Sunday SUNDAY

What I'm doing between questions: as if....figured out my desk schedule for this week, griped about feeling like I'm coming down with the crud everyone else has had, etc.

Let's just say that with two librarians here, we end up talking to everyone more often than not, and I can't keep track of what I actually DID. So, a lot, though it wasn't particularly busy.

Thursday (end-of-week for me, thank God and not a moment too soon!)

What I'm doing between questions: subjects-a-go-go.

10:00 in the children's room

• oops, I'm 10 minutes late arriving...but since there's no one except a couple changing a baby's diaper--I think? I have no idea what's going on over there, really because they are all lying on the floor (ick!)--I think all is well
• Am reeling from the news that our HR person feels that we ought to be expecting--and scheduling--all full-time exempt employees at least 45 hours a week since we're short-staffed (not that we'd get paid for those hours because we are exempt from overtime)
• Also, a former colleague has raised a major kerfuffle in academic librarian circles this week, and I'm torn between admiring the fact that someone is standing up to journal publishers and wanting to murder her for being a self-serving beeyotch (the latter is by far the usual reaction I have to her shenanigans)
• Children's dictionary (for grownup)
• Children's thesaurus is returned (by a child)
• I think this is the family that is here regularly--this seems to be a supervised (or un-?) visitation thing or something, cuz they are literally just sitting on the floor passing the baby back and forth...no interaction, no reading, no toys
• Forgot my card [I look it up, and have to re-register her in SAM because there's a new number...]
• "Is the printer in here working today? [I do a test print from my account and YAY! it's working]

11:00 in the children's room

• OK, it's either supervised visitation or "Baby Has Three Parents Who Don't Really Know What to Do With Her" [they just left]
• [phone] Out-of-consortium library checking on one of our patrons [all clear]
• I'm trapped here, a sitting duck in random conversation with the cleaning guy...sigh 

4:00 in the children's room

• There's a kid with a fauxhawk chasing littler kids around the play area--all of them screaming and shrieking
• Nope, check out up front [one of the shriekers and parents]
• Fauxhawk has made a very large gun out of Legos....ahhh, here comes the woman that must be his mom [skanky blonde in fleece with green lowlights in her fake blonde hair and pierced lower lip....yep, it's mom; and eventually they leave, with the kid on full speed]
• I'm slowly coming to hate that we have puppets in unlocked bags.......
• The PowerPoint kid is back, and he hasn't checked in with his teacher to figure out how to open his work, so we're still stuck here....
• Books for preschool kids about clothes [omg--well, at least she has a list to work from]

5:00 in the children's room

• Headache approacheth....
• PowerPoint kid needs shortcuts, but we're working through the transfer...slowly
• Apparently I can't print guest passes in here? Or at circ?
• [phone] Out-of-consortium library checking on one of our patrons [all clear, and since it's the Head of Circ's husband, I'd lie even if he wasn't]
• Help with printing
• Bathroom key [adult bathrooms are through there..."but I'm on a computer back by those" and "those" are children's bathrooms, so the adult ones are through there....]
• This PPT kid is awfully adorable, in spite of the fauxhawk [must be the day for these]--I help him save  to his thumb drive, and re-up his time too
• "What does this word mean?" [typically=usually, normally] "Ah, ok"
• Where's the realistic fiction? [Realistically it's EVERYwhere...sigh]
• PPT: columns? [found it!]
• A Child Called It [a.k.a. A Boy Named It...sigh...I write down the call # and send her into the adult area to ask there]

Wednesday

What I'm doing between questions: if I wasn't chicken-hearted, I would SO be at Librarian J's house right now beating her with a lead pipe for taking the day off because her cat is sick when we are at less than half-staff all week with one sickie librarian and one injured librarian (both here today so far), and one vacationing librarian--and at least one other other librarian not feeling 100%. Not to mention the vacations and sickies at the circ desk! 

12:00 in the children's room in adult area after we rearrange things (see below)

• Sent the sickie home and told her NOT to come back tonight--I will
• After consulting with Librarian B, I will cover Ref now while she deals with a time-sensitive project for Head of Circ (who is on vacation), then I'll go home and come back at 6 and work till 9
• Strange guy who says I helped him out with something yesterday [could be, though he doesn't look at all familiar] wanders by, stops to chat randomly, and then goes and gets online [whatever]
• Pay to print, and help with printing
• Internet books [eventually, books about blogging and facebook etc.]
• Pay to print
• No, I need ID to look up your card number, sorry
• Card expired, I renew it thru tomorrow so she can use the internet
• Catalog not working [well, it does if you are patient and vaguely know what you're doing]
• Scratch paper
• Resume templates on Word
• Specific song off the Obsessed soundtrack, sung by a guy, can't remember name or title [and when I finally FIND a list of the songs, none of them look right or ring a bell for him--he'll ask his girlfriend and get back to us]

2:00

3:00

6:00 in the children's room

• Not a huge fan of split shifts, but here I am again, now feeling a little GI-unsettled myself
• Labradors on the Lawn [we don't own it, so I reserve it from another library and show her where some of the rest of the series that we DO own are {--grammar-death, victim of this day
• Our local group home of developmentally-delayed adults arrives for their weekly library outing:




One has a callous on his foot

One needs books on racecars

Bathroom key

One found the LIW books on her own and needs hand sanitizer

One guy has not stopped staring in this direction for 10 minutes--I think he's frozen

The callous guy is trying to distract the staring guy

LONG conversation with The Train Guy, whom I remember from years ago when I worked the night these guys came; he's very concerned about why Librarian M isn't here

Bathroom key is returned...by someone else...?

