Today is my first day back to Holyoke after two weeks of paid leave. The library was closed for a little while after the move as they got the heat sorted.
Holyoke is full of beautiful, historic old buildings falling into disrepair. It’s a great community to serve, and while I’ve enjoyed the extra time to clean and read, snowshoe and hang out with my handsome young godson, it will be good to be back.
my sister is my hero
So, my sister deals with trolls all the time in her gig as editor-in-chief for a fashion and pop culture blog. At Thanksgiving, when she was visiting, she shared her policy: If she acts friendly and addresses them directly in the comments, they almost always back off and react sweetly.
I got to try it when I got into the program office after break. Someone (a fellow student!) had written, “When is the last time anyone cleaned the keyboards—??” on the office white board.
I seethed, and then I calmed down. I cleaned the keyboards (since they’re white Mac keyboards, it’s a painstaking process that involved Windex on Q-Tips), and then wrote back cheerfully, “May. I clean them at the end of the semester, but I went ahead and cleaned them today. Cheers, Katherine.”
And lo and behold, after this weekend, I came back to find, scrawled beneath my saccharine note,
“You’re the best.”
Damn straight I am.
6 aspects of my jobs I’m thankful for (6 days before Thanksgiving)
- the trust to find my own projects. At both jobs, I’m encouraged to think of things that need doing, then tackle them. That’s huge.
- the overall patience of our patrons. Sure, we occasionally get crazies (like the guy who thought the dinosaur picture books should be in the adult section because “adults like dinosaurs, too,” and also he should be first in line), but by and large, the people in our community are really kind and easygoing. I don’t know how patient I would be if my computer spontaneously turned off in the middle of filling out a job application, but people are generally really nice. It’s a blessing.
- finding the coolest books. I don’t get to read much on my job, except at break, or during the Epic Shredding Bout of 2011, but I bring home a lot of great loot.
- my coworkers. Nearly everyone was so gracious in teaching me when I first started this spring, and I can’t remember ever being yelled at, even when I’ve maybe deserved. And the other girl who started at the same time has helped keep me sane on tough days — look, she even let me interview her for my library blog.
- snacks. I will always love a workplace where coworkers bring food to share. Any place where there’s a chance I can forage a doughnut is a welcome treat for me.
- relaxed dress code. Sometimes I miss that Mon-Thurs I really can’t wear sophisticated work clothes because I do so much bending and shelving and carrying, but most of the time, I’m grateful that I can wake up and throw on jeans.
Just give me all the bacon and eggs you have.
Wait … wait.
I worry what you just heard was: Give me a lot of bacon and eggs.
What I said was: Give me all the bacon and eggs you have. Do you understand?
—
Ron Swanson, Parks and Recreation
(These are probably my favorite lines from any comedy show ever, and Ron Swanson is definitely my hero.)
This would fix my lousy morning. I may settle for all the stale cinnamon buns in the office.
(Source: johnbowers)
best RSS feeds for LIS students
[please excuse cross-posting to The Cardigan Librarian]
Hey hive mind.
This morning I’m setting up Feed Reader on the lab computers here at Simmons GSLIS West. I’m trying to get a wide variety of librarian blogs and news sources. Here’s what I have so far, and what I think I need.
General News & Librarianship
Public Librarianship
Children’s Librarianship
- Association for Library Service to Children blog
- bookshelves of doom (a personal favorite)
Techie Librarianship
- librarian.net (Jessamyn West)
School Librarianship
- ?
Archivist
- ?
Academic Librarianship
Special Libraries
- ?
I want the site to be updated frequently and to be easy to subscribe to. That’s about it.
multiculturalism
Co-worker: I'm about to go get something to eat. But I'll be back, inshallah. You know what I mean?
Me: Sure. God willing and the creek don't rise.
I view it as a wake up call to your life when you’re driving around your hometown, on the way home from getting your cat vaccinated and you see the huge head of a guy you went to high school with on a massive billboard in the middle of town. Apparently he’s now a real estate agent for Century 21 and deserves to have his image plastered all over town? I’m not joking, his face is probably longer than I am tall. It didn’t help that he was kind of a douche in high school. Anyways, I sat there in my car and evaluated my life (living at home part of the week and my grandmother the other part, can’t get a full time job to save my life, possibly buys way too much clothing considering the size of my paycheck, has 2 cats that hate the other animals living in my house and therefore never leave my room, avoiding working on my thesis) and realized I should probably get my shit in gear and at least finish my thesis and by extension, school.
Then I drove home, ate a scrambled cheese egg sandwich, emailed my boss the last bit of work I finished before Christmas break and am now about to take a nap. Moral of the story: My life is going quite well, thank you Mr. Century 21 agent guy. Stop judging me from your billboard.”
—
She Sells Seashels by the Seashore:
Oh, Shelby, college roommate of mine, you speak the truth. From one underachieving part-time clerical worker to another. The twenties are weird.
new england hippie boarding school plays tennis
Me [wading through a sea of questionably appropriate Converse and settling upon a pair of moccasins]: I'm sorry, but you're going to have to borrow some shoes. You can't wear those on the court.
Girl: Oh, OK.
Me [leading her back to the closet]: Sorry, they're a little gross. They're just ones that got left here. But I guess it isn't any worse than bowling alley shoes.
Girl: I don't go to the bowling alley.
Me: I just wish we had socks to give with them.
Girl: I don't wear socks.
Me: Well, um, I guess I hope whoever had these shoes before did.
