Miss Information

Miss Information does not have that kind of time

2008-07-04T11:20:00.001-04:00

Miss Information had another phone call from the guy who likes to argue with her about library hours. Just for the record—the library hours are what they are and arguing with Miss Information isn’t going to change anything. The conversations always start about something else, collections, services, whatever. At some point Father Time declares his intention to come to the library, if only he knew when it was open. From there it all goes downhill.

Miss Information tells him the hours. He accuses her of lying. Fun. To be fair, he doesn’t come right out an use the l-word, he says things like “I’m not sure that’s accurate” and goes on to point out that Miss Information has neglected to mention that the library is not open on Christmas Day or some such insanity.

Today the man is upset because Miss Information has given him the library’s summer hours. Well, it’s summer, duh. But the man has a copy of the library’s March newsletter which lists entirely different hours. Obviously Miss Information is a filthy liar. Miss Information tries to explain that the winter newsletter lists the winter hours. This is why the library also produces a summer newsletter. Nice as it is, the winter newsletter is not scripture and should be lining someone’s birdcage right about now.

The man does not care for inaccuracy of this sort. Neither does Miss Information. However he thinks it is worth arguing about for 10 minutes; she doesn’t have that kind of time.

Here’s a partial list of reasons why the library hours might not be exactly as stated in the newsletter:

Blizzard
Bubonic Plague
Power failure
Poison gas leak
Public holiday
Apocalypse
Flood
Plague of locusts
Building collapse
Crime scene investigation
Fire
Hostage taking
Wombat infestation

Miss Information hopes that after she retires she can find a better hobby than arguing with library staff. Stamp collecting, perhaps.

Miss Information is annoyed by nostalgia

2008-06-28T16:57:00.001-04:00

Although Miss Information has a history degree, she doesn’t actually find the past all that interesting—unpleasant diseases, unreliable drinking water, no e-mail. Ick. But some people can’t seem to let go of the good old days.

Today Miss Information has had her fill of those people. The first guy wanted some kind of encyclopedia of nuts. He knew the author and title so it was a simple matter of checking the catalogue and letting him know that the book was not at this library. The man protested. He knew the library owned the book. He had taken the book out before—about 5 years ago.

Miss Information is sorry but 5 years is a long time in the life of library books. She offers to have the book brought in from another branch but the man says no. It turns out that he lives clear on the other side of town and came all this way to get the book. Miss Information mentions that the library has a telephone and unless he really enjoys a completely pointless scavenger hunt now and then, he should have phoned ahead.

Later that day the phone rings. A guy on the phone wants a book. He knows the library has it. Sadly, he knows very little about the book besides that. Title? Nope. Might have had the word “mechanics” in it though. Author? Uh-uh. Didn’t make a note of that. Anything that might help? Well, he took it out before, so he knows it’s in the library. Miss Information does a search using key words like “mechanics” and “analytical” which may or may not have been in the title. This results in nothing useful. Well maybe it was “classical” not “analytical”. Miss Information still can’t find the book he is looking for. When did he read it? Oh, about 5 years ago. Miss Information narrows the search down to the years between 1995-2005. Still nothing. The man thinks some more and lets her know that the book was probably published in the eighties. Oh, and it had a pink cover.

Miss Information tries to interest the man in other books, she checks the shelf and finds him a lovely book published in this century with a black cover. But no. He needs that pink book.

Miss Information suggests he check the library’s online catalogue which has pictures of book jackets and find his pink book that way. She urges the rest of the world to stop living in the past. 350,000 books published each year--time to move on people.

Miss Information is annoyed by opening day

2008-06-27T19:20:00.003-04:00

The end of school, as always, coincided with the start of Manhunt season. Manhunt, for those of you unfamiliar with the sport, is really just an amalgamation of tag and hide and seek. What makes Manhunt so exciting and popular is that the playing field is the library. How very innovative. And annoying.

There’s a new crop of rookies this season with talent to burn but there’s no substitute for experience. Miss Information is a wily veteran who always comes through in the clutch. This could be her year. She overheard a co-worker shouting at some kids to stop running. This is the Manhunt equivalent of dropping the puck or tapping gloves. Some sports play the national anthem but whatever.

Miss Information could have ignored the whole thing if one of the kids hadn’t slammed into her. He called out an apology as he ran at top speed through the stacks. He came to play. Miss Information went after him. It was gut check time. You could feel the electricity.

