I've had a few people ask for updates on "American Grunt," and I finally have one. Ballast has done their edits, I've approved the changes, and we're on to book design next week. I'm not totally certain how long this phase will last, but I'm still optimistic that the book will be in your hands sometime in June for your summer reading pleasure. In the meantime, here's another couple tidbits I had to cut out of a chapter about working at Barnes & Noble in St. Augustine, Florida right after I graduated from college. Really glad that people seem to be enjoying these.

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I was at the registers in the front of the store one day, processing transactions when a guy in his mid-30’s came up and put a rather large book on the counter beside the register.

“Will this be all?” I asked in my best retail droid voice.

“Yes,” he answered.

I picked up the book and scanned the bar code. “That’ll be thirty-seven dollars and fifty-eight cents,” I said, expecting him to immediately hand over his credit card. But when I glanced back at him, it was as if he was about to give me the keys to the car where he’d lost his virginity and couldn’t bear to see someone else drive away in it.

His hesitation gave me a moment to glance down at the cover of the book he was about to purchase, which was titled “How to File for Chapter Eleven Bankruptcy.”

I made eye contact with the guy. “This book really shouldn’t be that expensive.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” he answered, “like maybe this is one of those better financial decisions everyone’s been telling me about.”

I picked up the book and flipped it over several times. “Thirty-seven bucks should be the price of a book called Stuff to do on your Yacht.”

His eyes darted back and forth as he tapped his MasterCard on the counter. “Maybe I should leave this here and see if they have it at the library.”

“You want me to cancel it?”

He slipped his credit card back into his wallet. “Yes.”

I did whatever multi-step process the computer needed to delete the transaction and nodded at him. “This seems like a big moment in your life, man. Glad I could share it with you.”

“It is. It really is. Thank you.”

He walked away a brand new man. And that dude is now a multi-millionaire. In my head.

One of the other employees at the register with me that day was a girl named Nancy who was undoubtedly one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met. She was giftedly smart, but also very timid because of what I assume was a rough high school experience as she struggled with her weight. I absolutely adored her. Her laugh just made the day better. But something about her always managed to attract the worst people to enter the building. And her typical reaction was to simply stand there and take it until tears appeared. Because of it, once a week I got to be the overprotective brother I wasn’t able to currently be for my actual sister up in Pittsburgh.

Once I was at the information desk and heard Nancy’s cracking voice over the speakers. “Kevin, please come to the front. Kevin to the front.”

I hustled up to the registers to find Nancy welling up as a woman in her sixties berated her. Nancy and I shared a look that implied she no longer had the capacity to deal with this hag.

I nudged into the discussion. “What seems to be the problem?”

“I can’t reach the magazine I want!” the woman shouted. “It’s way at the top! I’m five foot two. How am I supposed to reach it? The slow, weepy girl couldn’t tell me why at my store I can reach it, but you people put it way up at the top!”

“Well I’m six foot two, so if you just point out what magazine you need, I can easily…”

“I shouldn’t have to ask you! I should be able to get it myself!”

“We do provide stools in case…”

“I don’t want to balance on some stool! I could fall!”

Clearly no amount of reason was going to get this woman to calm down so my only option was to create some ridiculously confusing bullshit that would be super hard to refute. “You said this isn’t a problem at your home store?” I asked.

“No!”

“Ah. What most people don’t know is that Barnes & Noble crafts the height of their magazine racks based on the average height of the county where the store is located. St. John’s County is actually the third tallest county in the nation. Where are you from?”

“Montgomery County, Maryland.”

“Ah, that’s probably a short county. I bet it’s why you can reach that magazine so easily when you’re back home. Perils of travel, right? Nothing’s the same.”

She stared at me as if I’d just revealed her darkest secret out loud.

I smiled. “Can I get that magazine for you or would you like to use the stool?”

I’ve always been proud of that one. Almost as proud as when Nancy giggled her way into the break room and told me that after a customer got snippy with her, she told him, “I’m sorry, but your rudeness turned off my computer. I can’t help you.”

It was so unexpected. I leapt three feet in the air. “Nancy standing up for herself! I love it!” She was a straight up badass, perhaps for the first time in her life. I pumped my fist almost as excited at her newfound confidence as she was. After that, it’s not like she walked around thumping her chest all day, but I never saw a customer make her cry again. Sometimes you rub off on people in weird ways.