Library Ninja

Renovations

2007-11-19T18:32:00.000-05:00

Way back when I first interviewed for my job at this library, one of the things that came up was the as-then-hypothetical renovation. Because I can't help myself, I started making suggestions on the spot about tearing out some shelves, putting up others, getting better tables/chairs/seating, maybe a coat of paint... I only just barely stopped myself from drawing up plans then and there, as I suddenly realized that you don't go redecorating someone's house before you know them well, and even then you only do it if you're going to live there.

It worked out for me, though, because last week--about a year and a half after I first gave words to my sweeping vision--we renovated the children's and teen areas. Why did it need to be renovated so badly? Well, here's the "before" picture:

It should be pretty clear why I've been so eager to do this. Those stacks in the middle of the room! The galley kitchen appearance! And oh, those paperback racks on the wall, with little organization (alphabetical by the first letter of the author's last name--ugh!) and racks that chew up the bottoms of the books! Of course, we can't forget the institutional-white walls, and who doesn't love that hand-me-down index table from Tech Services in the middle of the room?

Well, it took a while, lots of brainstorming and floor planning, paint samples, and catalogs up the wazoo, but we have our renovation. A fresh coat of paint (yellow), new shelving (perimeter), tables and chairs (cafe style), and comfy seating (beanbags, plus floor rockers pending). We're waiting on new computer tables (with a mid-January ship date), which will replace the table in the middle of the room, and we'll have 6 computers on it once the electrician comes to rewire (the neon sign will be moved and plugged back in then, too). Take another look at the picture above for comparison, then look at our new room:

Thanks to the Friends, the town, and a whole bunch of volunteers who painted the place (under a grant that the children's side got for their renovation), we actually look good! Teen response has been positive so far--I've overheard things like "I love the new tables!" and "it looks so cool!", and witnessed a few girls race each other to the beanbag chair in the back. It's amazing how much of a difference this made--I'm very excited about it, and so are the kids. Hooray!

Monthly report

2007-10-30T12:07:00.000-04:00

I’ve been somewhat remiss in my blogging. I’m okay with it, and I haven’t heard any complaints from readers, so I guess it is what it is. I’m thinking of hanging up the whole work-related blogging thing anyway—when you have some measure of job satisfaction, it’s hard to come up with things to say. It’s so much easier to complain than it is to make the mundane, everyday events interesting.

I’ve started working on the grant, now that we have it and have to implement the crazy things I said I’d do. I’ve been meeting with school representatives on various issues, most notably the head of the science department, to get him on board with the sci/tech component. One of his teachers has already volunteered to do a session on aquaculture using the high school’s lab. I have no idea what aquaculture is, but we’re going to set that up as one of the early sessions—early, because she’s the only one who’s volunteered so far. I’m hoping she enjoys it and spreads the word.

We’ve had a couple of meetings of the new advisory board. Not surprisingly, the middle schoolers are a much bigger group than the high schoolers, who aren’t even a group, because you can’t have a group when there’s nobody there. One interested ninth-grader asked that the meetings be moved to evening, since lots of kids work in the afternoon—but lots of them work at night, too, so there’s not really a time that’s great for everyone. I had split the groups into middle school and high school, but I think it might be better to just recombine them, since the high school group is so non-existent. The middle schoolers have had some really great ideas, though, and with their input I found which of my own ideas aren’t so great. Oh, they have some misses, too—the boy who suggested an ice-sculpting workshop, for instance, admitted that he didn’t think it through when I asked what kind of tools we’d need for it—but on the whole, they’re a great group of kids with great ideas, and I’m looking forward to really getting to know them.

Last night I brainstormed with one of our pages to come up with ideas for crafts that aren’t the same things we’ve been doing. Mostly it’s been “here are materials (beads, wire, pipe cleaner, paper clips); make something!” and we’re looking to break out of that mold. I think we might end up planning a trip to AC Moore, and just see what looks fun while we’re there. And different. Fun and different, because as bored as the attendees are with what we’re doing, Kate and I are just as bored. (Kate is the best page ever and I’m very sad that she’s off to college next fall. In the meantime, she and I are of like minds when it comes to crafts, which is a negative insofar as we can’t even muster the energy to do crafts one of us hates—because we hate the same ones, so neither of us can “carry” the other in running a non-craft like decoupage.)

I’ve been plugging away at the summer reading list. At last check, there was some discussion of giving a choice of books for each grade level, which I think is a great idea. So my annotated list keeps getting longer. I also have an obsessively-detailed spreadsheet, broken down by grade level and then color-coded by genre (speculative fiction, historical, mystery, realistic, non-fiction). I am a big nerd, but it was very helpful to take a quick glance at the spreadsheet and realize that, right now, 8th grade has nothing but sci-fi, and the bulk of the 7th grade list is historical. So I know I need to mix that up a bit, and add more 7th-8th grade titles in general. 10th grade? Not so much, because my 10th grade list is huuuuuuge.