...15 minutes later, one caretaker is looking for the other one (who returned the key) as they are MIA

Now the OTHER caretaker is here, and the first one is gone! UGH

• Look up password [she's my oldest niece's age and has a daughter my son's age, omg]
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid : The Third Wheel [not here yet...SOOON!...I reserve a copy for him]
  
• Coloring paper and crayons
• Wimpy Kid kid looking for Frankie Pickle books [turns out they're too easy, but I find a brand-new Choose Your Own Adventure-style book and he agrees to give it a whirl]

8:00

• Printer in the children's room not printing, so I print her Word doc here...
• Mapquest directions to new doctor's office, and back
• I walk through the adult area and do the chair-pushing in, book-picking up thing [how does a chair get from one side of the nonfiction stacks across to the far side of the reference area??]
• Librarian T does closing announcement
• Pay to print, and a comment about something someone else left sitting here at the desk
• Librarian T tells me to "knock those two off" the internet [why--they shut down automatically at 5 till...?]
• Last minute question that turns into a nightmare....arrived at 8:55, not sure what books she wants, card is expired so placing holds is more complicated, and when I check to see what's going on ("I think I might have fines...") it turns out she owes almost $180! And "I haven't lived at that address in years!!" (Duh, honey: your card expired in 2009) Holy shit what a clusterfuck.

Tuesday

What I'm doing between questions: checking rural card-user's holds, checking our orders and marking off what has arrived that I missed, and whatever else I can find to kill 6 hours of desk time instead of doing my actually (cataloging) job! grrr

1:00

• Clark Gable movies [doing a Shakespeare play and resetting it in the 30s, so all the actors have to research a specific actor and his/her style for their roles--cool idea]
• Circuit breaker form [and of COURSE the printer jams!]
• Do we have PPoint on the computers [he can't see the icon, so I show him]
• [phone] Updated card, password didn't transfer [all fixed now]
• Reserve a few Nora Roberts books for patron
• Pay to print
• How much is left "on here" [hands me his card--$8.75 because I know without asking what he's talking about, and God forbid I engage in conversation...]

3:00 in the kids' room

• Register to use internet [which, of course, doesn't work--but I think I've found out the rule for entering them, finally]
• Pencil [still not much here]
• Mom + 2 9-ish-year-old kids comes in, walk toward the "American Girl Dolls books"--they stop, mom mutters something to one of them, and they stalk back out [hmmm]
• Bathroom key, for a grownup, which I don't register till he's gone
• Key is back
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid books [he's so excited to see the one he wanted!]
• Same kid wants How to Train a Dragon [and he's thrilled to discover they are a series!!]
• Can a dad park his stroller by the desk while he wanders with his kid? [sure] Where are the Very Small Kids' books? [right over there]
• Bathroom key
• Wimpy Kid movies [ours are checked out so I place holds for him]
• Where to put books we don't want after all? [my hands...]
• Movies [from the Very Small Kids' guy]

4:00 in the kids' room

• Books "folkloricos" [stupid me--the only thing with that word I know is a dance troupe--it's the folktales assignment for dual language, duh]
• "WALK!" and "Slow down!" to one of our regular (cute) kids
• Rules by Cynthia Lord [here, got it]
• The circuit breaker dude from this morning is back [he told me earlier he'd just gotten out of the hospital last week, so I expect he's doing his laps to get back in shape]
• Author of The Magic Thief [yes, and it's even on the shelf]
• Questions from Librarian M about a new online subscription
• Bathroom key (and apparently too late, as the little girl comes to tell us she pooped in her pants)
• Books for Asperger's 5th grader

6:00

• Stapler
• Refill printer paper
• Look up passwords for two kids
• Computer #5 in the kids room isn't working so I'm chasing that down too
• Something I can't remember in there too
• Pay to print x2 (the lost pw kids)
• Pay to print
• Problem with overdue--we don't know what library the book she lost is from, so we don't know how to do the check
• Reserve an Atkins diet book

7:00

• Pay to print [she rattles off her number to me on her way to the printers...]
• Unused scratch paper returned
• Early- to mid-20th-century American art. Oh, and impressionism too [off we go to see what I can scare up]
• [phone] Supposedly there's a call, but when I answer it, they've hung up
• Ah but there is a message, which involves ordering a book from another library, but I can't do it for him since he hasn't got a full-use card...blah blah blah [he'll come in and pay the extra so we can ILL it for him]
• Study room? [pick one and take it over!]
• [phone] Doom 2 [doesn't exist in IMdB (with that name), sorry]
• Pay to print x2 [lost pw kids...yes, they are still here!]
• ...quick walkthru the adult area to see what's up at 7:50...not a hell of a lot I need to worry about....
• Except the guy on computer 1 who is hyper-sensitive to anyone else talking--he's been spinning around to glare at people periodically the whole time I've been here tonight [GO #*%*ing home!]
• I do go ask one pair of kids to quiet down a bit--the young man is totally polite and says, "That's on me, I'm really sorry!" Wow. Nice.

