ILL Be Seeing You

Something weird happened to my template. I'd like to think I was the target of some sophisticated hacker bent on rescuing the world from my scritto owing to the dangerous ideas but I'm sure it was only the result of my hitting the wrong button or something. I got tired of trying to keep up the other stuff anyway.

I just finished Soccer in Sun and Shadow by Eduardo Galeano which was loaned to me by DOOL who borrowed it from TCCL on ILL. By the way, any book which adheres to the long tail of readership in the state of Oklahoma is undoubtedly held at TCCL. I'm not sure where they keep all their books - probably some Cold War era bunker under the Sun refinery in West Tulsa or something. I can't tell you how many times we don't have some awesome book and I'll check WorldCat to ILL it for someone and damned if it's not at TCCL. Tex used to get mad when we'd say anything about it, but it is true. Anyway, this book - eh, wasn't so great. I usually don't judge books that have been translated too harshly because it is technically out of the author's hands once it gets translated. It mainly consisted of dozens of half- or one-page dissertations from the mind of Galeano on soccer-related topics. The outcome was that in reading it I kind of felt like I'd picked up Marcel Proust hitchhiking on a highway outside of Moscow just after he'd had his morning pot of espresso and we faced an eight hour drive to St. Petersburg on ice with no brakes, half a tank of gas, no radio, and he really, really liked soccer.
I'm starting Mirth of A Nation to-nite.

I'm Hip About Time

Rummy came after me yesterday with both barrels. You'll remember I have whined not once, but twice about people asking their own questions. Well yesterday, as Senator Clinton squared off with the King of the Anti-Socratics in a hearing, he went off a on a classic one minute and thirty second question and answer session - with himself! So when the news channels needed a soundbite all they needed was that! Brilliant! Check out the video. You can skip to 8:30 into the video to hear him go off.


I had the coolest thing happen yesterday. This elderly woman - about 75ish, not the greatest health, dressed like a churchlady - asked me for travel books for South America. I took her to the 918s and asked her my customary, "Do these seem like the kind of books you're looking for?" She said yes and then I said, "Y'know there're some nice travelogues on the other side of this range I could show you. I love reading those before taking a trip." And she said, "Oooh. Right on!" - like a caricature in a parody of Easy Rider. I showed them to her and then walked away smiling - first at the thought of a septagenarian wanting to go trekking around South America and then at the thought of hippies being that old. I just never thought that would happen.

Took SGK to Cactus Jack's today. She did pretty well for her age. 190 tickets. Here is the material assessment of what I got for my $10 (I'm not going to go all VISA and say "Afternoon kicking it with daughter - priceless," cause I can do that for free):

1 Fortune telling fish
1 Alien head glow-in-the-dark ring
2 Orange glow-in-the-dark bracelets
1 Amoeba bracelet
1 2" tall dinosaur
2 Human-shaped eraser
1 Fossil-making press
1 Sticky dart
252 Dollars in fake cash

They Buy Books, Don't They?

I flew solo on the Do-Nothing Desk today and decided to list all of my questions just for the heck of it.

Is my Tom Sawyer reserve in?
I looked up the youngster's account and she had reserved some thing called Tom Sawyer, but it wasn't the Twain book. I could've said, "No," and left it at that. But, no, I said, "Let me see if we have a copy of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer..."

After that I had a homeless guy that sat down in front of our big dictionary and began to read the dictionary out loud in Shakespearean dramatic tones. Captivate! Captivating! Captivation! Captive! It was pretty funny for about five minutes. Security quelled his ardor.

Reserved a study room.
Reserved another study room.
Here's how the next one went: "I wanna know. Do they buy books?" "Uhhh. Do you mean can you buy books here?" "No." "Uhhh, well, I mean we do buy books. Are you wanting to sell a book to us?" It went on for awhile before she said she had a book called The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass. Eureka! "And you want to know it's value?!" I said. That was it. I looked it up in Alibris. I said mostly they're worth about $2-5 unless it's original. It is. Well, I said, here's one for $40,000 signed by Douglass himself. Well, this one is, too she said - and Abraham Lincoln. Oh, I said. You'd probably better take it to a rare book dealer and gave her the info on that.