Not much happening on the non-work front. Halloween is tomorrow, and with it comes the start of the holiday season for me—which means I need to get cracking on all the Projects I’m planning to do for Christmas. I’ve already requested 2 days off in December to give myself a 4-day weekend, which will be the big Candy Weekend, but I also have a couple of quilts to finish and other miscellaneous projects I’ve wanted to get to and haven’t had time for. It might end up being a less-handmade Christmas than I’m hoping, but that makes me a little sad. Dammit, I want some time to play with art supplies!

I’ve been losing a lot of my free time to the Y—stupid exercise eats into my reading time, my crafting time, my cooking dinner or watching TV or otherwise being-home time. The scale believes I’ve only dropped 3 pounds in the month I’ve been going, but all my clothes are looser, so if nothing else I’ve redistributed the weight I have. And I’ve been feeling a little better now that I’ve been moving more, so that’s a win, too. (I’m feeling like a slug now that I haven’t been in a week, but that’s because I’ve had a stupid cold that left me short of breath at the best of times; vigorous exercise didn’t seem the best plan.)

So, work, Y, eat, sleep. That’s about the extent of my life. Reading has finally picked up from the summer, though not a the breakneck pace I’d accomplished back in the fall. Full log, with reviews, is at GoodReads.com. (I’ve read 165 books so far this year!)

Overheard

2007-10-02T14:27:00.000-04:00

A kindergartener telling the children's librarian what he learned in school today:

"Everyone thought the world was flat, and they would fall off the water. But Christopher said 'I'll fix that!' and bought three sailboats--at a store, I guess--and sailed to America, where he didn't even know there was. And nobody fell off the water anymore."

Summer Reading

2007-09-04T10:17:00.000-04:00

As a quick wrap-up, the teen summer reading program had 141 people signed up and 160 folders given out. Everyone's pretty happy with my numbers, me especially. Yay!

A week or so ago, I got a call from the newly-appointed head of the English department for the local public schools. She's looking to revamp the entire summer reading list, and wants my suggestions of what books should be on there. I already have a pretty sizable list (I'm always very excited to push books on people, and freak that I am, I like making annotated booklists), but I'm having trouble adding to it. I need to find books appropriate for grades 6-11 (12th grade gets to pick something off the NYT or Boston Globe Bestseller lists), ideally that isn't already on the list for the school year.

That said: Hive mind! What books do you wish you'd encountered in high school? What books are you happy you did? What should be avoided at all costs? (I promise not to get into my rant on Why Assigned Summer Reading is a Bad Idea.)

Best Mini-Reviews

2007-07-30T20:18:00.000-04:00

As part of our summer reading program, teens submit mini-reviews of books they've read for our weekly drawing. Some of my favorite reviews so far:

Title/Author: Magic's Child / Justine Larbalestier
Comments: An okay ending to a bad series
Would you recommend this book? yes!

Title/Author: Out of the Dust / Karen Hesse
Comments: This is the best book in the history of life.
Would you recommend this book?YES!

Title/Author: Spiral Bound / Aaron Reiner
Comments: This is the perfect graphic novel (unless you like swears and violence)
Would you recommend this book? Of course!

Title/Author: Crash / Jerry Spinelli
Comments: This story is very nice. The author has an imagination.
Would you recommend this book? Yes, I would.

Title/Author: The Unbearable Lightness of Being / Milan Kundera
Comments: I'm reading this book, I don't know if I'll like it, but it makes me seem like I am cool like Harold Bloom, who is my hero.
Would you recommend this book? Sure, why not.

Happy birthday to me!

2007-07-14T21:52:00.000-04:00

I have 365 more days to do all the things I planned to do before I turned 30. Luckily, I don't think there's anything on that list, because I've never really been much for setting arbitrary time frames. At least, I never made an official to-do-before-30 list, so, okay, I guess I can check list-making off the list. (Did that sentence make any sense? It did in my head.)

The week leading up to my birthday was pretty good. In work news, I found out Tuesday that my library won the Serving 'Tweens and Teens grant I wrote back in February, so the state is going to give me $20,000 for teen programs and services, and limited remodeling of the Teen Zone. Not only will this look great on a resume, but I now have at least 2 years of job security, because nobody in their right mind will want to implement my Grant Year Two project, in which I outlined a plan for a semester-long marketing/consumerism/visual literacy program, which will culminate in having the teens develop their own print and (local) TV ad campaign to promote the library in general and Teen Zone in particular. Hell, I'm not totally convinced I want to take on this project!

Wednesday we found out that we're also being given a $20,000 grant via ALA to renovate the whole children's room, and everything needs to be picked out by the end of August. It's not really my news, because I'm not in charge of the children's room, but WOOHOO $20,000 to bring the room out of the 1980 orange-and-mustard color scheme. Hooray!