She cornered those running, yelling brats and explained library protocol. She was in the zone. She gave 110%. In a final dramatic gesture, she turned and stomped away…knocking herself senseless against one of the pillars holding up the building. It ain’t over till it’s over but yeah…it was over. Miss Information lost her focus. She choked. It was a hard fought contest but the other team just wanted it more. You could feel the momentum swing.

Miss Information has to put this loss behind her. She’s gonna to take it one game at a time. She’s got to regroup, make some adjustments, rethink her defensive strategy, step it up and take it to the next level. Unfortunately there's a lot of games left in the season.

Miss Information is having like the most annoying day ever

2008-06-18T13:02:00.004-04:00

Unfortunately it's not over yet.

Miss Information has not been sleeping well lately but the day started out ok with lots of kitty cuddling. And then so very quickly the good times were over.

Her first realization that the day was not going to be a happy one was when she realized her car keys were missing. Her mom, Mrs Information had borrowed her car. She returned the car, but not the car keys. Miss Information easily tracked down her mom and the keys, but this involved a longer walk than was recommended in those shoes. Also, it meant she was about an hour late for work.

Miss Information spent the morning putting bandaids on her blisters and trying to get ahead of the piles of work which had grown a ridiculous amount in the lost hour.

At some point Miss Information heard the sound of an unmuted computer. She gave the guy a minute to correct the problem, when that didn't happen she went over to help.

The guy for some reason took it all quite personally. Miss Information tried very hard to be polite, she was sorry for disturbing him but he needed to mute that computer. Maybe the headphones were plugged into the wrong jack. Let's work together to fix the situation!

Unmuted Guy did not wish to be friends. He became quite hostile. Miss Information apologized for upsetting him. Really, she didn't want to upset him. Nevertheless he was upset and became abusive. Miss Information was having a crappy day and this made her cranky. Actually, come to think of it though, and although it was sort of unprofessional, she is NOT sorry she told him to go fuck himself. He started it.

One of the other patrons/bystanders told her she did the right thing. So there.

Then Unmuted Guy went outside and screamed on the front steps for awhile. Seems volume control is an ongoing issue with him. Security was notified. Miss Information was waiting patiently for this to play out when the phone rang.

She answered it. What could go wrong? The person on the phone was polite but argumentative. He didn't care for her answers to any of his thousand questions. They chitchatted briefly about a government website but he wouldn't get specific about what he wanted to know. He needed information about services. What kind of services? All the services for seniors. Ok. Miss Information started to describe the services for seniors. The man took exception to that. It was too restrictive. Some services might be of interest to young people and seniors, like fall prevention.

Sure. Whatever. Miss Information informed Polite But Argumentative that it might be best for him to come in and see the website for himself. Oh that sounded dandy to the guy. When was the library open?

Miss Information knows this answer. She told him. The man replied that he didn't believe her. He accused her of intentionally misleading him by not telling him about public holidays. Ok. Miss Information clarified. The library is open these hours, unless it happens to be a public holiday in which case the library is closed. The beer store is also closed on public holidays. Miss Information is happy it is not a public holiday today. She might be requiring a trip to the beer store soon.

He became obsessed with the hours of the library, insisting that Miss Information tell him all the days the library would be open...for eternity. He probably has a busy schedule. Miss Information patched the caller through to a supervisor after the man decided he needed to know all about the library's contract with its building contractor.

It's really a miracle she doesn't tell more patrons to go fuck themselves.

Miss Information directs your attention to the spectacle of annoyance in the centre ring

2008-06-14T14:33:00.002-04:00

The woman on the phone is chewing gum. This is annoying and Miss Information hates her already. Actually she has dealt with this Gum Chewing Lady before. She watches a lot of television and then calls the library to order books which may or may not exist. Sadly, she never ever pays enough attention to be able to pass on helpful details. Hey, Gum Chewing Lady! For the love of all that is good and holy, get yourself a pen and a notebook! Keep them by your TV! This isn't cute anymore!

Last night GCL was watching A+E. A book was mentioned. She wanted the book. It was about Sigmund and Freud. You know…the circus performers?

Hysterically, even after Miss Information clarified that the names were Siegfried and Roy, the customer continued to insist on pronouncing it Sigmund and Freud.

Little known fact about Sigmund Freud-- raised by a family of circus freaks, he was forced to abandon his first choice career as a fire eater when he accidentally ignited his tweed jacket. It was a blazer. He trained on the flying trapeze but he just didn’t have the legs for those formfitting leotards. He briefly attempted sword swallowing but quickly realized it was too Freudian.

