Files of an Unorganized Librarian

and now .... the end is near

2010-03-02T15:47:00.000-05:00

dear beloved super awesome blog readers. where to begin? i will be resigning from my post as children's librarian exrtaordinaire and will be running off to south america with my beloved bolshevik to go on zany adventures.

say what?!

yeah, you heard me. so with that i bid you adieu. but do not fret my lovelies ... i will leave you with another blog so that you may follow my hijinks.

xoxo
miss dewey decimal

things you shouldn't have to say in a library

2010-01-23T12:10:00.000-05:00

me: (speaking to assistant manager) there's a guy playing guitar over there, do you want to tell him to stop or should i?
am: where?
me: over there (pointing to the computer/reading area). you can't miss him, he's the one with the guitar.

just another saturday at the library

grrrrr

2010-01-20T08:50:00.000-05:00

patron: habla espanol?
me: solamente un poquito
patron: que?
me: UN POQUITO
patron: no otra personas trabajando? (looking around at the injustice of having to deal with an english speaker in new york city)
me: no. solamente yo.
patron: (looks me up and down, then rolls her eyes) no.

and then dear blog readers ... she walked away. yup, after conversing with me in spanish about how i don't know much spanish she decided i was not worthy of helping her. yeah, thanks.

letter writing week

2010-01-12T22:37:00.000-05:00

today we had a letter writing program, in honor of letter writing week. we're doing something this month called Every Day is a Holiday, and we are celebrating every weird random holiday we can find. bean day, kazoo day, penguin appreciation day, etc. anyway, told the kids we would be writing letters to famous people, and that hopefully said famous people would write back to us. several times i had to explain that michael jackson would be a bad choice because he can no longer read or respond to correspondence. urgh. anyway, i encouraged them to think of living people to write to, and then ask them thoughtful questions so that they would have something to respond to. here's my favorite letter:

Dear Barack Obama,

You are an awesome president. I'm so concerned on global warming. What are you gonna do about global warming?

Love you, awesome president!
From:

P.S. Say hi to your family from me!

things i don't need ... stupid donations

2010-01-06T21:15:00.000-05:00

fodor's boston 1988. yes, i appreciate the spirit of giving and all that, but really? what do you think i can do with this?

now that i think about it, the bolshevik and i were planning on traveling back in time to 1988 and visiting boston. thank god i have this book! i'm sure many of the patrons here intend on transversing the space time continuum, so that for their next weekend getaway they can re-live the glory which was bean town 20 years ago. this book is a life-saver.

p.s. i really like the old school fodor's logo they have here ... maybe i could ride that rocket they've used as an apostrophe and take it all the way back to late '80s.

I HAVE THE POWERRRRRR!

2009-12-29T15:13:00.003-05:00

little girl: (holding a spongebob squarepants book) what level is this?
me: we don't have levels here. what grade are you in?
little girl: third
me: then you can read that book
girl: (eyes wide with excitement) yay, thanks!

and miss dewey decimal saves the day by allowing kids to read books that are interesting!

hanukkah fairy stops traffic at times square

2009-12-27T10:15:00.004-05:00

so i realized i never shared with you my finished hanukkah fairy costume (with faux fur jacket!). sadly, i didn't get a chance to take a picture of the awesome felt menorah oh-so-cleverly glued onto the back, but i think you get the idea.

some costume details to look for:
* actual dreidels sewn into the skirt of my dress
* jewish star "pasties" glued onto ... ahem .... well you can guess where
* blue fairy wand
*hanukkah "dingle hoppers" headband
* jewish stars puff painted on dress to cover booze spilled in previous years ;)

oh, the crafy craftiness knows no bounds.

reading level riot

2009-12-26T08:32:00.006-05:00

before i start my rant let me tell you that i do in fact know some teachers personally, and they are not retarded. i assume these "non-retarded" teachers are not the minority, but evidence has proven the contrary.

so it has come to my attention that someone at the local school is dissatisfied with the library. they work with parents and say that a lot of parents have been complaining that they are unable to find the books that are on their child's "level." complaining to the school, because it is the school that gives the assignments, not us.

now, these reading levels are made up of letters which determine what books the child "can" read. we do not use levels here. when a kid comes up and says "what book would be good for me?" we ask the kid a series of questions and then pick out books for that child. OR , another way to put it is that instead of just pigeonholing a child into a meaningless system, we give each child individual attention and help them find a book which is appropriate and interesting to them. this is how it has been in public libraries since the dawn of children's literature. if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

so this person from the school was complaining that the public library should be organized not by dewey decimal system, or by genre, or author ... oh no! instead the library which serves the ENTIRE community, should be organized by the local school's reading level system. of course! let's cater to just you, local school! forget the community as a whole!

