Caution, Lunatic running asylum

I hate to boast, but I am now (acting) 2IC of the library. Yeah me!
Wait, i don't hate to boast, I love it, that's at least part of the reason I have a blog!

In other news, I managed six radio spots for ALIA's Library and Information week although I apparently upset the archivist when I talked about the archive (I don't remember talking about the archive).

In ADHD news, Willie Mason has placed himself on an alcohol ban (good move), however since my last post bagging the poor sap, I have heard that the NSW rugby league gave each player $1000 spending money for one night on the town as a 'bonding exercise'. And I have to admit that with $1000 burning a hole in my pocket I may be tempted to behave like a twat.

Oh to be 15 again

We've got a trainee running around the library upsetting the staff and generally being fifteen. Having been fifteen myself once (apparently a lot of our staff never were) I wonder what the hell people expected of a 15 year old trainee? Did they expect that after two weeks she'd be a full dynamic member of the library team?
A mate of mine is a builder and he assures me that apprentices cost money. That is to say you take on an apprentice and they proceed to break things at a rate of knots, leaving the builders bank account shaky.
At least there is very little danger of that in the library, a trainee costs staff time in training, costs resources like a new computer, a desk and a lot of money in personal phone calls but with luck at the end of the two years you have someone who still wants to work in a library.
15 year olds however don't tend to want to do exactly what they're told whereas older (bun wearing shushing) librarians tend to act like the RSM of my old regiment and expect instant and exact compliance.
I've taken on the role of being the trainer for a couple of days and can say with pride that I'm coming across as the cool guy who is fun to work for. The down side of that is that I'm also failing to actually teach anything or get any work done by said trainee. So I think the attempts to be liked by the trainee are an indication that I'm a sad git with some sort of pathetic need to be popular.
Oh well I'll get over it,
Seems to me that the combination of ADHD librarian and Librarian with a Bun probably averages out?

ADHD is no excuse

For those of you who don't follow Australian Rugby League, let me tell you about this chap. Willie Mason is a footballer (rugby league) whose management have just blamed a whole raft of 'bad' behaviours on ADHD.
Let me just say Ahhhhhhhhhhgggggggggggggh.
As someone with ADHD I would like to say "I have never been involved in rape, group sex (consensual or otherwise) , I have never worn a T-shirt and shorts to a police interview, I have never visited a brothel or... "
whatever.
And if I had done any or all of those things it would be because I did them, it would not be because I have ADHD and this is a poor way for this bloke's manager to try and win public sympathy for a client.

To quote Peter FitzSimons

What league collectively needs is to bloody well grow up. It needs all those in positions of leadership within the game to hammer home the following message: Guys, if you look at your watches you'll find that it's not only 2004 but the sun is shining, and from this point on you will be treated as grown men who will be held accountable for your own actions. No more excuses. No more perpetually acting like 18-year-old louts, away from mummy and daddy for the first time on your first trip to the Gold Coast. It's over. Too many people have loved this game for too long and built it up for too many decades to allow one generation to piss it all up against the wall in one go. So get the message or get out

It's at times like this I can stand proud and say I'm glad I play Rugby Union it's a much better game. Played by gentlemen!

collar and tie

I'm writing this post in response to The Well Dressed Librarian's post regarding the wearing of ties by library staff. It reminds me of an occasion when I as a Library Assistant decided I needed to lift my profile in the organisation and repair some of the damage my poorly regulated mouth had done to my promotional prospects. The solution was obviously, wear a tie. This lead to patrons, suppliers and contractors assuming that I was the senior staff member. On one occasion while out with my boss a supplier bidding for a large contract with us spent the entire time talking to me because I was a bloke in a tie and my boss was 'just a woman'.

However the tie wearing died a death for a while when the library manager in a casual conversation said to me "you don't earn enough to wear a tie".
How is that for a put down? I believe that his intent was to say that as the council didn't see fit to pay Library staff as much as it did engineers why should we have to put up with the discomfort of ties. Which is a fair point. The tie did come back after I graduated and was pressing for a Librarian's Position but now that I'm in the outback I feel overdressed just wearing long pants and the ties are once again just decorations for the inside of my wardrobe.

