Things patrons brought to the library with them today

•  A full-size bottle of ketchup
• A bottle of A1 steak sauce (seemingly unrelated!)
• Their own space heater

Modern library problems

 Shelver: Hey Emma, you're the librarian in charge right now, right?

Me (cautiously): Yes...

Shelver: An UberEats driver just delivered some food to the front desk. We have no clue who it belongs to? What do we do?

Closure questions part 2

Things patrons want to know right now:

• I have a ton of zucchini from my garden and I thought the library staff might like them. Can I put them in the book drop for you?
• How late are you open today?...What do you MEAN I can't come into the building?
• But I've been holding on to these old magazines for you for MONTHS--are you SURE I can't just donate them? Don't worry, my house is very clean, I'm sure they are safe. They are great magazines, in perfect condition.
• Is there still storytime this Friday?
• Did you know that people were parking in the library parking lot while y'all were closed? I thought you should know that people were violating the law.
• I came by the library back in April to return my books, but the book return thingy was closed, so I just put my books on the top. Did you get them?
• Is the library going to never open again?

I see the logic

Like a lot of libraries/rec centers/etc. in working-class communities, my library participates in a program where we serve lunch to kids during the summer. The idea is to help out families who rely on free/reduced school lunch during the year and might have a rough time feeding their school-aged kids over break. These programs are funded by the department of agriculture and they have a ton of rules. In Texas, one of those rules in that the kid has to eat the lunch in the room you serve it in and can only take fruit and whole grains with them. As you can imagine, this confuses the heck out of six- and seven-year-olds. I served my first 'summer lunch' last week and had this conversation:
Kid: Can I take my cheese with me? Can I take my milk with me?
Me: Sorry, I know these rules don't make a lot of sense, but you can only take your apples with you.
Kid: Why?
Me: Well, we get our food from the government and they have a lot of rules that we have to follow.
Kid (thinks for a minute): Well, that makes sense. Milk makes a mess. If you took it with you, you might spill it on the government's stuff, and they wouldn't want that.
Me: Yeah, I'm sure that's it.

The last straw

My most laid-back coworker (the one who gave me a Sandra Boynton board book about dinosaurs when I was having a stressful day) comes from a long career in food service so he's seen it all and normally doesn't bat an eye when patrons are awful to him or to the library. However, today he was walking across the parking lot to his car after a long shift and spotted a half-empty bottle of Coca Cola sitting by itself in an empty parking space. He walked over, seemed to take a deep breath, clenched his fists, looked up at the sky, and shouted "Motherf*****! People are animals!" before picking it up and stomping over to the dumpster to fling it inside.

Food rules

My library, like many public libraries, is a city department, and one of the things that means in this case is that we have to follow a lot of health/safety-related rules in our programs. One of them is that we can only serve pre-packaged food at library programs. That's usually not an issue since we never have money to buy food, so normally we don't serve food at all. However, we have a craft program that is run by a volunteer, who loves to buy food with her own money and bring it in. It's very nice of her, but I am constantly in a battle with her about following the pre-packaged rule and other food ordinances. To be honest I'd probably let it go in other circumstances, but she and the people who attend her program always leave a huge food mess behind, so this is part of my strategy in trying to make bringing food so inconvenient that she will stop and then my staff and I won't have to clean up after the program anymore.

Last week I was wiping down the tables in the program room where her craft program takes place and saw that someone had put a banana in the trash can.  My coworker was in there setting up for the next event and so I rolled my eyes and said "[Coworker], the craft volunteer brought in bananas this week!" Without looking up from what she was doing, my coworker just shrugged and said "Would you say a banana is 'pre-packaged,' at least?"