it was even suggested that the school would send help so that we could re-arrange our collection of tens of thousands of books to their liking. then i helpfully suggested that if they want a library that caters to them, maybe they should work on their own school library. surely, it would make sense if the school wants a library that caters to the school's reading level system, why not do this at the school library. see where i'm going here? but alas, the school library doesn't have all the books that ours does. so instead of them working to improve their collection, they figure it will be easier and cheaper to just mess with us. thanks!

you might be asking yourself, "self, what's so bad about reading levels?" well i'll tell you. reading levels are not inherently evil. but here at the library it isn't our job to teach kids how to read or to give them boring reading assignments. our job is to foster a love of reading. so if a kid picks up a book that interests them, we encourage them to read it. maybe it's a graphic novel, maybe it's a magazine, maybe it's a book that's a little too easy for them but they'd enjoy reading it. we don't care! we just want people to read something that they like reading. then later, if they want to read something more difficult, they can read that too.

imagine if adults had reading levels ... i would love to go up to someone and say, "oh i'm sorry sir, you can't read that new dan brown book. the lost symbol is totally below your reading level. here's a copy of the canterbury tales instead." or maybe next time i see a nice old lady picking up a danielle steele novel i should rip it out of her hands and give her madame bovary instead. you catch my drift?

and a few times i have actually encountered kids who wanted to read a more advanced book, but were afraid to since it wasn't on their level. can you imagine? some kid picks up harry potter and then finds out that it's a level above him so he puts it back and picks out something that is less interesting to him. great! what a way to encourage reading!

now, just to further complicate things ... many non-teachers believe that reading levels are a bit of a scam created by the publishing companies. for instance, they sell these "leveled" books in bulk to the schools, and many of the titles are not available for separate purchase by libraries or other individuals. also, many of the titles which are on these reading level lists are actually out of print, and therefore can no longer be purchased.

in the end, i was told i should "meet up" with this school person and "work it out." but i am a bit unclear about what there is to "work out." i think in the meantime, i will just stick to recommending quality age appropriate books to the children. like i'm a librarian or something.

why miss dewey decimal loves xmas

2009-12-24T10:06:00.002-05:00

this may just be my year to finally drive a tractor!

poetry is always a crocodile

2009-12-10T21:17:00.001-05:00

today we had a program which i created called "reading rocks." no, it is not reading a rock, but an affirmation that the art of reading totally rocks. yeah!

in "reading rocks" i will typically read to the kids, usually ghost stories or funny short stories or riddles, etc and then we will do a small craft. it's not the most popular program, but i usually get a handful of kids, which i think makes it worthwhile. there will be reading in the library, damnit!

so today i read the kids shel silverstein poems. turns out shel silverstein actually visited one of the local schools! who knew?! i am slightly less disillusioned with the public school system now!

anyway ... a lot of the times these poems have a little "twist" at the end, so often if the kids aren't paying attention i have to explain what happened in the poem. so i read the following poem about a crocodile with a toothache, aptly named "crocodile toothache:"

The Crocodile
Went to the dentist
And sat down in the chair,
And the dentist said, "Now tell me, sir,
Why does it hurt and where?"
And the Crocodile said, "I'll tell you the truth,
I have a terrible ache in my tooth,"
And he opened his jaws so wide, so wide,
The the dentist, he climbed right inside,
And the dentist laughed, "Oh isn't this fun?"
As he pulled the teeth out, one by one.
And the Crocodile cried, "You're hurting me so!
Please put down your pliers and let me go."
But the dentist laughed with a Ho Ho Ho,
And he said, "I still have twelve to go-
Oops, that's the wrong one, I confess,
But what's one crocodile's tooth more or less?"
Then suddenly, the jaws went SNAP,
And the dentist was gone, right off the map,
And where he went one could only guess...
To North or South or East or West...
He left no forwarding address.
But what's one dentist, more or less?

so at the end of the poem i ask, "what happened to the dentist?" and one very bright kid said "he got eaten."

"that's right," i said, "the crocodile ate the dentist."

and then some of the kids that have trouble listening were all, "ohmygod! the crocodile ate the dentist!" better late than never folks.

so then this bright kid says, "that's what always happens in poems."

"what always happens in poems?" i ask.

