There…

…. moving is (almost) complete.  After I get a handful of boxes removed from my old place, along with a little bit of cleaning and my move-out inspection, I’ll be done!  And at my new place, I’ve only got a few boxes in my office left to unpack.

Expect me to be quiet for the next few days — but I’m setting aside time to catch up on my Google Reader and my blog, so I should have some (good) stuff posted by the end of the week!

Thanks for bearing with me — and special thanks to my family and my friends Chris R and Tina for helping me move!

Eight Random Things

Michael tagged me with that crazy “eight random things about yourself” meme a couple weeks ago, so here’s my response:

1. I have a weird preference for seeing numbers spelled out rather than written as numerals. I think it’s because some numbers-as-words look nothing like their numeral counterparts and (for that matter) nothing like other words. “Twelve” is an excellent example of this phenomenon.

2. I actually enjoy diagramming sentences. (I took a grammar class as part of my undergrad, and the extensive attention we paid to diagramming took my Catholic school education to a whole new level.) For more on this subject, check out the book Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog.

3. Doctor Cox on Scrubs (played by John C. McGinley) is my personal hero. A friend actually gave me an autographed picture of Mr. McGinley, and it’s one of the best gifts anyone has ever given me.

4. I have a peripheral interest in urban design. Before I accepted my current job in Library Land, I seriously considered going to graduate school at Georgia State to pursue this further.

5. I’ve always dreamed of being in a rock band. Our name would be “The Diversion.” We would transcend amesome.

6. My favorite novel is William Faulkner’s “Light in August.” Something about it just hooks me every time I pick it up. I like the rest of Faulkner’s body of work as well, if only because his language (the diction, the cadence) are bizarre and beautiful and because I feel that Faulkner really struggles with his racism as a writer and a Southerner.

7. I love the trilogy of “Ocean” movies. (Yes, even twelve — and there’s that number again.) I’m still working on convincing Tina that if we ever have twin boys, their names will be “Rusty” and “Danny.”

8. I’m a diet coke fiend. It used to keep me alive during all-nighters in college.

And with that, I tag Maria, China, Mary, Nick, and Kathleen.

Go.

On (Occam’s) Razor-Edge

Being both Roman Catholic and a medievalist at heart, I’ll jump on any opportunity to reference the positive legacies of Roman Catholicism.  (And yes, I know the Crusades and the Inquisition sucked — I very intentionally used the word “positive.”)

Anyway, check out “Occam visits the Library,” an excellent piece about how small, simple changes can make a big difference for yourself, your staff, coworkers, and your customers.

Amen, Occam! (And Emily, too!)

Libraries without fear

I find it eerie that these two posts on sort-of-related topics from not-exactly-related blogs appear within a day of each other.  Coincidences aside, I consider both of them required reading for front-line library staff.

The first one is from Michael Casey, “Practitioners of Panic and the Culture of Fear.”  I recommend reading the whole thing for context, but here’s a particularly good paragraph:

When libraries face growing numbers of teens, increased computer usage, and nontraditional usage of their space, we should not respond with the draconian crack-down often called for by those practitioners of panic, those dealers of dread. Closing our doors, locking down our computers, and reserving our spaces only for “true users” of libraries will do nothing but seal our fate in the coming years and doom us to ultimate failure.

The second post is from Service Untitled, “Work for the 99%, not the 1%“:

A lot of companies treat their 99% like criminals because of the 1%. You have probably been a store where you have to a dressing room unlocked or get a number saying how many items you brought in. This is because the 1%, or even the 5% steals from the store and they have ”had to” implement this policy.

The post ends with this particularly awesome rule:

… don’t treat your customers like criminals. Work for the 99% that mean well, not the 1% that don’t.

It really is easy in Library Land to be (unncessarily) suspicious of our customers, especially since the vast majority of our services (with the exception of copying, maybe) are free. 

But public libraries shouldn’t be places of fear – if nothing else, they should be celebrations of a community that is free and open and accessible to everyone.

There are, of course, bad elements worth noting (including but not limited to, say, sexual predation).  But these bad elements can be found lurking anywhere — and that reality perhaps justifies awareness and caution, but it doesn’t justify fear or paranoia.

With that said, here’s to our libraries and the 99% of our customers who mean well and who genuinely appreciate what we provide.

That wasn’t so long…

…  was it?

So some of the proverbial dust is settling.  The major task right now involves moving in less than three weeks to an apartment just a couple miles from where I work.  I’ll be posting here in the meantime, but it will be sporadic at best.

Hopefully my absence hasn’t alienated my handful of regular readers. To anyone who has been waiting for the hiatus to end, thanks.