In better news

Some good/funny things happened at Walnut Bluff this week too:

We recently got a new paper towel dispenser in our women's bathroom--the lock broke on the old one and people kept stealing the roll of towels out of it. Our custodian normally refills the towels and toilet paper as the last thing she does in the morning before she leaves for the day. The first day with the new dispenser, she came to get me and said she could not for the life of her figure out how to put towels in the new dispenser--well, when I say "said," it was mostly communicated by gestures since she doesn't speak very much English and I don't speak very much Spanish that isn't library-specific. I went to take a look at it and, despite the pictorial instructions, was equally stumped. Finally we had to go get a third person, who doesn't speak any English, and he spent about 15 minutes wrestling with it, with the custodian and me looking over his shoulder and offering suggestions in two languages. As we triumphantly came back to the desk, the librarian who was waiting for patrons to come in raised her eyebrow and said "How many librarians does it take to change a lightbulb?"

I was pretty obviously having a rough day one day this week and was in my office working on something. One of my favorite coworkers knocked, handed me a Sandra Boynton board book called Oh My Oh My Oh Dinosaurs!, said "I bought this from the donations for you, you seemed like you could use it" and walked back out without another word.

Someone left their cake behind in the library. We kept it in the lost and found for the rest of the day, but no one came back for it. A fierce debate raged about whether to toss it or eat it, but in the end cautious, sensible heads prevailed and we threw it out untouched.

Mystery Library in brief

This is the busiest library job I've ever had (I think a past retail job edged this one out by a little bit) and I know the blog is suffering. I'm also working on a professional project that, ironically, I won't be sharing here since it will be linked to my real identity, and I really appreciate having anonymity on this blog. I feel like I can be honest about both the good and the bad of my employers since it's not reflecting on them.

Anyway, since it's been a while, here's a lightning round update of the goings-on at Mystery Library:

Computer things people have been struggling a lot with lately:
-Number lock
-The '@' sign (what it is, how to refer to it, and how to make it appear on the screen)
-Where to plug in a flash drive

The ESL teacher came by the front desk and said "Weird question, but does anyone have a bag of hot Cheetos?" Sadly it was a really busy shift and I never got a chance to find out the context.

No cereal in the parking lot this week. I hope the Cereal Leaver is okay. I really hope they finally decided to stop littering cereal.

Two different Hispanic toddlers pointed at the World Cup logo on our soccer display and exclaimed "Mexico!" 

A man brought in a balloon and tied it to the chair he was sitting in. Somehow it popped and he was really mad.

I cleaned several pistachio shells off of a shelf in the Large Print section.

I live in fear that someday while raising or lowering the flag outside the library (the pole is not lit at night so the flag code says it should come down each evening) that I'll touch the flag to the ground and horrify some patriotic Texan. I was starting to think I was overcautious, but then last week I noticed one of our patrons stop on the way out and salute while I lowered the flag at sunset.

A real live princess (a 20-something woman with a brilliant smile and as much patience as she had makeup) came for a tea party program, and I got to see some kids having the greatest day of their lives so far.

Talking trash

Today it was again my turn to pick up trash around the library grounds. I did not find any cereal, but I did find:

• 32 cigarette butts
• An empty bottle of motor oil, which I'm sure has nothing to do with the auto repair shops on either side of us
• The label for a can of fat-free refried beans
• (Presumably) a can of refried beans, about 5 yards away from the above label
• Two of my nemesis' daily cigarillo packets, since no one picked up the trash yesterday
• A long lock from someone's extension, or so I like to think.
• The largest bottle of Smirnoff I've ever seen outside a liquor store (empty)

Sorry, but no

More services we don't provide:

• Microwaving your cold fast-food lunch in the break room microwave
• Typing in your social security number for you
• Talking to your caseworker/the housing office/your lawyer on the phone because you can't explain what you need
• Memorizing your library card number so you don't have to get our your card to check things out (knowing your face and your name is already a lot, actually!)
• Reading everything on the computer screen aloud to you because the print is too small for you to read
• Watching your laptop while you go to the bathroom
• Watching your baby while you go to the bathroom

Mysteriouser and mysteriouser

Last week when I was picking up trash around the building, I saw that someone had dumped what looked like an entire box of Cap'n Crunch cereal in the parking lot. Today, the same parking space, I picked up an abandoned hat and a bunch of Apple Jacks fell out.