8:00

• [phone] Another computer froze in the kids' room; I walk through how to unlock the patron's card so they can use a different computer
• Ethernet Guy leaves the cable on his way out
• Pay to print, and then fax...and then she wanders away after I get our credit card site all ready for her [wtf?] AND she stole my pen! grrr
• Help printing in color
• Oh nvm, fax woman/family is still here but she's having trouble getting what she needs to fax to print...and I'm having trouble using our credit card site so we're sort of even
• Closing announcement
• [phone] Overly Familiar patron needs to reserve Eight Men Out on DVD [done]
• Meeting rooms and basement doors are checked
• What time do we open? [9] "You should be open 6 to 10...lol" [not...lol]
• Stapler...and the computers all shut down YAY

Monday

What I'm doing between questions: I have about a gazillion RSS updates I have been ignoring for a month...time to clean that pony up and make it rideable again. Also, subject headings...zzzz

1:00

• Immediately, new guest SAM user, which somehow gets snarled. I end up deleting and reentering him and it finally works
• Bang bang bang goes the mouse-finger on Reference #6...yes, it's quiet enough that this is what I'm hearing
• Man walks past, doubles back and then double-takes when I say, "Hi there!" in greeting. What can I do for him? "Just wanted to say thank you and tell you, again, how incredible this library is." [wow, I've never seen him before, but gee it's nice to hear that!]
• Today's classifieds
• ValueLine (and other mail) arrives so I go put that out; I'll miss that when they stop the paper edition
• Scratch paper, and can she use a study room to make a quick call [sure, Pet Mormon, sure]
• Classifieds are back
• Refresh time for the mad clicker
• Return of "pencil" (looks like a pen to me) borrowed before I was here
• Pay to print
• Guest SAM guy leaves...very polite, and yet...I'm a little weirded out by him

2:00

• Help attaching a document in YahooMail, the Spanish template
• Ethernet cable for a different cable guy
• [meanwhile phone is ringing off the hook]
• Reserve "Relidj-yoolous" [Well, it's actually "Religulous" and it's here--and OMG, "You have movies on THIS side of the shelves too? Documentaries are my thing!"]
• I love my Chucks
• Help printing/Pay to print
• [phone] "Can I get an absentee ballot from you?" [Nope, the County Court Clerk at the Courthouse. Then he argues that "The County Center" isn't a courthouse. Uhm, yeah, there are courts there.... But no we don't do voting, just registration. He has the "County Building's" number memorized...hmmm. (And yes it is a courthouse, goddammit (in my head))]
• "Thank you" from Yahoo lady
• Regular Ethernet Dude arrives for 'his' cable
• Resumes...and the History of Art
• How to get online....thankfully, it was a bloop, the connection works fine
• One day, I'm going to keep a tally of how many times I say hello to people and how many times people say hi to me (as in, how many people just walk by and say hi)
• How to print part of an email
• Bone series (Jeff Smith) volume 9 for a kid, and "maff test buuks" [Bone is no problem, but the "maff testink buuks" for 5th grade? No. School library, and the kids textbook are your go-tos there]
• Slightly odd woman (a.k.a Mouse-Basher, above) comes over and whispers, "Have a good day!" on her way out. Then goes and pushes in several chairs and leaves.
• Our volunteer magazine shelver comes up and asks if "an older woman" just came and asked for help finding an obit [no]; now she's panicking and wildly looking for her so she can get my help [sigh...thanks Volunteer]
• ...and Vol. finds her in the bookstore and reports back to me; I guess this is known as being forewarned?
• Guest SAM user (see above) returns--"Can I sign on again?" [sure, and sadly, I even remember his pass number]
• I have a bad feeling about the next ten minutes--like I could get trapped here after my shift ends at 3
• Scratch paper
• Guest User leaves again, and says goodbye again
• Somewhat off-the-wall woman needs scratch paper to write down a soup recipes...and I'm regaled with a (short) soup dissertation before she leaves again
• High-school-hoodie-wearing kid needs the stapler [nice kid, but...why not in school??]

4:00 in the children's room

• Kleenex [none in here, so I steal the circ desk's box]
• Key for "girl's bathroom"; and some help using it
• Bathroom key
• One key is back
• Where's the restroom? [I send her to the adult area, as she is {ahem} an adult (without child)]
• Other key is back
• Bathroom key [yes, these are all different people]
• "I'm leaving for coffee, will be right back. Boyfriend's in Reference if my kids need anything" [she is here every day and her kids are self-sufficient tweeners who behave so I'm not overly fussed]
• Bathroom key is back
• Pencil for homework [we're down to golf pencils so I send her to the Adult desk]; she comes back in a couple minutes: "Where's the adult desk?" [oops--I walk her over]
• Husband calls to ask for my Gmail password so he can sync my new smartphone at the Sprint store
• ...and calls back because it didn't work [seriously, I have to type it up to get it right!]
• Battle of the Books list for West... School
• Coffee mom is back
• BoB list is returned; she found a book
• Bathroom key (2 girls, sharing)
• ...and back (giggling)
• DVD movies? [her eyes get huge when I point to the wall-o-movies in here]
• [phone] Renew books

5:00 in the children's room

• My new phone is here....yay!!
• 13 by Lauren Myracle [we don't own and she doesn't want to reserve]
• How to print
• Holes and The Outsiders on DVD [we don't have Holes, but I put them both on hold since our Outsiders is checked out]
• Good Dog, Carl [our copy is not where it belongs :-( ... but it turns out to be on the hold shelf for her :-)]
• Do backpacks count as one item? [yes]
• Can't get online [I delete his temporary number and move the money from it to his actual card, delete his password...and hopefully it'll work]
• Ethernet Guy comes by
• Refill paper tray