Crushed by his failure, he ran away to join academia.

Miss Information is annoyed about being back

2008-06-11T13:03:00.002-04:00

Miss Information has returned from vacation with perspective. This is never good. She finds herself wondering anew why staff members don’t just withdraw the mouldy and water damaged books as soon as they see them. One circulation staff member dutifully notes the damage along with her initials and the date. This process probably takes longer than the discard procedure. As if the library mice are gonna come out at night and repair damaged books. Miss Information knows the library mice and they’re all lazy bastards. Fix the books? They don’t even do their own dishes or fill up the water cooler.

Often this notation is followed by a second one, sometimes dated years after the first citing circulation figures with a desperate librarian scrawl—“only copy in region, keep as is!” Miss Information believes with all her heart that it is the responsibility of the library to provide its patrons with books that don’t make them say “ick” and run away cringing to wash their hands but maybe library school will show her the error of her ways.

The stupidest conversation Miss Information had today went like this:
Guy using library catalogue terminal: I can’t get the Internet on this computer.
Miss Information: That computer doesn’t have access to the Internet. You need to use one that has a sign that says “Internet”.
Guy (huffily): Well, why don’t you put signs on every computer that tell you what each computer does?
Miss Information: Great idea! Oh, except that would duplicate the beautiful, clearly worded signs we already have on every computer telling you what they do.

If they put a sign on Miss Information it would say “tries to get stuff done while answering stupid questions”.

Miss Information is annoyed by a scheduling conflict

2008-05-22T17:07:00.002-04:00

Miss Information received an e-mail suggesting that next week would be a really good time for her to conduct a training session on the library's new electronic calendar program. It's just too bad that Miss Information is on vacation next week.

It is also unfortunate that Miss Information doesn't know anything about the new electronic calendar program.

It would have been a pretty memorable training though.

Miss Information is annoyed by TV guy

2008-05-16T20:28:00.001-04:00

Miss Information is unlucky enough to work in one of the few libraries that are open Friday nights. Because of this all the nutjobs from all over the city who can’t spend an hour without librarian attention call poor beleaguered Miss Information and share their weirdness with her.

Case in point: TV guy.
He wants to know about today’s episode of Family Ties. A few frustrating moments later it transpires that he really wants to know the name of the actor who played Mr Keaton’s father. Turns out that it was John Randolph. Miss Information always liked him. Saw him on Broadway once, in fact. TV guy wants to know if he’s still acting. Miss Information guesses he’s gone to the old theatre in the sky but decides to humour the nice taxpayer.

A quick Wikipedia moment later she is able to report the sad news that John Randolph is no longer with us having died in 2005 at the ripe old age of 88.

“Well, what’d he die of?” TV guy wants to know.
“Um…he was 88,” Miss Information replies.
“But what’d he die of?” TV guy repeats.
Miss Information checks the Wikipedia entry. According to them it was “natural causes”—also known as "he was 88".
“Natural causes? What’s that mean?” TV guy wants to know.
Miss Information again suggests that 88 is pretty old and maybe they didn’t really look into the death. Maybe it was his heart, maybe his lungs, maybe he was 88, for god’s sake.

TV guy is not happy but decides to move on to his next stupid question. He wants Miss Information to find out whether any TV shows are having cast reunion movies in the near future.

Miss Information tries to beg off but he refuses to believe this is impossible. It’s in the computer he insists. Other libraries could find it. Just once Miss Information is going to respond to this statement by suggesting the customer call one of those other libraries. If those other libraries are so great why doesn’t he just marry them then?

Well, she attempts a Google search which gets her nowhere. TV guy is not going to go down quietly. He insists she look up Full House because there’s bound to be a Full House reunion in the works. Right. Sure there is. Not on this planet, however. By the way, Miss Information knows one of those Olsen twins is too thin but she’s studied pictures and still can’t figure out which one it is. Aren’t they both kind of on the stick figure side of reality?

Not satisfied, he asks about Webster. Like anyone would want to see a Webster reunion who wasn’t in the original cast. No luck there either.

