9.19.08 ‘brary story!

Category: dribblings

the other day my coworker was minding her own when a patron walked up and asked where the biographies were. my helpful coworker pointed to the smallish shelves that were not 4′ away from the circ. desk. the patron then asked, “are they in order by author?”

i froze on the spot not making eye contact with anyone cos i knew how this was going to play out.

my coworker kept her cool and answered, “no ma’am, they’re in order by subjects’ last names.”

the patron did not like this at all. “what?! but i wrote down the authors! all i brought with me was the authors’ names!” she had three index cards with authors names on them.

my coworker, ever helpful, said, “well who were you wanting to read about?”

“i don’t know!”

“you were wanting biographies right?”

“yes! i can’t BELIEVE they aren’t in order by author!” then she added the ever popular, “when did you start DOING THAT?!”

“they’ve always been like that. whose biography were you wanting to read?”

“i don’t know. all i have are author names!”

my coworker turns to me and gives me the “help me out here!” look. i say to her, “i’ll be right back.” and i scram to the back of the office where my best pal Joanie works and i was laughing and telling her about the lady who was currently losing her shit over the biographies.

eventually my coworker told the lady to look up the authors on the OPAC to see what biographies she needed. we never learned WHY she didn’t know which bios she needed. it was weird.

when i came back i apologized to my coworker for leaving her alone with the crazy. she was all, “yeah thanks for dumping me with her!”

“sorry! it was either that or get myself fired for laughing at the patron.”

“did you see me try to explain to her how the biographies are in order?”

“yes. and it failed.”

“was i speaking another language?”

“i don’t think so. i love how she pulled the, “how long have you been doing that?” thing. they always ask that.”

“i know!”

“from now on we should answer, “tuesday. we changed it tuesday.”

“she was so upset.”

“she didn’t even know who she was supposed to be reading about.”

“who does that?”

“i don’t know. that blew my mind. how long have we been doing that? my god, i’m 30 so i guess they’ve been in order by subject for AT LEAST the last 30 years. where the hell have these people been?”

“i don’t know.”

“and also? i went to public school. IN THIS TOWN. so it’s NOT like i learned this in college or anything. i learned library skills in elementary school JUST LIKE SHE DID. JUST LIKE THEY ALL DID. and the worst part? THEY’RE STEALING OUR OXYGEN.”

***

this week i taught my conversation partner, Aline, to juggle. at first she was all, “no i could never learn that. it’s too difficult!”

i was all, “oh please, you’re a firefighter. how hard could this be?”

she caught on really fast! and she was having a great time even though learning to juggle involves a lot of dropping balls and chasing them around. after a while she made ten catches in a row! i said, “look at that clock.”

she was all, “what about it?”

“it’s only been 25 minutes and ALREADY you are juggling!”

she laughed, but was suprised, i think, to have picked it up so quickly. i let her keep the three juggling balls so she could practice.

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