Do I know you?

A teen girl walked up to the desk. "Where's my sister?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know?"
"That's right."
"But she was just here!"
The little lightbulb went off (one of the bulbs they used in those horrid Itty Bitty Book Lights, by the way, only not as powerful). I had helped a girl log into a computer to type a paper just a little while before. "Check the Children's Room," I said authoritatively, gesturing to the Children's Room mere feet away.
"Where?"
"The Children's Room," I said patiently, resisting the temptation to add, "You know, the room 15 feet thataway. The one that has one and a half foot high letters over the entrance that say "Children's Room." But I didn't. She'll be back for printing help, mark my words.

The late lamented Dewey Decimal System

Our library catalog is maybe not the easiest one to master. So I look up a lot of books and movies for people, which is fine. (Except for the Djooguysguts and other miscreants.) And some people just don't like computers and don't want to learn, which if fine, too, unless they want to complain about how stupid computers are, which, even if true, is like getting mad at self-check at grocery stores. Some people even talk about missing the old card catalog, which I miss, too, and can be roped easily into a conversation about the good old days. But I got a different spin on that today when a patron asked for help finding the Jewelry Making section.
"I wish you guys still used the card catalog and the Dewey Decimal system," she opined. We were standing in the 700's by then.
"Um...we still use the Dewey Decimal system."
"No you don't."
I gave her a weak smile and asked if she needed anything else. I was dismissed.

It's Official: I look really stupid to teenage boys

I began suspecting this since I began shaving, back in the early 17th Century. Anyway, two teenage boys whom I had earlier chided for horseplay (or perhaps it was hijinx, I forget) came to the desk with an elaborate story of how I really needed to page their friend over the intercom. It involved confusion and danger, though the specifics are already fading in my mind. I reminded them that the library was relatively small and on only one floor, but they persisted. For some reason, most likely to get them away from me, I relented. I picked up the phone and asked what their friend's name was.
"Jack Meehoff," the sincere-looking lad before me said.
To be fair, it took me at least a twentieth of a second.
"Do I look that stupid?" I asked. I was honestly offended. Not that they'd tried to prank me, but because it was such a pathetic and transparent attempt. I wished I'd been a little faster on the draw. I would have said, "You know, I think I saw him with your friend Heywood Jablome."
Oh well. Next time.

At least once a day

We have a print release station for the public InterWeb computers. If you want to print, you go to the little computer at the printer, log in and print your jobs. It's not entirely transparent, so people often need some help. No problem there, but there is this big button on the screen that says in big letters "Print Your Job."

When I point this out to people and tell them to click on the button that says "Print Your Job." When I say this I point to the mouse, which is right next to the keyboard which is below the screen that has the button on it.

About ten times a day, the person I say this to will jab the (delicate, expensive, new) screen with their finger, since we are all used to touch screens now. "Uh...you need to click on the button. With the mouse," I say. Most of the time this is sufficient to get them to try the Old Skool Mouse Thang. But at least once a day, I get a rejab of the screen. At least once I have gotten a rerejab.

Whoopsie

This will come as a surprise to longtime readers (all two of you), but our public InterWeb computers have been acting kind of hinky lately, so for many hours a day for the last week or so, the boys from IT have been spending a lot of time at them. Tweaking, installing, deinstalling, praying, the usual what-have-you. There are two of them. We'll call them Sam and Dave to protect their identities. Sam is the boss. Dave the young guy. They are both very nice and diligent. While Dave was at one of the computers, I used the software that controls reservations and printing to pop up a little window on his screen that said something like "No porn, sir, this is a library" or something like that. Good clean, harmless fun and Sam, who was standing next to me, got a chuckle. It was funny in the way professors' jokes in college are funny, which is to say not really. But you aren't in class for the humor, so when anything remotely amusing comes your way it's funnier than it would be outside the classroom.
Later on, Dave came up and asked me to send a message that said "Stop Cussing" to Computer 12. No problem I thought and quickly sent a message that said something like, "Quit cussing for F#¢k's sake." Or something equally classy. Without the nice swear-hiding characters I just used. I looked up at Dave who had a kinda funny look on his face. Not understanding, I looked over at Sam at Computer 12. Only it wasn't Sam. It was the crazy mom of a feral child that I do not like. She is loud and disruptive and I have kicked her out of the library several times. She looked a bit freaked out and quickly left.
I shrugged. Dave shrugged. It turns out that he just didn't like the fact that she was using bad language. We both got back to work.

Etiquette: an udpate

If you are scolding your child over your left shoulder and decide that you must move quickly off to your right and you bang into a DeskSlave who happens to happen by, be sure to give him a dirty, "if-looks-could-kill" sort of look. Thank you.

