Barking Mad

Do you ever get personal phone calls at work that literally make you cringe when you hear a certain name is on hold for you?  I do...

Another Day, Another Dollar

Well it's nearing the end of another shift at the Ref Desk.  Not much happened today.  Spent most of the day forwarding emails to my supervisor (who is still on vacation).  I wouldn't need to forward the email if she just would have instructed on how to do certain things during her absence.  C'est  la vie.

Do I Offend?

People keep coming up to the Ref Desk and asking for my supervisor (who is on vacation) and they seem perturbed when they have to settle for my help.  What is wrong with them? With me?  Do I offend their sensibilities or do they not have any faith in the new girl?

So Shall It Be Written

Did anyone else spend the holiday weekend watching the traditional airing of The Ten Commandments?  One question..why can't ABC present it without commercials?  That movie lasts longer than the Oscar telecast. It reminds me of the good old days of the miniseries.  All it needed was Jaclyn Smith.

On My Own

My supervisor is taking a few extended days off so I'm left manning the Ref Desk all by myself for a few days.  This should be interesting...

Grindstone

Ahhh...back to the grindstone after a short weekend respite.  Don't you just hate the first day back to work after a holiday?

April Showers Bring...

More transients into the library after they get kicked out of the City Mission after lunch.

Drowning Thyself

What is it with people that drown themselves in patchouli?  That stuff smells worse than ammonia.  It literally takes my breath away and not in a good way.

Bobbsey Twins

"Miss Jane" was tired of her old Justin Bieber do so she took a picture of "The Duchess" to her hairstylist to copy her look.  Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, right?  

I Love Holidays

Four-day work week!  Woo Hoo!!!!

Road Rager

I've had the worst luck with discourteous drivers lately.  It's really contributing to my road rage.  I don't know what it is with people who don't know how to use their turn signals.  The other day I was driving through a parking lot at a major retail chain and the car in front of me stops dead in the road and just sits there.  I'm thinking are you waiting for a car to pull out or what but too much time had passed for that to have happened. 
Meanwhile this huge SUV decides to forsake all others and squeeze past us on the left (not knowing if a small child or other pedestrian was just lying in wait to jump out from behind a parked car) all the while the car in front of me just sits there. 

My passenger suggested that I lay on the horn and I held up my hands in a questioning gesture like 'What are you doing?' and finally the car moves into a spot on the right side that a car had just exited and as I'm pulling up I notice not one, not two but three empty spaces just beyond where they pulled in.  Is it me or was that simply rude? Is it too much to ask for you to signal that you're turning?  We did all learn that in driver's ed way back in high school, right? 

Snuffaluffagus

I hate this wacky weather we're having.  I can't keep from sniffling, sneezing, coughing and aching.  Just like the commercial says.  I have to blow my nose so many times a day I should buy stock in Kleenex.

Book Police

People don't realize that when books are deaccessioned from the library they end up in one of three places.  Either we discard them and send them to the Friends Book Sale or we strip the covers off and send them to the recycler or they get boxed up and thrown in the trash.  We had to start boxing the trashed books because one of our maintenance guys was caught dumping a bunch of paperback novels in the city dumpster and they were reported to the Book Police who complained to our director.  What we can't give away has to be thrown away unfortunately.

Free Lunch

Do you work with people that never associate with others during your lunch hour until a vendor comes along and offers to take everyone out to a free lunch and those same people are the first ones in line?  Go figure...

Time Suckage

It's pretty sad when you want to do more work but I feel like I could be a whole lot more productive and get more things done at work if the stupid computer system would just do what it is supposed to do instead of getting hung up and timing out all the time. I spend half my time waiting for things to move or pages to load.  

Pepe Le Puke

Okay.  Someone is re-heating their lunch and it smells fishy.  Literally.  Fish smells make me wanna puke.  Literally.

Upside Down and Ba$$ Ackwards

Why can't people follow the simplest instructions?  I had to make a photocopy of a local history book because the binding was obliterated and all the pages kept falling out.  So I made the photocopies and got a binder and a box of sheet protectors and asked a fellow staff member to help me out by loading the pages into the sheet protectors and putting them back in order in the ring binder.  Easy enough, right?  Not where I work. 

I went to inspect the final product before I made the spine label and cover insert and found that not only were the pages not in order but the sheets were loaded inconsistently and more importantly upside down.  So the first person to stand the binder up would have half of the pages fall through the open end of the sheet protectors because someone didn't take the time or didn't care enough to make sure that they were loading them in a logical manner.  Aarrgghh!