Reserved another study room.
Where are your love poem books? 800s here we come...
What is the meaning of the word herlamic? That one defeated me.
Where are your books on Jingis Khan? 950s here we come...
What is the meaning of apricentric? Do you mean afrocentric? That word fit the bill.
What is the meaning of essessist? Do you mean essayist? No. Ethicist? That was it.
Did a shelf check and placed a temp tracer
How do you spell ethos? No problem.
How do you pronounce eunuch? Asked and answered.
What is the meaning of polemical? Got it.
Can I return my books anywhere? Any of our libraries...
Where are the stairs?
Where can I do homeschooling in OKC? Is that a trick question? I found some local clubs.
Do you have an Evinrude repair manual? We did.
Can I get a card if I live in Piedmont? Only one way...pay for it.
Is there an Orbis Books? Yes and I gave them the number
Can you tell me if there is a chemistry professor at Stanford named XXXXXX? There wasn't.
He could be dead, can you tell me that? If he is, he didn't get Social Security benefits.
Do you have a book that can tell me who will buy a book I wrote? Writers Market is what you need.
Do you have a list of acrylics businesses in the region? Thomas Register
Where are your bible commentaries? Let me show you the 200s
Where are your astrology books? Let me show you the 130s
Where are the Alexandra Stoddard books? Let me show you the 746s
Can you show me a book on engraving tools?
What is the meaning of archaic?
Can you help locate Lund University? I have a citation from a Mr. Munga there. It's in Sweden...
How do you pronounce 'rhys'? Reese
Where are the firefighter books? Are you taking a test or just want to read about them? Just read them...628s
What is martyrdom?
What is the meaning of shariah?
Do you have books on immigration law in Oklahoma? No, but I found them some elsewhere
Can you define enculturation?
Do you have project management books?
Did a shelf check and placed a tracer
Is there a seminary in Ivory Coast? Yep.. in Abidjan
Do you have anime books? On first floor
Reserved a meeting room for 10.
Is the Grandmother of Europe there? On first floor
How many books can you check out? 30
Do you have any ghost stories? 398s
Do you have any Broadway show scores? 782s
Can you give me the number for XXXXX in Rogers, AR?
Looked up another for the same guy
I have heard there was an airport buried underneath Lake Hefner. Is that true? Not according to the information I have but there was one next to it...
Can you give me the number for XXXXXX in Moore? I can't find it in the book.
Do you have an OKC business directory? Not exactly, but I showed her a much better source than that
My last one for the day was a 70 something guy who asked one of the most agonizing questions in the library world, "How do I research my family tree?" It was near closing time, but I found him on the 1930 census and told him to come back next week...

Sorry so long and boring, just thought I'd give you a glimpse of a day at the Do-Nothing Desk!

Saints Preserve Us

I had to hang my head out the window on the way home from the Last Public Place In America to see if it was a full moon. We had some doozies today, God love 'em.

My first call of the day was from a dear woman who rang us up at the stroke of 9:00. She quite eagerly introduced herself with that squeak that octogenarians get when they are really excited, "Good Morning! This is Mrs. John Doe and I have a question!! I would like to know... I would like to know... Oh dear me. What did I want to ask? Oh! No... 'twasn't that." I tried my best to oil the hinges; I asked if it was something she'd read in the paper, seen on TV, a book she wanted to read, was it a phone number? Nothing rang a bell. She finally gave up, poor thing, and said she'd call back when she remembered. You've gotta love the optimism.

Later a guy called on behalf of an incarcerated young woman who had 14 books which were quite past due - to the tune of hundreds of dollars. He wasn't asking that she be forgiven the debt, he was just letting us know she wasn't going to be getting out until January 2007 and we didn't need to send any more invoices to her. I told him if he just brought the books back, we'd call it even. He then explained therein lay the problem - the books are gone. Apparently what happened was she had a creep boyfriend who was a burglar and he piled his loot up in her apartment, so she was sent up the river for 2nd degree burglary and possession of stolen property. On top of that , the apartment complex emptied her place after non-payment of rent and locked all her belongings up in storage. Then the boyfriend somehow got in and took her purse and the books. At first, I thought, "Yeah, right. you said the stuff was all locked up." But then I think, oh yeah - burglar. The gentleman I talked to informed me that he was her guardian angel. I said "Oh, is that like a program to help incarcerated people?" "No", he said. "I am an angel." "OK," I said. "Not with wings or anything," he tells me, "that's all just a myth; God uses real people." See, that's funny because I know the Pope's astronomer recently suggested that angels were actually aliens. I didn't bring that up. The thing is, though, I actually believe him. The story of what happened, I mean. I've seen so many times here what happens when people make a couple of wrong turns here and there and before you know it their lives are a train wreck. After I hung up I pulled up the record and sure enough, all 14 books were on witchcraft and the occult. I have never understood why the 130s are the most stolen books.

