Year of Gratitude - Day 122 - SPL Family

I know I mention Southfield Public Library a lot in this year of gratitude, but there's a lot to be grateful for. Like every single one of these people, for example. We all got together tonight and had dinner in Southfield. It was a wonderful evening!

Year of Gratitude - Day 105 - Public Service Patience

There are few experiences that have given me more life lessons than that of working at a public service desk at a library. I've worked at UM-Dearborn's Mardigian Library, then Wayne State's undergrad library, Southfield Public Library and West Bloomfield Public Library. At all of these places, I have dealt with the public in every age, color and creed. I've dealt with the rich and the homeless. I've dealt with people slogging through community college and the ones trying to find the Arc of the Covenant. I've dealt with soccer moms, former convicts and the mentally challenged.

What this rainbow of personalities and characters has taught me is patience. It's taught me understanding. It's taught me that while questions might sound silly, there really is no stupid question. It's a fine line. When I share with non-librarians some of the things people call for, they response with "I would never call the library for that" or "I thought you just talk about books." Talking about the profession generally entails some teaching. Yes, people call the library for far more than books. They call to fill out their star charts, settle bets and find how to use "who" or "whom" correctly. Some need help with their homework. Some need help with finances, real estate, scholarships.

It really doesn't matter what people need, most librarians will help. I have worked on the front line in libraries for 14 years now and I have gained patience that I could not have gained anywhere else. Now that I think of it, I didn't really think you could teach patience, but that's exactly what working with so many people has taught me. Everyone has something going on. As a public servant, you learn to navigate their personality, their baggage and there level of ability. And the more patient you are, the better each encounter is.

I still catch myself sometimes getting impatient. My speaking gets very terse and my face hardens one notch from a scowl. I have been able to realize this about myself and get my act together mid-interaction. Great customer service takes practice and self-reflection.

A perfect example of why I want to be the best librarian I can be is this: I was volunteering at an awards ceremony in Southfield. I noticed a man finishing his drink before he entered the event. He kept giving me side looks and finally came up to me and said, you look very familiar - where do I know you from?" As soon as he spoke, I immediately realized he had been a patron at the Southfield Public Library. He said he used to go there all the time because he was looking for employment. When he found a job, he said, he stopped coming. It was a great encounter and awesome to hear what our great library and staff did for him. He was so grateful. I welcomed him back to enjoy some of the more leisurely library offerings.

This encounter, and hundreds like it, will make me want to continue to practice kindness and patience whenever dealing with others. It is worth it.

Year of Gratitude - Day 67 - Jen Preston

Today my friend Jen Preston died. She was a great librarian and we were both interns at Southfield Public Library at the same time. The last time I saw her a few months ago was on the fiction desk at SPL. She was really tired and it was before her heart surgery and that. I'm sad that would be the last time I'd see her, but I was happy to spend a shift on the desk with her one last time.

Library land will miss you, Jen. We will all miss you.

Related Links:

• Jen Preston: Novi Library champion of teens passes away
• Get to Know Novi Public Library - Jennifer Preston

Year of Gratitude - Day 58 - Southfield Public Library

The Southfield Public Library is my favorite public library. I have so many great memories and lifelong friends from this place. As new graduate student, I visited SPL to complete an assignment. My old supervisor, Nancy Beets, handed me a pre-printed set of answers to my assignment's questions. That first encounter was quick, because the library was rocking. It is still rocking, but a little less than before.

As an intern, I learned from the best librarians in one of the busiest libraries in southeast Michigan. Once we limited computer use for nonresidents, we saw a drop in traffic on the floors. People love free computer and internet service. I sharpened my reference skills and picked up some pretty swell reader's advisory knowledge. Weeding the history and philosophy collections was also pretty great.

That one author that wrote the one book about that one thing

Recently, I witnessed a phenomenon that I cherish. It's one that you're exposed to the more you work with skilled and seasoned librarians on desk. Readers advisory is not easy, but is something to behold when done well. Same thing with reference work, but I'm a little better at reference than fiction. I'm working on that, but back to the phenomenon...

A woman walked up to the fiction desk and said to my morning shift partner and I, "I need to find an author's name." The patron rattled off a couple of facts about the author, no more than three, all short and all vague.

"Edith Wharton," my fiction partner said, with perhaps two seconds of thought.

