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Some Local Library:
Furious Champion Edition
Wednesday, July 30, 2003 - 01:34 p.m. - Defenestrator
Do You Think They Could Fucking Scream Any Louder??
One of the policies that we have at our oh-so-beloved workplace is "No food or drink in the library". Of course, being that the general public has an average IQ that's smaller than my penis (flaccid, not erect), you can usually find people bringing a wide assortment of vittles into the building. So this morning, while we're at the desk minding our business, one of our more civic-minded patrons informed us that there were ants in the children's play area. Without going into all the details, we found that there were raisins underneath one of the children's computers. As a result, HALF the children's play area has been closed down, until we have a chance to spray down the area with chemicals.
So that's how our day STARTED.
As for other happenings today...
1) I had to stop this one kid who was going from computer to computer, licking his hands, and banging on each keyboard. In the meantime, his sibling was on all fours on the floor, barking like a dog.
2) Afterwards, three kids came into the library, screaming and running straight for the children's play area that we had closed off because of the ants caused by the fact that our dimwitted patrons can't leave their food OUTSIDE of the library. As for the kids themselves, we're talking ADfuckingHD+++ here. Classic exhibit for the "screaming ethnics" category. I couldn't get up and go over to throw their asses out of the play area because, as you guessed it, I was busy getting them their prizes for the damned summer reading program. So yes, on top of putting up with their behavior, I had to put up my fake-plastic-smile and give these brats their trophies.
So, next time someone bitches to me about not being allowed to bring food and drink in...
Monday, July 28, 2003 - 04:00 p.m. - JackPot
So it has been a while since I have chimed in with something to say. Some of it was because of vacation, some of it was because of boring days and some of it was just plain laziness. But now I am back, here to provide my special brand of humor.
Jumping into the wayback machine for a moment, Saturday was a great day. With just me and Doc on the prowl and the Detective keeping things circulating, the day was actually quite enjoyable. Next thing you know the day was done and we all went over for a party and some serious gaming (both electronic and cards)
Today is not that good though. A short afternoon shift has me scratching my head and spending most of the day in children's is putting my anger of the rise. I am really tired of Summer reading club books. I am tired of looking for Death be Not Proud . And I am out.
Thursday, July 24, 2003 - 10:59 p.m. - Defenestrator
There is no way that so much stupidity can exist in one place at one time...
Doc's done a really thorough job of summarizing most of today's events, so instead of rehashing our angst, I'll just add to the annals what has not been mentioned thus far.
Not once, but TWICE today, the alarm for the emergency exit door in the children's department was set off by a child. I was only there for the first incident, but I noticed several boys (approx. age 10-11) giggling when the alarm went off. One of the gigglers had the gall to walk towards the door, as if intending to set off the alarm again. Too bad he didn't. It was storming outside, and it would have been fun shoving his punk ass out into the rain and shutting the door behind him.
Moving on, I had a girl tell me that she wanted to switch to a different computer. Of course, the computer she wanted to switch to had all the same games as the one that she was already playing on. When I asked her the reason for her request, she replied, "It's because the other computer has a shinier mouse." There were a bunch of things I would have liked to have told this girl. However, I eventually decided to tell the girl to get back on her assigned computer or just get off the computers altogether. Oh, and this girl was one of the daughters of the "toad" that Doc referred to earlier. Stupidity begets stupidity once again.
Thursday, July 24, 2003 - 09:33 p.m. - Doc
DON'T MAKE A CAREER OUT OF IT
(Book Two of the Christ Clone Trilogy)
How many angels can dance on the head of the hard-on I get while reading Christian apocalyptic fiction ("a subgenre", Publishers Weekly helpfully points out)? Woo-doggie, when I think about the Good Lord coming back and throwing all those homos and liberals and babykillers and vegetarians into the Lake of Fire, I get so tingly I can almost forget that it also involves the end of the fucking world and everything living upon it! God, I love my public.