"crocodiles," he tells me. "crocodiles are always eating people in poems. duh, it's so obvious."

indeed, smart kid, indeed. too much of the canon of american poetry is littered with crocodile assaults.

the usps hates hanukkah

2009-12-05T08:43:00.003-05:00

you may or may not know that the holidays are a very important time for me. why you ask? because there is one very special day in december when several hundred people dressed as santa claus form a flash mob in new york city and spend about 12 hours bar hopping and causing chaos. oh santacon, how i love thee.

as a cultural jew, i'm sure you can imagine that i have scruples with dressing up as santa (or dressing up as a "slutty santa" as many of my female peers do) so instead i have invented my own fab character ... the hanukkah fairy. my costume consists of a blue fairy costume that i have adorned with dredyls and jewish stars and all sorts of decorations. every year i try to improve upon this costume, adding a blue wig, a wand, etc. often i will hand out hanukkah stickers or chocolate gelt to children i meet on the street. i am SO much cooler than santa.

now, as you can see from the picture here, this costume is a bit slinky and does not provide the warmth that a santa suit does. luckily the last time i participated in santacon it was unseasonably warm. i doubt i will be that lucky again. so i decided this year i would add a nice cropped white faux fur jacket. and i figured i would decorate the jacket with a huge felt menorah on the back and maybe a dreydl on the front. i was thinking letterman jacket style, but made sassy for jews. anyhoo, i found a jacket on ebay and purchased it. i have been waiting oh-so-patiently for it to arrive at the library (i no longer have packages sent to my house since my last post office incident)

but then it never came and when i inquired where it was i learned that the seller had sent it to my home instead of my listed shipping address ... so again we delve into the horrors of the frightfully inefficient williamsburg post office.

1. i call the 800 number and they say they are unclear where the package is ... it is "out for delivery" since 2 days ago, but there is no sign that a delivery attempt has been made. sure, i can see why it would take 2 days to drive the package from the post office to my house. i mean, it is like 10 blocks away. a complaint was filed since apparently, this is contradictory to several different protocols.
2. i was given the direct number to my post office to call and see if i could arrange to pick up said package. (this will involve me missing work to go to the post office since they have shitty hours)
3. i called twice and got no answer. not an answering machine or a busy signal. just no answer.
4. i called a third time and i spoke to someone who immediately put me on hold. after being on hold for 15 minutes i hung up.
5. i called again, a fourth time! and again was immediately put on hold without so much as giving someone my tracking number. this time i waited 20 minutes before i gave up.
6. i called a third time and was quite bitchy and finally i got someone to agree to look for my package. of course, she wouldn't look for it right then. she said she would look for it and then call me if they didn't find it. then i stated that i wanted to come in and pick it up, but i'm not going to miss work just to go there and have them tell me that they don't know where it is. (this happened several times during the post office blues fiasco). so then she agreed to call me either way, if she found it or didn't find it. likely story. i will not be holding my breath for this phone call.

so sadly, the future of the hanukkah fairy hangs in the balance. will i be able to get my coat and not freeze my ass of? only time and incompetant postal workers will tell. if anyone has any suggestions where i can get a cute but inexpensive bolero type shrug faux fur coat please let me know.

an easy reader a day keeps illiteracy away

2009-12-04T08:17:00.000-05:00

today while routing in some books, i became re-energized in my plan to read one spanish easy reader a day. certainly, if i read a book a day in spanish it will help me to understand spanish better. no? but instead of an easy reader i couldn't help but read "if you give a pig a pancake" in spanish. what will happen if le das una panqueque a una cerdita? yo no se!

why must i improve my spanish, you ask? where might i be off to next, you ponder? well, my dear beloved poor forsaken blog readers i cannot tell you that just yet. but i will say this: when bolshevics wine and dine you on your one year anniversary, asking you in all earnestness if you will please do them the honor of running away with them ... the answer is always yes. si? si!

of course, i shall miss mi amor el bolshevik as he has just informed me that he will be going to panama for the holidays. ay dios mio!

keepin' it old school

2009-11-21T08:50:00.000-05:00

so i just couldn't resist bringing this clever cleverness to your attention ... another highlight of the party was the "take your picture with edward" photobooth (faces have been changed to protect the innocent).

now, i did this at our last twilight party and someone asked "how'd you do that miss dewey decimal? did you use photoshop?" no. i don't know how to use such complicated things as photoshop. i bought a poster of edward and bella and then cut bella's head out and encouraged kids to put their face in the hole where bella's face once was. anyway, it works quite well and even the boys enjoyed it once i explained that they could just make scary goofy faces. oh, there is no end to my awesomeness.

it's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life

2009-11-21T07:48:00.001-05:00

ok beloved blog readers, i am back! (don't believe a word i say) no, really, i am. i am totally going to write this blog again. i swear. really.

so yesterday in honor of everyone's favorite vampire werewolf love-triangle, i threw a New Moon party at the library. let me tell you, throwing these parties is hard work. and sadly, a lot of the work needs to be done on my own time. like baking these "vampire bites" sugar cookies. get it, it's like they were bitten by a vampire? so clever.

so two nights this week instead of finishing the first draft of my novel (so close!), i spent preparing for this party. which leads me to believe that if i didn't have a full time job, i would totally have enough free time to do what i need to do to get my job done. huh? dizzies the mind, doesn't it?