And there it was - the phenomenon. The phenomenon was the women's gratefulness radiating from her smile, her visible relief and frankly, her shock that this librarian nailed it on the first try. "One of my faves," partner said. You could feel the woman's joy as she rushed off to find the author's works. I watched the conversation in awe, mouthed gaped open slightly from the wonder.

Perhaps this sounds like a trivial thing, but this happens daily at the library. Folks come in and they have but a couple of shreds of information - sometimes a date, sometimes a description, sometimes a partial title. Each day librarians help people put it together and help find answers to questions. We are in the business of answering questions. While I've been in the business of answering questions a long time, it's still amazing to watch a pro wield knowledge effortlessly.

Order out of chaos

At a meeting just before Christmas break my boss said that I often made order out of chaos. I chuckled at the thought of my parents hearing that. The last two years of my professional life was figuring out where my department was, where we had to go and getting the team ready to GO. Maybe my boss already saw it then, but apparently some of the chaos was turning to order. As January wraps up and I look back on the first month of 2011, I think I starting to see it, too.

While I love trying to make sense of it all, I realize it's really freaking hard. My work in higher ed has taught me that I can take nothing for granted and that I have to do my homework and check it thrice. It's challenging, but entirely exhilarating when done well. I find in my personal life sometimes others don't see it that way. Though people will banter on all varieties of subjects, they can't go very deep when confronting the complexities of a topic, be it racism, revolution, world economies or poverty. There are many examples of aborted conversations in my personal life. And as a librarian I have seen people crash and burn at the very thought of some real deal research to try and understand those complexities.

Over the 2010 holiday I picked up a few full-day shifts at the public library. It sort of took me back to the old days of 8 hour reference desk shifts at an academic library I worked at. I shuddered. Working that long with the public is exhausting, especially you're pedaling information and not a commodity.

In the first half hour of my afternoon shift, I got a call from who is hands down my favorite caller to date. First, if you know who Underdog Lady is on the Howard Stern show, then you can pretty much substitute that voice for my caller. That afternoon, the patron nervously asked about two cities up north and which was better for a homeless person to live in.

"I know it's not an easy question to answer," she quickly said, her voice teetering on the edge of an anxiety attack. I agreed that it was a difficult question and had a few moving parts. I assured her that with a bit of research we could at least start answering that question.

I commenced with the reference interview. The first city that actually popped into my head was Portland, OR. She wasn't very interested in that. I began to ask her questions about what type of data she was looking for, basically, what she meant by "better for a homeless person."

"No data," she replied.

No data. Of course not. I asked her why she wouldn't be interested in say how many homeless shelters, churches, missions, etc. there were in the cities. I said that there was information about how much private funding goes to counties' humane causes. I asked her why she didn't want to browse some newspapers for stories on the homeless in those cities. Our NewsBank database subscription is tremendous and has a comprehensive collection of newspapers from all over the state, not just the main rags. What about census info on poverty? She would hear none of it.

Anyway, I knew where all of this was going. It was only a matter of time before my trying to answer her question would make her have a mini-meltdown. And so it began with a pause...and then...

"Well, can I have the phone number to (City 1)'s police depart-- no- never mind, this is getting too complicated," and hung up on me. The end of this call was very similar to the last.

The encounter lasted about five minutes and I thought back on how it could have been different. How could the question be answered better? I recalled the first call with this person a few weeks back and decided she was looking for a quick answer from a librarian that is easy to understand, no more than 2-3 sentences and still completely legitimate. The acceptable answer to her question would have sounded like this, "(City 2) is better for the homeless because people are friendly and the police do not harass the homeless too much." Yet, because I would NEVER make assumptions on things I don't know of, I would never throw a quick answer out like that.

Which brings me back to making order out of chaos. It's terribly difficult. Higher education and my adventures in research have taught me that the truth is never served up on a silver platter with no strings attached. In the case above, the truth was there and could have been discovered, but not without work. You must work for knowledge.

A tale of two men...Lech and Warren

Last week was one that I will never forget. One Tuesday, Oct. 26, 2010, I met Lech Wałęsa, Poland's past president and Nobel Peace Prize winner. Two days later on Oct. 28, 2010 I helped host Warren Graham, author of Black Belt Librarians and all around library security expert. Whenever a week of complete chaos like this takes hold, I feel such incredible satisfaction afterward. This weekend I reflected on the week's exceptional events. Life happens so fast that by the time the words are out the memory is already faint.