On the next shift I was downstairs and I kept hearing this shouting between a man and one of my co-workers upstairs. And I can't hear it perfectly, but I know I'm hearing 'murder' and 'kill her' and lots of other unpleasant things. So I move to a place I can hear better and I realize it's a guy who's nearly stone deaf trying to communicate to a Lipstick Librarian that he's looking for a newspaper article about a friend of his he heard had killed a woman. The funny thing was she kept asking him to spell the last name of the perp and he kept avoiding it. She would ask and he would answer a non-sequiter like, "Oh yeah, I've known him since 6th grade." LL has a stubborn streak and she dug her heels in; he was going to spell that name or die trying. He never did. I finally called up there and told Purple Bunny to ask LL to quit flirting with that guy and give him the damn article. Library hijinks!

Then I had this guy call who kept repeating everything I said. I was getting really annoyed with him, but he was awfully respectful and well-mannered. He finally told me he was blind and he was taping the info I gave him so he could have the Library for the Blind record the books for him. These were books about a particularly brutal sex crime. I don't envy the reader at the Library for the Blind. In addition to all that, though, the guy was apparently a little paranoid and he wanted to make sure that they didn't end up at the circ desk because the man who works there has a grudge against him and won't let him have the books. I finally determine he thinks he called our nearest sibling to the south. He is blind after all. I didn't explore the nature of his discontent, though, I'd had enough.

My last one was another sad one. The woman calling must have had that larynx surgery or had been smoking five packs a day since birth; or both. It was painful to listen to her. Her circumstance was that her book was stolen from her berth at the local rescue mission. She was desperate to get back in to use the library, but now she wouldn't be able to because she didn't have the $14 to get back in good graces. I told her there really wasn't anything I couldn't do since the managers had gone home, but tomorrow's a new day and all that. She lost it after that. She told me she didn't want to be at the mission; she had a job and a house and her husband got sick and before she knew it she was at the shelter. I pulled up her record while she was talking and the book was an inspirational paperback about getting your life back together. Shit. I mean consider the irony. She just needed an ear and, you know, that I could do. And tomorrow when she comes in, if it doesn't work out for her, I'll pay for the book myself. I mean, there but for the grace of God, right?

They Have Taken My Lord and I Don't Know Where They Laid Him

Well, actually, I do. Down at the county slammer. Not that those earthly bonds could hold him! Yeah, this morning around 10:00 at the Last Public Place in America this dude was escorted out in cuffs by two of OKC's finest (wearing bulletproof vests, I might add). Apparently, a woman was making a call on her cell phone (not a stall call) and this guy, we'll call him ... Jesus, thought she was taking a photograph of him. And so he knocked the phone out of her hand and reminded her that you can't take photos of Jesus. 'Cause he is Jesus. He would know. So Jesus is spending the night in the pokey pending assault charges. I think the part about not taking photos of him was in one of the Gospels that got cut at the last minute. I told the security guard, "well at least he didn't 'know' her." But he didn't get my biblical meaning so it was a wasted gem. Bible quizzers should be getting it about.........now.

The Killer has announced her birthday wishlist. A French Revolution "war set", a Jesus action figure from Archie McPhee, and more mixes for her Easy Bake Oven. I have no idea where to find a French Revolution war set. I'm sure toy guillotines were banned in the 1960s. The kid loves Marat, what can I say?

Have You Any Dreams You'd Like To Sell?

Ew..I just quoted Fleetwood Mac. Actually, that Rumours album is one of my guilty pleasures because it is centered around one of my fondest memories. It was the summer of '75 - the last summer vacation my family ever took. Not because of some tragedy or anything, it was just that for some reason we were too poor after that to go anywhere but the lake. Or as my dad says, "We weren't poor, just broke." We might've even been too poor to have taken the trip we did, I just can't remember. My dad was sent by our mainstream Protestant church to check out the seminary in Louisville with the prospect that they would swap tuition for a committment to lead the congregation. Or something like that. I'm sketchy on that part. Anyway, we headed east in our 1972 Chevy Impala. It was my first time east of the Mississippi River and my first time to see 'big cities' like St. Louis and Evansville and Louisville. Yeah, I lost my urban virginity to St. Louis. OK, ok. I just wanted to say we listened to my sister's Rumours 8-track on an endless loop all across the Ohio Valley. I still have every song memorized. Nothing quite like listening to the line, "Won't you lay me down in the tall grass and let me do my stuff" with your parents in the car. They didn't say anything about it, though. That's also the trip where I found out - during a brief radio interlude - that Mrs. Robinson wasn't a Christian song ("Jesus loves you more than you will know").