Patrons today

Can we have a barbecue on the front sidewalk of the library?

Are you guys notaries?

I would like to borrow a laptop. Do they burn CDs?

Are these [things in an exhibit behind a glass case] for sale?

Do you have a book club for preschool kids?

How do I sign up to work here?

I want to take back a donation that I made two years ago.

Advertising

Today I spent the morning taking flyers about our upcoming programs to various neighborhood institutions. In three hours, I: scheduled a program with someone I'd been trying to get in touch with for weeks, collected 3 advertisements for job openings to add to the library's Job Seekers Board, met a former library employee who is now a social worker at a local senior housing complex and who is going to be my new best work friend, and was given a free strawberry crepe.

Shoe leather--it continues to pay off.

Cookie monster

As I mentioned, I've been 'in charge of the building' a lot lately. Due to various issues, it ends up feeling like being a substitute manager more than just the person who gets called if a rude patron demands to speak to the person in charge. I am getting a real taste of what management must be like in bad times. I was thinking about what to write to indicate how busy I was, and what I settled on is simple: Not once, but twice, I have stuck a cookie in my cardigan pocket to hide it while I go help someone on the public floor.

It's not enough to be so busy you're eating at your desk. It's got to be so busy that you're eating at your desk and you get interrupted so often that you don't even stop to put your food down when it happens.

Source: https://amig0.livejournal.com/84449.html

Excuse me...

"Is there any way you can switch me to another computer. This one has chicken all over it."


No, I had not misheard that. Grrrross.

Regulars

Ms. Opp called three times within the first 20 minutes of my first shift back at Downtown Library. I also saw Mr. Timmons the same day but he didn't bring me any candy. I must have taken him too much by surprise, or maybe Seamus the Boss of Security has cracked down on food in the library now that it's all nice and clean (someone already spilled beer on the new carpet, though).


The first question my husband asked me when I got home from my first day back at Downtown was "Was Janis there?" She was not. I might have to email one of my new friends from West Side Branch and make sure she is okay.

Sunday shift

It's 55 degrees outside today in February and I am stuck inside on the Sunday shift. I'm struggling to be my normal sunny self with patrons.


Everyone is dressed up fancy since they've come from church, so that's nice at least.


Can you show us how to use the copier?


Do you have a Spanish-English dictionary? Thank you! What about CDs?


A man comes every day to read the day's newspaper, which we have to keep at the desk and hand out only if you give us something to hold for ransom because otherwise people steal it. Every day, when he returns the newspaper he jokingly says "Catch!" and pretends he is going to throw it to me instead of handing it back. Every day it is just as funny to him as it was the day before.


I don't have my library card. Can you look up my number?


A woman sets down a book and her library card silently on the desk and looks at me expectantly. Sorry, I can't check anything out at this desk. Not unless you want to set off our gate alarm, anyway, since I don't have a desensitizing pad.


A girl asks for several Blues Clues movies, and also Paranormal Activity 2. One of these things is not like the other...


A woman can't get on the computer because she's trying to use a friend's card number and the friend has too many fines. She can't use her own card because it also has too many fines. Of course this is our fault.


The woman whose statistics tutor I accidentally became wants to know: Can you help me figure out what a null hypothesis is?
Let's look in the index of your textbook, ma'am.


There's nowhere to plug your phone up at?


Do you have color paper that you can purchase? (People really think we are an office supply store. If you set up in the little shop for rent right next to us in the strip mall, you could make a killing.)


Do you have a scanner?


A man visiting from some southern state still hasn't figured out, after visiting three days in a row, which are the guest computers and which ones require a library card to use.


Show someone how to add page numbers to a Word document.


Polite kid: Excuse me, I was wondering where your comic books are.