Lech Wałęsa & adventures in solidarity
In the last few weeks I was a nervous wreck, especially when I thought of meeting President Wałęsa. I called my mom with more frequency and visited her for crash courses in proper Polish. I would only have a moment's time with the man, but I didn't want to make some glaring mistake like mixing up genders.

My moment would turn into two as I was asked to interpret for a union leader from Poland. What was supposed to be quick would turn into an invite to a lunch with dignitaries, where I would meet President Wałęsa and hear him speak twice. After lunch, the presidential party disappeared to give the president some privacy. He is still a very charismatic speaker, but the folks I sat with said he was much more tame than back in the early days of Solidarność. Time slows us all down in at some point.

There was about an hour between the lunch and the Solidarność Exhibit opening at the The Walter P. Reuther Library. Before I knew it, I was sitting with union leaders translating all types of automotive business talk to the best of my ability. When union people get together, they want to talk shop no matter the circumstance. By the time we headed over to the Reuther, we were invited to an International Metalworkers' Federation (IMF) meeting in Detroit. After some translated discussion about the international reach of unions, we headed to the Reuther for the exhibit opening.

The exhibit opening was excellent and there was a great crowd on hand. I met the president of the second time and took a picture with him. He would speak again, longer the second time. I was in awe of the president's interpreter. While I struggled to remember words throughout the day, she never missed a beat and lost no meaning in translation. She even translated comedy well - it was brilliant. This was the most Polish I had uttered in many years.

Attending the IMF meeting will be exciting, but it does take me away from my work at Wayne State University. Unless I'm on a week-long bike ride, I get a little antsy being away from work, but I've gotten much better.

Black Belt Librarians (and Black Belt WSU Alumni)
The School of Library and Information Science Alumni Association had been rebuilding and this event would be the manifestation of our efforts. We had all the ingredients for a winning program: support from the WSU Alumni Association, the willingness of volunteers to get the word out, people contributing promotional material, people going shopping for refreshments, etc. Even though we all have jobs and we're all busy, everyone pulled together to make the day successful.

Over 40 people joined us to hear Warren Graham, who is nothing short of extraordinary. We gave out evaluations and every last one was a satisfied participant. Warren Graham's strengths are definitely in the fact that he's a very strong speaker and that he provides practical information that people could take back to their libraries immediately. "Awareness doesn't cost a dime," he would say.

I was happy the event turned out well and I'm happy that people are hearing about the SLISAA. I got inspired and tweaked the website a little bit. Finally.

Public library encounters make me question some parts of academia

This month I picked up a few extra shifts at Southfield Public Library and I've noticed an influx of students from colleges and universities getting ready to wrap up their semester. For me, it's been an interesting return to reference in a higher education context. I haven't worked in an academic library since 2007, but I still have a great working knowledge of WSU's library system because I constantly use it. There have been a number of patrons that I've run across in just the last week that make me wonder what the heck is going on in academia.

There was one day that people were asking about a lot of citation assistance. But it wasn't just "How do you cite this?" I found myself explaining to college students how you have to list your references and give credit to others when you use their work. One patron's professor told the class to write a paper, then the professor returned the papers and instructed the class to go to the library and find out how to cite their sources after the fact. It seemed to me that this was a wild goose chase. Don't introductory college English classes teach the basics of MLA and APA writing styles BEFORE they ask a student to write a paper? And if the class showed no compentency in the areas of APA or MLA, wouldn't YOU teach them before sending them to a library? I was not amused, but I was compelled to help.

I've written for a long time, so perhaps research paper writing and plagiarism have been on my radar for a while, but logic stands that you can't just steal other people's work, right? Anyway, that's what I found myself explaining while working at SPL.

The second thing that I found myself (happily) doing was telling university students that even though they weren't at Eastern Michigan University or at Wayne State University they still had access to their school's databases from any computer with internet. The first woman was in her fifties and her topic was family counseling. She didn't really tell me too much more, because I told her we wouldn't have too many academic journals. She asked if Borders would have them and I said no. I found out she was going to EMU, so I told her she had access to their library system. I sat her down, helped her log in and started her on two psychology databases. Just like that she went from "I've never done research" to conducting her own searches in her school's databases. It was great.