Thursday was my director's birthday and I took Friday off, so YAY birthday cake in the staff room.

Friday: we found an apartment. It's in Central Square, which is further in than I wanted to be (we were mostly looking around Porter) and we'll have to get our own laundry machines (there are hook-ups) but the place is huuuuuuuge. We had to sign over our souls, and some big checks, with the tentative lease, but it looks like a go pending income verification. So unless the management company thinks we three--a bookseller, a librarian, and a teacher at a tech college--look like utter deadbeats, we should have a new address come September 1.

Following that good news, we went to see Harry Potter. A good adaptation, but man did they hustle through the first, I dunno, 200 pages or so. Come to think of it, the whole thing felt a little rushed--it could have used another hour or so--but the cuts they made were understandable. There were still little glimpses of the character development I wanted to see, so it's not all bad. The casting was fantastic--Umbridge in particular was so amazingly, pleasantly awful, and whoever designed her office, covering every inch of every wall with decorative plates of meowing cats was a freakin' genius. I have read some people commenting that the movies are starting to lose all intelligibility to people who aren't already well-schooled in the PotterVerse, and that's probably right. Not a problem for me, and the very reason why people should be READING BOOKS instead of just watching the movie.

We finished the night at Buddha's Delight in Chinatown, which was, as usual, really enjoyable. That they can turn soy protein and wheat gluten into such a range of meat-like foods is amazing in itself, but its also amazingly good and dirt-cheap to boot. And you can't go wrong with the pineapple milkshake made with condensed milk. Oh, I swoon thinking about it, but yum. We rolled home, and then my birthday was pretty much over.

Today I mostly stayed on the couch, watched junk TV, and finished the really boring phase (unfolding corners of blocks) of the quilt I'm working on. I really want to finish this quilt, because it'll be much easier to move a blanket than it will 168 squares of fabric.

Harry Potter and the Huge Page Count

2007-06-27T18:11:00.000-04:00

First: Summer Reading sign-ups continue apace, and I'm up over 100 teens registered already. I think it helps that I put a sign up on the shelves that hold their required reading, telling them that if they have fines on their cards and can't check out their summer books, signing up for the program gets them a Free Fines coupon. I have 108 teens so far. Hooray!

Second: Tonight is the All-Ages Harry Potter Discussion/Predictions/Support Group. I have no clue how many people to expect. All I know is that we've told a bunch of people about it, lots of the tear-off slips are gone from the library flyers, and a reporter with the Lowell Sun was mentioning the group in the article he's publishing today. We're serving up butter beer (chilled, because it's 6:30 and still 92°--and because we bought cold cups instead of hot), chocolate (to ward off Dementors), jelly beans, and Weasley's Ton-Tongue Toffees (actually just regular butter toffee, but eat at your own risk!). Wish me luck!

Third: in preparation for tonight's festivities, I just re-read the series thus far. I started last Monday, and finished at 12:30 last night, meaning I read close to 2800 pages in 8 days, while also doing crazy things like going to work and museums and having friends over for meals and making jam. Current read: Joey Pigza, because my brain REALLY needs a break.

Summer Reading: Down to a Science!

2007-06-14T16:47:00.001-04:00

Sign-ups for summer reading started today, the first day of summer vacation. Since 9 AM I've had 25 kids sign up already, which is pretty great for the teen program. (Past records indicate that the best summer ever had about 170 registrants by the end of August.) At least 4 have signed up for the mailing list, and most have entered the Win The Last Harry Potter Book drawing. And we're completely cleaned out of the entering-sixth-grade required reading book (Jerry Spinelli's Crash). It's going to be a busy summer, and it's off to a good start!

Whee Books Hooray!

2007-06-14T10:07:00.000-04:00

It probably happened about a week ago now, but according to my GoodReads.com list, I’ve passed the 100 book mark for 2007. Of the 102 currently on the list, about 30% of them are comics, which isn’t a bad ratio, in my mind, since most of them were good.

I’ve noticed, though, that the quality of my reading material has improved this year, or at least it seems like it has. This might just be an effect of public logging of each book—if people are going to see what I read, then I should be reading a higher caliber of authors, because I don’t want my friends to know just how many “guilty pleasure” books I read. I’m still not really into the classics—I can’t muster any enthusiasm for Fitzgerald or Melville—but I’ve been exploring some less-popular, more respected (and respectable) authors.

The new authors I’ve been reading are mostly the women I read in high school/college and not since, but I’m trying them now and really enjoying them. Women like Charlotte Perkins Gilman, who wrote way more than just The Yellow Wallpaper; Shirley Jackson, previously known only for The Lottery; even Margaret Atwood, whom I recognize as likely being the party guest who brought the cat in Moxy Früvous’s “My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors.” I’ve been trepadacious about Joyce Carol Oates, because I tend to think her short stories are just the right length and her novels are about a million pages long, but I’ll probably try to get over that in the not-too-distant future.

