Tuesday... Getting Closer...

          I'm trying to think if there's anything noteworthy for Tuesday. Nothing I can think of at the moment, but one of the cool things about working at the library is seeing all the books. So while I might sometimes be doing old, repetitive tasks... I'm always seeing new books. Some of them look really interesting and I write down their titles. Others are extremely strange or something I know will circulate a lot (many people will check it out) but isn't personally my style. If I have a day where I mostly need to cover and sticker the books (since there are a lot of them and it takes longer than you'd think) once in a while I'll read a book while I'm doing it. My hands know what to do from memory so I can read at the same time. I've read three books (since I don't do it all the time). One of them was "The Hunger Games", which I'm so glad I finally had time for. I've been wanting to read it for a long time.

Friday, Friday, Gotta Get Down On Friday

          Friday had a lot of tech and shelving work. However, I did help out Kai (the auditorium coordinator) and Susan (children's librarian) with organizing for the potluck. Pequot has one every year I think and it seems like a lot of fun. For example, they had chalk for the children to draw on their walkway and hula hoops to play with and a badminton net. Plus, there was obviously lots of food. I helped set up - decorated with some flowers, washed off the drink dispensers, and more.

          Also, I met another new staff member (or at least new to me). His name is Nabid and he's actually a senior in high school like me. Next year he'll be going to UConn for biomedical engineering. I was pretty impressed. He helped out a lot and we actually did pretty much everything that needed to be done. So we had a little work straightening up a display (books to be sold) and making it look nice. But then, something that's happened occasionally when I worked happened for the first time on my internship. We had to shelf-read. This is one of the strangest things I've ever done for a job, but I realize why it's necessary. It can just be so boring sometimes. Shelf reading is essentially what it says... we just look along the shelves. We do this to see if any books are out of order or completely in the wrong place or whatever else can go wrong. I just find it odd that walking around looking at books for a mistake is a job that needs to be done. Yet, then again, sometimes I find a lot of things wrong. So I guess that's why it's important.

Shadowing on Thursday

          Today I got to shadow Marianne. It was very interesting. I finally got to see, in detail, what she does. I always had a vague idea - a mysterious thing called "cataloguing" - but finally I got to learn firsthand. There's a whole system in SIRSI that she uses & basically she denotes how to find the book in our library. She used to have a scanner for barcodes but now she puts them in manually (except she's very adept at it from practice so it doesn't actually take long and she doesn't need to look at the keys). A lot of the time, other libraries already have a book in the system. So if their information matches ours we can just use that, and if not, we usually just need to make minor changes. Sometimes, our library is the first to put a book in the catalogue. Marianne marks down every time this happens for reference. Finally, I saw actually creating information for a book. I don't think I understood it all - you had to search online and import things and make sure there was enough information - but it was still cool to learn about.

          PS- Oh! I also sat in on a program the library was offering for children. It was Shakespeare for kids and was quite cool actually. A lady came in a explained the plot of "Much Ado About Nothing" using paper plate puppets. After it, I really wanted to read the play. She engaged the children as well at times, making them act out scenes. It was a fun and enjoyable program.

Wednesdays, Chairs, and More

          I worked in the tech department a lot today. They needed some covering and stickering done. I think 13 boxes came in from their orders. So I did a lot of that. One thing I love when I'm there though is that I get to see so many books and sometimes books that have just come out. It's great to see all the titles. I found one called "The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth" interesting. Others made me laugh, like silly ones about the troubles of the 5th grade, and I remember there was one in which I enjoyed the pun ("Only the Good Spy Young"). Sitara was here again today so I showed her some more stuff. Basically, I taught her how to cover and we did some shelving together. She catches on quickly so a lot of the time she knew where things went already but I did help her with some books. Everything gets done even faster now that she's started working here. It's good for the library. Oh! And I just had to mention that the two tech librarians got new chairs today. They were really cool and looked extremely comfortable. It was funny because they put them together and the directions even said at the end, "BEHOLD! Your chair is finished." I mentally applauded the direction-makers for their sense of humor (intentional or not).

Gleeful Monday

          Today was a new tech thing: CDs (more accurately, audiobooks on CD). A lot of work goes into making audio books presentable... maybe even more than with books. We get the orders and we have to open them and write Pequot Library on every CD with Sharpie. Sometimes there can be as many as 21 CDs for really long books so occasionally it takes a while. There used to be stickers that went on the CDs, but sometimes they got caught when people went to play them so now we just write with permanent marker. I have to place a label lock (a clear sticker) over the spine label (sticker that describes the book in a way such as giving the first 3 letters of the author's name). Then I have to cut up the box the audiobook comes in and place the front, back, and side into our CD containers. Finally, I place all the CDs in CD sleeves and put them inside the container. And voila! An audiobook is done.

          In other news, I heard a story about a patron who came in today and started spraying bug spray all over. Apparently, he declared that the library had a bug infestation and he couldn't handle it. I have no idea what I would have done in that situation. Dealing with people upstairs can sometimes be such a hassle. While annoying, it wouldn't have been so bad but you can't just do that. If you have a problem, tell the librarians or go to another library. It was especially disturbing because some of the things he sprayed were restored - such as leather chairs and wooden tables - so the spray could have damaged them.

          On a happier note though, we have a new part-time staff member. She is Leslie's daughter, Sitara. She was very nice and a great help. I was "training" her in a sense, although it was a little funny because she's older than me (same age, but already finished her freshman year in college). However, we even know someone in common - my friend from Amity who's in Sitara's year at Vassar.

1st Day! Woohoo!

          So it's the first day of my internship... I can't believe it. Instead of going to school today I went to the Pequot Library in Southport, CT. It's a very nice library and the staff are just so welcoming. Today I was working in the tech department. They basically do all the behind-the-scenes work to get books ready. The books you check out from the shelves are there because of the tech department. We had a lot of books today so I spent the day covering and stickering them (AKA putting on a laminated cover to protect them and adding stickers that say it's a Pequot Library book, which book it is, and when to return it). But tomorrow I get to work at the desk and learn some new stuff. It should be interesting. First day of internship? Check.