Within an hour of that encounter, a Wayne State University student came up to me asking about the microfilm readers. Now I was REALLY have flashbacks from my academic library days. I spoke with her and looked at some old indexes and then she shared more about the project. It turned out that she could only get articles from either the New York Times or the Washington Post on certain topics. WSU's library system has full access to many, many years of digital, searchable archives for both of those publications. Though I commended her for trying to use the newspaper and indexes, I knew that I was going to have to show her some of the university library's glorious historical newspaper resources.

I had a most resourceful hour with both students and it was fun work, however, it still made me question why these folks were not being given the knowledge that they need to succeed in higher education. I continue to be interested in teaching and I am thankful to work at SPL and continue to have the opportunity to teach in little bite sizes. Yet, these small looks back into academia make me wonder if there is a bigger role for me in teaching at the university level.

'field Zone: Southfield's teen center sure to impress

It's always great to hear good news, especially in and around Detroit. Yesterday, I heard from my colleagues at Southfield Public Library that they got a sneak peek into the new teen center in Southfield, called the 'field Zone. Hopefully the teens don't laugh too much at the name, but man are they going to love it!

Unfortunately I didn't get to go for a tour, but word on the street is that it is really freakin' nice. There is a dance studio and a recording studio. I hear that there will be a singing instructor coming in each week. There's a price for membership and I think it is $55 a year for each teen. It will be only for Southfield and Lathrup Village residents.

We figured at first that the parents who are involved and care will get their teens a membership. The trouble makers whose parents don't give a snot won't at first. However, we hope that the word spreads and that more teens get interested because they heard how cool it was from friends at school. This thing sounds like it's going to be a hit with the kids.

UPDATE: Check out this article about the Field Zone in the Free Press http://www.freep.com/article/20090517/NEWS03/905170538/1001/rss01

Newsweek, Librarianship and Twitter

I have been a writer for many years in a variety of circumstances, but this last Monday was perhaps one of my biggest accomplishments and one of the coolest gigs ever. Newsweek published my essay about working at Southfield Public Library online.

A lot of people have asked me how I came across this opportunity. In a word: Twitter. I've heard a lot about how people think it's stupid and pointless, but I'm afraid I respectfully disagree. Being the podcast junkie I am, I was listening to Planet Money on NPR and learned about a little mini-contest they were running with Newsweek. The gist: tell us in a 140 characters or less how the recession affects you. This is how I got the gig:

@Newsweek The libraries in MI I work @ teem w/ patrons seeking work, foreclosure/credit info, job training, entertainment & hope. #rcstory

That's right. That wretched little scrum of characters got me a writing opportunity with Newsweek. Needless to say I see Twitter in a different light.

The article created a HUGE response. It's tremendous. I got emails from library students, directors, deans and, of course, all kinds of librarians. This is bigger than I expected, but I'm so happy that it received the attention it did. Not for me, but for the amazing profession that I am proud to say I am a part of.

What I heard a lot of, especially coming from library land, was "Thank You." Librarians have a reputation for being quieter and meeker than your average person (though I gotta' tell ya', that does NOT include the librarians I know :). I am neither quiet or meek and I will shout from the mountaintops about libraries and how much they rule. From the looks of it, librarians have approved of my message and the respect of my colleagues is priceless.

Hence, it is I who would like to say "Thank You!"

Thank you to the wonderful people at the University of Michigan's Mardigian Library for introducing me to the profession and planting the seed that would grow into a fruitful career.

Thank you to Wayne State University for providing me with a top-notch education in archives and librarianship. The experience, people, knowledge and opportunities at WSU continue to be a huge part of my life and work.

Thank you to Southfield Public Library for showing me how critical public libraries are to their respective communities.

Thank you to Newsweek for allowing me to share my story and Alan Wigodski, who took my picture.

Most of all, THANK YOU to all of the wonderful people who have contacted me about the article. Your support means more to me than I could ever put into words.

Much Love

Internships, Assignments and other school things I won't be involved with...

This has easily been the strangest fall ever. For one, I'm not going back to school. I vaguely remember not going to school for a year after undergrad, but that was spent looking into graduate school. It was nice, but I knew the calm wasn't permanent.

All this lack of going to school has made me think about school more often, ironically enough. This could also be due my just being hired by my alma mater Wayne State University. I sort of always thought of myself as a person who'd be most comfortable in academia. Academia, after all, has been very good to me, especially in the internship departments.

The first internship from the University of Michigan-Dearborn was something I couldn't have imagined: I wrote articles for the Detroit Red Wings. As with a majority of undergraduate internships, this one was unpaid. Yet, money couldn't buy that kind of experience. Even now, almost six years later, I still pinch myself. I am still struck by how awesome it is to write about something that you love.