the first night of non-writing i spent baking. however, i was very efficient and i spent the baking downtime listing items to sell on amazon. i am trying to rid myself of unnecessary items and live a more monkish lifestyle. except with lots of drinking and fab outfit changes.

then the second night i spent making iron-ons so that i could create twilight themed t-shirts as prizes for the kids. these actually turned out really cool. but time consuming.

the day of the party was total chaos. the devoted teen helpers we have here at happy shiny new library were all at meetings or otherwise engaged, so it was just me and my fab co-librarian in crime. we had a bella scavenger hunt, in which the kids were released into the library to solve clues all based on books that bella reads in the series (bella is a reader, i'll have you know.) do you know what i learned from this dear blog readers? the children have idea where we keep the books. and even when i was following them around giving them extra hints they were pretty abismal at finding stuff. even when it was right in front of them and i was screaming, "hot! hot! you're right there! look right in front of you!"

we had several other games, like a bella bandage wrap up relay and an unwrap bella's birthday present "hot potato" game. and lastly we also played Twilight Scene It?

now, you are probably asking your self "self, how did miss dewey decimal possibly afford to buy Twilight Scene It? on her measely budget?" well, the answer astute blog reader is that i didn't. i bought it with my OWN MONEY. but here is the clever clever part. since it has only been played one time and it is oh so perfectly still in tact, i am going to try to "flip it" on eBay! maybe you would like to purchase it? it was been touched by your beloved miss dewey d! if you buy it, maybe i'll make you a special crafty card or something to show my appreciation.

two months of silence and now this

2009-11-11T14:27:00.005-05:00

here's what i would look like if i were a mermaid made out of a popsicle stick. enjoy!

i'm leaving on a jet plane

2009-09-18T06:48:00.001-05:00

it's been so long since i've complained about my general maladies. hasn't it? i know you all are dying to hear about some maladies. well here goes ...

first off, with the rigorous summer reading schedule i really wore myself out. all those programs, and then us being down a manager ... it was tough. and for the past two months i've been getting sick fortnightly (i love the word "fortnight") ... so at first i tried to rest in my down time and take it easy. this of course was very boring and i missed out on lots of fun summer activities. and wouldn't you know it? it didn't even work anyway. and it was so boring.

so last weekend i decided i would ride in the nyc 20th century bike tour, even though i was recovering from illness. of course, i decided that since i was not in tip top shape the best thing for me to do would be to sleep late. so my friends began the ride at 7 am up in central park at 110th street, while i slept all cozy cuddly with the bolshevik. then at around 9:30 i got a phone call from miss fifi who had made it to prospect park already, and was politely asking me where the hell i was. oh miss fifi! so i finally emerged from bed, bid the bolshevik adieu, and got on my bike. by the time i got to propect park the riders were long gone, but then i booked it to coney island in record time and was able to reunite with miss fifi at marine park! i am SO good. and then we had a lovely time riding off into the sunset together. all in all, i rode 40 miles of the 55 mile ride (fifi rode even longer since she had riden about 10 miles just to get to the start line!)

but then dear blog readers, as i was tasting the sweet taste of success, i began to feel this strange pain in my knee. oh the pain! i've never been injured before due to sporty sporty-ness. ouch. even my free finish-line massage didn't help. so i've kinda been hobbling around ever since, applying the tiger balm and keeping it elevated and all that.

so then this week, my stupid sore throat came back AND i was hobbling around and it was all very sad. but the show must go on!

so yesterday we did something quite fab, despite my maladies ... at boy's club i decided to have a paper plane competition. i printed up a bunch of different paper plane templates from the internets, and set them up at various parts of the room. i gave the boys about 30 minutes to make as many planes as they wanted, telling them they would be judged on flight distance as well as plane style. so they had a fine time making the planes and coloring them with markers yada yada yada. i noticed a lot of them had some trouble following the basic directions, the trouble being that they refused to read them. so i think we will do more things where they have to read and follow directions. then we had the flight competitions where they threw their planes onto the "runway" and i placed little masking tape pieces where each plane landed. it was very exctiting and our top winners all received prizes. afterwards one of the boys came up to me and said he had so much fun and he didn't even mind that he didn't win a prize. ah, super sweet.

oh, and on the subject of planes i will be going on a TWO WEEK vacation very soon to argentina, accompanied by my beloved bolshevik. ay ay ay!

fall is here ... thank god

2009-09-09T20:21:00.000-05:00

that's right ... today is the first day of school. yay! the children are no longer here 8 hours a day. yay! oh sweet relief. guess what? it's quiet in here! like a library or something.

let's see my poor forsaken blog readers ... what has been going on?

