Tales from the "LiberryCAST"

EPISODE 09 (209): Schrodinger's Cup

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 27 May 2012 21:57:52 -0400

Take a coffee cup that has a lid... and is stationary... and has no backlighting... and has a radioactive isotope inside of it that could release a molecule that has a 50/50 chance to punch a hole in the side of it, revealing whether or not it's full... and... and... Oh, yeah, did I mention the room is completely dark? Yeah, it's dark, all right.

Anyway, after you think about all that for a while, listen to this week's episode featuring Mr. Hinky, a Rogue Patron who was a repeat offender at sneaking coffee to our computers.

EPISODE 08 (208): Bad Moms 2

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 20 May 2012 12:50:48 -0400

Okay, so it's a week late, but just like calling your mom for Mother's Day, better late than never.

Today's episode is the sequel to last year's BAD MOTHERS DAY podcast which got rerun last week in place of this one, which was eaten by Audacity. So now, freshly rerecorded and spiffy and stuff, here's Bad Moms 2. Featured in today's episode are more tales of questionable parenting, featuring such bad parenting byproducts as Little Kayla, Holly GoHeavilly and the children of future podcast featured former Rogue, Ms. Green.

ENCORE EPISODE 9 (109): Bad Mother's Day

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 13 May 2012 22:44:54 -0400

In honor of Mother's Day and because EFFing Audacity EFFing ate the Bad Mother's Day sequel file I recorded today just as I was starting to edit it . (That's okay, though. Turns out it had shitty audio cause something is set wrong on the wife's laptop. But I digress.) So instead, I present an encore reairing of last year's bad mother's day show. Tune in next week for this year's, dammit.

From the cast of 16 And Pregnant to the Octomom to that Brazilian chick who said she was having, like, nine babies and then turned out she was just fat, bad moms are in the news and are seemingly more common than ever before. And while the majority of the moms who I knew at the "liberry" were awesome, there were a handful whose parenting skills I at least had to question, when not being actively driven nuts by the ladies themselves. Welcome to the Tales from the "LiberryCAST" Bad Mother's Day Special.

EPISODE 07 (207): "I'll take Dents other than Arthur for $300, Alex."

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 6 May 2012 19:12:37 -0400

Throughout my time at the "liberry" I was able to identify and classify the top five grumpiest old men in all the world. So far Mr. B-Natural and Mr. Crab (#1 and #3, respectively) have had podcast episodes devoted to them. Now we turn to Grumpiest Old Man in All the World #4: Mr. Dent. This was an older gentleman kwho closely resembled Sam the Eagle from the Muppet Show, albeit with a massive dent in the side of his head. Oh, and he was also known for his infatuation with the alleged genetic impurity of a certain section of the English Countryside. I also discuss the concept and origins of Fake Shemps.

EPISODE 06 (206): Send in the Clones

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 11:17:11 -0400

They say if you're one in a million then there are 10,000 of you in the U.S. alone. And thems only 1990 census numbers. This being the case, I, and more importantly people who barely know me, have run into (or attacked, in some cases) perfect strangers who just happen to resemble me. These handsome devils I call my "clones" and they have plagued me since my days in college. One even paid me a visit at the "liberry."

EPISODE 05 (205): Urf Day

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 14:55:50 -0400

In honor of Earth Day, this episode presents my one and only Earth Day entry detailing one wildly irresponsible environmentally-conscious childrens' book that I regretted cold reading to a bunch of story hour kids. Additionally, this episode serves as part 2 of our cute stories about good kids series, albeit one in which some of the good kids are pretty frustrating. Guest stars include Brett Mavrick: The Card Sharp, Olive "Has No Inside Voice" Baker, and Danger Ben Stout.

EPISODE 04 (204): I Believe the Children Are Our Future (and a few of them are pretty good)

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 10:22:52 -0400

Kids. Lots of people have them and lots of them are shits. Even thieving shits, (See: the Fagins). But once in a while you'll get a few good eggs. In fact, whole families of good eggs.

After weeks (some might say 55 of them) of negativity and grief, allow me to present part one of a two part series of Tales of the Good Patrons--stories about great kids and/or great parents, who are no less entertaining than the bad ones--just in a good way.

