nichole's auxiliary storage

Book people are book people

The NYT reports in "Reading Between the Lines of Used Book Sales" that used book sales don't necessarily threaten new book sales. Librarians at OCLC have already noticed that library users buy more books than non-users, and have taken advantage of that in OpenWorldCat with their "Buy it now" buttons.

Lorcan Dempsey flips it the other way: "Find in a Library" buttons on Amazon? Wild.

How long until it's commonly accepted that all kinds of media consumption are mutually reinforcing? Maybe it is already, but that doesn't make the money people happy.

 

That wasn't cinnamon coffee,

it was the wad of gum I wasn't done chewing yesterday, that I put in my mug "for safekeeping." Ew.

Half way through

Emails from my brother have gotten shorter and more cryptic. A couple weeks ago he wrote that he was "half way through," which I hope means he can come home by October.

I've subscribed to a weather feed for Tallil, as a reminder not to take Wisconsin weather for granted even if it feels like being in someone's lung. The daily temperature and wind speed report from Iraq is not as good as a firsthand account:

Our projected high today was 120. We hit that at 10:30. By 12:30 it was 130. And the hotter it gets the more air conditioners break, but at least we get to take off our blouses!

Bill Wineke at the WiSJ waxes pensive about the weather and "suporting the troops."

...

On the 3rd of July, I heard this story on NPR in which reporters asked tourists in Washington, D.C. whether sacrifice was a part of this war. Many said no. A Vietnam vet said, "The whole point of the military is to keep the people at home from sacrificing at home."

An older man, however, said, "Well, you know we have this energy problem. Mr. and Mrs. America wanna drive their big SUVs. They think the laws of restraint applies to 'those other guys, not me.'"

Most of the interviewees said they didn't know anyone who was in the war, until one person at the end of the interview named several. I can't do it justice - listen.

Jail and prison news roundup

For some reason this strange story went out on the AP wire and didn't get any local coverage to speak of.

MADISON, Wis. - Sheriff's deputies have moved an animal rights activist who dodged federal authorities for years to a more secure cell after he received what might be an escape plan in the mail.

Moral: Do not send fake escape plans to your friends in jail.

Here's a heartwarming bit about San Quentin inmates raising money for the beleaguered Salinas public libraries.

Prisoners in San Quentin's inmate-to-inmate tutoring program sponsored something of a bake sale for literacy, selling doughnuts, pizza and fried chicken to other prisoners. Today, they will present a $1,000 check to the ailing Salinas Free Library, plus another $500 for literacy services in Marin County. Those sums are nothing to sniff at, given that an inmate with a high- paying prison job makes $56 a month.

And one about Project Return in Milwaukee, with some sobering reminders:

At 70,469, Wisconsin's parole-probation population is a smidgen of the state's 2.8 million-person labor force. But grouped together, it would be the fifth-largest city, just ahead of Appleton.

According to the latest federal data, Wisconsin has not only the nation's highest incarceration rate for African-Americans but also the nation's highest unemployment rate for African-American males.

Yu-Gi-Oh teacher wanted

Any Madisonians know a reliable grownup who could run a Yu-Gi-Oh game program? Drop me a line...

Garage sale-ing in suburban Wisconsin

Who knew it would yield a stack of Wu-Tang CDs for $1 each? What a score.

More typical, maybe, was the bundle of wifebeater tanks for fifty cents, and a huge box of paperbacks and Cycle World mags for the jail. I gotta work on my spiel - I think I came off less as a librarian do-gooder than someone with lots of recidivist friends.

The woman was visibly unnerved that her Anne Rice was going to the clink. "Glad to know I share reading habits with people in jail," she nervously giggled, then checked the watermark on my $20 bill. "They were saying on the news that people are trying to pass off fake twenties at garage sales," she said. Sure.

Plus we saw the creepiest sale ever. Some decent-looking stuff in the driveway turned out to be junk upon closer inspection. In a thick drawl, the woman invited us in to "poke around the basement, you might find something you like." Looked like a thrift store threw up in there. The pr0n movie poster posted at eye level was an especially unnerving touch. Gah.

Why stop now?

Without fail, every time I consider quitting the blog because a) I am boring myself, never mind you, to tears and/or b) it will get me in trouble some day, at least one long-lost acquaintance sends me a friendly email and a good book recommendation.

Someday's almost here

The cataloging department met recently and heard about new ways in which those pesky MARC fixed fields are being used in our OPAC.

They're enabling automatic generation of the kinds of lists patrons say they want to see: newly acquired materials broken down by audience, format, language, etc. All the time catalogers spend applying those dinky MARC codes, promising that "someday they'll be useful," enduring the jibes even from other librarians about "Cadillac cataloging," is paying off in a more tangible way.

Good cataloging is invisible. We must toot when we can.

Daily life in a library is different from what I read about in the biblioblogosphere. Most of the innovations won't get talked about, much less tried, in the average library. So though this may seem like a small step to those on the cutting edge of library tech, it still makes me glad to see it come to pass.

Twelve-spotted skimmers

I think I've seen a pair of them around. My dragonfly identification book seems to indicate that this is the female:

Here's the male from my previous post.

Popsicle playlist

Namely, I'd like to compile one for hot days like this, but can only think of three songs so far that feature popsicles:

1. Popsicle of Love - Talking Heads
2. Qué Onda Guero - Beck
3. It ain't gonna suck itself - Cracker

Little help?

Rebound of the Worlds

This is mostly for John, with apologies for my poor image editing skills.

   

Memory shortage

Explodedlibrarian writes:

[I]f I am always listening to music for particular moods or circumstances, when I am going to listen [to] new music and how is that music going to imprint on my present circumstances?

My problem is the reverse. I live with a pop music hobbyist/DJ. Hits of the rock era (1955-present) fill the house nearly every weekend as he and John tend their collection.

Years of indiscriminate exposure to pop music have confused my memories and rendered everything into a sort of soft-focus nostalgia.

Do chefs lose their sense memories as new gustatory experiences pile up? Does the intellect always interfere with experience?

I used to associate very specific images of middle school with "Ice, Ice Baby," but now I just lump all the early 90's stuff together, and avoid it whenever I can.

...Maybe that's not so bad.

And my world is a better place now that I've heard "Mr. Blobby," courtesy of the guys' British chart project.

Anyway, the iPod's cocoon of personal tunes has set me on the road to recovering my memories, if I concentrate. Yet wallowing in the known, as explodedlibrarian points out, has its dangers too. And it all takes up a whole freaking lot of hard drive.

"Going online keeps students in line"

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports on a West Bend middle school's use of blogs for tracking discipline issues:

A blog - shorthand for Web log - is sent to all Badger staff members at the end of each school day. Staff members who handle any behavioral incident involving a student write what happened and how it was being handled, enabling all staff to be aware of which students are having problems.

I wonder if there are special FERPA issues with this approach.

Last weekend

I can only hope. Actually, it was pretty great. Four days off, visiting and spending time with many wonderful people, eating good food, playing games and watching the fireflies from the back porch.

JM worked up a prototype for Ticket to Ride Madison:

And, of course, I spent a lot of time in the raspberries and saw some fabulous bugs.

As well as some real bastards.

Was it the weather?

Some days are inexplicably - festive? - at the jail. Last Friday afternoon was one. People were joking, talking, laughing, all up and moving about. Huge contrast from dead-still Saturday mornings.

One guy in particular greeted me effusively. It wasn't until later that I realized it was my buddy again.