6:00 because Librarian K went home early with pain from his stitches--he 'tried' to cut off a finger yesterday or something

• Family with kids who need to do homework but all cards are blocked because they all owe money; after totaling it up ($160+) I go ahead and give them passes for today, but warn them that this is the ONLY time we can do that until they talk to Head of Circ and work out a payment plan
• Help with printing x 2
• AP US History test books...he's Irish, and taking the CLEP but AP test are close enough for studying [nothing here, but at the next city over there is something]
• Proctor a test (on World History) for home-schooled high school kid [how freaky that I'd get these two questions together]
• Pay to print
• How to spell "versteht" 

Friday

What I'm doing between questions:

11:00 in Siberia in January the children's room

• The SpEd kids from one of the high school in town were here (instead of the park, since it's raining)--now their aides are trying to get them organized to leave. Joey introduces himself, asks my name and says hi. What a cutie.
• Librarian M wants to have the graphic novel version of Jane Austen novels in the same section--YA or adult--but doesn't care which...[why be boring?]
• Help with TumbleBooks [help from Librarian M more than me, tho]
• What order to read the Narnia books

Thursday

What I'm doing between questions: checked catalog for Hugo award winners then started an order for the nominees and winners (can only find one "best related work" title in Baker & Taylor--what the heck?!)

11:00 in the children's room

• oops, thought I was supposed to be here at noon...oh, well, it was dead anyway

2:00 in the children's room

• Someone made off with our scratch paper bin--it was MIA yesterday too. We find another and I cut up some paper to fill it
• At ten after a woman comes in to use the computers; otherwise I'm alone in here {yawn}
• Bathroom key ... and returned
• Programming stuff for kids
• Chapter books [we find the A to Z books and Katie Kazoo...hurrah]

4:00 in the children's room

• Best Christmas Pageant Ever [nearby community theater performing it this year]
• Adventures in Cartooning [checked out, so I reserve it]
• Books on learning Spanish [little girl actually knows Spanish but won't speak it back to her mom]
• Family I know comes in, missing the oldest because he kicked his sister and had to miss the library trip [how awesome that missing the library is a punishment!]
• Folk tale for 4th grade ... in English [hurrah--those we have] -- "Paul Bunyan is a classic, right? asks dad [uhm, yeah...lol]
• I hear a voice growling at someone, look up, and it's a MOM, son walks into the room away from her, and she reminds him to hurry, at which point he whirls around and says, "Forget it, let's just go" [lots of crabby today]
• A small sweet boy dances into the room, arms up, humming [this is why I like kids--how many (sane) adults dance into a room?!]
• Scratch paper
• "Headphones at my computer aren't working..." [so, move to a computer where they are...really ppl, especially kids, I know that 90% of you are carrying earbuds/earphones in your backpacks; use 'em!]
• 
  

Wednesday

What I'm doing between questions: loads of things....whatever I can find to fill the time


9:00

• Right off the bat, Reference Desk #2 computer is borked. Since that's the one I almost always sit at, I feel completely weird out here
• Fax
• Another library in consortium looking for item that's been on hold forever....I hate the people at this library!
• State H.S. football outlook printout
• Pay to print

10:00

• {{{crickets}}}
• Look up SAM number
• [internal call] Foil-backed labels or not? Uhm, yeeessss, I think?
• Pay to print

12:00 in the children's room

• There's a frog noisemaker inside one of the puzzles near the desk in here that seems to be motion activated; so far it has croaked at two staff members
• Patron brings in list of 7 or 8 books on food chains and animals--I find every one of them! This is...unusual
• No one got out a reference tally sheet this morning...oops
• The waiting list computer just booped to let the person waiting that they've been assigned a computer. Except...no one has registered to be assigned and there are 10 vacant computers in this zone. WTF?! I'm starting to get paranoid about stuff today: too much weirdness!!
• Librarian M comes in prepped to do storytime...says "shit! I forgot..." under her breath [this is rare enough to warrant comment, believe me]
• "Where is the storytime?" [in the story room--must be her first time]
• [phone] Register for photo organizing program [I should come to that!]

3:00 in the children's room

• Internet guest pass [the printer here doesn't work...and duh, once I think it through, I realize she can't get online without a parent's permission anyway]
• Kid asks me to look up his card #; just about the time I get it, his mom arrives to take him home
• WHY did my two book orders from this morning cancel everything in the carts?? WTF?! This day is really strange [oh, well, it's because I used the AV account--which is odd since I didn't think we were supposed to use that anymore, so why did it default to that? Anyway, orders are now in]
• Quite a few people in here, but not many needed assistance....

Tuesday

What I'm doing between questions: collection development yada yada

3:00 in the children's room

• Bathroom key...there's a line so she waits till one of the people finishes
• Little guy comes in wearing a hoodie similar to this one [omg, WANT! Too bad it's only for little kids]
• Bathroom keys are back
• [phone] How much does my son owe, and what does he need to get a new card?
• A to Z mysteries 
• Tigers
• Puppets
• Bathroom key
• Register for program next month
• Key comes back
• Biscuit books
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid books
• Bathroom keys (both)
• One key is "stuck" [no, but wevs--I have it again]
• Schedule Person asks how long my cataloging meetings usually take; I'd sent her a list of next year's dates this morning and forgot about the time (duh)
• Second key is back
• J323COL [yeppers]
• [phone] Contact info for the person who did our music program yesterday

Monday

What I'm doing between questions: placing holds, looking at what to order next for collection development, and generally trying to stay out of the way of the Schedule Person who is a right bitch today.

