Daily Thoughts 11/3/2011

L'Arlésienne, Madame Ginoux, Vincent Van Gogh, 1890

Daily Thoughts 11/3/2011

This morning, I read a bit more The Letters of Robert Frost to Louis Untermeyer.  Reading letters sometimes takes a little bit more focus to read than other books because it is usually about the relationship between two people.

This morning, I checked the Facebook and Twitter account for the library.  I am also making some minor adjustments to the URLs for the library website.  I'll probably finish doing this tomorrow.

The Friends of the Library are in the community room setting up for the Book and Bake Sale tomorrow.  They also are selling plants.  One of them asked about the Biography Book Club which is on November 15, 2011 from 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.

I spent a little more time on Lynda.com this afternoon learning about Photoshop.

This afternoon between 2:00 p.m. and 4:00 p.m. I spent some time in the computer lab helping people look for jobs and practice typing.  I also showed some people the Learning Express Popular Software Tutorial module which has video instruction for Microsoft and Adobe software.  People seemed to like it.  It can be accessed by anyone with a Westchester library card.

Web Bits

Death to Keyboards and Monitors 

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/this-could-be-big-abc-news/death-keyboards-monitors-omnitouch-202115388.html 
 

More Occupy Wall Street material on the Library.

Occupy Wall Street At Valley Forge
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-215_162-20127692/occupy-wall-street-at-valley-forge/

The Career Road of Occupy Wall Street
http://sales-jobs.fins.com/Articles/SBB0001424052970204777904576651373797984258/The-Career-Road-of-Occupy-Wall-Street

Occupy Wall Street Library Catalog Online
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/occupy-wall-street-library-online_b39726

Daily Thoughts 5/15/2009

I like the idea that it cost 25 cents for the World Almanac in 1903.

Daily Thoughts 5/15/2009

Today is one of those oddly memorable days. The Friends of the Library are having a book sale. Every single time I go in to the book sale, I run into a book dealer I recognize. I am hoping that one of them will be able to help me get me the contact information on someone I lost track of. I used to spend time pricing science fiction titles at a now defunct bookstore.

Before I got married, I used to go out to the flea markets on the weekends to look for old comic books, science fiction books, and collectible paperbacks. I would buy them and trade them in for comic books. A lot of this kind of thing is dead in Manhattan now. I still stop by Rogers Time Tunnel sometimes to look at their collection. It is a very old fashioned comic book store. http://www.yelp.com/biz/rogers-time-machine-new-york . It is one of those hidden gems in New York if you know where to look.

It feels like a long tail end to the death of many of the smaller independent bookstores. Unless a bookstore becomes very focused and trains their staff very well, they cease to exist. It has gotten to the point where many of them are training their staff better at selecting material and customer service than the big chain bookstores in order to survive. I heard that some of the dealers would come in three times today to see what was being put out for sale at different points in the day, in the morning, at noon, and at the end of the day.

There is no generalist bookstore in the city where I work. There is a small christian bookstore. The library is effectively the local source for books. I think this is increasingly becoming true in many cities across the United States. You either travel to a large mall or superstore, buy through the internet, or go to your local library.

The cooperative system was putting in new computers in our computer center today. They are also expanding the wireless access points by September to handle up to 25 people. A lot more people are using Iphones in addition to laptops in the library. Once again, this is an indicator I should probably get an Iphone or a smart phone. It is a matter of spending money to do it. I don't like spending money.

I spent some time also distributing phone books to the staff. A lot of people have stopped using phone books and now use the online yellow pages. I know I do, but some patrons still ask for local phone books in paper. The providers of yellow pages have gotten much tighter about what they will give out. It costs money for us to get phone books outside of the county. Verizon now has a special subsidiary, Idearc to handle the marketing of telephone books. We also have an extra supply of local phone books which we leave out for patrons to take.

I did my usual small tasks, reading the New York Times Book Review, filing law looseleafs, checking the displays to see that they were in order, and took some time to look at the slat walls. We are almost done ordering accessories for the slat walls. They look very nice. A whole set of new books are being processed to go out.

The large print standing order is being gone over by our representative. I reminded them to look at the Essence bestseller list for African American titles to see what was available in large print.

I read some of Emotional Eating A Practical Guide to Taking Control by Edward Abramson. I don't like the idea of dieting. My doctor told me I must lose weight and eat less sugar if I want to maintain my health. I initially tried to change the way I am eating, I have cut out most sweets, soda, and extremely fatty food. I am also trying food substitution, eating low fat foods like low fat milk, low fat cottage cheese, and low fat mayonnaise as well as eating more fruits and vegetables. I am also exercising. Quite frankly, I don't like moving quickly. I am doing floor exercises and walking but don't want to run or swim. I am trying to find ways around the cardiovascular exercise by trying a pedometer to see how I can move during the day.

The next obvious step is trying to find out why I eat too much emotionally. I have always thought diets were useless, but I have to lose weight. This means I have to change my habits and how I think about food.

Good Morning, The Complete Idiot's Guide To Managing Your Time

Italian panel depicting Charles Darwin created ca. 1890, on display at the Turin Museum of Human Anatomy.

The Complete Idiot's Guide To Managing Your Time by Jeff Davidson

This morning I finished reading The Complete Idiot's Guide To Managing Your Time by Jeff Davidson. This is a practical book. What people want to know about these kinds of books is not whether the book itself is good and easy to read, but whether they would get something worthwhile out of reading the text. By the way, the book is easy to read, although it is a bit formulaic.