I think Hemingway is next on my list of Revisited High School Authors, even though he’s not a woman. I’ve liked nearly everything of his I’ve read, though one American Lit professor ruined The Old Man and the Sea by making us read it aloud, each student reading one paragraph, around the whole room until we’d made it through the whole book. Hemingway for kindergarten, I guess. (She ruined The Education of Little Tree the same way, incidentally. I don’t have fond memories of that class.)

But the next books on my list, after I finish the Margaret Atwood I’m working on, is a re-read of the Harry Potter series, I think. Because in just under 2 weeks, I’m leading an all-ages discussion group on the whole series, and it would be nice if I remembered some of the details.

Let's all go to the movies!

2007-05-24T09:27:00.000-04:00

I'm interrupting my book- and work-related updates to just say: I am so freakin' excited about the next Batman movie. It's a year off yet (IMDB lists the US release as July 18 2008), but the little bit that's been released so far looks really great. By "little bit" I mean this news brief, complete with a photo of Heath Ledger as the Joker, and he actually looks scary.

Adding to my excitement solely by its weirdness: Nestor Carbonell has been cast as the mayor of Gotham. I'm excited but a little scared his presence will take me out of the movie, as the main role I know him from is Batmanuel.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix for my birthday this year, The Dark Knight next year... I was born at a great time to have birthday movie parties! (Who wants to buy me popcorn?)

Best book covers EVER

2007-05-21T19:43:00.000-04:00

Hats off to Digital Manga Publishing for bringing us EduManga, complete with the best covers ever. Of special note: Anne Frank, who smiles out at the reader while her old pal AstroBoy gazes at her adoringly. Oh, but to notice that cover takes attention away from AstroBoy, who begs to be hugged by the traumatized child held in Mother Theresa's protective embrace. Beethoven, imploring AstroBoy to Talk To The Hand?

Oh, I love them ALL. I truly want these books to be astonishingly awful, though after the cover images, it will take a lot to astonish me.

Things I Learned Today By Doing Reference

2007-05-15T16:20:00.000-04:00

(a) Boston Common, the first public park in (what became) America, was established in 1634 as a utilitarian common ground for grazing, militia formation, and public hangings.

(b) Pascal's Triangle is a concept in calculus that is related to Fibonacci numbers and other mathematical patterns and sequences. Not much is written about this, and 90% of the articles that are written are not available as full-text.

(c) Children enrolled in center-based day-cares have more immune system responses (i.e., get sick more often) than children in home-based day-cares. [NOTE: this is what the woman was researching; I don't know if it's actually true.]

(d) If a squirrel takes up residence in your car door, the average mechanic will charge $150 to repair the damage. This is why books like *Outwitting Squirrels* and *Outwitting Critters* are popular titles, and why it is useful to have an online subscription to Chilton's Automotive Repair, with drawings to show how to disassemble one's car door without paying a mechanic more than once.

(e) To a first-grader, birds and alligators are equally cool, and students should not be forced to choose between them for the purposes of reports. Sadly, there is no flying alligator.

We're back!

2007-05-15T11:24:00.000-04:00

We’re back from Reading Vacation, and it was fantastic. I managed 10 books in 3 days—granted, they were all pretty quick reads; I didn’t bring along any of the 500-page slow-reading books on my shelf (yeah, I’m talking about YOU, Rick Moody and Jonathan Franzen). A good time was had by all. Reading, relaxing, eating potato chips… what could be a better way to spend the weekend?

With my physical to-be-read shelf nearing empty, I went through my virtual to-read shelves (An Amazon wish list and my GoodReads list) and ordered a bunch of stuff from the library. Some fiction, some non-fiction. I should have a nice robust shelf again! And this time they’ll all be free. Hooray!

I’m already back at work, which is always a pleasant transition after a vacation. At least it was pretty slow yesterday and I got a little more reading done. My summer program is just waiting on a few dates from the children’s department, but I’ve given them today as the drop-date—after today I consider my dates firm and they can work around me, since I’ve given them about six weeks of flexibility to my schedule. Hmph.

Enjoy the nice weather while it lasts—it’s supposed to be hot again this afternoon, a fact that does not please me.

Ick

2007-05-07T18:08:00.000-04:00

I need to start by saying that the Withern Rise trilogy, by Michael Lawrence, has a really interesting premise (the Many Worlds theory), where Alaric accidentally found a way into Naia's reality--Naia being who he would have been, had he been born a girl. The premise is interesting, the writing is a little, um, not. But I keep reading anyway, because it's only a trilogy and I Must Know What Happens.

