4.22.08

Category: dribblings

leetle brahther’s surgery is this afternoon. when i find out anything i’ll post it here. thank you for praying.

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i know you guys won’t even believe this story, but every bit of it is true. and yes, it’s a ‘brary story.

high school student comes in needing to use the computer. and right away she’s all attitude, “i need to use the computer and NO, i don’t have my card with me.” which flies all over me cos you knew you were going to the library WHY DIDN’T YOU BRING YOUR CARD? so i ask sweet precious her name and she mumbles it. she talks in this really lazy way. yes, it’s a southern accent but also it’s kinda slurred and the way she speaks it’s as if it’s really hard for her to exhale air from her lungs to pass through her vocal chords. lazy.

“what’s your name?”

“mumble mumble.”

wincing, “can you say it again?”

“mumble.”

nice. “could you…spell your last name for me?”

and she spells it loud and slow like i’m an idiot. and her last name is a really common one around here, and it’s easy to say and spell. and when she told me what it was i was flabberghasted as to how she could even say it in such a way that it could not be understood.

right. so she goes off to use the computer.

about 45 minutes later she comes out and asks me, she asks, (and i swear i’m not making this up. cos when i told fellykish about it she was all, “NO SHE DIDN’T!” and i was all, “yes, she did.” “NO!” “yep.”) so the girl asks in her lazy attitude-filled voice, “how do you make the numbers on the computer do Roman numerals?”

this is not an immediately stupid question, okay? we’ve all had brainfarts, right? perhaps she was overthinking the problem? and forgot that you make Roman numerals out of some of our capital letters? it happens.

i explain that you just use the capital letter I, V, and X, for numbers 1 – 10. and then ask if she needs a more complicated number… cos if you don’t use them often the bigger Roman numerals all get confusing (to me, anyway.)

she looks at me like i’m speaking in tongues. so i start again, “you just type a capital I for one, and two capital I’s for two… you don’t use number keys because they look like our letters.”

“i don’t know what they look like.”

“…what.”

“can you draw one through ten for me?” she’s in high school, you guys.

so i make her a list 1 – 10 and i tell her that the computers are going to shut down in five minutes (closing time is nigh) and that she needs to print what she’s got or save it to a floppy. mare pipes in that yes, the computers are about to shut down so she needs to hurry up and finish whatever she’s working on. you can see where this is going.

five minutes later she comes out all huffy, “the computer just turned off on me and i need to finish my work.”

“that’s what i meant when i told you that the computers were going to shut down.”

“well i need you to log me back on.”

“i can’t do that. once they shut down, that’s it.”

“but i’m not done yet.”

oh, but you are. “i’m sorry but there’s nothing we can do about it. there’s no way we can bypass the system.” mare takes over dealing with her as i go to shut down more computers. she pitches a fit and goes back to the computer room and i hear her either kick something or hit something (trashcan, computer, i don’t know) so i start to go back there to make sure she’s not killing anything important and she comes rushing out and leaves. nothing looks broken. my pal jan is sorting through some books and she looks up all startled and she says, “hey, when that girl walked by she said, “bitch.” what gives?” jan was confused cos she had not been involved with the girl at all (and how lucky was she?). i dunno if she was refering to mare or me. pro’ly mare since she dealt with her last. which is a shame cos mare is a really nice lady and she doesn’t deserve any name calling. especially not by some spoiled brat.

i don’t know what shocks me more, her horrible attitude when talking to strangers or the fact that she’s in high school and didn’t know her Roman numerals 1 – 10.

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