The phone call ends with far too many questions about the Brady Bunch. Is the show on DVD? Where can he buy the DVDs? How much do they cost? No, not on Amazon. He wants to go to a store. Which stores have them? What about their CDs? (Like Miss Information needed any more proof he was insane…) No, he’s not interested on what’s available on Amazon. Which stores have them? Miss Information suggests HMV might be able to do a special order for them. He asks for the phone number of an HMV that is in a mall that is so far on the other side of town that it’s practically on another planet. Damn tourists.

Later TV guy phones back. He wants to know where he can buy a film projector. Miss Information looks it up in the yellow pages, suggests he do the same. He wants to know if libraries still have films and film projectors. She breaks the news that her branch dismantled its film department in the mid 1990s.
“Well, what’d ya do with the films and projectors and stuff?” TV guy asks.

Miss Information replies that she doesn’t know. Can’t she find out? TV guy wants to know.

After another 10 minutes of nonsense, Miss Information, who is alone at the desk tells TV guy that there’s a line up of people and she has to go help them for a while. TV guy suggests that those people can wait. Miss Information gets all defensive on behalf of these poor waiting people (who don’t actually exist) and insists that she can’t possibly spend any more of her life with TV guy.

Miss Information is creeped out by people with weird obsessions.

Miss Information is looking forward to being annoyed by library school

2008-05-07T11:01:00.002-04:00

Miss Information was sort of prepared for the break up--dividing of the CDs, the argument over the custody of the cat. Unexpectedly though, library school wants to give the relationship a chance. That’s good because Miss Information thinks she might need the salary increase to pay for psychiatric treatment.

The extra money would be a great comfort on days like today when the library network goes down. This is what typically happens—the pixies and the basilisk use the Internet as a football and break it. This is why we can’t have nice things. It’s sad but well, what can you do?

Here’s what you do if you’re one of the library customers. You sit down at a computer. Miss Information or one of her colleagues informs you that the Internet is broken. There is no Internet. You appear to understand. You move to another computer. Miss Information or one of her colleagues informs you that the Internet is broken. There is no Internet. You move to computer number 3. Surely there must be Internet on computer number 3. Miss Information goes for her pepper spray. It will give you something to think about while the Internet is in the shop.

Or maybe they just want to mess with her head

2008-05-02T13:46:00.002-04:00

Ok. So while Miss Information appreciates all the congratulatory messages, it turns out that library school may have just been jerking her around.

While the original e-mail offering her a place at the school, the official snail mail acceptance stipulates that certain conditions must be met. Sadly, Miss Information has not quite met one of these conditions.

She's e-mailed the original source to find out what the hell's going on.

Although this experience does sort of explain why all librarians are at least slightly eccentric and at most raving lunatics.

And now the real torture begins...

2008-05-01T12:55:00.001-04:00

Library school has finally called. It has grudgingly decided give this relationship a chance although it is stubbornly refusing to attend the couples counselling Miss Information has suggested. She’s sort of bitter because she practically had to become a stalker to get its attention. It was probably shopping around for someone who wouldn’t giggle whenever it mentioned “interacting with information systems”—she can’t help it, it just sounds dirty. Fortunately all the other applications were busy washing their hair, or were dating other faculties or didn’t like them in that way, so Miss Information is now a future librarian.

Miss Information has a new idea

2008-04-24T17:13:00.002-04:00

There was one bright spot in a seemingly endless day at the reference desk. At about 2:30 a man handed Miss Information a list of books his son wanted. At the top of the list was a book called 7 Habits of Highly Effected People.

Since snickering while trying to assist a tax payer is probably not recommended by any legitimate self-help author, Miss Information has decided to fill the gap.

Her book will be titled 7 Habits of Highly Affected People and will include sections on:
how to make broad sweeping gestures without injuring those around you
long cigarette holders, big sunglasses and other must have accessories
tips on adopting and maintaining your fake European accent

She's going to follow it up with 7 Habits of Highly Infected People. She plans to spend months researching the "staying in bed doing nothing" section.

Miss Information is freaked out by psychics

2008-04-16T13:27:00.000-04:00

Miss Information was sitting peacefully at the reference desk when she was disturbed by a commotion.

“Stop reading my mind!” the Internet guy shouted.

Miss Information was all set to apologize and promise to never read his mind again when she realized he had not directed his comment at her but was speaking to another computer user. Nevertheless she had a bad feeling about this so she alerted the woman in charge and the security guard who diffused the situation by reminding the paranoid guy to use his indoor voice when expressing his delusional thoughts.