Sometimes the magic works, and sometimes it doesn't

We have these spiffy "atomic" clocks here at DeskSlave Central. The clocks aren't really atomic, actually, no plutonium to worry about, but they do have some sort of fancy satellite uplinks that connect them to the atomic clock in Colorado.* Or so they say. I really have no way of checking. It could just be some old cheapie quartz clock like I have in the kitchen of stately DeskSlave Manor, repackaged with an impressive-looking atomic logo and a hefty upcharge. In any event, some of the clocks here have adjusted themselves to Daylight Savings Time, but some have not. It has been more than 24 hours since the putative switch, yet the clock at the circulation desk is still unaware. I am told this several times a day by helpful patrons, so I just have to shrug and give them the "shortcomings of technology" spiel.


* Question for you: why does the Navy had an observatory in landlocked Colorado?

Let me clarify

Patron asked for her husband's death certificate from another state. I said I could print a form she could send to get a copy of the certificate. She insisted I could print the actual death certificate from my computer and she additionally insisted that the librarian yesterday printed her son's death certificate (so why couldn't I?!).

So I went to the Ancestry database and found a listing for the record of his death in california's death index. I printed it out for her and she basically said, "Told ya so." Well, let ME tell YOU, lady! Printing out a page from the Ancestry Database that lists your husband's name, birthplace, and date of death is not the same as having an image of his actual death certificate. So there.

Speak softly and don't get any coffee

As we all know, deskslaves need caffeine. Lots of it. It helps us type important phrases like "Jackie Chan" and "Stephenie Meyer" quickly. I usually try to tank up before coming to work and then switch to the antioxidant-rich and much cheaper green tea. But yesterday, I needed a boost, so on my way in to DeskSlave Central I pulled into a Starbucks drive-through. (I know, starbucks=$tarbu¢k$=evil, but I was late)
"Hello, welcome to Starbucks! What can I get started for you?" came the voice of the cheery young man over the intercom.
As you may recall, this deskslave is a boring, middle-aged man. The coffee beverage of choice for my demographic is NOT a double tall mocha frappaccino with non-fat soy whip cream and a pineapple slice. It's just boring old coffee. Black coffee, in fact. Putting the drip back in drip if you will. You are what you drink, so make mine dark and bitter. I sometimes get funny looks like I could not possibly be ordering something with only one ingredient. But there you have it.
I try to cooperate with the sizing conventions at places like Starbucks. The sizes, in a rational world, would be small, medium and large. But of course we have the grande and the venti. I forget what small is. Probably like "diminuto" or maybe "miniscolo." So I piped back in an equally cheery voice, "Hi, I'd like a venti* coffee, please." Always polite, never demanding: we know what that is like. I think I may be the most polite person when I am on the other side of the counter.
Pause.
"I'm sorry, what did you say?"
I'm a little soft-spoken, it's true. Years of working in the hushed atmosphere of the library have turned my deep, booming baritone into a pathetic rasp. "Venti coffee, please."
Another pause.
"Could you say that again? Toffee? Do you mean Mocha?"
"No! Coffee!" I stretched out the second word so as not to leave any doubt. I was definitely overmodulating my voice, too.
"What??"
"Coffee! COFFFEE COFFEE COFFEE!! CHARLIE OSCAR FOXTROT FOXTROT ECHO ECHO! It's the second word on the Starbucks logo! The one that's not 'Starbucks!!'" OK, I admit it, I was raving. I was late and undercaffeinated. This guy was probably fucking with me.
"I'm sorry, sir, could you pull around...we can't understand you."
I just wanted to leave at this point. But that's not easy to do at a drive through; I was hemmed in. SUV in front of me, SUV behind me. For the very first time, I cursed my diminutive, gas-sipping Subaru. If I had an SUV, I could go over the curb and get back on the main road. Maybe even take out a few benches and a bus shelter on the way. Instead, I meekly advanced to the window. A young woman comes to the window and looks at me in much the same way as I would if a car had pulled up and there was a talking dog in the driver's seat. "What did you want again?"
"Umm...coffee? Venti coffee?" I was a little embarrassed. The mild mannered deskslave had briefly become a maniac.
"Oh." Over her shoulder to her coworker: "He said coffee. A venti."
The coworker with the headset sighed, and gave the ceiling a Lord-give-me-strength look. This was clearly my fault. I could have left then, I guess. Pulled away. But I almost had the darn coffee, and it had only cost me my pride and whatever a venti goes for. A non-deskslave made of sterner stuff might have demanded it for free. Instead I overtipped.




* The sign says Venti, so I say Venti. I have been corrected by staff who pronounce it like the Spanish word for the number twenty. Don't ask me why.

A day late

Actually, a week and a half late, young man. The Man has decreed that the deadline to register to vote is long gone. I'm sorry. No, really, I have nothing to do with it. I'm quite certain your reason for waiting so long to register is both true and compelling, but I have about as much control over the deadline as I do over the Tide Table.

My question: do the people at the Elections Office get complaints about fines?