Zen and the Art of Being Creepy

1. An older lady called in, wanting to know the populations of just about every small town on this side of the state. Along with that, she wanted to know the percentage of homes without running water or sewage in said small towns. I asked for her number and said I'd have to get back to her -- I'm just not that fast. She preferred to call me back at a specified time. Okay.

2. A young man (about my age, I expect) had a question regarding the law. We trekked off to look in the SC Code of Law books. He wanted to know how to get his brother out of an arrest. Apparently for sexual misconduct with a minor -- awesome, my favorite crime. I found the code, but of course it didn't help much. I did some searching online. While he had me corralled at the reference desk, he made his move. Yep -- he asked me out... several times, and gave me his phone number, and asked for mine. I told him no. When he asked why I wouldn't tell him my phone number. My response: "I have no idea who you are and know nothing about you. You could be completely creepy." His response: "How can you know I'm not creepy if you won't go out with me?" My response: "Beats me -- that's for you to figure out." He left eventually, after I gave him the phone numbers of some criminal lawyers in town.

(***NOTE: I am actually writing this on Wednesday, two days after the fact. I kid you not -- in the middle of typing that last paragraph, the guy appeared in front of my desk again. I have a feeling this will develop into a pattern. Fortunately, I don't really think he's creepy... just not my, uh, cup of tea. One of my coworkers walked past me while this guy and I were talking, and then promptly asked if she could talk to me for a minute. She didn't need anything -- she was just giving me an out. It worked, because he left. Public library workers unite!!!)

3. The older lady finally called back. I told her what I discovered. She then asked if she was missing any small towns... because I definitely know the names of every small, unincorporated town in the state. In fact, I did name a few that even she had never heard of.

4. A younger guy asked where the paperback nonfiction was. Our nonfiction is all shelved together. A few minutes later, he came back and said he could not find the book he was looking for. He knew the author's last name, so I looked it up. Our catalog definitely said it was shelved in paperback nonfiction. What?! How can a book be shelved in a nonexistent section? Anyway, using my super mad librarian skills, I happened to know the book he wanted anyway -- Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (okay, maybe it doesn't actually take a super mad librarian skill-set to know about that book). Anyway, our catalog said we had it -- it just didn't say where it was shelved or what the call number was. I looked in biographies under "P." Nothing. Then I tried philosophy. Nothing. This made me sad, because if I really had found it, that guy would have thought I was a blooming genius. Too bad for me (oh, and of course for the patron, who did not find his book). Anywho, that book is going on my reorder list.

Vocabulary Building

1. We have an older gentleman who comes to the library several times a week to "research" baseball. And by that, I mean he makes a lot of photocopies of baseball cards along with the statistics on the back. I think, from now on, I shall call him the Commissioner. Yeah. A typical visit from the Commissioner has me basically making the copies for him (because he cannot remember how to do it himself), looking for pictures on Google Images, or attempting to explain to him that I can't just magically look up any obituary on the planet. Well, I guess I could... but perhaps for a more worthy cause? *Aside: Am I too jaded this early in my career?* Anyway, today I had the Google Images search results page up. I kept printing out the pictures he liked, but he seemed dissatisfied. Finally, I realized that he wanted me to print out the entire results page -- yes, the tiny thumbnail sized pictures that repeat themselves or are just completely not related to your search. I printed it and he seemed fairly happy about it. Then he said proudly, "I be 84 on my next birfday, and I ain't on no medications." And then he walked off while laughing rather maniacally.

2. Do you know what a psychopomp is? I sure do. I think I would do a poor job of explaining it, so here's the Wikipedia version: "Psychopomps are creatures, spirits, angels, or deities in many religions whose responsibility is to escort newly deceased souls to the afterlife." I can't believe I've spent my 26 years on this earth not knowing that.... Anyway, some guy wanted to know if we had a book about psychopomps. Guess what? We don't. I looked for things related, and couldn't really find much. This, of course, is my subject area, so I guess I'll have to see about it in the future.

3. A man who looked like Bob Marley walked over to the reference desk. He asked, "mmmmm mmmm mmmmm mmmmmmmmm?" Or at least, that's what it sounded like to me -- he mumbled worse than I've ever heard. Eventually, I figured out that he wanted information on Wing Chun. Well, we had several things on Kung Fu, but nothing on Wing Chun specifically. I told the guy about ILL, and showed him some books I found on WorldCat. He ordered one and left. While walking away, he mumbled something to his wife about building a dummy. Holy crap! I asked him a million times what he wanted to know about Wing Chun! Did he ever say anything about the wooden dummy? NO. Good grief -- I could have just printed out some instructions from the internet for building a Wing Chun dummy. How annoying. His loss, I suppose.

I wish I could catch up.

I've worked at the library for almost a month, and a lot of interesting things have happened in that time. I really wish I could document those things -- my OCD tendencies want me to -- but I'll never start blogging in the present tense if I do that. So, I'm just going to start this week!

The Story So Far

I just began working in the library a few weeks ago. In such a short time, I have learned about the regulars. I know the quirks, whether I want to or not. I have answered some very interesting questions. I have called 911 once already.
Anyway, I've decided that I would really like to remember these days later in life. Therefore, I'm starting this blog -- a collection of happenings at the reference desk.