Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Bookstore Burglar Calls the Cops - Has Dinner While He Waits

According to the MailOnline, a drunk was on his way home in the wee hours of Saturday morning, kebab in tow, when he decided to break into a Tonbridge, England, bookstore.  After making a bit of a mess of the place, and stealing a few pounds from the change-drawer, he decided to read a book from the display window while he paused long enough to complete his meal of kebab and bottled water.  Then, his conscience seems to have gotten the better of him, so he decided to call the local police to confess his crime - and waited for them to come by the shop to make their arrest.

All very strange...but more interestingly, he was reading from a book called Fly Fishing by J.R. Hartley, the make-believe book from a Yellow Pages television ad that ran in the U.K. in 1983.  What makes this a fun story is that real-world author Michael Russell once decided to cash in on the advert's popularity by writing a book he called Fly Fishing: Memories of Angling Days, under the pen-name J.R. Hartley.  The owner of Mr. Books Bookshop displays a copy of the real book in his shop window because he believes it "symbolizes that I can get anything for you."

Keep in mind that this little crime was committed by a 50-year-old drunk, someone who probably remembers the book title from that 1983 television commercial.  Did his memories of better days make him feel guilty enough to call the cops on himself?  I vote yes.

Now, on to the 1983 commercial:


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