I don't know if this is precisely a downside of working in a bookstore. I tend to enjoy it, actually.

Most of the time, when I'm working, it's a closing shift. People are gone by ten, we spend the next half hour cleaning up and shutting down, and then we all leave. But, on the days when I'm neither closing nor dashing off to class (or some other event), this happens.

I will punch out. I will head downstairs, towards the breakroom. Oh, but on my way down the escalator, something over in music catches my eye. Gotta check that out. Well, it wasn't what I was expecting, but it still had a cool idea or two. Hey, what's around the backside of this shelf again? Oh yeah! That stuff! Hey, I remember looking at this - it'd be great for my sister. Settle down in a chair, flip through it. Twenty minutes later, I remember that I was supposed to put something on the staff recommendation shelf. Shelve the book, head back up. Make it around the corner before I get distracted by a Bloom County anthology I hadn't seen before. Forty minutes later, I glance at my watch and realize that I need to get home if I'm going to get the house clean tonight. Tuck the comic book back in its spot, but just before I make it out of the aisle, I notice an author that I hadn't realized did books. Seven minutes on that, okay, I really gotta go. Dart down the escalator, but just as I punch the code for the breakroom I realize - I didn't make it to the staff shelf.

It's not that it's bad, exactly. There are certainly worse vices to have. It's just that there's so much out there to read.

One of the managers frequently makes fun of me for this. I got off work over an hour ago, and I still won't be heading home for another hour. Too many books!