i went to honduras to visit my beloved bolshevik for a few days. that was lovely. i will not summarize it for you, but i will instead quote the bolshevik .... "that image of the man at pico bonito hotel, walking up to us as we arrived and offering us rum drinks in coconuts ... that will stay with me until the day i die." indeed, bolshevik. indeed.

also, the manager of happy new shiny library has sadly retired. we all loved her so. and now we are awaiting the arrival of a new manager. this is a little frightening since we do not know who said manager will be. shhhhhh. it's a surprise! i typically love surprises. but not this one.

anyhoo, now that it is fall we get to go back to our regularly scheduled programs, which means anywhere between 1 to 3 programs a day instead of the intense summer schedule of 3 to 5 programs a day. phew!

our highlight this month is the girls club & boys club. do not let the name fool you. it is not "boys and girls club." the boys and the girls will not be mingling. instead we do girly activities with the girls and boy stuff with the boys. we are imposing strict gender roles! but it's so fun. the kids really get into excluding each other. is that wrong?

anyway, yesterday at girls club we made these fab bracelets out of toilet paper tubes. we had some fun fabrics that we got from Materials from the Arts and we used them to cover the toilet paper tubes (you can see how this was accomplished with the bracelet on the right). then we glued on all sorts of bling. oh how i love bling! we used glitter foam shapes, beads, rhinestones, feathers, sequins ... anything that could be glued down. i must say that i had insisted on purchasing a bunch of glue guns with our grant money, and it was one of my most useful acquisitions.

and that's the story for now.

awesome and exhausted

2009-08-13T20:30:00.001-05:00

so i've been fighting off this cold for the past few weeks and because the library is short-staffed and we have anywhere between 3 to 5 programs a day, i have been working non-stop. in my free time i lie down a lot and try to rest and obsess about not getting more ill. it's all very tiring.

but this week we did two very cool things.

cool thing #1 - we had a teen Name that MP3 competition. now, i have about 7,000 songs on my iTunes, so i figured it wouldn't be too hard to come up with a sizeable list of songs that the young whipper snappers might know. and the bolshevik is always sneaking hip hop onto my iPod, so i figured i was all set. but alas, that was not the case. i looked over my extensive music library and realized that i have quite an oscure collection of music. why, certainly inner city teens would know such bands as Dirty Projectors, and Belle and Sebastian, and Fleet Foxes and Sleater-Kinney. who doesn't know them? so then i had a little panic about this program totally bombing if the teens didn't bring their own iPods filled with music that is actually popular.

but lo and behold the teens actually brought in their iPods and they all got very excited to pick out songs and try to stump the other participants. any time someone got one right we would throw them a hershey's kiss or one of those little "fun size" candy bars you give out at halloween.

then, every so often i would pick a song from my own iPod and try to challenge them and expand their minds with my musical trivia. for instance, i gave them the following hint: this song was the first ever video played on MTV. well that got them excited. of course they had no idea who the buggles were but they found it interesting all the same.

cool thing #2: today we had our teen iron chef competition in which 4 teams competed to make the best smoothie. we provided them with all sorts of ingredients, and told them they would be judged on the following criteria:
1. taste
2. attractiveness
3. creativity
4. viscocity (we did this just to teach them a new word. it's a library!)
pretty much, instead of looking at the options and picking several ingredients that actually go together, most teams just took a bit of everything. which was ok, but after a while i had a kind of icky feeling like i was filled with smoothie. not pleasant. but a good time was had by all, and the winning team actually did make a good smoothie.

now i am exhausted again, but i must press on and bake cookies for tomorrow's rock star party. and then saturday i am off to honduras to visit my bolshevik. ahhhhh mi amor.

the ultimate visual dictionary

2009-08-12T22:01:00.000-05:00

i was going through our big ol' stack of donated books, and i came across this visual dictionary. now, i love it that people want to donate books to us. it's the thought that counts, and that is very thoughtful. oh shucks. but it is important to remember dear blog readers that "donating to the library" should not be synonymous with "throwing out the trash." i don't need your outdated encyclopedias, archaic textbooks, or old national geographic magazines (unless they have cool pictures for collages) .

now, there are several key ways (beyond looking at the publication date) to see if a reference book is outdated. does it make mention to such modern labor-saving devices as computers, cell phones, or the internets? (have i ever told you the story of my grandfather's old dictionary from the 40s that listed the definition for computer as "one who computes." see? useless.)

anyhoo, upon looking up the word "computer" in the index of this book i happened across an entry for "clitoris." say what?! i thought this was a kids book. well ... i had to check it out. get your mind out of the gutter, dear blog readers, it was totally clinical. although, surprisingly unclear if i wasn't already quite familiar with that portion of human anatomy.

alas, we shan't be adding this book to the collection. why? not because of a clitoral pictoral. but because in the "visual definition" of a computer, there is detailed depiction of an external CD-ROM player. seriously people, what am i supposed to do with that?