And no, my dad didn't go to seminary. He joined the previously mentioned bad theology gang - The Fort Lauderdale Five.

Ok, the whole reason I brought any of that up was that after an email exchange with Adjective Queen about dreams I realized I don't remember any of my dreams. I would say I don't dream at all, but 'they' say that everyone dreams at about the same rate. So I don't know whether I'm really getting a good value out of my dreams because if I can't remember them, what good are they? Kind of a tree falling in the forest type thing.

Had a weird evening at The Self's annual Honor Society ceremony. Top 10% and all that. OK, this group of best and brightest had no actual, identifiable nerds in it. I mean no one looked like Bill Gates or Napoleon Dynamite or Eleanor Roosevelt. I just thought the top 1% should at least look nerdy. I'm afraid that rather than being actually smart, they're just rule followers. Sheep. I could tell this by the fact that after the ceremony about 60 kids sat perfectly still while their parents snapped photos and directed their poses. Not one of them acted silly, made a face, stuck fake ears behind someone's head, nothing. That's pretty sad.

Today, one of my co-workers answered a reference question and the caller was on a cell-phone and she actually heard him using the restroom and flushing the toilet. Ewww. Now that's multitasking! There's got to be a word for that. Hmmm, I wonder if I can get Sally Kern to make a law banning people from making a call while eliminating. I mean since she' s already solved all of the other problems in our state.

Meine Kleine Madchen

OK, all the parenting books tell you how to talk to your kids about all these BIG ISSUES like the birds and the bees. They have a Berenstain Bears book for helping families deal with death, stranger danger, bullies, bedwetting, new siblings - I mean those poor little bears must be curled up quivering in some dark corner of a closet by now with all the trauma they've gone through. But there's one topic they never cover. I know; I've looked. Dr Dobson and Dr Phil don't cover it. And it's an uncomfortable topic that needs to be handled delicately; one of those you don't want to give implicit approval by ignoring it or make it attractive by coming down hard on it. True, it's not something EVERY parent has to deal with, but it's there. I'm talking about Hitler fascination.

Yes, SGK has been fascinated with him for years. In fact, she used to claim that he was her very mean ex-husband - but he never hurt her, he was just 'never around'. I couldn't even make this up. So, last night after we sang 'Jukebox Saturday Night' and 'Lamplighter's Serenade', I'm waiting on her to go to sleep and all of a sudden the dark quiet is pierced by:

SGK: "When I get to heaven will I get to talk to Hitler?"
ME: "What?! No, I doubt if he'll be up there waiting on you! Do you think he'll be there?"
SGK: "Yeah. I don't believe in the 'bad word place'. So, he has to be in heaven."
ME: "Well, what would you say to him."
SGK: "Just..I don't know. Have lunch with him and ask him why he did all that stuff."
ME: "Well, what do you think he would say?"
SGK: "I don't know. That's why I want to ask him."
ME: "Well...uh...I don't know. Your mom answers all the religion questions. She says I have bad theology."

This went on for a little bit and, I mean, it just blew me away because she went on to say that in her view Jesus died for us all and he forgave us all and why shouldn't that include Hitler? I mean, I didn't have an answer for that.

Wow, we ate at a really great new restaurant tonight. It's a real Mexican buffet, not Tex-Mex. It's called El Encanto - I know it sounds like the name of some Aztec spectre that attacks tourists who wonder off the main camino. But the food is great. It's Mexican home cooking, lots of potatoes and peppers and stew and about five very fresh salsas and guacamole. Very good stuff.

Man, today was another surreal one at the Last Public Place in America. By 11 AM we had a gaggle of bankers in the meeting rooms, two school groups touring through, an adult day care making their weekly visit and of course the usual suspects. And between stints amongst 'em I'm writing legal documents and policy statements and having a meeting to commit to several hours of writing assignments. By 3:00, seeing it all swirling seamlessly around me, it hit me that it was one of those days there where I marvel at just how amazing this place is. I mean museums, sports arenas and shopping malls have multitudes, but they're all there for the same purpose. But here it's unique to each individual. I really felt privileged to be there today.