Ironically Miss Information can’t get the incident out of her mind. See she wonders how Paranoid Guy knew that Other Guy was reading his mind…unless Paranoid Guy was reading Other Guy’s mind, too. And really if you read someone’s mind when they’re also reading your mind, do you just get a crazy reflection of your own mind? Is it like that painting of Stephen Colbert standing in front of the painting of Stephen Colbert standing in front of…? Can you break the loop without causing permanent damage to the participants?

Miss Information would love to ask. This is why she’s never going to be in charge.

Miss Information and the serial kisser

2008-04-10T17:36:00.002-04:00

Miss Information found a condom wrapper in the government documents section today.
She herself has always found the government documents deathly dull. In fact one of her favourite things about the Internet is that so much of the mind-numbing tedium is confined there. Like a traffic accident, Miss Information is free to look away and so she does. What other consenting adults do with the government documents is none of her business.

Back when Miss Information still had some integrity (she remembers it well…it was a Tuesday, around 10-ish—good times) she took an interest (professional interest) in the government documents collection, weeding, labelling, etc. On these occasions she noticed to her great shock that someone didn’t find the publications quite so boring and had, in fact, left lipstick prints on a large number of them. Oh legislation about fisheries…how wonderful you are…let’s never argue again, my darling…Um, yes, sorry...kissing the government documents is just plain weird.

Miss Information suspected the government documents librarian, but the lipstick wasn’t really his shade.

Miss Information considers a different career path

2008-04-03T13:06:00.002-04:00

Miss Information's yoga teacher had an exciting announcement. It seems that she has recently been appointed "Tampon Ambassador". The diplomatic corps has so many exciting opportunities.

If this library school thing doesn't work out...

Miss Information is still waiting, you bastards.

2008-03-25T17:44:00.002-04:00

Miss Information has not yet heard from the good people at library school. This has made her frustrated, cranky, emotional and bitter. It is just so much like dating. They seemed to like her. She thought they had a real connection but they’ve had her number for 2 months now. Why aren’t they calling?

Ok. So Miss Information wasn’t absolutely perfect for them; they’re not such hot stuff themselves. Maybe they shouldn’t be so damn picky, especially with all those happening new online library schools out there. Sometimes you have to settle. Miss Information would be a great library school student. She has an endless capacity for bullshit. She promises she would listen attentively to all their boring stories. She would fake an interest in their hobbies—the history of records management, for example. Miss Information could pretend to be fascinated by that for a semester. No one would ever know the truth.

Miss Information just knows it’s because the admissions committee met an application they liked better—a cuter application, an application with nicer legs. Dammit. Why didn’t Miss Information use Times New Roman instead of Ariel? What the hell was she thinking?

Lately Miss Information has been terrified that the committee is just stringing her along, waiting for her to get bored and run off with a different graduate school or die or something and they aren’t actually going to tell her she’s been rejected.

They are like the worst boyfriend ever.

Miss Information is annoyed with familiarity

2008-03-13T13:02:00.004-04:00

Miss Information is happy to report that the hair situation is improving. It must be. Last week a patron looked at her in horror, "Is that your hair?" she gasped in disbelief. Miss Information tried to look at it as a compliment...and failed.

This morning though two (2) different and unrelated women both said they liked her hair. No room for misinterpretation there.

Her hair may be closer to fabulous this week, but other problems have surfaced. A customer asked for a natural facelift book. "I need exercises to tighten up my face," she said. "See, I have these wrinkles...oh, look...you have the same ones. They're exactly like the wrinkles you have!"

As much as this was intended to be a friendly, womanly bonding experience, Miss Information was not going to play along. Seriously, insulting the nice library lady by pointing out her physical flaws is not going to get you the service you may want.

It does, however get you the service you deserve.

Miss Information meets Miss Direction

2008-03-07T16:28:00.014-05:00

Miss Information’s library is the mother branch in the region—when ever someone gets a booboo or the sniffles in another smaller branch, mom dispatches someone to help out. This is great because any really good ideas at those little sibling branches can be borrowed, adapted, sometimes even stolen for the home branch. And don’t go crying to Mom about it, ‘cause she likes us best!

