Some people love fishing and a good fish story. I love books and a good book story. And this is the story of "the one that got away."
There once was a man who was something of a bibliophile – a true book collector who hunted far and wide for the rarest books imaginable. One day, he was visiting his neighbor's home, when the neighbor related how he finally purged his attic of years of junk, including old items ... and some books.
"Hey, you might be interested in this," the neighbor declared. "One of the books I tossed was a really old one. It was a dusty copy of a Bible. Some guy printed his name on the cover ... Guten-something-or-other?"
"What! Are you serious?" exclaimed the rare book collector. "If that was a Gutenberg Bible, that was over 400 years old! It would be invaluable. One of those recently sold at auction for over 4 million dollars!"
"Oh," replied the neighbor indifferently. "But, I don't think mine would have fetched a dime. Some guy named Martin Luther had scribbled notes all over it."
Gotcha.
Of course it's a joke, but it begs a real question: 400 years from today, if someone is rummaging through your attic and finds your old Bible, will the value of that Bible be enhanced or diminished by the presence or absence of your scribbled notes?
Oooh, zing. Gotcha again.
Happy Friday!