Hit parade of regular dropped-out negasouls tonight; the action's been constant and varied enough to more or less distract me from (a) my usual sunshine-y pastime of building a solid and literal wall out of heavy blocks of compressed contempt and (b) the sound of my co-worker sucking her lips and / or teeth every fifteen seconds. Seriously, though, when I do get a moment or two to actually think about it - when I look at the clock and realize that the past four hours have somehow only elapsed in two - when I realize that anything even remotely resembling public service, especially with the big fat glowing sigil of FREE attached to it, is just a dressed up way of impotently manning the front line against the complete and utter fucking failure of modern western civilization - well, it gives the ol' Doc a bit of a headache. But enough foreplay; I've got you all good and juiced up and no doubt quivering for the Countdown, the reason you came: the joylessly specific and utterly spiteful cataloging of individual library patrons. Lowdown!
The pimply-faced wreck who comes in all the time to squat like a furry, soggy mushroom in front of a computer terminal for literally hours and hours playing - oh, yes he does - a fucking MUD. This is not nearly as bad as, say, the Big Winners (who, knock on wood, haven't been seen in quite some time) and their darling Runescape (were they hit by a train? torn apart by wild English schoolchildren on a deserted island? the mind reels with the pornography of imagined abuses!) but it's still pretty damned pathetic. One night, I had to kick him off of the computer (because we were, much as the three fucking announcements over the public address system had subtly intimated, closing) and he hemmed and hawed and fluttered his little hands about, trying to wrap up a laughably lengthy goobye full of hugz and giftz of swordz or whatever the fuck to some little piece of Multi-User Coochie he seemed oh so very taken with. That's right, folks: there is no better or faster way to a similarly socially handicapped woman's heart than through the gift of imaginary weapons. +9 to hit -- my heart! Bonus detail: He wears this necklace that I would bet my pinky fingers was bought at a fucking Renaissance Faire [sic, sic, sic already, you hopeless little wankers].
Squinty McGee, officially designated as the World's Sexiest, Most Eligible, Most Hireable Nigerian by a crack panel consisting of himself and the three-way mirror in the Boys' department at the local Wal-Mart. I've probably written about him before - you'll forgive the overlap because (a) chances are you haven't read the archives and (b) the truly heroic measures of alcohol I drink in order to melt away pounds and pounds of ugly work-related stress at the end of the day also tends to, occasionally, take long, leisurely pisses all over my short-term memory. Squinty is a remarkably ugly man - so many of our patrons are no grand prizes, certainly, but there is a select cadre that, genetically, really and truly outdo themselves; he is one of them. It's the fucking eyes, I tell you - little more than angrily infected papercuts on his big flat face; in a characteristically classy move, he conceals them by wearing sunglasses all the time. His M.O. hasn't varied from Day One - he gets on the computer with the scanner, and spends hours and hours either scanning pictures of himself (some of which, I am happy to report, the plucky and resourceful Jackpot managed to salvage for my collection of discard) or working on his resume. That must be a real firecracker of a resume, because this has been going on for months. And months. And months. His nightly trips to Cupid Dot Com or whatever the hell in his hot hot quest for local lovin' must similarly be coming up craps; one night, Squinty spent a good long time showing some similarly homely young piece of crumpet how to use the scanner, and I thought he was going to hook up for sure. Guess not! Ladies: his hobbies include staying on a computer until the very second we close, and then disappearing into the restroom for a few minutes. Rrrrrrowr!
Mumbles was in today, with his brood (American dream). I didn't get a chance to interact with this hilariously pathetic local legend - no idea if his letter-writing campaign ever resulted in that family van (American dream) - but I did take careful note of the totally stylin' purple "Pick 5" t-shirt he was wearing, no doubt compliments of the State Lottery Commission. A winner is he.
Mr. Blue was here, briefly. Fuck him and enough said. While I'm dismissing people with the Great Big Fuck You, let me just mention a prick named Dwight; Jackpot referred to him in an earlier entry as "The Duck". This is probably due as much to the fact that Jackpot thought the patron's name was "Howard" as my having watched that AFLAC commercial with the pro-wrestlers and the screaming duck about six million times just prior to that entry being written. So, yeah, go take a screaming, flying fuck at a baboon's ass, you fucking impolite, entitled, hopeless cunt-fart. Yeah, good luck with the job search there, pal - I can't imagine why you still haven't had any fucking luck when you're clearly charming, articulate, and skilled enough to satisfy even the most finicky human resources drone! Never mind that he uses the fucking Internet for free every goddamned day on your pitiful little job search; never mind that forming a complete sentence and showing a little bit of courtesy and friendliness to the people he probably sees more often than his fucking family would obviously be a big imposition on his Big Sexy Time; this twat on one occasion actually fucking ignored me when I told him that his time was up. So, in summation, Mr. Secretary: fuck Dwight, and good night.
