Tales From The "liberrycast"

Among existing "liberry" patron archetypes, Conspiracy Guy and Stoner Lad are probably two of the more universal ones.  Every library has them, sometimes in multiples.  We did as well, but there were two specific people that embodied these roles for me.  Alas, by the time I began to write my blog, they had more or less moved on.  But on one perfect night, they afforded me a glimpse of their combined powers of archetypical representation.  (Now who sounds like they're on drugs?)

Those of you who have ever had service through DirecTV probably already know this, but it has been my experience that it sucks ass.  A lot of ass.  Copious amounts of ass.  And not in a good way.   I don't want to say that as a media distribution corporation they're a bunch of dirty liars willing to tell you anything you want to hear to get you to sign up, knowing full well that by the time you discover how much they've been lying to you in the first you'll be past their trial period and locked into an 18 month contract with them and subject to massive fees should I wish to discontinue service... but certainly the employees of DirecTV that I dealt with in just such a situation were in fact all dirty liars willing to tell me anything I wanted to hear to get me to sign up for their service, knowing full well that by the time I discovered just how much they had lied to me, I'd already be under the 18 month contract and subject to massive fees should I wish to discontin

I'm no stranger to anniversaries.  They happen every year.  I've tried to keep secrets about my wife's birthday that have left me stranded and screaming in the middle of an interstate on more than one occasion after she pulls those secrets out of the air, seemingly by means that might even be unholy in nature.  Eventually, I learned that a little bit of preventative maintenance went a long way in terms of keeping said secrets.  Unfortunately, getting my wife to actually pay attention to my desire to keep my big yap shut is sometimes a more difficult process than setting up those secrets to begin with.  You just can't win with her.  Or, in my case, you can't often win.  These are but some of those stories.

Wedding anniversaries: for me they happen every year and this year my 12th anniversary just happens to fall on the day this episode drops, Sunday, February 5. So, because I have a sum total of ZERO football stories from the blog I could slip in here to create a different theme, and because I love my wife (those excuses may not be in the right order), I shall tell an off-blog yet-still-blog-like tale regarding a mystery anniversary concert the wife arranged for me for our 3rd anniversary, way back before Tales from the "Liberry" even began.

I'm no stranger to car troubles.  I've owned cars that have left me stranded and screaming in the middle of an interstate on more than one occasion.  Eventually, I learned that a little bit of preventative maintenance went a long way in terms of keeping me unstranded.  Unfortunately, getting my mechanic to actually pay attention to me and fix the problems I could clearly hear were there was sometimes a more difficult process than dealing with a dead car.  These are but some of those stories.

There are many books that are problematic for libraries.  However, beyond the contractor's manuals, the three major tomes that created the most headaches for us were "The Da Vinci Code," "A Child Called It," and "The Five People You Meet in My Ass."  These were wildly popular books that were perpetually on hold for EVERYONE.  (We just cut out the middle man and automatically put patrons on hold with each new library card issued.  Saved time.)  Yep, these books blew the curve for all others because they were nearly impossible for patrons to read due to their high popularity, and, in one case, high incidence of theft.

Looking at the subjects studied in this week's podcast, I note that they are three separate men who skeezed out or were otherwise nasty to our staff during three separate decades, the 80s, 90s and 00s.  Then, all three returned in the oughts to skeez out a new generation of library assistant, i.e. me.  Join me for the tales of Mr. Creepy Guy, Mr. Butts and the patron known only as Red Alert.

One of the most colorful of our area eccentrics was a lady that we and the rest of the town knew as The Purple Nun.  She was a lady who was always garbed in a purple nun's habit and carried the lifestyle to new and astounding levels.  Hers was a strange and interesting life, which we only learned of via bits and pieces gleaned from the stories told of her by others.  And pretty much everyone had a Purple Nun story to share.  This is mine.

I thought I'd wrapped up all my Christmas-based entries in a nice bow in the 2011 ChristmasCAST, but it turns out I missed a few.  And a glorious few they are!  Among the tales featured this week, we have a holiday tale of complaint and revenge delivered Santa-stle by board member Mrs. Day.  And the tale of a Christmas miracle featuring none other than our formerly nastiest patron ever, Mrs. Carol Satan.  

As much as I complain about nutty patrons, the vast majority of people I had to deal with on a daily basis were amazingly nice and appreciative folk, who would never think to question a fine, let alone whine about it and whose scant few complaints were limited to things like, "I wish the library was open even more often than every day, cause I love it so." Then, just when I was starting to think that humanity was basically decent, if occasionally misunderstood, and I should really look into shutting up with my own petty moaning, someone truly evil, such as the patron I called Mrs. Carol Satan, would arrive and blow the decency curve for everyone. Mrs. Carol Satan's overriding memorable quality, (beyond smelling like a Marlboro factory in heat) was her ability to go from zero to psychotic, lying, bizatch in the space of 2.5 seconds. Not only was she known to frequently lie to our faces concerning matters that were her own damn fault, but she usually did so at full scream, practically slashing at

Most libraries have a compliment of mentally handicapped patrons, but we in fact had one such soul on the staff.  (No, not just Eternal Newbie Greenhorn Ms. S.)   Though he rarely made appearances on the Tales from the "Liberry" blog, our volunteer staff member Lennie was a weekly presence in our lives, though not one without his quirks.  For instance, getting him to leave the building could be a challenge, cause he was built like his literary namesake and could not be easily moved if he did not want to be.  However, we found the answer to that problem and it involves the Village People.

Honkies.  They're a problem, be they people honking their car horns incessantly (or, in my case, to keep from being backed over in Walmart's parking lot), to crazy old white men, to people engaged in honking of a completely different and non mechanical nature.  In honor of it being national honky week (and if it's not, I'm declaring it), this week's podcast is dedicated to the honks we love to hate.

Fact: There are still people in this country--young people, even--whose lives do not revolve around the internet.  These are people who not only don't check their email every day, they don't even HAVE email.  It's kind of refreshing, when you think about it.  However, it can also be VERY frustrating when those same people turn up and decide to jump whole hog into it in the course of one lesson.  It can be difficult to explain the concept of the world wide web to an internet neophyte when they are still trying to climb the hurdle of basic computer concepts.  It is even more difficult to explain all of the above to a person who is aggressively ignoring everything you tell them. That used to be my job.