The Thousands

‘Danielle is easily swayed by the prospect of free candy from strangers’. For many years, my mum would write this in the ‘other’ section in school excursion forms, right after ‘mildy allergic to bees’. Despite being down with the whole ‘stranger danger’ thing, l would have been a goner if the creepy man who sat in a car outside our school everyday ever thought to throw a Killer Python onto the tanbark.

On the cash register at Oxford St Books sits a bowl of free Minties. If it was a no-go to take free candy from a stranger in 1992, it’s a total no-no-go to do it now. But Oxford St Books aren’t strangers, right? The dudes behind the counter have been there for like, years! Even when they moved two doors down, and everything felt a little ‘the same but different’ inside, Oxford remained more friend than stranger. Why? Because they’ve got great contemporary fiction, non-fiction, some of the best design and photography tome selections around, they’ll order you the most obscure title in a flash…but mainly because there’s always a bowl of free Minties on the cash register.

Three things:
1) Any book shop that offers a free Mintie with your purchase, or offers you a free Mintie even if you don’t buy shit, is probably worth looking into
2) Any book shop that offers a free Mintie AND a free bookmark (a nice brown card one, no frills) with your purchase, even if you don’t buy shit, is probably worth looking into
3) Enough of this ‘probably’: Oxford St Books is the only bookstore in the 6000s you’ll end up in at 10.29pm on a Monday night.  In moments like these, you need Minties.