3:00 in the children's room

• Spanish books? [I show her]
• There's a mom sitting with her son and another boy, both about 7 years old. The other boy keeps thrashing and spazzing
• Paper [what kind? "Pink?" Uh, no, try again: scratch paper...ok, eventually, he admits that his mom has his school stuff in the other room, and he has paper, so I get the crayons out that I bargained him down to and he snags some scratch paper from the basket...lol]
• Stapler [same kid]
• Key for craft room for window washer [while I'm off getting it, she discovers that Schedule Person is in there, in the dark...]

4:00 in the children's room

• [phone] For Head of Circ
• "Slow down...!"
• Help getting online [as she is in here without a kid, I escort her back to Reference to get online there, so kids can use these]
• [phone] For Admin Asst.
• Kevin Henkes books
• Books on CD for YA
• Battle of the Books list [I make photocopies, since I doubt this will be the last parent/child to ask]
• Louis Sachar's Holes [all copies are checked out, needs it tonight, bummer]

Sunday

What I'm doing between questions: review journals. I have backup today from Librarian B but she's not feeling great so she's mostly in the back, unless a line forms.

1:00

• American Psycho on DVD [here, hurrah]
• Can people download stuff from YouTube to their iPod? [sure, as long as they know how, cuz I surely do NOT (ok, I could figure it out, if I had to)]
• Pay to print x 2
• Christmas section
• Car repair manuals
• The YouTube guy is back and hasn't been able to figure out how to do it--I try, but eventually Googling "how to..." is the only answer [now if we could just figure out why his music folder doesn't show up when we open his iPod folders]
• Ethernet cable for the Ethernet Cable Guy
• Expired card [front desk]

2:00

• Some of our computers don't have CD drives; of course, all the ones that do are in use, and then the disc doesn't work right when we find one [Walgreen's makes you download software, WTF?], do I get the Belkin disc-reader and we use their camera card to find the pix--whew!--and then I have someone else help them attach the bloody picture to the email they want to send. Holy shit!
• VHS Nice Older Patron requested is still in the queue; no idea when it will arrive [if it ever does]
• Heroin Diaries [I place hold for her]
• Jesse Jackson Jr.'s congressional street address
• Postmortem by Cornwell [yes it is here]

3:00

• How to print
• Password for SAM [and she has two cards], and pay to print [and I have to move the money on her old card to her new card], and the new card is expired [so I change exp. date to tomorrow]
• Renew time
• [Librarian B does closing announcement]
• Help with printing x2
• Ethernet cable returned

Saturday

What I'm doing between questions: subject headings a-go-go.

12:00 (covering for a sickie, same one as Thursday)

• Can't get online [card didn't get renewed in SAM plus NumLock wasn't on]
• Fax
• SAT subject test books for Physics, Math and Chemistry [holds placed]
• Pay to print x2
• Help with printing a return label [and she has to go get money first]
• Computer froze [I log him off from here and go reboot the computer he was using]
• Can't figure out what happened....now says he's in the wrong "zone"

...at which point my shift ended, and I was scheduled to leave--and the kid trapped in the wrong zone was outside arguing about a bike that may or may not have been stolen....kinda glad I could go!

Thursday

What I'm doing between questions: subject lists, sleeping, the usual

3:00 in the children's room

• The "away from the desk" sign throws this woman so much that she completely forgets what she was going to ask...and when she remembers, her friend is waving the book she's asking about at her [rough reference question there]
• Kid looking for a Kleenex for his glasses [he's been here every day after school, easily 6'3" tall and a student at the nearby K-8 parochial school--nice kid]
  
• Kleenex--"somethings makes me sneeze at the library" [couldn't possibly be dust...]
• Pay to print
• "Blood as art material", and "Body fluids as art material" : Two subject headings I hope to never, ever need to use
• Staff member: "Why are pet turtles in two different numbers: 636.932 and 639.392?"  [because that 2nd number has been wrong for 11 years....sigh]
• [phone] Checking to see a book came in that he ordered [his name? "keeeuuuugggh gheiiiiteeehhuuhhh" seriously
• [phone] Renew books
• [phone] Cataloger from nearby library calling for clarification on something from this morning

I spent the morning at a cataloging meeting, and it's dark and rainy outside, so I am 100% ready for a nap. Too bad I work till 6, and the last hour will be spent at the circ desk filling in for a sickie.

Wednesday

What I'm doing between questions: pulling books that need some bib record cleanup

3:00 in the children's room

• Help finding ABC books for a Pre-K kid whose mom is afraid he's going to "flunk" his assessment for Kindergarten. I find a few books, but tell her the best way for him to learn is to practice finding the letters
• Numerous Battle of the Books/Award assignments to be searched on the shelves
• Biography assignment (Walter Payton FTW)
• Biscuit books
• Princess books

I'm also scheduled in the children's room 9-11 to cover for a sick staff member, but it's dead quiet, so the schedule person let's me stay in the workroom unless someone needs help. They don't.