EPISODE 03 (203): Greenhorns Saga Part 3

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 8 Apr 2012 15:37:19 -0400

While most newbie greenhorn employees settle into the job at some point (even some who take a year or two to find their feet) there are some who NEVER find their feet no matter how many times you train and retrain them. These are the eternal newbie greenhorns and Ms. S was their queen and, eventually, sole member at our branch. Which is odd, because Eternal Newbie "Liberry" Greenhorn Ms. S was allegedly a trained library worker with some sort of library degree to her name before she started.

EPISODE 02 (202): Sprangtime

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 8 Apr 2012 21:00:00 -0400

This episode drops April 1 and it's all sprangy outside. In honor of that, here are a handful of stories involving the season of spring (with just a hint of winter).

Highlights include appearances by Fatty Manchild and Old Man Womanlegs, plus the greatest and best shot in the world, and an unprecedented question from a patron.

SEASON 2 EPISODE 01 (201): Return to Tri-Metro

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 21:37:53 -0400

Tales from the "LiberryCAST" enters Season 2 with some hints and details on my return to my old stomping grounds of the Tri-Metro area of small Appalachian towns--the very place that spawned the original Tales from the "Liberry" blog.

In honor of a few return trips to the actual "liberry" in question, this episode also presents a few adapted tales starring the one Rogues Gallery member I've actually seen at the "liberry" nearly every time I've been back.

EPISODE 52 (152): Open Letters, part the second

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 4 Mar 2012 12:43:56 -0500

Back in Episode 10 (110), I featured some of the Open Letters I'd published to both patrons and members of the entertainment industry (both living and dead). And back in Episode 10, I said I had some more such letters to come. Today's episode, Episode 52 (that would be the one year anniversary of this show) features those other open letters.

By the by, I'm gonna take a couple weeks off before starting Season 2 of TFT"LC", cause I'm moving houses and stuff.

EPISODE 51 (151): Dumbass Things I've Done Lately Week

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 11:00:55 -0500

I've often maintained that if a person is going to go around pointing fingers at the foibles of others (or recording podcasts adapting blog entries about the foibles of others), it's only fair for that person to occasionally point a few at some of their own. I did this pretty frequently during the course of writing Tales from the "Liberry" and even devoted an entire week to it.

Adapted here are a few entries from that week, as well as dumbass things I did beyond it. Guest stars include Mr. Stanky, Mr. Perfect, my moms-in-law, and, unfortunately, my junk.

EPISODE 50 (150): The Founding Fathers Won't Leave Me Alone

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 10:55:49 -0500

We at the "liberry" were no strangers to playing the role of "liberry" clubhouse junior detectives on occasion. But one day we were presented with a huge mystery that remains largely unsolved to this very day.

On this week's podcast, you can listen to what our staff did after an older gentleman patron behaved most ungentlemanly to us by spreading lies that we had refused to supply him with copies of the founding documents of our nation, after we very much had.

I give you the story of Grandpa Sam.

EPISODE 14 (114): The (Vid) Borrowers REPOST

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 09:42:11 -0500

(NOTE FROM 2012: Okay, I don't know what happened but somehow half this episode vanished. No, the version that's been posted here, for who knows how long, had the theme music, then trailed off to silence for, like, 12 minutes, then came back in with the second and third stories and wrapped up. There was a massive gap where the first story had been and I don't know how this is even possible. It was just gone and was gone from my back up .wav copy, and the .mp3 copy, and the online copy, and the backup online copy I had on another server. Huge mystery. I think I'll lay the blame upon Audacity. Anyway, I have now rerecorded the missing bit and the episode is whole once again.)

Libraries aren't just for books, you know. In fact, some patrons wouldn't crack one if there was crack in it. (Unless it was written by V.C. Andrews, but maybe that's just around here.) That's okay, cause most "liberries" have on hand a selection of some of the greatest films ever created and the shittiest VHS tapes ever to be lobbed into a donation bin. The patrons who exclusively check out such tapes fall into the patron archetype of Vid-Borrowers. And their queen, Mrs. Bellows, is a force-of-nature-of-frustration.

EPISODE 49 (149): Meet the Hackers

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 11:01:32 -0500

Meet Johnny Hacker, one of the "good" patrons. He was a college student living at home who was known to us only for his use of our facilities for their best possible purposes, not to mention for being an all around cheerful dude. That boy's parents raised him right, and we know cause they were usually not far when Johnny was in house. However, while his mother's good lessons of "cover your mouth when you cough" definitely stuck in his brain, common sense notions of "if you're going to give off hacking coughs every 10 to 20 seconds FOR TWO $&%#ING HOURS, not only should you cover your mouth but you should GO THE &*$# HOME before someone brains you with a PDR! As a bonus, I include a non-blog tale about a couple of sick cars.