Not mentioned by press time: The enormously obese woman with pustules and a cane (that doesn't really have any bearing on anything, but you know me and my love of grotesque details) that was just shocked to discover that the computer classes usually ran at least sixty and sometimes, just sometimes, up to a big ninety. "You have to do them all at once?" she asked. "What about elderly people?" "They tend to fall asleep," I blandly replied. For real, this time.
Bonus! A patron whom I had (apparently; I didn't remember her face) actually came up and said "thank you for working here". As I've mentioned before, compliments always seem that much richer when they're right in front of the Big Boss.
Thursday, July 24, 2003 - 03:52 p.m. - Doc
KLAATU BARADA COCKSUCKER
I need a drink. Badly. I am not even fucking kidding about this.
Today has just been one fucking headache after another. First of all, I woke up with a sore throat, which is just goddamned ridiculous - how in the hell would I get sick? It's not as though I spend my waking hours exposed to the most squalid and noisome individuals in the community; why, I'd have to work at the fucking post office for that sort of personal and career fulfillment! A couple of belts of whiskey - the cheaper the better - would certainly burn a path right down the old pipes and lay waste to whatever last vestige of germy filth was lodged in there like a rusty pinball.
This paragraph took fifteen minutes to compose. It's just that busy here, at the moment - check that, I am that busy. I'm on the reference desk with a co-worker who, sadly, is lacking in key elements of reference work: elements like speed and English speech and comprehension. This invariably means that I handle ten patrons while she trudges fumbles her way through one. Big Fun. We wouldn't be this busy here, regardless, were it not for two key elements:
Number One: Speedy the Clown. This fucking clown was supposed to be giving some sort of clownish demonstration of his or her talents this afternoon at three o'clock. I'll spare you the Red Alert-style building of suspense and assure you that you are correctly assuming that Speedy didn't show. We couldn't even get in touch with Speedy. A child answered Speedy's number. Is there a number we can reach Speedy at? Hell, no. The clown in question, and let me emphasize that this is a direct goddamned quote, "drives around all day". Wonderful.
The end result of this is that the library is presently just fucking packed with a literal horde of noisy children and their ridiculous parents. Without anything to do, these teeming, entertainment-starved families all want to get on the fucking Internet. Am I on the Internet? Can I get a computer with Internet? Where is the Internet on this computer? I need the Internet!
"Oh no you don't, you fucking babies," is what I would say in some sort of magical dreamland and didn't have to worry about the consequences of my actions. I would also be carrying the very latest in non-lethal anti-personnel devices; I'm talking a veritable cornucopia of gasses, prods, and foams. Just as soon as the bad news hit - that Smacky the Fucktard will not be faffing gaily about with balloon animals and candy-colored retardery - this gigantically bloated squinty Nigerian man with a face like an obscenely contented toad and his five daughters of not-too-wildly varying ages (all regular visitors, I can assure you) swarmed over to the desk and clamored for Internet access. Variations on the word "Innaned" x 6. One of the younger girls also had a Big Crisis - she's lost her purse. It's pink and says "Angel" on it.
You don't say.
Let me get right to Number Two: there is a gigantic goddamned thunderstorm outside. Why go home through that awful rain and wind and scary thunder when you can simply loiter aimlessly here for a couple of hours? I sure can't think of any reason! So go on - make yourselves at home, take off your shoes, "catch up" with your friends and neighbors at the top of your squeaky, flappery little voices - public spaces are for You to Enjoy!
