Books for Breakfast

"For those of us with a bookish bent, reading is a reflexive response to everything. This is how we deal with the world and anything new that comes our way. We have always known that there is a book for every occasion and every obsession. When in doubt, we are always looking things up." Diane Schoemperlen Our Lady of the Lost and Found

The one place you won’t find me today Is at the mall. The stories on the morning news about shoppers mobbing the big box stores for after-Thanksgiving sales repel me. I’d rather buy online from the comfort of my own home, with the TV on in the background and a well-stocked kitchen nearby.

This morning I did take my usual Friday morning walk to the Tattered Cover bookstore in Lower Downtown Denver, but I didn’t buy my usual banana bread from the in store coffee shop. Apparently, the banana bread bakery took the day off, so I’ll have to make my own. As it happens, I have some bananas that have just reached the appropriate stage of over-ripeness.

Last Friday, I finally made the trip to the new Tattered Cover on East Colfax in the former Lowenstein Theater. My friend Lisa Ray Turner was having a book signing for her new book, Ghosts. She and her co-author Kimberly Field told some very funny stories about a famous robbery in the 1920s and ghosts on the third floor. I learned that mint employees are not allowed to bring any coins into the mint and women visitors cannot bring their purses. All the circulating coins in the country come from either the Denver or the Philadelphia mints.

They stopped offering tours for a while after 9/11, but you can now make reservations for a tour. Although I’ve spent my whole life in Denver, I have never been inside the mint. Listening to Lisa and Kimberly made me want to take a tour. Their book would be a great Christmas gift for anyone who is interested in coins, mints or Denver history. And you don’t have to go to the mall to find it.

©2006 Dixie Darr. All rights reserved