in - I could pick it up at the Wolverhampton branch of the store. With such a readily available book, we had hoped 3 weeks would probably be sufficient time for it to be obtained, but, if not, I didn't mind an extra week or two (perhaps) wait.
We now scroll forward to a week or so into July and - my partners queries to Waterstones re. the book having been ignored - I finally decided to 'cancel the order'... which I did with no real comment from the Waterstones sources that I spoke with on the matter! (I genuinely got the impression they either didn't give a toss - no explanations were given as to why the 'in stock' book hadn't actually appeared yet - or such cancellations were a regular, daily occurrence, maybe? A close friend tells me he has been waiting literally months for something he ordered from them?) Whichever, as I was hanging up the phone, my partner was tapping the title into Google - despite my protestations not to bother, as it was too expensive online - and she informs me that someone is selling it on Ebay for just £8!? Of course, it's a 2nd-hand copy, but this doesn't bother me as I only own about 10 books that were actually purchased brand new anyway! Lol!
So - long story short - she responded to the sale on Ebay and, 5 or 6 days later, the book plopped onto my doormat!
Beginning to slowly work my way through the volume, I'd basically found it to be everything that I'd hoped for. My concentration levels being well into minus figures, these days, I have taken to snatching an hour or so of scrutiny whenever I get the opportunity. In settling down (with our chickens) in the garden recently, I did the usual, page flicking, 'Now where the hell did I get to?' search and happened to spot 'Cannock Chase' being mentioned (on a page I'd not reached yet).
Despite being an incredibly pedantic researcher, Screeton didn't bother contacting me over the Chase-related content, otherwise I could have saved him the time it took to tap out that (albeit fairly brief) section. Whatever - it was doubly delightful to eventually get my hands on a copy of the volume concerned AND discover that the W.M.G.C. had merited a small mention therein!
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