Tuesday

What I'm doing between questions: death dates list


3:00

• Pay to print
• Renew time for newbie who doesn't know she needs more time
• Directions to an address on B-field Road
• Renew time
• Ethernet cable guy needs ethernet cable ;-) + how much to fax?
• Help with JobHat [man, those annoying come-ons at the end are annoying!]
• Try to sight up JobHat woman for internet and job-hunting classes, but she has to work when all but one are scheduled [sigh]
• Fax [ethernet guy]

4:00

• Printer is streaking pages, time to change the toner cartridge...which turns into a 20-minute debacle involving toner spiillage, Clorox wipes, cartridges mislabeled and eventual success
• Help with verifying phone number online
• Pay to print, and do we take credit cards
• Guest pass...nevermind, I look up her number, she pays small fine, and put money on her account
• Can I print from wireless [previous print guy--uh, no]
• Phone number guy, who is actually amusing in a weird way, needs more help because he wants to win a million dollars off the text he got from MyWMart...blah blah, but he can't operate the computer to get it to work [uh, dood, might be the site, not you]
• [phone] "What movies do I have on hold?" [I tell her and she seems less than thrilled]
• Research for two different term papers [EBSCO tutorial--and yay, she sort of knows what she's doing]
• Spell check in email--how to turn it on
• Pencils [golf pencils ARE pencils]
• Internet newbie is confused

Monday

What I'm doing between questions: cleaning out my "inbox," sorting stuff into recycling/garbage/file piles. That's done by 12:45, and in the process I excavated down to the now-nearly-five-year-old list of BAD MATCHING ERRORS. Wonder how many are left. And then there are the ever-present RSS feeds, which I've been ignoring for weeks....

12:00

• Kleenex? [nope, we're still out back here--I go snag a couple boxes
• "Where did my boarding pass go?" [other window under the one she's got up ; and she needs help printing of course]
• Pay to print x 2
• Questions about how to print--smart questions [God, how I adore smart questions]
• Confusion over new guest pass for one of the Mormons; eventually I work out that her name is spelled wrong and she just needed more time, not a new number
• Help saving to thumb drive
• Kleenex lady stops back for a handful
• Reserve two Eric Blehm books
• Help with printing
• Wireless down?
• FOL Booksale volunteer brings out 3 possible additions. Yes, we'll have them all.
• Pay to print
• Long rambling discussion of games on the internet stations...[none downloaded, gotta go online to get to 'em, he doesn't want to...blah blah]
• Kleenex lady returns--she must have some SERIOUS allergies!
• Reset patron time

1:00    

• Kleenex lady returns--she must have some SERIOUS allergies!
• Reset patron time
• Problems with printing (thumb drive guy)
• Problems with saving (ok, it's a theme--same problem as thumb drive guy)
• Pay to print
• Downloading onto Kindle
• C++ programming, and/or computer game programming
• Italian Rosetta stone
• Pay to print

4:00 in the children's room

• Newbery winner [Neil Gaiman FTW!]
• Bathroom key (for middle-school parochial girls to change]
• Kid's card is inactive even though he's renewed it
• Yes, your password can be blank, though we don't recommend it...
• Inactive kid still having trouble--I go over and work him through it, while watching a toddler stand on a chair 3 feet from her oblivious father
• Help with inactive card kid--who is super-sweet, thank God--with his powerpoint, saved from school online...kinda cool thing there
• Plains Indians, like shelters and stuff

5:00 in the children's room

• Oh, no! We have an Awful Library Book in our collection! Well, say goodbye to that one! [keep in mind that I'm over a week behind on reading that blog...]
• Bathroom key
• Renew time on SAM
• At some point, both bathroom keys are returned--apparently someone else gave out the second one while I was in outer space
• Inactive kid has finished his power point and now it won't save [we try everything and eventually get it saved as a PDF, but can't figure out why PPT won't work...sigh]
• ...freakin' Spanish folk tales assignment...we're totally out of elementary level books...I end up writing a note to the teacher for the kid
• No clue how to register people for the Dia del los Muertos program...I send them to Reference

In case you haven't noticed, my hours on-desk have jumped a bit lately. We are short-staffed (down 2 professional staff) and also the librarian with the most accrued vacation time is burning through her days off. Hence, more time in public for me. Yay. ← sarcasm

Friday

What I'm doing between questions: yawning, checking off people on the Death Dates list.

3:00 in the children's room

• Kid is singing along with Mickey Mouse on the internet--this is NOT a preschooler, either...cracking me up
• Japanese art [for an adult]
• Extra headphones [noo...yes! The first drawer I open has a set in it]
• Mickey kid is actually in YouTube, and his mom just caught him watching something..."Get outta that video!" [no clue what it was--she's sitting sideways to him with her younger-than-him daughter on another computer]
• Japanese art woman is back--"can you put the third book on hold for me?" [uhm sure, but I suspect it's gone missing...

