This Kind of Thing is Always Happening

The week before last I ordered “A Country Called Amreeka,” Alia Malek’s re-telling of American history through Arab-American eyes.

Or so I thought. Every day I checked the foyer of my building, hoping to find the brown Powell’s envelope on top of the mailbox. Every every day it wasn’t there. Finally, today, I checked into the situation. Just before heading home, I went to the Powell’s website, opened my account, and found my current and past orders.

It wasn’t there!

I checked a second time: no dice. Doubtfully, reluctantly, I decided I must not have ordered it, and so I ordered it again.

What had happened? Maybe I got distracted, failed to complete the purchase, and later imagined ordering it? Maybe I saw it was available at Politics and Prose, decided to buy it locally, but never dropped by the store? Maybe I decided to wait a few days to order it and then forgot?

It turned out, though, that none of these things had happened, because when I got home half an hour later, there was the brown Powell’s envelope on the mailbox, addressed to me, and inside it, Alia’s book.

Arghhhhh! I had ordered it a second time half an hour before I received it at home. How does this happen?

I’m going to the Powell’s website now, to see if I can cancel my order.

In the meantime, I’m really happy to have the book. And if I can’t stop the second copy, oh well. Powell’s can use the money and the local library can probably use an extra copy.