Gidget Bubble Butt hearts Buttercup Lizard Buns

2009-08-08T22:29:00.002-05:00

yesterday we had our captain underpants party. we've been having crazy theme parties every week for the kids. we typically get about 100 participants each time. it is absolute chaos. but the kids like it.

anyway, at this party we made capes and silly flip books. then we played games involving tossing a pair of tidy whities into a toilet bowl or hot potato using rolls of toilet paper. but my favorite thins we did, was the captain underpants name change game. i must give credit where credit is due, this was totally the idea of my fab librarian partner in crime. she printed out the algorithm (found below) and as each child entered the party we figured out their new name and gave them a name tag with said silly name on it. if you cannot guess from the title of this post, i am none other than Gidget Bubble Butt.

anyway, it was quite amusing to announce these silly new names to the kids as they entered. one little girl came up to me and told me her name. i declared "your new name is Buttercup Banana Breath"
"no," she said quietly, "my name is christina" (names have been changed to protect the innocent).
"i know," i said, "but your new name for the party is Buttercup Banana Breath."
"my name is christina."
we went through this a couple times and finally a little girl behind her explained in spanish that we were giving out fun new make believe names ... and thus Buttercaup Banana Breath took her name tag and wore it with pride. the end.

To Make Your Own Captain Underpants Name:

Use the first letter of your first name to determine your new first name:
A = stinky B = lumpy C = buttercup D = gidget E = crusty F = greasy G = fluffy H = cheeseball
I = chim-chim J = poopsie K = flunky L = booger M = pinky N = zippy O = goober P = doofus
Q = slimy R = loopy S = snotty T = icky U = dorkey V = squeezit W = oprah X = skipper
Y = dinky Z = zsa-zsa

Use the first letter of your surname to determine your new middle name:
A = diaper B = toilet C = giggle D = bubble E = girdle F = barf G = lizard H = waffle I = cootie
J = monkey K = potty L = liver M = banana N = rhino O = burger P = hamster Q = toad
R = gizzard S = pizza T = gerbil U = chicken V = pickle W = chuckle X = tofu Y = gorilla
Z = stinker

Use the last letter of your surname to determine your new surname:
A = head B = mouth C = face D = nose E = tush F = breath G = pants H = shorts I = lips
J = honker K = butt L = brain M = tushie N = chunks O = hiney P = biscuits Q = toes R = buns
S = fanny T = sniffer U = sprinkles V = kisser W =squirt X = humperdinck Y = brains Z = juice

a budding romance OR i like to party

2009-08-07T20:50:00.006-05:00

a man, tall dark and handsome, walks into the library (have you heard this one?) he's asking for Oz on dvd. i tell him we don't have it, as i am aware that we don't own any tv shows on dvd at this particular branch. then he repeats it like i am hard of hearing or maybe retarded.

guy: oz ... it was on hbo.
me: yes. i know what oz is. we don't have it here.

then he asks me if i can look at other branches for him. so i look around and it seems like the seasons he's looking for are all lost and stolen. this is what happens with popular dvds. i suggest that he go to one of our larger libraries that appears to have the dvds on the shelf.

guy: [staring at me all creepy without saying anything]
me: yeah, so ... sorry about that. you should really just try that other library.
guy: [strange blank stares]
guy: do you ever go into manhattan?
me: um ... sometimes. [fiddling with papers on my desk, knowing where this is going]
guy: yeah. they have good clubs there.
me: i guess.
guy: you go out there to party, right? [nods head in creepy fashion like he's picturing something very enjoyable in his mind]
me: eh.
guy: yeah you look like the type. you like to party.
me: hmmm.
guy: you married?
me: no, but i am in a relationship. (if only the bolshevik would make an honest woman of me)
guy: with someone?
me: yeah (no, i am in a relationship by myself. duh.)
guy: you have beautiful eyes.
me: yeah so you can just try that other library then.
guy: [more extra creepy stares]
me: [stares at computer and prays guy leaves]
guy: i guess i'll be going then
me: good luck

why? i ask you. why?

que pasa

2009-08-05T19:44:00.001-05:00

oh dear blog readers, i am lucky if there are any of you left out there. it is quite the shame how i have forsaken you. so what's been going on?

we've had a crazy busy summer here at happy shiny new library. there are no less than a gajillion children here and it is quite overwhelming. we have weekly theme parties where we typically have attendance of about 100. i am quite looking forward to our "rock star" party next week where we will play playstation karaoke. yay! we've made some awesome crafts, had a videogame day, had an author visit. good stuff.