Paper, Scissors, Glue

"Mr. Sarcasm" is also in charge of arranging public speakers to give presentations or arrange public displays for the library.  One man called and sold his display as an epic in state history, something that no one else had ever attempted.  "Mr. Sarcasm" readily snapped it up sight unseen but when the guy showed up to install his historic presentation all he had was nine science fair project type display boards with pictures cut out of magazines or printed off the Internet with names and dates underneath.  Most of the captions with historic factoids were wrong as well but since it was promoted in the library newsletter we were forced to display this 'embarrassment of riches' for an entire month.

Matinee at the Bijou

"Mr. Sarcasm" used to offer free movie nights at the library along with popcorn and refreshments until one of our patrons decided to lift the tip jar.  One bad apple can spoil it for everyone or in this case the two patrons that regularly showed up for the free snacks.

Can't Be Bothered

I know it may sound like I pick on coffee drinkers a lot (they make such easy targets) but have you ever noticed that when the coffee pot runs low, they will take time out of their busy day to dump the old pot and brew a whole new one? Yet they can't be bothered to show the same courtesy when other stuff around the office needs attention like the staples in the stapler run out or the pencil sharpener is overflowing and needs to be emptied.

Stupid Klutz

I learned the other day that some guy fell down the last section of stairs in the central staircase of the library in full view of staff and patrons.  He apparently sustained some minor injuries but at the time he claimed it was all his fault yet the library ended up settling out of court and paying the guy like $40,000.  


I could fathom the settlement if it had been our fault due to a faulty railing or bad carpeting but the guy tripped and fell all on his own and admitted as such yet the library paid him off anyway. But when a staff person fell off a ladder and tweaked their knee and was laid up for more than a week, the library wouldn't even turn it in to Worker's Comp. They made them use their sick leave.  Go figure...

Expiration Date

One of my least favorite duties at the public library is being a notary.  There was one crazy lady who kept bringing the same handwritten diatribe in every couple of days to get it notarized every time she found a typo or didn't like a certain paragraph she had written.  She even brought it back when she saw that the person who notarized it stamp had expired.  She thought her document had expired too so she wanted someone with a fresh expiration date to re-notarize it.

Death and Taxes

As the tax deadline approaches I'm reminded of those particular patrons (and every year there are a few) that come into to the library to fill out a FAFSA application or something similar and they need a copy of their tax return from their summer job at Taco Bell only to discover that their cousin Bubba that filed their taxes online last year didn't save a copy of their return.  They all just assume that since it was filed in cyberspace that they can easily download it from somewhere. Unless they printed out a paper copy or cousin Bubba saved the file on his computer they're not going to be able to retrieve it at the public library.  Sorry folks...

Happy Trails to You

This lady came out of the restroom one day with a three foot piece of toilet paper stuck to the bottom of her shoe.  Could she not feel it on there?  I thought that was just a bad movie cliche like the lady with her skirt tucked into her pantyhose but I've seen both here at the library.

Hail Hail the Gangs All Here

I can't recall the last Monday morning when the entire Ref Desk staff showed up to work.  I don't know what it is about Mondays and Wednesdays but they seem to be the optimum days for calling in sick or taking a personal day.  I'm guilty of it myself.  I just can't face all the craziness of the library on some Monday mornings.  The thought of it is just too overwhelming.

Count Chocula

Just found out something that I think is interesting.  You may already know this but I was surprised to find out that they put dark chocolate and cocoa in cigarettes. You can actually smell it in the tobacco.  

Brat Patrol

I don't know how working mothers do it and I don't really care to learn either.  What I'm talking about is managing small children at home and all their tirades.  My supervisor has a small child and he keeps her coming in late every day because she has some crisis or another involving this 'brat' for lack of a better word.  The kid has a hissy fit over everything. 

This morning she was on time and just about to leave him at his preschool when she blew him a kiss and he burst into tears.  She spent the next twenty minutes trying to soothe the little monster.  He saw the other kids eating breakfast and he was hungry too but he had another little outburst because one little girl was drinking water when everyone else had juice so he wanted water too. So my supervisor had to make a special trip to the cafeteria to appease the little stinker which made her late for work yet again.

Not a Morning Person

We have another regular patron who lives across the street and comes to the library bright and early every morning to check out, renew or check in her library materials.  She is so relaxed that she comes over in her fuzzy house slippers and pajama bottoms.  Most of the staff are used to her but the patrons find her voice a little jarring.  You see, she has one of those high, shrill voices.  Patrons ask us all the time to ask her to hold it down but to no avail.  She has only one volume - LOUD!

