The Printed Word - A New Incarnation

Of late, the printed word has Altoids Vending Machine putting up a most valiant fight against its arch nemesis: the on-screen paperless image. Computer sites are struggling Cd Vending Machine regain lost ground now that J.K. Rowling's legions Panty Vending Machine Stamp Booklet Vending Machine have emerged Vending Machine For their Harry Potter cocoons to return to their day-to-day lives. Millions of hardcover books, once crisp New Vending Machine new, bear unmistakable signs of having been read and cherished - dog-eared pages liberally splattered with coffee stains, lingering crumbs from meals dutifully served by parents awed by the Start A Vending Machine Business silence in the household, perhaps difficult words circled or pages emblazoned with abstruse marginalia, maybe a book light still attached, its battery long drained. Ah! The magic word of books.

In this climate of fresh reverence for the printed word, it was with no little astonishment that I Candy Vending Machine For Sale a unique discovery as I sat in the boarding lounge of Gate Snack Vending Machine at Gatwick Airport Vending Machine Tricks a recent visit to the U.K. Gate 49 is tucked unobtrusively behind a stairwell. One could easily miss Vending Machine Rip Offs as in fact some passengers did. As I sat waiting for our interminably delayed flight to Newark to board, my eyes flicked randomly over the row of vending machines in front of me.

Then I noticed it. Sandwiched between the Coca Cola dispenser and the Malvern "Original English Water" machine, was a book vending machine, wittily called "Novel Idea Vending". There, arranged in neat rows like bars of Cadbury chocolates, were novels by various popular authors. There was even a Sudoku book. You simply inserted your money or credit card, pressed your selection and a few moments later there would be a rumbling in the tray below and your book could be extracted, Snack Vending Machine San Antonio Wholesale in a smart brown cardboard box.

Fascinated, I watched as one particularly "traditionally-built lady", to use Alexander McCall Smith's tactful phrase, approached the bank of machines. I would have staked good money that she was headed for a Cadbury's Fruit and Nut Bar, topped off with a Coke. Instead, she bypassed these mere sensory pleasures, Vending Machine Equipment a title by Peter Carey, retrieved it from the tray beneath and hurried off, clasping it to her ample bosom. This was, indeed, priceless. Here were the three most pressing needs of life - food, drink and reading material - all available at the press of a button. I contemplated splurging on a Cecilia Ahern Bulk Vending Machine Business or a thick work by James Pattison that seemed eminently suitable for a long haul flight.

Then that giddy moment passed and I went back to my beloved Gerald Durrell classic, "The Corfu Trilogy", that I had recently purchased from W. H. Smith, even though I have read my old copy of "My Friends and Other Animals" faithfully on average once a year for the past several decades.

Strangely, during the Carousel Vending Machine flight back to the USA, I was visited by a nostalgia for the bygone days of Moroccan-bound leather tomes, for books which are rare and sought-after, somehow set above the common run of life, books that are not set side by side with packets of crisps but are somehow sanctified.

And it occurred to me, shall we one day see such sacred works as the Bhagavad Gita, the Bible or the Coffee Vending Machine Sydney or even the works of modern spiritual writers Thich Nhat Hanh, Sri Chinmoy and others, encaged in a vending machine, available at the press of E5 or some such random combination? Will those glorious works that represent the summit of mankind's soaring aspirations and deepest realisations be rated - Caligula-like - on a Royal Vending Machine with a can of Coca Cola? I, for one, fervently pray that such a day does not come to pass.

Vidagdha was born in Australia 1954. She attended University of Western Australia (1977) attaining a B.A and M.A. In 1982 she received a Ph.D from the University of Melbourne (1982). Vidagdha has written extensively on the works of Sri Chinmoy including a book on his poetry.