Sometimes though it kind of backfires. Miss Information laughed out loud at a sign that just had to have been stolen from another location. It was sitting at one of the checkouts. “Check Out Closed. Go to Next Service Desk,” it said, including a helpful arrow. The arrow, alas, is pointing in completely the wrong direction. If the customers were to follow these instructions they would need to circumnavigate the globe in order to get to the right place. (Hopefully they’d find another library on the way.) They’d also have to gnaw their way through a cement wall. Miss Information pictures them jammed up against the wall like sheep who have grazed to the corner of the pen, pawing uselessly at the wall. “If it weren’t for this damn wall, I could get my books checked out,” they would whimper pitifully. Miss Information pictures the staff playing dumb. “The sign says you should go that way. Don't question the integrity of the sign! There must be a desk over there."

The beauty of this sign is that there is not only no way to orient it correctly, but there is no other desk where it could be used and be accurate.

Miss Information is suddenly happy that none of the customers ever read the library signs.

Miss Information is annoyed by pests

2008-03-04T16:47:00.002-05:00

Miss Information loves animals. She identifies herself as a cat person, but really anything furry is ok with her. Except raccoons. She hates those bastards. She also really thinks reptiles are cool and has a close personal relationship with the library fish, Dewey 11, so it isn’t just mammals.

Anyway, there’s a problem with annoying vermin in the library. Not the librarians. First there was the bird. A customer brought in a stunned sparrow. It had knocked itself senseless on a nearby window. Miss Information would have constructed a nice outdoor shelter for the little thing, because, well, birds should be outside. However the kind-hearted librarian in charge put the bird in a cardboard box and put that box into the librarians’ workroom, where it (the bird not the box) quickly regained its senses and began flying around, ending up in the rafters thanks to a missing ceiling tile. It was captured by two staff members who took it outside (door held by Miss Information). All of them congratulated themselves on a job well done and returned to the librarian’s workroom for the inevitable sharing of war stories only to find the bird was still flying around. Apparently the bird wasn’t so much captured as not captured, then. Eventually the bird really was captured and released, but not before someone left the workroom door open, allowing the bird to have a good, proper test of its flying around the library skills.

A couple of weeks after that there was a bat in the library. No one quite figured out where that came from but it was released (door held by Miss Information).

Then there was the dog. Not Miss Information’s shift but apparently a local dog wandered in while the door was propped open for the daily delivery. The reference desk staff briefly discussed what to do before deciding chasing dogs out of the library wasn’t in either of their job descriptions. The dog quickly realized he was in hell and left on his own accord.

Just before closing last Saturday, a bunch of teenage girls started screaming. Not so unusual. But the cause for the screaming was a teeny, tiny mouse. Miss Information tried but failed to catch the mouse. She planned to let it go outdoors where it would escape the library mouse poison.

Today she came into the staff room to find the furniture moved and a strange Dr Seussian sculpture where the couch used to be. It consisted of several vases stacked on top of each other. Miss Information thought it was someone getting creative but it was pointed out to her that the bottom vase contained a mouse. She offered to take the mouse outside. Apparently someone had decided that the best course of action was to call the pest control guy and show him the mouse, in the process slowly suffocating the poor bastard (the mouse not the pest control guy).

That this seemed like a good idea to anyone makes Miss Information worry about the people around her. Also the mice.

Miss Information is annoyed by lack of climate change

2008-02-20T17:06:00.002-05:00

Miss Information has been struggling with her usual winter melancholy. She may have mentioned that she hates the cold…also, snow, hats, ice, boots, runny nose, steamed up glasses…well, the entire stupid season, frankly. This year seems worse because in addition to all that weather stuff, the library is in yet another transition period compounded by shuffling staff and the introduction of a new computer system which has everyone suicidal. Miss Information is also waiting for the inevitable rejection of her graduate school application. Of course maybe this year she won’t be rejecte…no, no, no…Must. Crush. Optimism. Ahhh…all gone now. That was close. As John Cleese once pointed out it’s not the despair that will drive you insane, it’s the hope.

In spite of all these distractions, Miss Information is positive she could cope much better with life if she didn’t have conversations like this:

There is a customer standing in front of the microfilm reader. The microfilm reader is clearly labelled with a large “Out of Order” sign.

Woman: Can I use this?
Miss Information: Sorry, it’s not working.
Woman: When will it be fixed?
Miss Information: We don’t really know. Soon we hope.
Woman: So I can use it to read the old newspapers?
Miss Information: You could, except it isn’t working.
Woman: Oh. When will it be fixed?
Miss Information: We’re not sure. It needs parts.
Woman: But can I use it?
Miss Information: Not right now. It’s out of order.
Woman: So I can use it to make a copy?
Miss Information: Well it’s out of order right now, so no.
Woman: So, when will it be fixed?