Here's the dedication from book three, The Underwood See:

For IE and MAS, my parents, who, by randomly introducing a particular sperm to a particular ovum, created (hopefully with pleasure) the eventual author of this trilogy, which is set in the very house in which the coupling took place.

Ick. Just... ick.

Nothing—and then some!

2007-05-07T14:33:00.000-04:00

That’s about all that’s been going on. The library’s been dead these past couple of weeks, probably because it finally stopped raining (note to self: cancel plans to finish ark-building) and the weather’s gotten really nice. Even the school projects seem to be slacking off. So, not much happening at work. I’m caught up on all my projects, and what little bit I have—finishing my teen summer reading packets—has to wait until the children’s department finalizes their dates, so that mine are firm and I can go ahead and publish. I have a meeting at the middle school in a couple of weeks to start pushing it, but until then, I’m at the “wait” part of “hurry up and.”

Our talented teen volunteer has been producing some clip-art images we can use for all our summer promotional needs. Some of the science-themed pictures she’s been drawing are hilarious—so far, I’m partial to the one with the teen whose beaker just blew up in his face.

(Talented Teen Volunteer just came in and got very excited when I told her the series she’d asked about—Ouran High School Host Club—was in for her. She’s happily reading it now, and I interrupted her with a list of other suggested titles: which should I buy? She looked over the list, asked for more Revolutionary Girl Utena and Cardcaptor Sakura, and then said “Mars? That one was so romantic it made me barf. And angsty. It’s angsty and too romantic and it makes me barf. Get these others instead.”)

I spent the majority of the weekend reading, which was a fabulous way to spend a weekend. And I’m leaving Thursday morning for Reading Vacation, from which I’ll be back on Sunday, with a good chunk of books removed from my to-read shelf, I hope. I just picked up a book this morning from my local library, in a different library network, because nobody in my network owns it yet (The Underwood See by Michael Lawrence; third in a series with an interesting premise but kinda crappy writing).

The only other news I have is that I’m itchy. It’s not the dry-skin kind of itchy I dealt with all winter, and it doesn’t feel like heat rash. But there are a bunch of tiny red marks up and down one arm, like little bites from god knows what kind of insect. Just one arm. And Alexander’s fine, so I assume it’s not something living in our apartment. No new detergents, soaps, foods, or anything else. Just random speckly itchiness. Complaints, complaints.

Three days until Reading Vacation!

For the intellectual reader-man

2007-05-02T09:29:00.000-04:00

The Amazing Adventures of Lethem & Chabon.

Good news & other things

2007-05-01T12:01:00.000-04:00

No excuses for the 11-day lapse this time, other than I've just been lazy.

We've been pretty busy with reference lately--lots of interesting questions, some annoying questions, some just plain dumb. Personal favorite was this interaction:

"Where are your biographies?"

"Names starting with 'A' start right here, and then it goes alphabetically around to here. Is there someone in particular you're looking for?"

"Robinson Crusoe."

".... Are you looking for the book, or a biography of Daniel Defoe?"

"oh... um, I guess the book."

My summer reading program is pretty much set. There are a couple of dates for craft programs that are still up in the air, because the children's room is trying to line up performances that might conflict. I've given them a drop-date of May 15, after which my dates are firm and they can work around me. I've scheduled 3 "performers"--2 sessions of the Henna artist, Rory Raven talking about the paranormal and skepticism, and--this one I just set up yesterday--a forensic investigator with the Mass State Police Crime Lab. He says his thing is a little talk in the beginning about what he does, possibly a Powerpoint presentation, and an interactive exhibit of his tools and the sorts of work that he does. That's going to be an evening thing--in part because I think I'll get more kids that way, and also because then my dates won't get shot to hell if he ends up in court that day. (It was his suggestion, for just that reason.) Teen Summer Reading, Down to a Science. I hope I can get some kids to come, with all this stuff! (I dunno; I think forensic investigation should be a draw...)

For the good news: my director told me this morning that she got a phone call yesterday from someone on the board of library commissioners. Basically this person was just saying that we'd have to reallocate the money we'd budgeted for me to go to PLA '08, since we can't use federal funds for it. Which is sad, because I wanted to go. But this person also said that, while they're not making any decisions yet, our grant application was very strong ("and if it's her first grant, she should be very proud--it's really good!"), and we're one of the frontrunners. They did send some apps back for rewrites, but ours was not one of them, because we know how to write clearly and follow directions, I guess. Anyway, we won't know until the summer, but our chances look really good. This commissioner said she was optimistic, anyway. Hooray!

Been reading lots. Check Goodreads.com to see what I thought of it all!

With activities and programs for all

2007-04-20T16:01:00.000-04:00

Today is the end of school vacation week, and the one day this week I don’t have a program. (Monday was a state holiday—Patriot’s Day—so the library was closed.) Tuesday and Wednesday were Dungeons and Dragons, with a pretty good crowd both days. Interestingly, we now have some fairly damning circumstantial evidence that there’s one particular kid (I’ll call him J) who eats all the food and causes the usual ruckus.