EPISODE 48 (148): The Anniversary Flight Blues

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 5 Feb 2012 17:26:11 -0500

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.

EPISODE 47 (147): Spinoffs

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 18:16:13 -0500

As with successful TV shows that spinoff into subsequent TV shows, sometimes "liberry" programs spin off into others. However, for every Cheers to Frasier spin-off, there are twenty forgettable Friends to Joey spinoffs.

I got to be the architect of two such back to back spinoffs of our weekly morning story hour program, which became evening story time projects with the unlikely acronyms of O.U.A.W and T.U.A.T. Over the course of most of a year, their attendance, and therefore success, varied wildly from week to week, with anywhere from six to zero kids turning up to hear me read stories at them.

While I always thought of myself as Frasier, I guess I was closer to Joey. Or maybe even, The Tortellis.

(This episode features notable appearances by previous podcast topic characters Little Kevin Martin and Chester the (Potential) Molester.)

EPISODE 46 (146): Greenhorns 2: Greenhornier

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 15:04:51 -0500

Our troubles with the Newbie Greenhorns on staff only began with Ms. K, Ms. M and Miss F.  For they were but the heralds for the coming of the great and terrible Queen of the Greenhorns: Ms. S.

On paper, Ms. S seemed like a dream come true, for while she was but a newbie to our "liberry" she held in her employment history actual experience working in a larger library in a neighboring county, which meant she knew our computer system already.  Sweet!  Better still, she allegedly held an undergraduate degree in library science.  We thought: How could a new employee get any better?  Welllll, a lot, it turns out.  And by quite a staggering margin.  She took greenhorning to the next level.

Taken individually, none of Ms. S's myriad of "liberry" crimes was worthy of termination from her job.  However, it's the cumulative effect that really drove the rest of us over the edge.  This is her story.

EPISODE 45 (145): Winston's Story

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 14:05:43 -0500

One of the cast members of the Tales from the "Liberry" blog who was on the scene long before I ever worked in a public library was my cat Winston Churchill: The Infinitely Bad Kitty. Named because she looked exactly like the former British Prime Minister as an infant, Winston was one of my best friends throughout my 20s and much of my 30s. However, due to a series of most unfortunate events, she nearly didn't make it through the midpoint of my 30s. This is the miraculous story of her salvation.

EPISODE 44 (144): Newbie Greenhorns

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 8 Jan 2012 14:51:44 -0500

Everybody has to start their career somewhere and usually when you start at entry level you're not very good. It takes a while to find your feet. And that was the purpose of the Newbie Greenhorn program at our "liberry". Newbie Greenhorns were allowed time to work out the kinks and master the details of their job without a great deal of initial positive expectation on the part of their coworkers. Ideally, these employees would graduate to mere Greenhorn status and then full fledged "Liberry" Ass. status, with all the perks that come with that position. Some graduated right away. And some did not graduate EVER despite years on the job. Today's episode is the first part in an ongoing series chronicling our problems with the Newbie Greenhorns.

EPISODE 43 (143): ParkaST 2

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 1 Jan 2012 14:31:18 -0500

Back for the new year are tales of everyone's favorite puffy, white, Michelin Man parka-clad, innanet crowd patron, Parka. Detailed here are tales of his repeatedly thwarted efforts to drink his coffee while chatting with his e-skanks on our computers, what it might sound like were he to have been given a microphone with which to chat with them, his deep roots into the synchronicity fields surrounding our building, and his banning from the use of our computers at the hands of... himself.

EPISODE 42 (142): What Would Wal-Mart Jesus Do?

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 09:00:22 -0500

On this special day, on which we both celebrate the birth of our savior and worship at the altar of commerce, I bring you a Christmas story of another humble servant of God.

One of the most memorable patrons we ever had to deal with was a fellow we collectively called Jesus and who I blog-dubbed Wal-Mart Jesus. How come? Cause he looked like Jesus, but wearing flowing, striped, table-clothy robes that looked as if they had been pulled directly from a roll in Wal-Mart's fabric department. He was instantly recognizable and very very memorable. Which is odd, because the major trouble we had with him stemmed from an incident involving him that none of us could remember.