At this point Miss Information does something very wrong and completely unethical. She whispers conspiratorially that she’s heard rumours that the machine will never, ever be fixed. It had to be done. If the conversation lasted another second Miss Information would have run screaming into the night—without her boots, hat and gloves.

Miss Information is annoyed by a winter storm

2008-02-03T22:22:00.000-05:00

Ok. So Friday it snowed. A lot. Miss Information was working the late shift and things were well and truly out of control when she got to work around noon. For one thing the library parking lot was never ploughed. The maintenance guys are obviously busy on days like this and although the library is one of the largest in this part of town, it was not made a priority. Miss Information understands. Most of the patrons live within walking distance. On the other hand, about 75% of staff drives. Many of them drive tiny-little-easily-stuck-in-the-snow-able cars. Miss Information has been considering trading in for one of them but she does so enjoy her ground clearance.

The library almost never closes for something as wimpy as a little snow, but amazingly the decision was made. Then the fun started. The parking lot was now impassable and those little tiny cars didn't stand a chance. Miss Information was one of the last to leave because she had helped lock up the building. She also loaded her ice scraper to a colleague. Not to be impolite, but GET YOURSELF A DAMN ICE SCRAPER! You know who you are.

So, in the end Miss Information, one of the muscley male librarians and two managers stayed behind to help dig out their remaining colleague. As they were shovelling, pushing, shovelling, pushing, a car turned into the parking lot. The more senior of the managers tried valiantly to stop the inevitable. The customer (who comes to the library during a blizzard?) was upset. What do you mean the library's closed? Her son had to work tonight at (name of big retail chain). A big retail chain which, by the way, SELLS ICE SCRAPERS. Someone who shall remain nameless might want to check that out.

The manager was extremely, and quite beyond the call of duty, patient and the patron reluctantly agreed to go away. Sadly, instead of reversing out of the parking lot, which would have worked, the customer, in a superb moment of stupidity came forward. Although now two cars were well and truly stuck, Miss Information really appreciated the poetic justice at work.

Unfortunately, the new car was now blocking the exit. The senior manager offered the excellent pushing and shovelling services of the library staff. The customer, however, insisted that she was fine, that her front wheel drive would save her. Ummm...no...she was wrong about that. She was completely stuck. After watching her struggle for awhile and over her vigorous objections, the staff just ignored her and started pushing. After getting her out, they returned to their colleague, who really needs to invest in a car with better traction that isn't quite so close to the ground. Also a damn ice scraper. They're cheap for god's sake.

Miss Information has fun with visualization

2008-02-03T22:13:00.000-05:00

Miss Information is not a football fan, but she listened to part of the Superbowl on the radio. She just wants to say that the sentence "there's a giant down on the field" creates a far more interesting mental image than "there's a Giant down on the field". She also enjoyed the references to the "giant medical team" and drove home happily picturing enormous nurses and really large stethoscopes.

Miss Information is annoyed by the technology challenged

2008-01-30T17:09:00.000-05:00

It is computer training day. The last Wednesday of each month, Miss Information’s colleague introduces people to the wonderful world of e-mail. Miss Information secretly refers to this workshop as “E-mail for People who Shouldn’t Use E-mail”. She used to be the instructor for this particular training session but it almost always made her curl up in a tiny ball and weep, so the guy in charge had someone else take over.

Here’s how it would go: a group of bright-eyed and bushy-tailed idiots…no, patrons…would drop in to benefit from Miss Information’s years of experience sending joke e-mails to her friends. The class would log on to some free e-mail provider, yahoo, hotmail, gmail, whatever. It didn’t matter, it was always a disaster. Some people just aren’t good at filling in forms. It often took the entire 2 hour class to get 10 people e-mail accounts and the 75% of the script dealing with actually using e-mail went unpresented.

Miss Information tried to feel good about getting everyone signed up but the end of the session was always really discouraging. The very last thing in every workshop was to make these clueless bastards…sorry, students…log back in to their brand new account. In spite of her pleading with them to write down their log in and password, in spite of her providing them with a little specially designed piece of paper to do so, in spite of the class only lasting 2 hours, the majority of the group would be unable to log in having forgotten their account information. Sheesh. Morons...no, wait, yes...morons!

Some things never change. As soon as the class was dismissed today a couple walked directly to the Reference Desk. They needed help logging in to their new e-mail account. What was their login? They weren’t sure. What was their password? Didn’t actually make a note of that. Miss Information sent them back to their instructor. Some people can’t be helped.

