Hi. My name is Self-Entitled.

A lady comes up and asks if I have any blank paper she can use.

I show her the scratch paper.

No, that's not big enough.

So I give her some sheets from our recycling box.  These are whole sheets with prints on one side that people just leave behind.  We save them and cut them up for scratch paper.

No, she wants brand new, blank computer paper.  Why?  So she can make copies.  I pointed out that she can make copies with the kind from the recycling box.

Not kidding.  She walked off without speaking to me.

This lady is also a bat-shit crazy conspiracy theorist.  But more about that later.

Rick Steves Goes Religious

Girl: I need a book by Rick Stevens.

Me: Which one?

Girl: I don't know the title... it's something about driving.

Me: (At this point I assume she wants a travel book by Rick Steves.  I think that's a reasonable assumption. So... I search for a few seconds but don't come up with anything.  So I ask for the title again.)

Girl: Driving Life by Rick Stevens.

Me: Do you know what's about?

Girl: Um... life?

It dawns on me.... Drum roll, please....

She wants The Purpose-Driven Life by Rick Warren.

Can I Tally This as a Reference Question?

Teenage girl:  Do you have a tampon?

I checked... sadly, I didn't.  I felt sorta bad for her.

So Serial.

I just heard the following conversation between two patrons.  Well, really it was one lady talking and the other lady staring blankly:

"You see, Beverly Lewis writes books in series.  So, what happens is, she writes one book... and then the next one she writes picks up where the other one left off."

I am repeatedly amazed at the number of patrons who ask if there is a fee to check out books. It befuddles me... in a slightly sad way.

Lieutenant Dan!

1. There's a man who has been coming to my computer classes.... I have no idea what his actual name is, but I think of Lieutenant Dan from Forrest Gump every time I see him. I'm not 100% sure why, as I don't think he's like Lt. Dan at all. He just has long shaggy hair... and always wears camo pants and army boots.

Anyway, this guy can talk your head off, mostly about making money on eBay. This would be the theory of making money on eBay, though, as he doesn't know how to use it. He keeps coming to the computer classes in hopes that I will somehow teach eBay tricks or something. I told him to come to the Internet class, but aside from that, I'd show him some books we have about eBay.

I guess Lt. Dan would not be interested in eBay, as it did not exist at any point in the timeline of Forrest Gump. Ebay was founded the year after that movie came out.

2. I have evaluation forms for my classes that I hand out at the end of every class. Honestly, I get rather useless feedback from them, but I keep up with them just the same. Anywho, one of the questions is, "Is there something you didn't learn that you wanted to learn? If yes, what?" One of the answers from yesterday's class: "To learn how to check spelling or grammar" (and yes, it was spelled correctly and everything). That would be a lovely suggestion... if it weren't for the fact that we definitely DID talk about right-clicking on those squiggly lines. Granted, it was a brief discussion, and we didn't talk about the full spelling & grammar check, but still.... It seems somebody failed to pay attention.

The other day....

I'm going to call the following patron Amy. I doubt her name is actually Amy, but you know how some people just look like they should have a certain name...? Yeah.

Anyway, Amy just came to get those books... you know, the ones you had sitting behind the desk for me? From a few days ago?

Well, actually, that was about 2 months ago and we have since reshelved them.

Oh, well, can you just tell me where they are?

Sure, but you'll have to remind me what books they were (because I do not have a super-human memory).

Well, they were blue or green... and there were two of them.

Oh, I see -- and what were they about?

I was looking up definitions.

So, dictionaries? I took Amy to the dictionaries in the reference section and there was, lo and behold, a matching set of blue and green dictionaries (Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, to be exact).

Oh, those aren't the right ones. I remember they were a couple of shelves over.

Hmmm, well that's interesting, since there aren't any dictionaries a couple of shelves over. But okay, let's go look over there for kicks.

Amy decided that we still had the wrong books picked out but that they would work "okay."

The Unfairness of Life

This is a story that has nothing to do with crazy patrons or anything of the sort.


So, I left work this afternoon to go to lunch. I was meeting a coworker who has been out for several weeks with an injury. When I told my boss who I was having lunch with, she asked if she could join... and I said she could, of course!
She wasn't going to be able to meet us until a few minutes later, though.

Anyway, I went to lunch, but my boss never showed up. I checked my phone a few times in case she called, but I never got a message or anything. I just figured it had gotten busy at the library and she wasn't able to make it.

I got back to work from lunch a little bit later than I meant to. When I came back, I noticed a lack of cars in the parking lot. Also, no one was in the reference workroom. However, our director was sitting at the reference desk. This is when I discovered what happened while I was gone.

Apparently, shortly after I had left for lunch, the power in the building went off. It was off for so long, that they actually decided to close the library and send everyone home for the day. So, that's why the parking lot was mostly empty and why my coworkers were gone. Apparently, though, the power had come back on before everyone had left, so whoever was left had to stay. My boss had left me two voice mails telling me about this, but I didn't hear them until I was already back in the building. Now remember, I had been checking my phone because I was wondering where she was. But after a while, I quit checking, and I didn't hear it when my phone actually rang.

So, anyway, I'm sitting at the reference desk now (on the day, by the way, when I typically have no desk hours) and most of my coworkers are at home... enjoying an unexpected afternoon off.

I was going to come in early tomorrow for taking a long lunch today. I'm not doing that anymore.

Deja Vu All Over Again

Today, I had two practically identical phone conversations.

I was a little late getting the October computer class schedule out this month, simply because I've actually been pretty busy... mostly teaching the September classes! Anyway, I had several messages about the computer classes, and I finally got around to replying to them today.

The following conversation took place (twice, with completely different people):

Me: Hello, could I speak with Fred?

Patron: Who?

Me: Fred, Fred Smith.

Patron: What?

Me: This is Allison at the County Library. I have a message here from Fred. Is this the correct number?

Patron: Fred?

Me: Yes, could I speak with him, please?

Patron: He ain't here.

Me: So... is this the correct number?

Patron: What's he want?

Me: I have a message requesting I call him back (Aside: I can't actually tell the person exactly why I'm calling, unless it's Fred -- it's a privacy thing).

Patron: Well, I just said he ain't here.

Me: Well, could you give him the message?

Patron: Yeah

Me: Thank you. Goodbye.

Patron: [hangs up without saying goodbye]

Me: [pretends to strangle patron through the phone]


Sheesh! Hasn't the phone been around for over 100 years? Is it that hard to communicate? I'm considering never leaving my work phone again -- that way, no one will ever need to leave a message.

Currently...

1. Yesterday, I taught my first computer class for the general public. It was quite the experience. The class was Basics I -- this includes things like the parts of a computer, how to use a mouse, and how move windows around on the screen. It truly is amazing what people do not know. I have to teach Basics II tomorrow. Basics II is comprised of saving, printing, finding programs in the Start menu, and properly shutting down the computer. Next weeks is the Email class, in which I will lead the class in signing up from a Gmail account and using the basic functions within it.

I will report back once I have been doing this a little longer.

2. I just had to shush some people again. They were really nice about it, though. I'm such a sissy when it comes to confronting people, though. I need to grow some librarian balls.

3. I got to go visit my EC library friends this morning! It was very good to see them all, and it's cool getting to talk to them more as colleagues. Definitely worth getting up earlier than usual for. :-)