Noon – 3:00
- Books by Canadian authors. Look for ones with a maple leaf on the spine. Second time I’ve been asked for that this week, must be a school or college project.
- Happily, the on-call Ref Assistant arrives. I can eat lunch, don’t have to answer everything alone, and have someone to talk to. Also, I can work on finding pictures for a Hallowe’en flannel story online.
- After viewing our Hallowe’en display, an adorable little guy wanders around saying “Boo!”
- A man calls up and wants me to look for his wife and son. We don’t have an intercom for paging and I only see a mom and girl in the children’s department, sorry.
- I answer the phone but have to put the caller on hold. When I ask if she can hold, she sounds like our Circ Chief, so I wonder if she’s paging me and ask “Oh, is it you?” Nope, it’s not. Whoops, sorry, ma’am. That was embarrassing.
- A girl asks for Witch Child by Celia Rees (an excellent YA novel, by the way), but I have to place a hold, since we don’t have it. Remind myself to order a copy for us.
- The lady on hold wants to know about computer training at the library.
- Mother of world’s most demanding boy asks for Buy and Sell
- World’s most demanding boy asks to sign up for Children’s Internet and can barely contain himself while I write his name down. I think the child needs Ritalin.
- Circ Person comes over and asks who a pair of little shoes in the children’s department belong to. Turns out the man looking for his wife and kid called the circ desk since I wouldn’t go on a manhunt for them. It really pisses me off when people do that. No means no, don’t keep calling different people until you get the answer you want.
- Turns out the woman and son were indeed here and the shoes belonged to him, I guess they were over in the adult section. Because I’m such an incredibly nice person, I let her use the phone to call him to find out he's not coming to pick them up.
- Phone question: the novel The White Noise. No record of it in our system. After hanging up I check Amazon, turns out it’s from 1986, so that explains it.
- The Saturday guard comes down to tell me that a homeless woman who was banned from our branch and the main one a few months ago for being completely insane and threatening staff is here. I’m not sure if she’s still banned (most of our bannings have time limits) so we decide to let her stay for now. I later check the problem report folder and it turns out she was banned until July 2, so I guess she’s okay, at least until she goes ballistic again. Maybe she’s turned over a new leaf after 2 winters of causing us problems. She was also famous for picking the leaves off our plants and constant sleeping.
- Books on building log cabins. I have a feeling he means models, but I ask if he wants real log cabins and he says yes. As I show him, he’s muttering about making them and selling them for lots of money. Okay…
- A man with limited English asks for books for “teaching children about cheese.” I take him to the only jr nonfiction cheese book and he then says it’s not actual cheese, it’s for the game cheese. I have no idea what he’s talking about until he walks away and then I wonder if he means chess. He does. And we even have 2 jr chess books in, hooray!
- Edmonton phone book
- A man places holds on Teeth of the Tiger by Tom Clancy and Steel Rails and Iron Men by Barrie Sanford.
- Visitor from Alaska wants to use the Net. Still need to sign up for a time slot and we’ll log you in when it’s your turn. Yes, "log you in" - you need to use a library card to get on.
- Parent asks for the children's librarian. I say I'm it and she asks about our preschool Hallowe’en storytime.
- A child who is too old for the program gets sent over from Circ to get a brochure, but I’m helping someone else and that last parent took the last brochure.
- Alaska guy is getting rather pushy and wants to use it now that someone’s left early. He’s rather messed up the sign-up system, but I’ll fix it when he leaves. I’m rather tempted to let him know I don’t actually have to give him access, but he’s not that bad.
- A British lady comes tells me her daughter says she just has to read the Outlander series. I tell her it’s on my to-read list, too, and place a hold on the first one for her.
- An odd woman who’d been hysterical over losing $35 yesterday comes up and tells me she found it. It was so cold, she’d put on 2 pairs of pants and stuck it in the pocket of the pair underneath. That’s good. I was a bit worried about her - she’d said it was all she had and I believe her.
- Newspapers are over there.
- Information about the "traditions and customs of Taiwanese people" and also either the Inuit or the Metis. One book about the Inuit left. Our branch doesn’t own any books about Taiwan and the couple in the system are out, but they’re pretty happy with the encyclopedias and the Internet search I did for them.
- Yes, surprisingly, the book you put on hold last night online is here already and will be on the holds shelf under your last name.
- An insanely large flying bug buzzes around, alarming me. Why isn’t it dead? It’s darn cold outside.
- GatorGuy’s brother stops by for a chat before using the Net.
- Books by Christopher Pike. Only 2 in the catalogue, the rest are with the YA paperbacks.
Stay tuned for Part III....