Take your 'chain mail' and shove it up your...

There should be some way that people who forward stupid emails could be rounded up and beaten with rattan canes. Sort of like public flogging for those of us whose office mates and friends forward all manner of mindless drivel masquerading as public service notices.
In the last few days I have had emails warning me that those with HIV are stuffing used syringes into movie seats (scary lies) that Bill Gates will give me money for forwarding e-mails (greedy lies) that rapists are pretending to be the police and pulling over cars on remote roads for rape and murder, complete with a recommendation that you don't pull over until you've called the local police station on your mobile and confirmed they have a car in your area (stupid lies).
If I was to look at the emails I've had over the last few years, I can say I've had thousands of emails that those who forwarded them on to me should have known better about. Lets face it if you are sending e-mail then you have the net and can therefore check the validity of the email you are forwarding. Or is that just a librarian's way of thinking?
I have now taken to writing snide replies to those who send these to me and I cc it to anyone whose e-mail I can ascertain from the message as someone who has forwarded it on. I've stopped being nice because I figure if people are too stupid to realise they AREN"T GOING TO GET A FREE NOKIA then they're too stupid to understand a subtle reply.
So for those of you reading this who have forwarded on 'chain mail' let me say "you're a moron and don't bloody do it again" If you believe there is a valid reason to forward it on, because we your friends will all die from reusing our PET bottles
check a reliable source first, I use snopes it leaves my hair shiny and manageable plus if you put a link to them on your web page they'll email you $100 and an extra $25 for each person who follows the link and a free mobile phone once you reach 1000 referrals. And each month they give away a Ford Territory to a random user and they track your referrals using a new program from Bill Gates that generates money by turning binary code into a new polymer note need I go on?

caution media whore

I'm whoring the profession around the media today and into next week. I had a TV gig today, then a newspaper photo shoot and next week I have a couple of radio spots. What can a librarian do to impress the media? I don't know but I keep getting invited back so I must be doing something right.
I'm afraid I won't be identifying the media organisations concerned as I'm trying to maintain a level of plausible denyability about this blog. That is I'd like to be able to say (should anyone at work challenge me about this blog) "wow, what a coincidence that guy sounds a lot like me"

So why the press, you mean aside from my obvious charms?
Well it's Library and Information Week, the traditional week for librarians to try and claim they are young and hip. We have an excuse to get off the circ desk and into the TV studio to say witty things like
"please come into the library, if we don't get more members the'll be cutbacks"
or
"We'd like to ask members to stop chroming in the Young Adults Lounge"

you know standard stuff...

The library is all out of Waldorfs

Well, I just discovered that Steiner education is also called Waldorf Education. The parent who came in was so concerned that I didn't know. Still I guess that if you go to a school that teaches you to read and write then you miss out on the finer points of Waldorfing.
The funny thing was that when searching for Waldorf, I kept finding Fawlty Towers videos. I thought of suggesting she watch those, but like most Steiner folk I have come across she seemed in urgent need of a sense of humour injection and I could just see that it was a bad idea.
Wow, I saw it was a bad idea and therefore shut my mouth! I didn't realise it until I typed it, what a breakthrough in my personal development.

I don't know what it is I have against Steiner Education. As an ADHD boy you'd think I'd be all for it, but somehow it seems to bring out the nutbags. I have had many problems with Steiner Folk, wanting resources from the library, no correction, demanding them. Resources that the library budget doesn't stretch too. You know it is so hard to find a polite way to say
"if you sent your kids to a real school they'd have books there".
but I'm not about to spend my budget on sets of readers because the Steiner school doesn't have any.
Nor am I buying texts on the philosophy of Steiner education just because some Steiner parents believe that I should be spruiking for their cause.

