Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Well, well, well



I arrived to work this past Sunday morning to find two more book trucks filled with dirty old tired books. The reason for my new blessing was tucked away in the office e-mail. Our floor manager forwarded the minutes from last week's manager's meeting.

Our dear old floor manager told a big one. He announced in the May 21st meeting that our floor had finished processing all of the books in storage. You see, the dear old man is retiring next month and he doesn't anyone to talk about the shape he left this department in. Needless to say, it means that he is pushing work on us without warning.

When I saw the additional trucks, I said, "They could have just thrown these books out!" Spines were gone, broken, and torn badly, beyond repair. The pages were all shades of gray, some even boderline black(you know what that means.)

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

This is what I get for leaving work early yesterday!


This is what was in front of my cubicle when I arrived to work today. I am supposed to go through each and every one of these and determine if we should keep it or toss it. I feel like chucking the whole cart. They are VERY DUSTY and some look as if they will fall apart as soon as I touch them.



Saturday, May 17, 2008

My Wednesday at work ended on a negative note

Nine out of ten times, I usually upset a patron when they ask for something and I refuse to do it.

Well, we have temporary passes for use of the computer. They are only given out if something goes terribly wrong with the computer. If the computer has stopped working properly because of patron error, they aren't automatically given a pass, so that they can have additional time on the computer(This seems to be only a rule on my floor, according to the patrons.)

So this old Becky asked for my assistance with her computer. She said that it was acting up. I saw that she had done something to the computer, but I couldn't figure out what, so I just rebooted it. As I was rebooting the computer, she asked, "Can I have one of those numbers?"
I said, "No."

She thought that I didn't understand her, because her next statement was this. "I mean one of those temporary passes." I said, " I know what you meant and I am not going to give you one."

She then said, "WHY NOT? I HAVE BEEN NOTHING BUT NICE TO YOU!" I began to say, " It's not the policy........." She cut me off and yelled even louder, "SOMEONE IS GOING TO GIVE ME A PASS NOW!" I tried to explain that she still had 35 minutes left on her card and she didn't need a pass. She kept yelling, so I walked back to the reference desk. She promptly marched over to my co-worker(another old Becky.)

My coworker to her to just use another computer, once the one that she had been on had finished rebooting.

This woman waited until I left the desk, then asked my replacement how to go about filing a formal compliment.

If you hear loud voices, or any type of commotion, check the 3rd Floor first.

It is a running joke that our floor is the one where the most incidents occur. This happened about two weeks ago.

A half shim approached me at the reference desk( half because he had on all male clothes, pumps, and his long blonde wig was twisted.) You could tell that this was a man who had just thrown on a wig. You could see his bad attempt at streaks. His natural hair looked as if instead of blonde streaks, he got blonde dots. He had shaved his head a bit, but the spots were still obvious and the wig just wasn't covering it.

Now he complained that he was being harassed while sitting in the Gay/Lesbian Center. My boss was at the desk with me, and we thought it may have been a regular who doesn't like anyone to be in the center while he is in there.

My boss went into the center and spoke with the man who was in there. He asked him to leave because it had been reported that he was harassing another patron.

Two minutes later, a man comes walking past the reference desk. As he is walking by, he is yelling, "I F**KS WIT B*TCHES, I DON'T FU**S WIT MEN! YOU BETTA GET THAT STRAIGHT, I FU**S WIT B*TCHES, NOT MEN!"

I turned to my boss and said, "Oh, I guess that's why he was hanging out in the Gay/Lesbian Center and harassing a shim!"

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

What happens when security doesn't do what they are called to do?

Last week, I just happened to be in the staff area behind the reference desk. A female patron was cursing at a male librarian and calling him everthing but his birth name.

Following proceedure, the librarian called security so that the patron could be escorted from the building.

Security arrived, dude determined that the patron was cute, and said, "Oh, okay, I'll help you."

That was the second incident in two weeks, where the security guard decided the patron was cute, so she was allowed a free pass from acting out.

Sunday, May 04, 2008

My new quest

Last week, I thought it was a fluke. It happened again today. Now, I am on a mission to find this patron and get them banned from the library.



There is a bank of 5 computers in the back corner of our floor( I am told that a section like this exist on the 5th floor also.) It is a section were the perverts usually hang. A patron approached me Thursday afternoon. She couldn't log onto the computer. I went over there and discovered that the patron who used the computer prior, had disconnected all of the wires. This was annoying more than anything. I reconnected the wires, turned the computer on, and walked away.



Fast forward to today. A patron complained that she couldn't log onto the computer. This time, it looked as if everything was intact, but there was no connection to the server. I submitted a req. form and called a technician. The technician discovered that the ethernet cable had been disconnected and then tangled into the other cables. The technician was frustrated because he first had to untangle the cables, then reconnect them.



The technician advised me to locate the patron and explain the seriousness of the crime. He also said to explain that the patron would be banned if the behavior continued. I told the technician that I was one step ahead of him and had already set the wheels in motion to catch our thoughtful patron.