Can I leave these bags here while I go to the restroom? (No.) Also, where is the restroom?


Mr. Timmons brings me candy *every day* now. I think I might have to tell him I'm on a diet. That's a total lie, but I know he doesn't have a lot of money and also most of the candy is pretty weird.


Do you have a pen? Never mind, I need a marker.


Can you help me? I accidentally clicked something and the menu went away on Microsoft Word.


Do you have Orange is the New Black, season 1?


Show two different people how to use what IT (presumably ironically) calls our "self service" print release station.


The 'closing in 15 minutes' announcement plays over the PA system. Thank goodness!

Today's conspiracy theories

Patron 1, when I tell her that a copy of Vatican Assassins, a book with asserts that the Jesuits killed John F. Kennedy, costs $125 on Amazon and the publisher is no longer in business: "Well, I guess that's not really a surprise, that they're no longer around. You hear about people who reveal these things that they don't want to get out, there is poison in their food and so on."


Patron 2 (totally unrelated 'question'): "Is there anything about medical capitalism, making people sick for money?...You're not allowed to talk about the elements in food. We have a periodical table of elements, but it's illegal to talk about it. The nutritionists who make the supplement catalogs, they can't publish anything about the geological elements that you need."

I don't believe you

Things patrons have told me at this library that are probably not true:


"I'm going to open a bakery for diabetics. It will use sugar alcohol. That has no calories."


"I returned that yesterday."


"The people at legal aid told me to come here, and that you could find me the form for contesting a will in Michigan."


"My son read his book to the police department and they decided to buy 250 copies to give away to the youths so they would know not to make the same mistakes."


"I'm not a drug addict anymore, I'm on methadone."


"A meat packing plant is like a toy store for men. They just love them."


"If your computer would just let me go to the website, I could collect my fifty thousand dollars!"


"It took my money but then didn't give me my printouts."


"The streets aren't built right. They should be generating electricity from the vibrations. That would make them safer, too."

Wednesday before the storm

There's supposed to be a big snowstorm in our region starting tonight, so I thought I'd better give you the news today in case we close tomorrow.


Exchange "good mornings" with the two men who are always here first thing when we open. I have never answered a question for either of them at the ref desk, although there is a third man who comes in a little bit later and asks about the newspaper if it hasn't been put out yet.


Coworker goes downstairs to take a found driver's license and library card down to lost and found.


Janis is here this morning as well. I showed her how headphones work (well, I showed her where to plug them in, I assume there will be a Part Two about how to put them on your head). Yes she is a lot of work, but she's so nice. I was relieved to find out she lives in an adult foster home, so someone will be making sure she does get home okay if the storm hits.


Make change for the same man twice because he's printing a huge number of documents. I'd better remember to put in more paper when he's finished.


Janis comes to let me know she has to go brush her teeth.


The printing man drops a twenty dollar bill. He's lucky my coworker and I see it first.


Our new elevator has a button to call the elevator company installed it in. This button is low to the ground, probably for the legitimate reason that people who are short, young, or in wheelchairs should be able to reach it, but people lean on it without noticing all the time, and then it broadcasts a dial tone for ten minutes and no one in the building has the power to turn it off.


Janis has left her cup for rinsing her mouth down on the first floor, so she needs to know what button to push on the elevator to go down and get it to brush her teeth.


For some reason our library system's boss of finance is here using the copier and printer. I hope he at least has an override key of some kind.


Coworker comes by to return the props I used in a Detroit/Motown/Underground Railroad display for Black History month.


We get Janis logged in to a computer and watching a video of Janis Joplin. She is really making progress!


You got newspapers up here? (Which ones?) Oh, just any.


Lend out a scanner.


Help a nice woman looking for books on parenting shy kids.


MAC calls for a couple of phone numbers. Ugh.


People need a tax form. Sorry, the copier doesn't do double-sided.


The elevator opens to a deliveryman with a box of pizza. Uh oh.