vote one Irma Moron

Yes it is that wonderful time in the life of the public librarian. Local Government Elections, an occasion when potential politicians get space in the local paper by big noting themselves and criticising all the people they'll have to work with on the off chance they are elected.
At present we have had one candidate propose closing the library as a cost saving measure and another describe "worse than third world hygiene"
Now it is my guess that this man has never even been to Yorkshire.
I know for a fact that the candidates who have been sounding off about the library aren't members, don't come in here and in short are talking out of their arses!
The real pain in all of this is I'm not permitted to write any sort of reply to the papers to contradict the idiocy, inaccuracy and grandstanding of these wannabes. If fixing all of the towns problems was so simple you could assume the last council would have done it, so should these folk get elected they'll end up disenchanted with the difficulty of actually operating within their charter (and the law) and will end their term by attending one council meeting a year only raising their heads again when it's time to be re-elected.

Confabulation

Gentle readers,
I have learned a new word Confabulation, it is in brief the telling of stories (loosely based on the truth) in order to protect ones self from the negative aspects of ones own behaviour.
Having learned this word I felt it was only fait to admit to being a confabulator. Yes the stories I tell all have a thread of truth in them, but all are seen through ADHD coloured glasses. That is to say at the time these things were happening I was probably not paying attention, rather I was looking out the window at a shiny object. Therefore the stories I write are reconstructions, written as I try to make sense of the things that go on @ my library.

No wait, I've been reading too many books on ADHD. From here on in it will be better for everyone if you just believe that I wouldn't lie to you and every word I present to you is 100% total honesty (or at least a big picture overview, I wouldn't want to worry you with the boring details).

licorice allsort

More on the paint job we've been having in the library. Aside from the fact that my office looks like a juice bar, there is more. The public area looks like we're working inside a giant licorice allsort and the back workroom looks like an aquarium.

The odd thing is the fact that all in all I like it??? Still there's no accounting for taste (or lack there of) Two more days until the public get to come in and complain about how much they hate it

Born to be mild

There is a regular patron here, an old bloke with a chin covered with drool, a shuffling gait and the sort of deep croaking voice one associates with the undead inhabitants of pyramids. In short this chap seems older than Methuselah.

However as we are closed for redecorating I happened to run into him outside the library, near the carpark. I had a nice chat where he admitted he'd forgotten we were closed (I've told him at least four times in the last fortnight and I guess other staff would have spoken to him too as he is a regular).

So why bring this up?
Well, I took his returns off him, said "see you next week" and watched as he CLIMBED BACK ON HIS MOTORBIKE.
Now this bloke has trouble standing when choosing library books but he thinks nothing of riding about town on a little 125?????????????????

I was stunned, always picked him as the type to ride the bus.

My office now looks like a juice bar!

Yes, it is repainting time @ my library (TM) and the colours my office has been painted are lemon and lime, sure they have fancier names on the colour chart (tropical wild and flobadobba or something equally stupid) but I feel like I should be selling shots of wheat grass.

Still the place was in need of a paint and I'm happy to exclude the public from the place for a week. I told a few people today that the new paint scheme will drive me mad as ADHD meets the most uplifting colour scheme outside of a McVomits Family Restaurant and all night toilet stop.
They all rolled their eyes and tried to imagine me becoming more hyper.

WheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeBoingBoing

Still on the positive side I cleaned my desk of 12 months worth of clutter, so when the removalists put my desk back I'll be able to start again.
I did however read that my desk is a mess as a coping mechanism for the ADHD, that is to say
"I fear that out of sight is out of mind therefore I fear filing things out of sight"

Thank God for ADHD self help books, they provide me with so many insights into my behaviour, trouble is that the ADHD means I couldn't care enough to fix the problems.

I'm a character in a Dilbert Cartoon

From: ScottAdams@aol.com [mailto:ScottAdams@aol.com]
Sent: Thursday, 6 May 2004 1:43 PM
To: John
Subject: Re: Dilbert-INDUHVIDUAL QUOTES

Hi,
Thanks for the quote. I appreciate it.
Scott Adams

__________________________

What do you mean he uses the same form reply letter to every looser who emails him?
umm, besides which I can't even remember what part of my work day was so fantastic I felt it needed to be in a cartoon.