Tuesday, J was one of 11 kids at the session, and we went through 2 bottles of soda, 3 pitchers of Kool-Aid, a bag of Doritos, 2 big bags of potato chips, and a full package of cookies. Another kid dropped a full plate of chips on the floor. Kid Number 3 (whom I’ll call P) tipped his chair over backwards and fell. (These are both usual occurrences, to the point that it hardly seems a session is complete without these two events.)

Wednesday, there were 13 kids, and J was not among them. Despite the net gain of 2 bodies, we went though almost exactly half as much food—just over a pitcher of juice, almost two bottles of soda, a box of Oreos, and half a bag each of Doritos and Cheeze Doodles (which usually disappear). Nobody fell out of their chairs. Nobody dropped plates of chips on the floor (boy in question claims it’s when he has to yell at J for something, that he knocks the plate off the table).

Things don’t look good for J, but I’m not going to kick him out of the group. It's an interesting phenomenon to witness, though.

Thursday was my big craft blowout—a 3-hour session, with all the odds and ends from other crafts available to be combined in any way imaginable. I’d expected—well, not a crowd, but a handful of kids. The weather’s been icky all week (it’s monsoon season in New England; did you know?), it’s school vacation and kids are bored… I really thought half a dozen kids would show, we’d make stuff, and everyone would go home happy. Except the weather turned against me and yesterday brought the first spring-like day we’ve had—blue sky, not pouring, reasonably warm. I had one girl show, and she’s someone I recognize from other crafts. She’s painfully shy, doesn’t like to talk to people much, and keeps very much to herself. It was a long 3-hour workshop, the two of us quietly working independently. Eh. These things happen.

Obviously I have time to plan several programs and blog about it, so I’ve been thinking of ways to fill my time. I think I found a way: I’ve volunteered my services to the adult programming committee, specifically with the goal of planning programs for young adults—not meaning teens, but meaning adults who are young-ish—the 20- and 30-somethings. I tossed off a couple of ideas in conversation with the adult reference librarian and the director, just minor things like “hold a monthly café night—get a tray of Danish or cookies, put on a big pot of coffee, and invite people in to read and/or socialize.” They both just stared for a moment, and then the reference librarian turned to the director and said, “we need her on the committee.” So apparently I’m now being added to that committee. Um… hooray!

I’m planning on doing some minor things in the current teen area, to give teens something before the summer rolls around. I can’t move any shelving or anything before summer, and therefore I can’t put in more seating or anything, so I’m hoping I can make it a little more interactive, at least. I found 3 small sets of Magnetic Poetry, and I’m going to put those up on the end of a shelf. There’s a book of visual puzzles I found in the collection; that’s been moved to a table. I mentioned to the children’s librarian that I was thinking of buying a couple of cheap, quick-to-play board or card games, like Set, Quiddler, Trivial Pursuit cards… anything that has pieces that will affect gameplay if lost (i.e., the cards for Clue) will have said pieces kept in baggies behind the desk, to be checked out with a library card. Anyway, I’d tossed this off as something I’m thinking about, and she kind of freaked a little: “If you’re doing that, then I’m going to get some toys for the children’s section!”—as if this had been some kind of ongoing battle, where I’ve been saying she mustn’t have ANY toys for the kids EVER. I think I walked into a weird scene, but I’m going to give it a week and revisit it when she’s had some time to calm down. Because I honestly don’t think a deck of Uno cards is really a hill I’m prepared to die on.

All this stuff that should make me great, and the middle school teachers are complaining that the programs here at the library are “a bunch of crafts, and nothing literary.” Never mind that my total attendance at 6 book discussions was 4 kids, and only two of them had read the book. So now I have to find a way to placate them by explaining the upcoming science programs, and hope that they go for those even though they’re not actually literary, even if they are academic.

Tricks are for Kids

2007-04-11T13:27:00.000-04:00

Yesterday’s Dungeons and Dragons session went well enough—12 kids, about average, but were they ever wound up. School vacation is next week and they’re all pretty eager for it. Plus, the sky was blue and it wasn’t raining for the first time in I don’t even know how long. It wasn’t particularly warm, but not cold, either. The kids were just ramped up and LOUD. Seriously, I’ve had quieter D&D groups with close to 20 kids. This was just insane.

When the session wrapped up, most of the kids went home, but the few who had to wait for rides were still being crazy and (frankly) annoying. They finally went downstairs, and we all breathed a sigh of relief.

And then the pizza guy showed up.