At the end of my graduate degree, I hopped onto the staff of Southfield Public Library as an intern. I just wrapped up this internship last week. It was amazing. I met lifelong friends there, got the full library experience and beefed up my resume to aid in getting a good job. This was a paid internship, but let's face it: it was still an internship. Again, the payoff was in the experience.

After a few months of hunting for jobs (in Michigan, of all places), I started getting down on myself and my accomplishments. I wondered what the point of being involved in school was. I wondered if these internships were too amateur and weren't helping me. I wondered if I would have to turn to freelance writing. I wondered why the library world didn't have room for me. I waited for a sign as my anxiety mounted. I imagine I was practically unbearable for my colleagues at SPL, but they remained incredibly supportive.

Then my internships did the talking.

Within one week, I had been contacted by the Wings to cover opening night. Then I interviewed and snagged a position at West Bloomfield. Then I interviewed for a position at Wayne, which would become my current endeavor. Then the litigation consulting picked up. Some publishing consulting reared its head. There's even an archival possibility in the midst. It has been quite a ride.

So, although I started getting mopey, looking back I think I did a lot of things right. Perhaps my patience wasn't my strongest point, but the experience gained through internships and assistantships really pulled me through to the Promised Land (read, full time employment). My advice: get involved with school, find an internship and NETWORK. Frankly, nobody cares about your GPA.

Last day as an intern

Yesterday was my last day as an intern at Southfield Public Library. I thought about how strange it is to turn in a two-week notice. My transition to a new job has never been quite like this. Before it's always been "My contract ends on so and such date."

It was not necessarily a sad day. I loved my experience at SPL, but I am really excited to take the next step and shed the intern title. I will actually serve as a substitute librarian there, but I'm going to miss seeing the people on a daily basis. The staff was full of excellent people and everyone from the head guy to the volunteers were critical to running the library like a well-oiled machine. No library is perfect, but SPL is pretty dang awesome. It was a fun ride.

So, I was sitting here trying to figure out what to write about my last day at SPL and found it was nothing too compelling. I had a few little projects floating around, including Ebay research for a class and leaving a pirate message on my boss's voicemail (see International Talk Like a Pirate Day). Some tasks I finished on my own. Others were ongoing and needed to be passed on.

We enjoyed coffee and donuts. We rocked the reference and fiction desks. I skipped lunch, because I chowed on one too many donuts and wanted to shoot the breeze. At about 3:30, I really started feeling the lame duck status sinking in (read: crashing from donut sugar high).

That was it. There were no sappy goodbyes or tears, which was great. I'll take laughing and telling stories over weeping like a dork any day! We all understood that I wasn't leaving the state. I was sticking around as a substitute. Of course, I'm still a patron and I found friends there that I'm pretty sure are going to be lifers.

I think I'll write about how both of my internships changed my life at a different time, but it's safe to say that working at SPL was one of the coolest places to work, ever. Not perfect, but close.

Kindle: the technology and hubbub

A combination of research on Amazon's electronic book reader, the Kindle, and the Atlantic Magazine article about Google making us dumber took this blog in directions unforeseen. My initial thoughts were about how Kindles would be used in a library, specifically the Southfield Public Library. Those thoughts will be shared in another post. Due to my gadget-loving nature I also thought Kindles were cool and hip, but then I thought about the intellectual property issues surrounding such digital distribution. That moved my thoughts to the music industry, copyright and of course the writing industry. This rabbit hole went deep and it was messy.

Krugman & Intellectual Property Matters
Paul Krugman, columnist for the New York Times, first made me think about writing on this topic, a topic that split into many. He wrote a brief column about the Kindle and offered a short discussion about how intellectual property laws are going to have to change with technology. He used the newspaper industry as an example of the struggle to give intellectual property away online in exchange for ad revenue, but he still sort of leaned on that model. I have some qualms giving away intellectual property and building a business model around that practice. Much of my worry stemmed from journalism's dilemmas. This model doesn't sound all that mad, but it sounds like things could go seriously wrong, especially for content creators - writers, musicians, etc.

Krugman received interesting feedback on his column. The New York Times published letters to the editor three days after Krugman's column; they were pretty good. One mentioned the fact that there are many writers who can't write for a living and have to do something else. This inevitably led to less time for the writing process. Another writer wrote about how easy it would be to zip through text on a electronic reader. I thought this a great point; I love Control+F.