4:00 in the children's room

• Bathroom key
• ...and back
• [call from Ref Desk] "You don't have Rose up on your screen? [no, and since no one else does, go ahead and do a Free Record override...p# is...yeah...]
• Awesome--someone shut of the printer in here
• No, I don't know why [person in adult area] can't connect to the Wi-Fi--maybe their Kindle doesn't like "foreign" networks?
• Two girls waiting on Mom have made a fort under the picture-book reading table and are lying down doing the Best Friend thing, along with several of the puppets. I miss being a little girl [betcha they don't put the puppets away when they leave, either]
• Now there's another, slightly older, kid sitting around the corner giggling at whatever he's got going on the internet...crack me up [he's trying so hard not to make noise he sounds like he's going to die]
• [phone] Renew items
• [phone] Staff member calling back in to say she found her wallet after all [I relay to message]
• American Girl Dolls books [close enough]
• There is a library in our consortium that called this morning about a CD that's been in processing for a really long time. They have a patron waiting for it (there's another hold from another library for it as well). First of all, we can't find it, so I left it for the other cataloging person to look for since she started with it. Secondly, if you have a patron waiting for something fucking buy it for your library! They just called back to ask about it. Dudes. Really? We said we'd look into it, but the person isn't here today. "But I told our patron I'd call her back today!" Well, that would be your problem, hon; we'll let you know when WE know what's going on. 
• "Can I use the phone?" [it's supposed to be an emergency, but since she's standing right here I can hear her, and it's really NOT ... except she doesn't have a key to get in her house. I remind her that we close at 6 and she calls her mom to get a ride, or to find out when someone will be home; no answer]
• "Let's just make my life easier: call number for Fairy Tales?" [yup: 398.2, both in the easy books and the elementary books]
• OK. I Am Outta Here!!! :-)

Thursday

What I'm doing between questions: whatever I can find to do: checking new materials in the catalog, Dead Deweys....whatever it takes

10:00 in the children's room

• Ten minutes late due to running around checking Tech Service for stuff in processing
• "Can anyone use that room?" asks a dad pointing at the door to the craft/storytime room [uh, no--but THANK YOU for asking first!]
• Same guy, as he's leaving, drops off the Community College catalog he's done with "for someone else to use"

11:00 in the children's room

• 45 minutes and several families in and out, but no need for me to be here otherwise
• ...and half an hour after that (11:45) I am alone in here; another five minutes and I'm calling it safe to leave

4:00

• Look up password
• Darkest Hour on DVD [ours is checked out]
• [phone] OCLC calls to tell me they can't figure out why two records refuse to export into our catalog ; since I'm here, I can't really get into it with the tech, though, so I'll play around again tomorrow
• Constitution. The most current one [lol--for GED (or INS?) test]
• May have to go apply some Quiet Down in one of the study rooms, and also in a corner where there are 3-4 kids grouped around an internet station...which is directly in my line of vision beyond this monitor 
• No, two of the kids in the study room just left...now I can see that there are two three MORE kids who were sitting on the floor. WTF is going on??
• Fax
• Dude walks across the reference area in the lowest possible gear; every step makes me think he's going to fall (literally) asleep before he gets where he's going... 
• One very mentally ill--and perhaps seriously physically ill--woman asking about GED books, and tells me her life story: kidney problems, husband in jail, kids (??somewhere), "none of this" is her fault, didn't take all her pills this morning, a friend's coming to get her and maybe take her to the hospital...man, I'm worried she's going to walk outside and get hit by a car
• Scratch paper & pencil
• Help with copier
• Kids' room needs help finding realistic fiction [I hate these assignments--and this kid is a non-talker to boot, but I send him home with Frindle]

4:00

• Media card reader 
• [phone] Two messages left at some point this afternoon: Postmortem is checked out so I call and tell her...blah blah blah...and the other is for the audiobook of The Shack, which we have and when I call I think he's thrilled [why is everyone behaving like they're stoned today?]
• While I'm doing that, someone starts asking about how much we charge for faxing ($1/page) and can't believe it's so much, "you can overnight stuff for less!", and it doesn't cost us anything after all... [uhm paper/ink (for the confirmation page), and MY TIME?? --but I say none of this]
• Slipknot CD [yuppers]
• Fax [ironically, she arrives in the middle of me typing up my rant above]
• Cute little girl gets ejected by her dad from a computer station because she's too young and just banging around ["but I want to twy it!!"]
• More shushing, different kids
• Holy-moley, all the internets are in use! Weird
• After some eyeballing and careful listening I determine that yes, I can hear what the guy 25 yards from me is listening to in his headphones...holy hard-of-hearing, dude!
• Pay for printing [and I check the paper level in the printer...and refill it]
• Problem with security crap that someone downloaded on a computer [I move the patron to another computer, shut the problem one down, restart it, and it's all good]
• "My internet log in expired?" [they do that, so I renew]
• Pay to print 
• Wrong edition of a book arrived in ILL--I cancel it and reorder the correct edition
• "Can I use the study room?" [yup, those books are left from the slobs in there before]
• ...and I'm so out of here!!

Wednesday

What I'm doing between questions: I'm so caught up on cataloging that I'm rewarding myself with checking Dead Deweys. Also did a kids' Spanish order for the woman who does all the Spanish storytimes; except two of the books she wants are OP.

9:00 in the children's room

• I'm late, but thankfully someone else got the computers all going for me
• "Where's the spider puppet?" [no clue, sorry--who gets this manic about a freakin' puppet?]
• ...at 9:45 the second non-staff person appears
• [phone] Shelf-check for a patron at a library outside our system (and less than 20 minutes away...]