you may or may not know that the bolshevik has absconded to honduras as bolsheviks often do. he is studying the spanish and i am quite jealous because
1. i would like to live in honduras for a month and have hondurans do my laundry.
2. i really need to improve my spanish speaking abilities so that i can better communicate with the patrons of happy new shiny library.

so today i am cataloging some of the spanish easy reader books. for those of you who are unfamiliar, easy readers are books meant for K-2nd grade kids and typically only have a few easy words per page, often accompanied by big pictures. so now i am reading the spanish easy readers in hopes to improve my spanish. i have learned about the life cycle of a bear, or an oso as it is called en espanol. i have learned how to get ready for school. soy listo para ir a la escuela! but my favorite is this book about telling the truth (shown above). now i wish i could get a picture of this first page ... there are about 5 kids, all on scooters, and they have their arms crossed and are making very angry faces. they're like a little gang out 7 year olds. very intimidating. and in big block letters next to them it says DECIMOS LA VERDAD! that's right. this gang only tells the truth and all you liars out there better watch our of you will feel their scooter wrath.

and that's my day here at la biblioteca.

belize adventures days 4 and 5 summary

2009-08-02T14:27:00.005-05:00

how late is this post? SO late.

here's the gist ... day 4 was my birthday and we spent the morning at mayan ruins. nothing says "turning 31" like mayan ruins. we wound up buying a full day tour so after the ruins we return to the hotel for lunch and then our driver returns to take us cave tubing. i use the term driver loosely. don't be too impressed. it was just some dude in a beat-up van.

we are taken to these caves that have rivers running through them and we sit in tubes while we leisurely bob along inside a huge cave. it was pretty cool. and we had little headlights like miners.

then on the way back we have our THIRD transportational break down. our little van just up and died on the highway. so then it's me and the bolshevik and our driver standing around on the side of the road. we're at least 45 minutes from the hotel so there's no hope of being rescued quickly. so we're making small talk with our driver and then i see a little shack down the road that seems to be selling refreshments. so i get some chips and sodas (and a water for our driver) and the bolshevik takes some pictures and in the end we're having a fine time on the side of the road.

then our driver flags down a pick-up truck coming from the opposite direction of our hotel and tells us to get in. he says he'll wait for a tow. so we get in this pickup truck and there's an older man driving, then his wife in the passenger seat holding a baby, then an even older woman who didn't talk much, and two more kids (about 7 years old or so) in the back. so we squeeze in and all the kids are piled up on top of various adults, and they're showing us their various toys and balloons. turns out they're coming from a carnival. needless to say, this was a bit awkward. the bolshevik and i exchange glances trying to say "who the hell are these people?"

we make small talk telling the gentleman about what sights we've seen and how much we like belize, etc etc. about 20 minutes into the conversation i ask them if they live in san ignacio, which is the town we were staying in. "we live in the hotel!" the man says, "it's my hotel!" if you didn't pick up on this plot twist, we had been picked up by the owners of the hotel while they were having a day with their grandkids. so then we tell them how nice the hotel is and what a lovely time we're having despite our ride breaking down. we ask them for a restaurant recommendation, and the bolshevik adds "it's miss dewey decimal's birthday. we wanted to go somewhere nice." and then there were many ooohs and ahhs about it being my birthday and they asked if we wanted to stop for ice cream. as much as the bolshevik and i love ice cream we kind of wanted to get back at this point. so they gave us several names of places, even offering to call several establishments for us to make sure they were open that evening. they were super nice.

so we get back and have a little lie down in the hammock and take showers and all that. then we go to the lobby and our driver is back and he offers to drive us to dinner. isn't that sweet? so we have a lovely dinner in this little local place. then we go to a nearby bar and chat with some locals. when they find out it's my birthday they make me a long island iced tea, since i had told them i'm from long island. the bolshevik has something called a "panty ripper" which is supposed to alleviate women from the burden of panties. we make a quick stop at the casino where my man wins about $15 and then we head back to the hotel for late night drunken pool antics. all in all, it was an excellent birthday.

the next day, the final day of our trip, we go to caves branch river for the "black hole drop tour." we drive into the jungle and pull up to this beautiful lodge in the middle of all sorts of lush wildllife. we are rushed onto a tour bus (we were a bit late) and are taken on a hiking trek into the jungle. we do a pretty intense hike for an hour and then we get to the top of a mountain that has a huge sinkhole in the center.

now, i knew we'd be "dropping" into a "black hole" but i really had no idea what that entailed. tuns out we are harnessed up, and we are supposed to lower ourselves off the mountain and down the 350 foot drop to the bottom of the gorge. i am a gal who likes adventure but i will not lie to you dear blog readers. i was terrified. it had been raining so the rocks were all muddy and slick. the bolshevik goes first, slipping a bit on the rocks and scaring me even more. he makes it to the bottom (or so i am told because there's no way to actually see what's going on off the side of the cliff) ... and then it is my turn.