The same day the letters were published, there was a blog that brought up some very excellent points about content having high value and Krugman denying that fact in his column. The post wrapped up strong:

Krugman's article is based on the premise that intellectual property will become worthless, that the real money is made selling ancillary products. His example is the Grateful Dead, which makes its money not from its music but from sales of tshirts and memorabilia. We don't buy it for a minute. Great content has value in and of itself. Harry Potter's adventures will sell, even without any related tshirts, bookmarks and action figures. Content has value as does the intellectual property of writers and songwriters. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

With all this in mind, my brain still whined "We've got to get a Kindle!!! It's just as important as iPod or BlackBerry!" I calmed it down by gently agreeing that yes it would be amazing to have a device like this, but that it's a little too cutting edge (read: expensive, plus, I'm a librarian for crying out loud). I would be an early adopter if I could afford it. I seriously feel that these gadgets are going to do one of two things: either they will make me and a bunch of other people fantastically successful and happy or they will destroy me and the rest of mankind, like in the Matrix.

Kindle's Technology
All these issues sort of swirled around in my brain and I decided it was time to find some reviews on the Kindle. The first one I found was in the May issue of Scientific American and it was fascinating. The article, called "Working Knowledge: Inside the Kindle E-Book Reader," described the technology that both the Kindle and Sony Reader are using: electronic paper. This stuff apparently catches light quite like the texture of paper. It is also very energy efficient: one battery will allow the user to turn 7,500 pages. Obviously downloading the books requires more energy, but that's still pretty cool technology. And if you get the Kindle, you can get those books or newspapers and magazine subscriptions through a wireless network. Instant gratification for reading urges? Would this help people read more or be distracted more? I personally would friggin' adore this thing. And be completely distracted by it.

In the May 20 issue of Forbes, the blog post "Amazon’s Kindle hopes to become the iPod of books" takes a look at some business implications Kindle might create for Amazon. This article made me grumble a little, because it first made me think of how Amazon as a business entity bungled tapping the world of libraries for their hot, hot business. Memo to Amazon: We need you as much as you need us! Someone better have lost their job for that genius move.

Now Amazon's looking to make up for it. The article rekindled (no pun intended) my worries about how technology is forcing change, which may or may not be a bad thing. I'm a little on the fence until I hear what more writers think about this. It should be no surprise that the first example offered by the article is the iPod and how it changed the music industry. Not all musicians are too crazy about the changes imposed by innovation. The Kindle wants to be the iPod of reading, which will indeed have an effect on writers.

Survey says...
I also looked to the blogosphere to learn about other people's use of Kindles. Did they like the product? Was it dependable, etc? I have yet to see one up close and personal. I found this very informative and honest look at the Kindle:

• Putting the Kindle to the Fire

Elderly behaving badly

Working at the library will introduce one to all walks of life. At the Southfield Public Library, we get a lot of senior citizens coming through. Generally, I think how great it must be to be retired and just read, read, read books to my heart's content. A lot of the elderly folks are very kind and are pleased beyond belief when they are served by the librarians here.

Yet, I've been noticing some senior citizens behaving badly lately. I'm not sure if it's because they are gaining in years and feel they are entitled to act like [insert expletive here], but it's getting sort of silly. For example, an unwritten rule here at SPL is that you do NOT kiss the librarians. One of the best librarians in the house was kissed by an elderly patron. Not cool. If you want to show your appreciation, fill out a comment card with fluffy prose. Don't forget to add our names. Kissing does nothing for us other than gross us out.

A second unwritten rule: don't kiss and then insult the other patrons. A week or two ago, another elderly lady came in and tried to kiss a patron's daughter. The older lady then started telling the patron and the patron's daughter that they were too fat and had to go on a diet. My colleague grabbed a piece of paper with call numbers on it, grabbed me and sharply whispered, "Get her out of here." I interrupted the patron's berating of the others and had her to walk to the stacks with me. It was embarrassing for everyone except the lady, who chuckled and asked me, "Oh, was I misbehaving?" I looked at her and said, "I'm just showing you where your books are."

