Jesse Jackson Comments

THE DEAL

This is just a little "postette" (I made that up all by myself!). Being a fervent observer of how people word things, I just wanted to point out how interesting it was that Jackson was so specific about what he wanted to do to what part of Obama's body. If you haven't seen the clips yet, check here.

THE OBSERVATION

Mere specificity, my friend, mere specificity. I've noticed that people who have a lot of bottled up emotions get really specific when they speak about things that frustrate them. Why? Maybe because they've thought about it so much. For the really extreme folks out there, they obsess over things and it keeps them awake, fills their thoughts during the day, or even drives the majority of the decisions they make (sounds kind of like a comic book villain actually). But I'm sure there are many other theories out there. So, what interested me about Jackson's comment is that he went so overboard. Instead of just wanting to do something general, like "throttle", "slap", or even "kill" Obama, Jackson wanted to cut (even just "cut him" as a vent would've been in the 'normal' range) Obama's nuts off. Now, I'm not saying that Jackson necessarily has some sick fascination with genital mutilation, but being this specific for a comment that was supposedly extemporaneous, is a little suspicious.

Both my grandmother and one of my friends that I spoke to recently said that Jackson was just jealous because he had tried to be a viable African-American candidate and had failed. Of course, I don't know how much truth there is to that, but I guess it's a rational enough idea.

Well, that's enough rambling for now. Later.

I’ve noticed a terrible trend in the college culture around my school: selling textbooks back to universities and local bookstores. Even worse, some students don’t sell their books back at all. Some of them (brace yourself) throw them away!!!

Who needs this post?

1 | People who regularly fail to sell their books back to anyone.

2 | People who regularly sell their books back to universities/local stores.

3 | People who want to get more money back for their books

The Process

Log on to Amazon.com (or some other online marketplace like eBay or Craig’s List, I’ll use Amazon.com as an example since that’s where I sell).

If you haven’t already, click Start here at the top of the home screen to create a new account. Follow the instructions Amazon.com gives you.

Once you’ve created/logged in to your account, find your book by typing its title/ISBN (the barcode number on the back cover). Click on your book when it comes up.

There’s a link on the right-hand side of the screen that says "Sell yours here". Click on it, and you’re on your way!!

Why Bother?

It’s all worth it because I save somewhere between $20 and $70 for every book I sell on line, as opposed to going to the buyback station at my local book stores and actually losing at least half of what I paid for the book in the first place. Let me show you with nice, big, round numbers. Let’s say a text costs $100. I buy it, use it for the semester, and try to sell it back. The book store usually won’t give you more than half of what you bought the book for (and even that is asking for a lot), meaning that I won’t get more $50 for this $100 book. Now, if I go to Amazon.com, I’ll be able to sell the book for somewhere around $75 to some poor soul that needs a break on the costs of this particular text. By selling my book to this person via Amazon.com, three wonderful things happen. First, I feel smart for a day because I “outsmarted” the book store. Second, the person buying the book saves about $25/25% on a vital piece of educational material. Third, I get an extra $25/25% compared to what I would’ve received trying to sell my books back to the book store.

Because I take five classes every semester, this means I save about $250 a year (in a world where each of my textbooks is worth $100) just by selling on the web. I understand that there are other fees involved with selling online. Amazon.com takes a commission, and shipping has to be paid. But, whoever you sell to has to give you enough money to cover shipping, and Amazon.com is nice enough to take their commission out of combined price of the book and shipping, so I actually get more than I requested for a book every now and again since shipping’s pretty cheap where I live. This is why people can still turn a profit even when they sell small items for a penny.

Understand that this is not going to work out so smoothly every time, everywhere, for everybody. My hope is that you will at least understand that it is possible to get a much better price when selling (and buying) your text books online.

Questions?

blog@my-proofer.com

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