The main concept that interested me was the idea that your desk is like an aircraft carrier, it needs to be completely swept clean of everything before you put anything down on it. This way, there are no distractions when you are working on something. I never thought of it like this. I always had piles of paper on my desk. I did not think of them as being distracting, but that is how I am.

Now, I kind of understand why people think people are more productive if they have an absolutely clean desk. The funny thing is that the time I see most people cleaning their desk is just before they go on vacation when they will be doing nothing. It is kind of perturbing.

The book reinforced some of my habits. I try to get enough sleep every night, I don't always succeed, but I try. I always take my lunch hour and try to take my scheduled breaks. I know I will not work as well if I don't. I also believe in doing one thing at a time consistently every day, day after day. Right now, every day, I am taking time to order books, weed books, check the displays, and make sure the area I am in is clean and orderly. I also try to take lunch outside. This gives me a slight breather from being in the building.

I think the book would be useful for most people in some way or other to learn about time management. It is not just about managing time, it is also about how not to get overwhelmed by the office. How and when to say no, when to take vacations, how to be orderly, and how to make decisions quickly.

Good Morning

This is the kind of review that makes you want to go out and buy the book. Review of Your Hatemail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by John Scalzi. http://www.sfsite.com/11b/hm284.htm . I am rather surprised that I have never received any truly dreadful hatemail for writing this blog. I have been contentious at times, but nothing which is dreadful.

The library is having its book and bake sale today November 21 and November 22. I went downstairs to the community room to buy a cup of coffee from The Friends of the Library. It was a rather genteel environment. They were playing I Got My Thrill on Blueberry Hill by Louis Armstrong on the CD Player. There was a nice assortment of baked goods next to the coffee which was 75 cents. I looked around at some of the books. There were a few nice art books, which people might buy. A retired librarian runs the Friends of the Library sale. I thought the best selection was in the childrens books.

Prince of Stories, The Many Worlds of Neil Gaiman, Hank Wagner, Christopher Golden & Stephen R. Bissette came in for me to read. It is a fresh new book. There is a foreword written by Terry Pratchett. The book is a doorstopper. It is 545 pages long.

I am also going to try and read The Collins Best Practices series of business books: Managing People Secrets to Leading for New Managers, Difficult People Working Effectively with Prickly Bosses, Coworkers, and Clients, and Hiring People, Recruit and Keep the Brightest Stars. These are short concise books which look practical.

I went and gave instructions for the Job Information Center books to be taped and labeled, weeded some more books in the social sciences, and did a few miscellaneous tasks to make sure everything was in order before I left for vacation.

I changed the floor display from "energy issues" to books on globalization and the issues surrounding globalization; free trade, fair trade, immigration, NAFTA, hegemony, the rise of BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, and China), and other large things. I am hoping that people will like the books.

I sometimes feel a little nervous before I go on vacation, that there will be some mistakes that will happen. I can be a bit cautious about these things.

Friends of the Library Bake Sale, Thoughts

Today and yesterday are the Book & Bake Sale for the library. This is run by the Friends of the Library. One of our retired librarians runs the book and bake sale. None of the currently employed librarians are supposed to work in the book sale because it would create a conflict of interest between the freinds which is a separate nonprofit entity and the library.

Currently working librarians are not supposed to be selling books on library property. Patrons would ask us whether we are selling our books if we sold the books in the book sale. Almost daily, we get the question do you sell your books here, can I buy this?

Our answer is no we don't sell the books. There is a good reason for this. People might deface property hoping that we might sell it. They might also try and claim they can buy the new books because we sell books. This happens anyways.

One of the reasons we get this question so much is that there is no big bookstore in our community. There is a small christian bookstore. Also, there is no comic book shop in our community. I think this is becoming more common in many communities.

Small bookstores are closing. Also Amazon, Ebay, and ABE (Advanced Book Exchange) are eating up a lot of the book market which would go to the smaller bookstores. You can order your book from home. With a search engine like http://www.booksearchengine.com/ you can search dozens of stores to find the title of a used book which you want.

The publishing industry seems oblivious to this change. I try and approach them to get authors to come to our library for events. They ask us to partner with the nonexistent local bookstore. On free comic book day, I was asked to partner with a nonexistent comic book shop. It can be frustrating at times.

I went downstairs a couple of times to wander through the tables of books. They were holding the bookfair in the community room. There were tables of old hardcovers and paperbacks which people were going through. I did not find a huge amount which I wanted. I found a copy of The Adventures of Cavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon which won the Pulitzer Prize for literature. I was going to buy it, but I decided instead to give it to another person who seemed interested in the title. I can always order a copy of it. There was also a stack of old star trek fan guides which were kind of interesting.

I bought my obligatory brownies and cup of coffee from the bake sale table and stood around for a few minutes talking to the older ladies running the sale. Hopefully, the bake sale will generate some funds for a few minor improvements. The Friends of the Library funds a decent amount of our library programming.

Then I went to lunch. There was a local politician who was at the diner where I sometimes go to lunch. He works for the local housing coalition and is on the Board of Ethics for the city. I said hello and suggested he might want to go to the booksale. He has wanted to meet The Friends of the Library for a while.

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I was looking at http://www.biblioimania.net/ and I saw a very interesting looking book, The Library At Night by Alberto Manguel. None of our libraries had it yet. I put in a request for it to be ordered. I rather like reading about libraries and bookstores.

In the coming weeks, I am going to also look for a book on how to write sonnets.