A third patron of ours loves coming to the desk and acting high and mighty with his vast knowledge bank. He always tells us what he recommends and what we should be watching. Sometimes he tries to get folks to talk about inappropriate things at the desk, like God. Sorry dude, no can do. It was funny one day when he was trying to talk hockey with me. As soon as he began ragging on Nick Lidstrom I knew he was full o' crap. When I had a reply for every one of his ridiculously formed statements about the Detroit Red Wings, he looked at me and said, "How do you know so much about the Red Wings?" When I told him I wrote for the organization for 4 seasons, he realized that he was not the all-knowing party in the conversation. He left immediately and without a word. Silent victory was mine.

Finally, there's a patron who is a tutor and feels that he should be served right away, regardless whether there are patrons in front of him or not. Further, he SCREAMS his demands at the librarians from across the floor. He's also been calling people names and throwing around his age, like it's some pass for acting like a [insert expletive here]. He keeps threatening that he's going to tell the boss, but the boss isn't going to respond well to some dude that screams at and degrades his librarians.

Elderly folks really should know better. If you want to be respected, you must first show respect. Age isn't a "Get-respect-whether-you-are-civil-or-not" card.

Free Technology Program - May 8, 2008

On May 8, 2008, Southfield Public Library will be holding a FREE technology program. This is the first of a new series called "Tech Trends: Gizmos Gadgets and Widgets". This program offers patrons a simple introduction to technology that can be utilized in everyday life. There are 4 sections: Computers, Communication, Internet and Entertainment. Each section will cover a specific topic. The evening's topics include Mac v. PC, cellular phones, news readers and podcasting. Handouts with instructions and additional resources will be provided and a Question and Answer session will follow the presentation. All ages are welcome and no prior computer experience is necessary.

Check out this and many other programs at Southfield Public Library's Home Page.

Irony: sometimes it's astounding!

The other night at the library, a young lady was kicked out of the library for violating the code of conduct. She was told she could go to Public Safety (the Police Station).

About a half hour later, the troublemaker's mom comes in hooting and hollering that her daughter should not have been kicked out because she doesn't have a coat.

My thought: it's November in Michigan. The kid, regardless where she was going, needs a f***ing coat. Perhaps if the mom added a little quality parenting into the mix, her kid wouldn't have been kicked out and would have a coat. Just a thought.

Silly human tapestry

In yet another research endeavor, I found some pretty strange titles for various community segments. I was researching Southfield's demographics and found people labeled as "Milk and Cookies," "In style," "Salt of the Earth," and "Midland." These are just 4 of 65 difference groupings. The "tapestry" is quite interesting because random things just come up under certain groups.

For example, apparently if you are a "Boomburb" (#04) you are more likely to read airline magazines. If you are under "Main Street, USA" (#24) you are likely to watch 7th Heaven. "NeWest" residents (#58) like to listen to Hispanic music. There's a whole bunch.

You can look at the poster, which isn't quite as wordy, HERE.

You can view the entire PDF manual in all it's glory HERE.

I looked through all of these things and thought Mr. Man and I fit best in segment #39, Young and Restless. Where do you fit in???

On the matter of reading - books that suck.

I have neglected this blog and it's readers, so I apologize for that. However, with this blog in mind, I've been having a lot of discussions about reading. This will probably be the first of many posts on reading. Since I'll be wrapping up school, I've got to enjoy books for pleasure rather than suffer under the tyranny of textbooks.

Here goes. People at the Southfield Public Library are always looking to gobble up books. They call in and ask us to hold books. They're part of book clubs. They suggest books they'd like to see. It's quite wonderful. Well, it is right up until you open some of these books up. Let me cover two groups of books that suck.

Urban Fiction
The people at SPL loooove their Urban Fiction. They devour these books and come back for more. I've promised myself that one day, I'll read through one. Lately, whenever someone calls in and asks for a book entitled, "Is the bitch dead yet or what?" or "Gold Diggers" or any other silly title, I open it to the first page and begin reading before I deposit the book on the elevator, where it will go to the first floor for the patron to retrieve later.

The word "terrible" doesn't even begin to describe some of this stuff. The flow of the story is juvenile at best. The sentence structure is about as smooth as Detroit highways. The character development doesn't exist. In fact, the characters don't develop or change; they're the same character over and over. Newsflash: Sluts are redundent. The worst part about these books is that they glamorize violence, infidelity, gang activity, drugs - all the poop that is ruining urban America.

But people are reading.