Let me give you an Immediate Example: this weird woman who can apparently communicate in nothing less than a yelp came fluttering around asking all sorts of crazy-ass questions; they started off normal, sure - they all do. Where's the middle school summer reading list? Over there. Hey, is this it? No, that's the New York Times Bestseller list. Ooh, is that Kennedy book on there? Yeah. What's Last Week mean? Its position on the chart last week. I can't wait to read that trash! Uh-huh. Where's the middle school summer reading list? WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM with the shiny flat underside of a stapler. Or not. She would later shout across the library to one of her darling children: YOU FIND THE BOOKS ON TAPE? And which section was Lady Miss Yelpy standing in? You'll never, ever guess. She's still wandering around, looking lost and twitchy.
And don't even get me started on the woman who carried herself like a fucking meth-addled rooster, twitching and bobbing her head with the manner of someone who's been told one too many times that YOU ARE A GOOD PERSON and YOU HAVE EVERY RIGHT TO BE PROUD OF YOURSELF and DEMAND WHAT YOU KNOW YOU DESERVE and here's the World War One Flying Ace breaking a frosty mug of shut your fucking mouth over her head as she flaps and spurts out demands, thoroughly embarrassing her teenage daughter.
I must adjourn here, but you can bet your fucking ass there's more to this story. Hint: ANNOYING PERSONAL HABITS REPEATED AD INFINITUM.
Friday, July 11, 2003 - 10:49 p.m. - Defenestrator
At the risk of sounding like a KKK Sorcerer Supreme...
One of my biggest pet peeves for this summer is kids who join our reading program and read books significantly below their ability level in order to gain the prize more quickly. Here's a quick rundown:
1) Child registers for the reading program
2) Child receives sheet with which to document books that are read
3) Child returns 5-10 minutes later with said sheet completely filled with book titles, jubilantly expecting to receive their hard-earned prizes
In past years, when encountered with one of these types of kids, I would just let it go and give them the prizes, even though both the child and I knew they didn't deserve them. This year's been a little different. I'm not sure if it's the fact that my boss has been cracking down on these cheaters, or if it's the fact that I just want to stick it to some kid and ruin their day. Most likely, it's a little of both.
Anyhow, this one child came up to me today. She's actually a teenager, getting ready for the 7th grade this coming year. She brings her reading sheet up to my desk (about 30 minutes after having received it), expecting to get her prizes for her not-so-herculean efforts. Well, I look over her sheet, and I see a number of book titles. For the 7th grade, you'd expect something along the lines of Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, one of the Chronicles of Narnia, hell, even Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys would do. Instead, I see titles such as Count on Clifford, Arthur's Pet Business, Potty Time for Girls, and The Very Hungry Caterpillar. To make a long story short, I asked this girl where she got these books, then told her that I wasn't going to give her any prizes for reading these books. She then explained that she was a visitor from out-of-town visiting some relatives, and that since she was headed back home in a couple of days, she wanted to get her prizes ASAP. I'm thinking, "Why the hell did you even bother registering?!"
Anyways, I don't know what it is, but I've been noticing that a bunch of these kids come from the same ethnic group. Basically, the profile looks something like this:
1) Family consists of at least 5-7 siblings in one immediate family.
2) Normally, 3-5 of said nuclear family units visit the library simultaneously.
3) More often than not, these 3-5 nuclear family units (henceforth referred to as "clan") reside in the same house, or in some cases, apartment.
4) Each member of said clan fails to understand the concept of "quiet in the library, please".
5) Clan members are not required to bath regularly (i.e., once per day).
6) Chiefs of said clan (normally 3-5 in number) all converge on the reference desk with a list of at least 20-30 books, expecting reference staff to go through the catalog and search for each book one-by-one.
7) When reference staff directs chiefs-of-clan in the use of public catalog system, said chiefs-of-clan suddenly become nonfluent in their usage of the English language.
8) On average, clan possesses 1.5 library cards per member.
9) Clans normally congregate at the library an average of 4-5 days per week.
That's just a sample of the profile. Is it any wonder then, that I was a little less than thrilled at the prospect of giving this girl prizes for reading books that most kids read pre-puberty???