2:00

• Scratch paper
• "Something's wrong with my headphones--I've got the volume up and can only hear faintly" [hmm, as I get 10 feet from the computer I can hear stuff coming out...oh, only one side is working and he's deaf in one ear. Genius]
• Doofus looking for John Wayne movies is back: wants Chisholm, El Dorado, and The Flying Leathernecks [I find one in the system and will ILL the rest. Or not. Depends on what the ILL Librarian says (she says forget it)]
• Stapler
• Chat with the guy who always tells me a joke on the way out--super-nice guy
• Holy cats: I haven't seen TMWSAMIT in here in at least a year! Damnit! Why is he back!?
• Pencil/paper [people who stand here and write notes kind of freak me out]
• Dude on his motorized chair arrives, zipping down the reference section at dangerously high speed (hah)
• Young woman and her mom sitting over the younger one's laptop--suddenly spring up, with the younger woman muttering angrily at her mom, and continues haranguing, quietly, all the way out the door [wtf? you talk to your mom that way? duuuuude!]
• Local want ads [deaf guy]
• Pay to print, and a list of politicians, state & federal [ooh, I hope our template is complete and current!!]
• Want ads are back
• Pencil, plus "how ya doin?" [surprising how few people say anything when they come over here]
• Oh, a NEW set of Mormons, one of whom needs a guest pass [all set, except I had to do it twice because some dipwad on staff forgot to mark that s/he used the last blank number in the book :<)
• And of course it doesn't work...because they never do when I enter people...stupid SAM! [finally got it going]

3:00

• Someone logged out of Windows, so I successfully find the login in our notebook full of logins
• SERIOUSLY?! ANSWER YOUR F$(%&$%&ING PHONE OR TURN TO VOLUME DOWN! Don't just sit there and let it ring! Asshat!
• Help with printing
• Do we have a wireless signal? [uhm yeah]
• Stapler [printing dude]
• Pay to print [and no, you still have to put money in to make photocopies--no account for that. Yet]
• Pay to print, and a little help with the printer
• Guinness book of records to check out [current is reference only, and 2011 is 'too old' for the kid]
• China Study [on hold]
• It occurs to me that I had a couple other people ask for specific books, but I can't remember what they were--I placed the holds and forgot about 'em....
• ...and life went crazy at the end....

Saturday

Y'know what? I'm not gonna to hours as the post title anymore; seems redundant. 

What I'm doing between questions: end-of-month stuff, plus placing holds on Demand orders (which ends up taking over an hour to do about 30), checking old order-request slips to see if they arrived, and cleaning out old emails. Hey, for a change I'm starting from 700 instead of 2000 of them!

9:00 in the children's room

• Lost "baby" [doll] is still lost [i.e., not here]
• Books in Spanish for dual-language student whose mom doesn't know Spanish [and we end up talking for a long time about allergies--daughter is allergic to a kabillion things :( ]
• Bathroom key ...and back

11:00

• Look up password [holy smokes! No wonder: it's a string of 12 numbers! First he wants to keep it, then he says to change it--good, since he's not the brightest bulb in the marquee]
• Yup, having trouble getting it reset
• The werewolf-woman and her offspring are here; she's still looking for those Magyars but has moved on to shamanism and Native Americans, and she needs parts of it copied/pasted/printed which turns out to be more than the usual complications [she's really computer illiterate, not to mention practically blind]
• Another patron needs help finding authors, which she's sorted out while I'm werewolfing
• Today's classified ads
• More werewolf stuff...and I reset the printer since it's being ridiculous--hate it when people hit buttons!!
• The guy with incredibly wide shoulders is back, still looking for a girlfriend (I can't find where I mentioned him before, but his shoulder are as wide as his legs are long; really big guy, but short]
• "Act Like a Lady..." book by Steve Harvey [our copies are either out or MIA, so I reserve it and show her where "other stuff like that" would be]
• Classifed's return

12:00

• Guest pass--for more than one use [I get her set up, and THEN discover she already has an account, but it was set up with no birthdate...FAIL!]
• Stupid printer only fails when werewolf woman uses it...so freakin' annoying
• Fax
• Renew password, and update expiration date too [glad I noticed that]--but it's still not working [grrr, finally figure it out
• Help resetting Gmail password [much easier than getting her online!]
• Printer works fine for nice-looking couple
• "Do you fax/Can I fax?" [yes, nice looking guy for whom the printer works]
• Fax (surprise!)
• People magazine [and she introduces her friend "Marge" who is 94 years old...and a little hard of hearing]

4:00 in the children's room

• Friend from church is here with her kids
• Where are the movies? [there, and over there]
• Sorry kid-friends, I can't check out you; gotta haul your gelt to the other desk.
• Stylus for PDA/game system found and turned in...sigh [I doubt the owner will return for it
• [phone] For circ person
• "Do you have any Harry Potter books?" [uhm, yes]
•  Bathroom key
• ...since I'm leaving a few minutes early, I start doing the cleanup routine at 4:30...
• Key is back
• It smells like patchouli in here...faintly
• [phone] Yep, we do close at 5 today
• Bathroom key, no the other bathroom key {elephants being much cooler than ladybugs, I guess}
• Where are the Easy Spanish books? [over there, and oh crap the sign fell down again, sigh]
• Key is back
• ...only to go away again to a kid who needs help with its use
• [closing announcement is done -- but no one is leaving]
• Key is back
• Winnie-the-Pooh picture books [under WIN...because they're not by Milne]
• I'm leaving, people or not...