1. Back corners of the stacks must be brightly-lit for safety
2. As long as the elevator exists, no one uses the stairs
3. Scanners. SO many scanners.
4. No matter how many times I ask them to, staff never turn off the front desk computers at night
5. The patron who comes in with his own power strip and charges two phones, a tablet, a laptop, and a mysterious device I have yet to identify.
I am doing a pet project of cleaning up old notes on patron records when I have downtime on the reference desk. As far as I can tell, I seem to be undoing the life's work of one of Those Old School Library Workers who felt that all things should be noted in the patron's account, period. Today I deleted someone's social security number from the notes field of their patron record.
SMH.
Today an elderly lady who was hard of hearing came in with her grandson, who I'd guess was in his mid-20s. I'd ask the lady questions in a loud speaking voice, and she'd say "What's that?" and then her grandson would repeat whatever I said by shouting it 18 inches from her ear: "SHE SAYS THERE'S A SCANNER IN THE COMPUTER LAB!"
Fortunately, none of the other patrons complained.
The library system where I work has four locations. Here is how changing of the desk shifts "on the hour" works at each one:
Location #1: If you're not arriving to relieve your colleague 5 minutes before the hour, you're late.
Location #2: You arrive on the hour, on the dot, period.
Location #3: You wander in around 5 minutes past the hour. Sometimes the person on desk has to call their replacement to remind them to come out.
Location #4: Half the staff thinks the cultural standard is the same as location #1 and half the staff thinks it's the same as location #3, and they hate each other. You cannot win. If you try the location #2 approach, BOTH groups hate it.
I know that I am easier to reach than the IT department is, but please be advised that the things below are not my job just because I am the Technology Librarian:
Our main library is two stories and has an open staircase between the floors. Overheard around closing time just out of line of sight:
Parent: Don't do that.
Kid: Whyyy?
Parent: Because that's antisocial behavior....[pause]...would you want someone to drop a taco on YOUR head?
When I started this blog more than 10 years ago, I was in my early 20s and got harassed by creepy patrons ALL THE TIME. It has its own tag in the blog.
Now that I spend less time on desk and I'm in my 30s, it's been literal years since it's happened to me. But today I was filling in at a branch and doing a 'roam' around the public floor and a very Anglo-looking patron said "Hola" to me. Being polite, I said it back, but when he followed up with "¿Como estás?" after I'd already passed him, I pretended I didn't hear and just kept walking. I was not at all surprised when he said "damn, that ass!" as I was not quite out of earshot.
The sexual harassment is much less nerve-wracking than it was when I was young, but it was still exactly as gross.