Sunday, July 6, 2003 - 09:45 a.m. - Doc
SEVEN MINUTES FROM THE SUN:
WHERE WE'VE BEEN, EXPLAINED
More for the interest of continuity, mind you - we've not updated this little exercise (more solipsistic stretching on the mats than parallel bar deviltry) in what? over two weeks? It's been a month since I've posted, for that matter, and it's not as though things haven't been happening that are worth writing about. I mean, hell, we seemed willing and able to squeeze a couple of paragraphs out of any asinine little thing when we began; an objective observer would probably conclude that we're all either dead or teenagers. Happily, neither is the case - the truth is a lot more complicated and delicate; an intricately etched crystal goblet would make one hell of a Blunt Instrument. This leads us directly, kicking and screaming &c into my attempt at summing up Weird Summer 2K3, which will doubtless involve a lot of euphemism and hand-wringing and repetition. Let's begin!
The way I've been describing the situation at Some Local Library to anyone who gives a good goddamn is through the metaphor of volume; everyone's personality, it seems, has been amplified - imagine, for example, me more high-strung and paranoid, the Detective more bitter and weary, and the Big Boss, well... Daintily prefacing my comments with the fact that I actually like the Big Boss; I really do. She's never dealt me a bad hand once, and has been (for an authority figure) almost pathologically supportive and understanding of my weird little set of ambitions and circumstances. Bear in mind that my background pre-Library is almost entirely retail, which is to say I come from work environments that are fueled almost entirely on a tacit, agreed-upon atmosphere of mutual suspicion and contempt; to work at a place where almost everyone gets along almost all of the time hardly seemed like work at all. I credited this, to a very large extent, to the laissez-faire management style of the Big Boss.
Anyone willing to share their opinion with me - and, as the summer blasts along, discontent loosens more lips than I'd ever have imagined - agrees that the Big Boss' behaviour has been, for lack of a better word, erratic. Unfortunately, she's taken a more aggressive, almost spiteful turn in her handling of the old reins... except when she doesn't. Personal incompatibilities seem to have boiled up into genuinely Bad Blood; a difference in opinion (e.g. perhaps we oughtn't take on more fucking waste-case court-ordered community-service "volunteers" than we actually have things for them to do, much less let them faff around in our workroom, where we keep our fucking personal effects) is received at best as content-free static and at worst as destructive and antagonistic criticism. No one really knows where they stand, presently; it's gotten to the point where just about everyone's got one eye over their shoulder. A room full of conversation or laughter - bang! cold and quiet if she materializes in a doorway. To which I say - have said - &c: this is a goddamned public library, people; we do not work in an emergency room or a fucking chemical weapons lab. We pretty much let people borrow shit and use the free internet all goddamned day and fall asleep in the study rooms and drop off their stinking useless massive brood while they go off to toil in the local crystal meth mines or whatever; it ought to be relatively uncomplicated and controversy-free work, and I cannot possibly imagine why there should be even the vaguest whiff of office politics. It's just too fucking easy to get along with your co-workers and do your work well.
So, to sum up: where we've been? Tension City. It has been a busy summer, and the Characters really are just falling all over themselves to belly up to the goddamned Information Desk and spurt their unique strains of Weird and Crazy all over my overpaid willing face. You can just forget about having the free time or confidence to update this thing on-site. I can't speak for the rest of Troop Beverly Hills, but by the time I get off of work, I am ready to unwind with truly irresponsible doses of alcohol & Wario Ware and forget the day, not blow another thirty fucking minutes immortalizing it on a stupid webpage that no one reads. Capisce?
Also: the other night, I got tipped three bucks by an extremely grateful woman for whom I'd done a tricky bit of computer-related slicing and dicing. I tried to give it back, but the patron would have none of it. I'm almost ashamed to admit that I felt a bit smugly satisfied; the Big Boss was sitting right there and witnessed the whole thing. These uptight assholes who spend all day on our computers typing up their failure-scented tacky-ass resumes / personal ads / nutjob manifestos don't fucking hesitate to throw a hissy fit when I tell them that their time is up, but only rarely does someone stop to make a point of recognizing Good Work on Our Part. I don't think I really deserved a tip - what I did wasn't particularly special or beyond the boundaries of my job - but it being so fucking obvious and in the face of someone who's currently in Big Lurve with repeating inane customer service platitudes was just gratifying.
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