T.G.I.F.'d

You're probably thinking it's Friday, right?  Not in this case.  TGIF'd today equals two girls in flagrante delicto. I don't care what your sexual preference is: girl/boy, boy/boy, girl/girl.  It doesn't matter to me but I don't care to be subjected to watching you engaged in slathering tongue hockey sessions while on the public Internet computers.  No one wants to see that.


Well... I take that back.  The pervy guy with his hand down his pants on computer no. 9 is probably enjoying it but no one else is.  You're just making everyone else uncomfortable. So put it away or take it outside.

Aussie Spumante

Most of our regular inebriants are just that, inebriated. There's no fuss, no muss. When they are confronted, they admit their condition and quietly leave the library but there are a select few that once they have been awakened and told to leave will actually stand up and try to engage you in a lively debate over how well they hold their liquor all the while they stand there 'tay ina win' as Nell would say, bleary eyed and boastful.

Where's Clarabelle?

There is a regular patron who cavorts around the library carrying a dummy.  You know, one of those dolls like Howdy Doody.  I've never seen him attempt ventriloquism. He just carries the dummy around all day.  He walks through the stacks, surfs the Internet and stands in line to checkout materials at the circulation desk all with this dummy in his arms.

Uh, What's Up Doc?

A guy came up to the Ref Desk today wearing pink bunny ears and searching for a lost Easter egg.  Oddly enough, he was not the first costumed creature that I've encountered during a typical work day.  

Mad Hatters

Nothing quite like starting your morning watching a bunch of mad patrons wandering through the library stacks on an Easter egg scavenger hunt.  Too funny!

Dorothy Needs A New Pair of Shoes

Just saw on Huffington Post that Hollywood is remaking "The Crow" movie.  Why?  With all the great books out there crying out to be made into film, why does Hollywood keep making these retreads of old 80s t.v. shows and movies that were already made and in some cases made badly to begin with?  What's next "The Facts of Life" or "What's Happening" movie?

Help spur dvd sells by re-releasing the old t.v. shows and movies from the 80s and 90s and keep movie theaters supplied with fresh new material and hopefully not another comic book come to life movie. Give us a break. Please....

Rollin Rollin Rollin

We had to implement a no tobacco use policy in the library because our maintenance staff was constantly cleaning up dried tobacco out of the cracks and crevices of the furniture from where people had 'rolled their own' cigarettes and those disgusting creatures that like to spit tobacco wads and juice in our trash cans. Now if we could only stop people from smoking in the boys room we would be doing just fine.

Dubious Honor

Happy Librarian Appreciation Day!

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Lunches

Why is it that people that bring stinky lunches always position themselves in the lunchroom in front of the microwave so you are forced to inhale the nastiness of the bulger concoction that are trying out this month on their 'special' diet?  They monopolize the conversation with their die-hard political views and force you to sit through inane soap operas or right-wing talk shows while you are just trying to relax and unwind from another stress filled day at the Ref Desk.

What? No Caffeine!

Coffee drinkers can be real snobs sometimes.  There is one particular lady in the library that likes to brew a fresh pot of (OMG) decaf. One of the more austere caffeine abusers gave her a real tongue lashing for taking his pot of the real stuff off the warmer while she brewed her non-toxic version.

Better Late Than Never

Anytime "Miss Jane" can find an excuse to come to work late she takes it.  She will offer to work an extra evening shift or schedule doctor's appointments for mid-morning just so she can come to work by 1 pm.  I've heard of late risers but she really takes the cake.

I Need 0xygen

Why are conference rooms always stuffy?  No matter how long the meeting lasts there is never enough oxygen in the room once the blow hard giving the presentation gets underway.

Need A Good Dose

I am in desperate need of an IV of caffeine and a good kick in the pants to get going this morning.  The weekend was too short and I just don't want to get out of bed this morning.

Rapido Rapido

Why is it that the patrons that are the most demanding and want everything right now are always the ones that come in five minutes before the library is about to close and we're starting closing procedures?  It's not our fault your kid waited till the last minute to tell you that they have a book report due tomorrow and you didn't think to call ahead and ask us to pull the materials for pick up at our drive-thru window not to mention the fact that you didn't call and ask what time the library was closing before you left the house.

Essence de Mexico

I hate it when I'm especially hungry and I'm stuck covering both lunch shifts at the Ref Desk and inevitably someone who works down the block at the Mexican restaurant comes in and they smell like burritos and salsa.  It makes my stomach growl.  

Oompa Loompa Do-Ba-Dee-Do

Okay so it's prom season again.  How do I know?  All the little teenage girls running around the library looking like oompa loompas and smelling of bananas and coconut from the tanning booths.