For real. A guy came into the library, carrying one of those delivery bags, and asking who ordered pizza. It wasn’t anyone up here in the children’s room. It wasn’t any of the downstairs staff. None of the pages. Even the patrons denied any knowledge of this. Eventually the pizza guy took his pizza and returned to his store. A woman came in and said she’d given a couple of boys a nickel for the pay phone because she assumed they were calling their parents, but we later could see them on the corner in front of the library, on a cell phone, watching the pizza guy intently, so we’re pretty sure it was them.

Here’s the thing, though: I have never understood this prank. The boys apparently wanted to do something mean to the library, so they ordered a pizza to be delivered. The library was mystified, but that’s about it. A little befuddled, even. The pizza guy is the one who wasted half an hour of his day and didn’t get a tip, AND has to go back and explain the undelivered (and thus wasted) pizza to his boss. How is this a mean prank to the library? It’s a mean prank on the pizza guy.

(There was brief talk of buying the pizza anyway, since it did sound good, but nobody had any money.)

Minutiae

2007-04-04T10:35:00.000-04:00

My reading log is mostly moved over to GoodReads. I'll probably keep with that, and just mention the highlights (and lowlights) here. Right now: more people need to be reading Amelia Rules; Carolyn Haywood's Betsy books still occupy a soft spot in my heart (and perhaps in my head), despite being kinda poorly written; and Tom Robbins is officially Not For Me.

Non-reading updates: the renovation of the adult department is just about done, and it looks pretty good. This bodes well for my renovation of the teen department this summer. I'm going to a meeting next week on Teen Standards: Facilities (that's the fancy-pants name of the meeting, actually), where I should learn more about creating good teen spaces. The problem: most of the books and meetings tend to assume teen rooms are much bigger than mine--I only have 12 feet across to work with. Part of me desperately wants to be the jerky neighbor when I get my new shelving, and move the fence line between the teen and children's departments over about six or eight inches.

RefGrunt: I don't mind helping patrons with the computer. I'll even try to patiently explain that if they want to email a resume for a job, they need to have an email address. But could the people who need this help please, please bathe and brush their teeth? I had to sit with a man yesterday who smelled, all over, like morning breath. Basic hygiene should not be too much to ask. Yikes.

The middle school has confirmed the summer reading titles for sixth and eighth grades: Eighth is sticking with Where the Red Fern Grows; sixth is abandoning Hatchet (after something like 10 years) and doing Crash instead. Seventh is tentatively looking at Loser. Someone in the English department is a big Spinelli fan!

Lastly: I'm told that comments aren't working consistently. Eventually that will get fixed, I guess. Let's have a round of applause for Blogger's upgrade, which only broke most of the features I use!

Odds and Ends

2007-03-28T11:13:00.000-04:00

First, and most important: hie thee to GoodReads.com! Post your list (and reviews, if you like) of books you've read, are currently reading, or even plan to read. Look at what your friends are reading. Get recommendations for other books to read. It's MySpace for Readers. (I'm findable by name or by email.) Mostly my book-blogging will be over there, unless I have a review of something, or really need to snark.

I've confirmed two performers for the summer reading program--the annual henna programs and Rory Raven, coming back to give another talk on skepticism and the paranormal. Or something. He's a good person and very flexible; I've left the topic in his capable hands, as long as I can (however tangentially) relate it to the science theme. (And an update: yes, the teen program will be called Down to a Science.)

I have almost all of my non-outsider programs planned for the summer, and my brochure is just about finished. Just waiting now to get some images from the girl who draws all our summer art.

I've had a teen survey up on SurveyMonkey for a while now, and it's gotten a whole 19 responses so far. Responses have been pretty uniform: teens want movies and CDs added to the collection, and the fantasy, horror, and realistic fiction collections increased. They want more computers and comfortable seating. They don't like the cramped space they have now and the lack of more than 2 computers. There haven't been any real surprises, but that in itself is valuable knowledge.

The best book title weeded from the Children's Room thus far: A Boy and a Pig, But Mostly Horses. We've been refering to it as "a kid and some stuff that the book's not about," but really, it's hard to draw MORE humor out of this already-absurd title. This book deserves a special prize for the title alone.

Pi Day

2007-03-19T16:50:00.000-04:00

I only realized a couple of days ago that I missed Pi Day last Wednesday, 3.14. I sighed sadly, having missed the opportunity to do something fun at the library for it. But then I figured, well, I can always do something during the summer reading program (theme: science!) for Pi Approximation Day, 22/7 (okay, so it's 7/22 for the Americans, but we'll fudge). But 22 July is a Sunday. I can't do a program then, either, because we're closed. And it'll be almost three years before I get another binary day--not until January 1 of 2010--01/01/10.

It is a sad calendar for geeky librarians, that's for sure.

Books: The Black Veil

2007-03-19T15:56:00.000-04:00

I finished The Black Veil last night. Moody did manage to tie together his memoir with "The Minister's Black Veil," but ultimately it was because of a genealogy project--the Moody in the story being, according to family legend, one of Rick Moody's ancestors.

