Book Buying Binge - Coupon Style

Today I made the short trip to Columbus, OH to use my two "$5 discount" cards at the Half Price Books stores (including a visit to a store I had never visited in previous trips). So did I buy only two books?

Of course not.

Instead, I bought eleven (11) books. Just don't tell my wife. I did get the $10 off, and I used my Teacher discount (10%) on the other books, but I did get eleven new books. Mostly, these are reference books that I will be able to use in future research projects, such as the Qualitative Inquiry: A Dictionary of Terms. Others are directly related to current projects (e.g. Human Behavior and the Social Environment: A Social Systems Model) or teaching efforts (Business Intelligence For Dummies (For Dummies (Business & Personal Finance))). All in all, a good stock of materials and well worth the trip. My only regret is that some of the books were more expensive in person than I could have purchased them online (even with shipping). On balance, I'm pretty sure I got good value - especially with the coupons.

*sigh* I may have to go back for more books next month, after they get a chance to restock. Maybe I'll have the bookshelves in by then.

More acquisitions

Man. Today, a bookstore trip netted 14 books. Good buys, but I didn't really need fourteen books. Not that I mind, though...

Acquisitions - 11/22/2009

Today on a used bookstore stop, I picked up two books: one for work (Rethinking Social Inquiry: Diverse Tools, Shared Standards), and one for 'fun' (Faster: The Acceleration of Just About Everything).

The former was written as an 'answer' to the call by previous writers (King, Keohane, and Verba) for a focus on quantitative methods. Brady and Collier call for an equal focus on qualitative methods, with which I wholeheartedly agree. In fact, I would not be surprised if something from this book found its way into one of the articles that I am currently trying to complete. Checking the used prices, I see that I would not have been able to pick this one up online for less than $5 above what I paid today (not counting shipping).

The latter book has no practical or research value for me, but it is interesting. As one who feels the difference in life at the increasing pace of 'internet time', not to mention a borderline Luddite in some areas, I can sympathize with the message in the book. Unfortunately, it may not be written so well (according to the reviews), but we'll see. Equally unfortunately, I could have picked up a copy of this book for $0.01, which is $4.97 more than I paid.

All in all I got the books for what I would have paid online, but that isn't such a good bargain. I guess it is fortunate that I'm not in this for the profit, because today would have been a loss.