Movie Max

Since the demise of Blockbuster the public has been urging us to order more new release titles of movies and t.v. shows on dvd.  Unfortunately, the minute we get them in someone either steals them and throws the broken security cases in the trash or the Brady Bunch family checks out the maximum 3 dvds per person and we never see them again. Sometimes you can find a few of our titles at the local flee market or pawn shop.

Calling Dr. Bombay

Ever wish you were like Samantha on Bewitched and every time you had a medical crisis you could just summon Dr. Bombay and he would instantaneously appear? I get that feeling anytime someone gets sick in the library. I'm subconsciously thinking "Don't throw up or don't pass out until the ambulance gets here".

Royal Pain

I have just been informed that "Miss Jane" has marked her self off the calendar on the day of the Royal wedding so she can sit at home and watch the procession. Only thing is... it's not her home she's staying at. Not only is she taking the day off, she is traveling to another state to watch it in the comfort of her elderly father's home. She's also busy contemplating which wedding souvenirs she is going to purchase to commemorate the big day.

Handcuffed and Hauled Away

Color me surprised! "The Duchess" and "Mr. Sarcasm" teamed up to take out a hooker and her john the other day who were caught in the act in the first floor restroom. I'm surprised either had the gumption to confront the pair. Maybe that's why they had to team up. Two backbones are better than one.

The hooker and her client were barred from the library for 5 years. How they are going to enforce that I have no idea. No one bothered to get their names or make them show an i.d. Maybe it will appear in the police report and we can get their arrest photos to add to our wall of shame?

Yes Ma'am

Sometimes I think that it's impossible to please some people. Literally. No matter what you do or how hard you try, some people are just bound and determined to be miserable and to try and make you miserable too. Going the extra mile for someone like this eventually drives you over the cliff.

Queen Bee of Hearts

Whenever I pass the director's office the "Queen Bee" is either yelling at someone on the phone or sitting at her computer playing Hearts. Guess there just aren't enough things to keep her busy. If she ever caught me playing a game on the computer while staffing the Ref Desk, it would be "off with her head!"

Commute From Hell

I'm really starting to hate mini-vans and the people who drive them. They are always in my way. Driving too slow in the right lane and causing a back up or hogging the left lane and refusing to pass or get over. Get up the road or get out of my way people! I'm under enough stress at the Ref Desk I don't need to add road rage to my list of worries.

Pot and Kettle

Why are the people that are so sensitive about how others talk to them in public lacking the same compunction for their actions when they 'talk down to you' in front of others? Are they just so self-centered that they don't see that they are exhibiting the same behavior that they so despise or is it some sort of display of passive aggressiveness?

Automaton

I love it when I am left alone and can get my groove on. I feel so productive today.

Lost Causes

After one of the latest natural disasters one of my co-workers felt compelled to put out a coffee can to collect money to send to the Red Cross for assistance. I tried to warn her not to leave the can unattended and full of money at the Ref Desk but she didn't listen. She took the time to decorate it and put the Red Cross emblem on it to make it look official but she failed to keep an eye on it and the first time that she left the desk unattended the can was gone. She was devastated that someone would steal money intended for the victims. I wasn't surprised. We have people who steal pens and toilet paper from the library. They are not going to have any qualms about taking ca$h.

Smoke Signals

I don't think smokers realize that they leave a trail of smoke in their wake after they have had a cigarette. Every winter or rainy day we get some wiseacre who is too lazy or too selfish to wander outside in the elements to take a puff and instead goes into the public restroom to light up. Besides the smoke emanating from the bathroom door, the stench of cigarettes lingers in the air, on your clothes, on your breath and is a dead giveaway that you are the guilty party. Leaving ashes on the floor and toilet seats is also not recommended.

Tortoise and the Hare

Have you ever worked with someone who moved so slow that you could literally work circles around them?

Timber!

One of my least favorite activities in the library is waking up the drunken public. We have a policy of no sleeping in the library but it is really hard to enforce when people are passed out drunk and refuse emergency assistance so we have to rouse them up without infringing on their civil liberties and ask them to leave the library sometimes with a security guard escort. They all say the same thing "I wasn't sleeping, I was just resting my eyes". It almost makes me want to pre-record all the loud and obnoxious snores beforehand so I can play back their sawing log noises to them as proof of their condition.

Reach Out and Touch Someone

Our director had to cut down on the number of calls that a certain hearing disabled couple were making via the TTY/TDD machine. It turns out that the wife was using it to call long distance numbers and was running up the library's phone bill.