The memoir parts of the book were interesting, and I really enjoyed those sections. The criticism of the short story I have no intention to read, not so much. And really--is a stranger's genealogy interesting to anyone besides the person doing the researching?

I have his new book (The Diviners) on my To-Be-Read shelf, along with a review copy of an upcoming collection of novellas. I'm still looking forward to those, but I need to put a little bit of time between my Moody indulgences.

Renovations

2007-03-17T16:12:00.000-04:00

The library was closed to the public yesterday for renovations. Lucky we were, too, because the 2-day installation stretched into a third day (yesterday) and it still isn’t done. The workers will be back on Monday to finish up, I think. And bring the remaining pieces of furniture, which for some reason aren’t here yet.

Despite all this, though, it’s pretty good. The new desks (reference and circulation) are far more comfortable than the old ones. It’s a hassle trying to find things (since one of the pieces that didn’t come is the drawer unit for the reference desk) and take phone calls (since the phones aren’t wired right, and the reference phone isn’t hooked up at all—the phone currently at the ref desk is the main phone into the library). It’s an adventure, to be sure.

The biggest issue I have with the renovation is that the new reference desk is where the old circulation desk used to be, so all day long I’ve been directing patrons to the new desk. Which they have to walk past to get to where I am. And then when I point to the GIANT BLOCK OF WOOD that’s literally eight feet away. And telling people that the return slots are at the end of the new desk, right there [pointing]. No, to your right. Your RIGHT. Turn around—on the RIGHT. That’s the new circulation desk. See the slot in the wall of it, down the end? Down the END. No, THIS is the reference desk. Right THERE [pointing] is where you can do your returns and check-outs. To your RIGHT. (For the curious: yes, that was all with ONE patron.) Several have continued to hand me their items. One complained “But that’s even further now!” (n.b.: the return bin is a good six feet closer to the door than it was.) This would all be hilarious if it weren’t so freakin’ annoying.

Reading: I flew through Jonathan Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close last week. To all those who say it wasn’t any good, I say Bah, and You Don’t Know What You’re Talking About. It’s a 9/11 story, in a way—a 9-year-old boy (Oskar) on a quest for answers after his father dies in the World Trade Center. After finding a key labeled “Black” in his father’s belongings, Oskar tries to track down the owner (by visiting every person named Black in the New York City phone directory), in the hopes of understanding something more about his father. There’s a second story being told, about an old man who can’t speak, and the life he’s had since leaving Dresden after the World War II bombings. The stories come together beautifully, I have no idea why people are saying that this book just isn’t good. It’s sad, it’s touching, it’s intriguing, it’s funny. Is it as good as Everything is Illuminated? I have no idea, since I haven’t read that one yet, but it’s high on my list now.

Currently I’m reading Rick Moody’s memoir, The Black Veil. The memoir parts of it are interesting, and I’m enjoying them. The parts that are slowing me down considerably are the parts where he gets into criticisms of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Minister’s Black Veil.” Only as I look it up on Amazon do I find that the original subtitle wasn’t just “a memoir,” as it is on my copy, but “a memoir with digressions,” which I think is far more accurate. With 1/3 of the book behind me, I’ve finally realized that it’s okay to skim over the digressions.

(And as a little something more that made me laugh: when looking it up on Amazon, one of the results is for a downloadable study guide for Hawthorne’s story, the full title of which is “The Minister’s Black Veil: A Parable.” The study guide in question lists it as “a paradigm.” I don’t think this is quite the study guide to trust…)

Speaking of Hard Pan...

2007-03-12T11:51:00.000-04:00

Holly’s Secret, by Nancy Garden. A seventh-grade girl has just moved to a new school and takes the opportunity to reinvent herself—including pretending she doesn’t have two moms. But how to keep up the charade? And both moms are hurt when Holly pretends one is just an aunt. It was good enough, I guess, but I’m having a really hard time reconciling this (frankly) kind of bland, weakly-written novel (published in 2000) with the wonderful Annie on My Mind from almost 20 years earlier. Annie had so much heart to it, with sharp writing that rang true to the ear. I honestly thought Holly’s Secret must’ve been published first—it has a lot of problems with rough, stilted dialogue and stereotyped characters (Understanding former Fat Girl, Follower, and Queen Bee), and the activities of seventh-graders in suburban/rural Massachusetts seems so hopelessly out of touch. But no, it’s just preachy and bland. It appeared on my weed list and I wasn’t sure about it, so I read it. Now that I’ve had some time to mull it over, I’m pitching it. I don’t have enough shelf space to keep Message books that aren’t even well-written.

Current YTD total of books: 32. This includes a number of graphic novels, but even so, that's more reading than I'd thought. Hooray! Current number of books left on the to-be-read shelf: 23. Yes, I did have it down to 18. This is something of a sickness.