In other lack of technology news: a customer singing the praises of Wikipedia wanted to know how many volumes it was published in. Another patron wanted…no, needed…a movie with the word “sunset” in the title. When asked for additional details, the woman offered the information that the movie was released in a year starting with 19. Great. Big help.

Miss Information is annoyed by too much information

2008-01-23T17:02:00.000-05:00

Miss Information is mourning the loss of distance. She has always fancied herself to be inscrutable and mysterious. She urges others to follow her example and stop providing her with unnecessary details of their mundane lives. She has her own mundane life to worry about, thanks.

Her reference desk colleagues do not need to announce their bathroom breaks, for example. One of them typically phrases it the form of a question: is it ok if I go to the washroom? Miss Information’s understanding of science is minimal, however she thinks it’s ok, perhaps even recommended, but maybe you should consult with a medical professional just in case. Honestly, some day she’s going to say no just to see what would happen.

As ick-inducing as these declarations are, Miss Information recently experienced something worse. Mike has been coming into the library every day since he was a child. Even then it was apparent that he’d missed the train to normal by several light years. Everyone expected (hoped? prayed?) he’d grow out of it. He didn’t and so now he’s pretty heavily medicated but basically harmless. Miss Information usually likes to think of patrons like Mike as differently normal.

One day recently, Mike asked to use the phone at the reference desk. He didn’t have money for the pay phone and he had to call his mother. She’s been worried lately because he’s been peeing outside and he needed to call her and tell her that he hadn’t peed at all today, but he wanted her to know that he hadn’t been peeing outside…today…yet. Miss Information was delighted to hear this--as was everyone in the library. Mike has no indoor voice. He says everything at 11.

Miss Information, usually reluctant to allow customers to use the phone, made an exception and handed it over. Mike changed his mind. He decided to tell his mother in person instead. Miss Information was happy for them both. She spent the rest of the day longing for a shower.

Miss Information is annoyed by a hanger on

2008-01-04T16:30:00.000-05:00

Miss Information once spent a lot of time in a Christchurch, New Zealand Starbucks without realizing that it had closed. The store hours weren’t posted and the counter person never actually said they were closing, because obviously then Miss Information would have left. Reasonable people leave when a place closes.

The Starbucks had closed because it was closing time but sometimes a place needs to close for another reason—flood, fire, sarin gas leak. All good reasons to evacuate and sensible people would go away, at least until the hazmat team clears out. Miss Information’s library rarely closes to the public. It has remained open during times of no heat, times of too much heat and a really neat flood…The library briefly closed when some joker set fire to the toilet paper dispenser in the men’s washroom but only long enough to determine the smoke wasn’t toxic. Anyway, staying open during chaos is the library’s only claim to fame and the staff lords it over more feeble branches who close for a stiff breeze. Closing is a last resort—which happened on Saturday.

It was a power failure. The library remained open for an hour or so but when the emergency lighting faltered and parts of the library were plunged into darkness, the decision was made to evacuate. Most people distressed over the inability to surf the net left peacefully. One man, the man in the yellow coat, refused to leave. He didn’t understand why the library was closing. Miss Information tried to reason with him, the library was getting cold and the washrooms were unusable. It’s ok, the man replied. He had a coat. Also, he had gone to the washroom before he left home. This was a little too much detail for Miss Information so she turned it over to one of the senior staff librarians. She confirmed that the library was indeed closed and the man should exit. The man didn’t feel that this applied to him because he only wanted to read the newspaper. The librarian in charge got involved. The man wanted to know why he should have to leave—the encroaching darkness, the falling temperature, the many hazards, and the library asking him to leave not being enough of a reason. Eventually he demanded an audience with the manager. Miss Information suspects that her fellow staff members, not being fellows, did not have that masculine authority Yellow Coat Guy was looking for. Sadly, the duty manager was also a woman. She had a seemingly endless phone conversation with the guy who repeated the phrase “but it isn’t logical” about 1000 times. After about 20 minutes of this, the man slowly made his way to the exit, vowing to write letters of complaint to, well, everyone.

So, Miss Information has a new appreciation for that Starbucks employee who let her stay in the store even though it was closed. While acknowledging that much better coffee is readily available almost anywhere in New Zealand, she urges those in the vicinity of Cathedral Square to drop in and visit the Starbucks there. You don’t have to have the coffee.