The 'Queen Bee' also had to cut out international faxes after the great Spanish Lotto controversy because so many of the public were getting duped into sending their actual money to get their "lottery winnings". The cost of the fax call plus replacing the toner and paper was really adding up and the measly fax fee that we charged just wasn't adding up.

Online Catalog

Why do people always approach the online catalog thinking that it is just another Internet accessible machine? They inevitably figure out that it is locked down but why can't they just read the sign above it that says "No Internet Access Available"? I guess it's not safe to assume that just because someone can read a book it doesn't mean that they can also see, read and interpret signage.

Grody to the Max

Why do men in particular like to take the daily newspaper into the bathroom? Our sign clearly says "Please do not remove newspapers from the library" but that doesn't stop a particular gentleman from picking it up and taking it to the bathroom for his morning constitutional only to return it to the same shelf afterwards. Totally gross!

House Calls

My supervisor will be out of the office tomorrow and will be telecommuting from home. My only question is... how do you access a library remotely? Don't you need physical access to the collection? How do you process books, journals and reports from home? This should be interesting...

Can't Remember Sh**

I have too many logins and too many passwords to remember. Why does everything need a PIN number these days? Arrggh!

Over the Hill

Arrgghh. My computer keeps crashing today. I can't get any work done because the stupid system keeps timing out on me and my mouse keeps freezing the cursor on my screen. I want to take this computer and pitch it over the hill.

People With Too Much Time on Their Hands

If I Worked There I Would Slit My Wrists

Partaaaaaaaay

Don't you just love it when your supervisor is in a two hour meeting?  I sure do.

Half-A$$

Is anyone else out there tired of having to overcompensate for people around the office that do everything half-way?  I get so tired of being expected to pick up the extra load because someone else is too overwhelmed and needs to be babied in order for the team to succeed.  If you can't pull your weight, get out of the library.  It's not brain surgery after all.

8 Days a Week

Someone needs to declare an eighth day of the week between Saturday and Sunday.  I just can't get it together with only two days off.  I need an extra day in-between. 

Taxi Cab Confessions

We get people at the Ref Desk all the time asking if they can use our phone to call for a cab. When we point out the fact that there is a pay phone downstairs for public use they always say that they don't have money for the pay phone. But they have money for a cab ride?  Go figure...

Butt Crack of Dawn

Why is it when the weekend comes and you finally have a chance to sleep in you still wake up at the butt crack of dawn?  Life's just not fair sometimes.

Jump the Shark

Why won't MySpace die already?  It's not a friendly, innocent, social network anymore it's filled with johns and prostitutes who use it to see each other naked during 'pool tournaments' and for face-to-face hookups.  Die MySpace Die.

Parenting by Dr. Pepper

I don't get parents these days.  They drag their children into the library so they can spend two hours searching for more hookups on the Internet all the while ignoring the children they already have.  When the kid starts screaming "I'm thirsty" or "I'm hungry" do they take it as a sign that it's time to leave? No! They just pull a bottle filled with cola out of their bag and shove it in the kids mouth expecting them to be quiet.  That's all a jacked up kid needs...more caffeine.

R.I.P.

Well we lost another longtime patron this week.  That makes about five that have died in the last year or so. One died of a long-term illness, one died from a chronic condition, one got hit by a car crossing the street, one was found dead while living on the street and now this one died unexpectedly.  Rest in peace gentleman.

I'm Not Your Bloody Secretary

There is a certain gentleman who likes to use the public Internet computers to conduct his own online business.  Unfortunately he is not very respectful of the women who work in the library.  The men he likes and will talk to freely but the ladies only get orders barked at them. He will come in early in the morning and ask for you to find this and that and make so many number of copies and have it ready for him to pick up when he returns from another appointment.  He also likes to call and ask you to look up 'his' website a couple of times a day just to increase his visitor count.

The 'Office'

The "Lady Wrangler" is a semi-retired gentleman who only 'works' at the library three days a week.  He comes in late usually about 10:30 or 11:00 then promptly takes lunch at noon only to return thirty minutes later to sneak off into his 'office'.  His office consists of a mechanical closet with a reclining lawn chair, a towel, and a box to prop his feet on so he can take a cat nap and rest his weary soul.

Vanishing Act

Why do some people have the innate ability to sense when they will be needed so they make sure that they are no where around when the situation arises?  They are either in a meeting, on a conference call, in the bathroom or just conveniently away from their desk.  Whatever happened to personal accountability?

Cart Before Horse

Don't you just hate it when your supervisor tells you to do something without ever showing you how to do it and then asks "Why didn't you do this?" and "You should have done that first"?  Like duh, I would have followed your directions to a 'T' if only I had been provided them beforehand.