Trudeau: fraud, career con, author, millionaire.
One day at the desk, I answered a women's question about a certain Kevin Trudeau. The book was some diet book and I thought nothing of it. After the transaction was done, my colleague sighed and said something to the effect of "God, I wish we could hand out disclaimers when people ask for that book." I didn't understand what she meant. She told me that he was a con artist and fraud and showed me an old Washington Post article.

Today, I went digging a little bit and here's what I found about this pile and the stupid book everyone wants to check out called Natural Cures "They" Don't Want You to Know About. The excerpts are from a USA Today story (Aug. 8, 2005) called "Here's what 'They' do want you to know: It's baloney" by writer Liz Szabo.

• "The sun does not cause cancer. Sunblock has been shown to cause cancer."
  That's wrong, says Darrell Rigel, past president of the American Academy of Dermatology and a dermatology professor at New York University. The evidence that ultraviolet radiation from the sun increases the risk of skin cancer is overwhelming, he says.
• "Take digestive enzymes."
  These enzymes are very caustic and could burn the esophagus, Johnson says. They're typically prescribed only for patients with pancreatic problems.
• "Get 15 colonics in 30 days."
  There is no medical reason to have even one of these procedures, which typically involve purging the bowels with enemas, let alone 15 in one month, Johnson says. All that purging could lead to dehydration or electrolyte imbalances, which can disturb heart rhythms, he says.
• "Antiperspirants and deodorants contain deadly poisons" and are "one of the major causes of breast cancer."
  Not true, according to the National Cancer Institute and the Food and Drug Administration. Neither has found any link between antiperspirants, deodorants and breast cancer. The institute has singled out this notion in an online fact sheet of "cancer myths."
• "Take coral calcium."
  The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, part of the National Institutes of Health, has issued a consumer advisory warning that there is no evidence that the product treats cancer, multiple sclerosis, lupus, heart disease or high blood pressure. In the online fact sheet about cancer myths, the National Cancer Institute notes that "marketers have made false claims" about the value of these supplements.
• "Take liquid colloidal minerals daily. You are deficient in minerals."
  Colloidal silver products are made of tiny silver particles suspended in liquid, according to a consumer advisory issued by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. The advisory warns that the FDA doesn't consider these supplements safe or effective. The advisory says colloidal silver can cause serious and irreversible side effects, including argyria, a bluish-gray discoloration of the body for which there is no treatment, and seizures and kidney damage.
• In the book, Trudeau also advises readers to beware of psychiatry, psychology, microwave ovens and electric tumble dryers. He promotes the health benefits of wearing white, sleeping on magnetic mattress pads and products that "neutralize electromagnetic chaos" caused by satellites, cellphones and remote controls. Stephen Barrett, a retired psychiatrist from Allentown, Pa., who operates Quackwatch.org, has one word to describe that advice: "Rubbish."

But people are reading.

Although they both suck, here's the difference:
While I don't like the writing style or the message those urban fiction books portray, they are still fiction. Trudeau is banking on millions of people that don't know any better. He's pretending to be some health guru when actually, he's a lying con. I personally feel that his books have the capability to put people's lives in danger if they follow his (unprofessional) advice.

Please take your baggage and problems to the group study area.

I was looking for a small little tidbit to post here and it just came to me at work. A man came to the desk and asked for a phone book. No surprise there. Then he sits down in front of me. No problem, that's what the dang chairs are for. As he's browsing through the phone book, he gets a call from someone he obviously didn't like. He told the women (she was loud) that she should never call his phone. When asked why, he said: "You a bum," and hung up. Nice!

Anyway, here's where the privacy issue comes in. He asked me for the phone book and required no other assistance from me. I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but he was sitting right in front of me, like 3 feet away. A grave situation surfaced. He had locked his child in his car - in our parking lot! He was very calm while talking to whoever he contacted. I wondered to myself: Should I report this to the Librarian in Charge? Should I have told the man that the Southfield Police are like 100 feet away? Maybe the cops were the last people he wanted to deal with. I'm not sure.

When a patron lets it rip in front of me, I rarely shoo them away. I have two switches: "Completely focused on patron" and "Completely ignoring patron" (one of the things I need to work on is a middle ground.) I should more often, because I don't need to deal with their baggage. But when you hear someone has locked their kid in the car, what the heck are you supposed to do?? And this guy's on the 3rd floor while the kid's stuck?!? Argh - what to do?!

In other news, a patron tried to start talking God to me and I cut that off right away. "I don't think I need to be discussing God right now." Besides, it was a REALLY stupid attempt at explaining God.