i am strapped in and i start slowly backing up off the side of the cliff. i get to the very very edge of the ledge and then i am paralyzed with fear. my feet are slipping off the rocks and i have no where to go now. it's just open air. i look up the young belizean man who is lowering me down and i say, "no! i've changed my mind! i don't want to do this!"
"it's okay," he says. "just calm down. take a minute to relax. you can do it."
"NO! PULL ME UP! RIGHT NOW! I AM SERIOUS!"
"just stay there for a moment. you're almost there. this is the worst part. take your time."
"NO! I WILL NOT! PULL ME UP! NOW! I WON'T GO!"
and then he began to pull me up and i clung for dear life onto the mountain, scrambling back up to safety.
i might want to mention that there was another couple with us and they had to witness this fiasco. i looked at them and said, "good luck!"
the two of them went, and when the girl was halfway down she shouted up to me "it's not that bad once you get off the mountain!"
so i decide to try again, realizing that i would not be able to live with myself if i don't do this, and that i cannot make these nice men hike back down for hours when i can get to the bottom in a matter of minutes.

so i go it again ... and again i make it to the very very end of the ledge and i am paralyzed and i look up to the nice belizean man and i tell him i don't know what to do and he explains to me i just have to step off the mountain now. oh, that's it? just step off the side of a mountain. no biggie.

so i step back off of the mountain ... of course the harness grabs me and then i am sitting in the harness like it's a little hanging seat and then it really was kind of nice. so i slowly lowered myself down the mountain passing by tree tops and flowering vines and it was all quite lovely. i make it to the bottom and i am beaming with pride that i was able to face my fear and do this. i run over to the bolshevik shouting "i did it! i did it!" and he looks at me and says, "yeah ... good thing you did or you wouldn't have been representin' brooklyn." ahhh the bolshevik, always looking at the bigger picture.

we hiked for several more hours. by the end we were exhausted and covered with dirt and bug bites. it looked like we had been through a war. we got back to the hotel and rinsed off and then lounged by the pool drinking tequila sunrises.

dinner was served buffet style and everyone at the hotel ate together. we wound up sitting with a few older couples. one guy introduces himself as ian and i remember that i saw a sign that the hotel was owned by a man named ian. someone at the table asks "are you the ian anderson?" and i realize that we are dining with the hotel owner and his wife. now, suddenly the conversation goes towards jethro tull and i put two and two together that ian anderson is a member of jethro tull. how cool to be in a rock band and then build a hotel in the jungle. we chat about nyc and ian tells us how much he loves katz deli and a lovely time is had by all.

when we arrive back in nyc i tell everyone how we met ian from jethro tull. "was he the flutist?" people ask. and i tell them i have no idea. eventually, i retell this story in the presence of the bolshevik and he interrupts me. "he wasn't in jethro tull," he says, "he just had the same name as the flutist from jethro tull." so it turns out i had been spreading all sorts of lies about staying in a hotel owned by a member of jethro tull.

and that was our vacation to belize. repeat ... we did not meet any of the members of jethro tull.

the end.

finally.

what you've all been waiting for

2009-06-30T23:23:00.003-05:00

oh yes, it is howler monkey video time.

(in the beginning of this video you can hear our knowledgeable guide, robert, "rile up" the alpha male by making monkey sounds)

great crafts ... less funding

2009-06-29T07:54:00.000-05:00

this is the last week before summer reading truly begins. we'll be having about 3-4 programs a day and it will be complete and utter chaos. in this calm before the storm we're getting everything ready, and i decided to make a Gock prototype. Gocks are goth sock puppets, and we will be making them with the teens. i've heard about gocks for years now and i've always wanted to make them. i'm pretty pleased with the way mine turned out, and it was quite cheap to do.

i was able to buy a couple of 6 packs of socks at the dollar store for about $4 each (which is a good deal since that's 12 sock puppets per pack. i bought socks in black and turquoise). then, i used several buttons to make the eyes (we have a whole load of buttons just lying around). i purposefully used different sizes to give it a "freaked out" kind of look. i used a shell for the nose (which we also just have lying around), then i glued on a couple of feathers for eye brows (feathers purchased from oriental trading). i made a mohawk out of funky yarn that was also purchased at the dollar store (for only $1 per skein!) then i made a choker necklace out of some trim i got for free from materials for the arts. i wanted to goth it up a bit more so i used safety pins to make an eyebrow piercing and a tongue piercing (tongue is made out of felt). all these items were attached using a glue gun, but they could be sewn on or glued with craft glue.

admit it, this is a pretty awesome gock. you know you're jealous.