WWWMJD? Drive us nuts.

EPISODE 41 (141): Christmas Party Pack

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 16:50:16 -0500

I loves me some Christmas Party. Yessir. Nearly my favorite kind of party due to high concentrations of fantastic food and drink and presents. Our "liberry" Christmas parties were especially fun, as we usually did them potluck style and stuffed ourselves beyond full with the amazing dishes created by the wonderful cooks I worked with (and am married to). But there are many varieties of Christmas party beyond the "liberry", not to mention just nutty seasonal crap to deal with. This week's podcast explores the topic all around.

(Features unfortunate guest appearances by both Chester the (potential) Molester and my colon.)

EPISODE 40 (140): Mr. B-Natural

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 15:24:32 -0500

There are rogue patrons and there are Rogue Patrons and Mr. B-Natural, Grumpiest Old Man in All the World, was usually somewhere in between. Not an evil human being by any stretch, but a tremendously cranky man, except when in the presence of his beloved pooch, Bubba. Our main beef with him is that Mr. B-Natural was a guy who definitely took pleasure in annoying the bejeezus out of the library staff by blatantly breaking as many rules as he could get away with just to piss us off. To hear him tell it, a library needs patrons who break the rules, otherwise we would have no reason to have rules at all. (Which, I think, was exactly the motivation of Professor Zoom, the arch-nemesis of The Flash.) So he continually signed his name upside down on our computer sign in sheet and tried to sneak his coffee back to the computers for his daily crossword. These are but a few of his stories.

EPISODE 39 (139): And the Password Is...

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 4 Dec 2011 20:57:47 -0500

Everybody has a secret these days. If nothing else, they have at least one computer password. We went through several at the "liberry" for our patron computers, mostly because our patrons kept hacking them. And, sure, we didn't always make this as difficult as we should, but people having the patron computer password wasn't exactly the end of the world. It was just irritating. And who among our patrons tended to be the ones who tried to hack us most frequently? Why the Rogue Patrons, of course.

(Featuring appearances by Parka, The Evil Fed Ex Guy and the Devil Twins Auxiliary League of Neighborhood Kids)

EPISODE 38 (138): The Thanksgiving Podcast

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 15:03:06 -0500

On this Thanksgiving holiday, I am thankful for family and friends willing to travel great distances to my home only to have to sleep on inflatabeds. I'm also thankful that I once wrote a handful of Tales from the "Liberry" entries in which Thanksgiving played a part. That's cause they were readily available for me to adapt for this week's podcast.

Hope you and yours are having a festive turkey season.

(And that you don't live in Missouri or Kentucky, cause I shit on those states pretty heavily in this episode.)

(This podcast features the first podcast appearance of Birthday Lady)

EPISODE 37 (137): Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 17:19:20 -0500

There are many irritating patron archetypes, but among the most irritating of them are the Geneal0gy People. Yes, those patrons who are so fervid about their own ancestry that they simply must spend at least six hours a day diligently researching the shit out of it. And, really, if you're gonna put that kind of time and labor into something you're so passionate about, are you gonna keep your discoveries to yourself? Hell no, you're going to tell simply EVERYONE about it all. And who better to start with than the library staff? We had a handful of amateur geneal0gists under foot, but the one we actually avoided at all costs was the man who became known as Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine.

EPISODE 36 (136): The Ballad of Crusty the Patron

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 16:56:57 -0500

While not the stinkiest patron we ever had to deal with, the man who became known as Crusty the Patron was still counted among the worst of the stinky patron lot due to his tenacity in inflicting his stench on us for hours at a time. Crusty suffered from a number of other hygienic ailments that made working at my "liberry" downright unappetizing. And while I was not allowed to kick him out directly, I was able to find at least a temporary solution to the basic problems he caused for us without a direct confrontation. (Don't eat any pastries while listening to this episode.)

This ep also features appearances and references to Parka and the worlds second stinkiest patron, Mr. Stanky.

EPISODE 35 (135): Billy the Brainchild

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 6 Nov 2011 17:28:20 -0500

There were only a handful of patrons I truly hated, most with good reason. However, one who pressed all my hatred buttons within seconds of meeting him was a guy I called Billy the Brainchild--well, him and a remarkably similar patron called The Expert). Billy was a guy out to make a name for himself in a variety of half-assed media business ventures of a pornographic nature. His ultimate goal was to become Appalachia's version of Larry Flynt, minus the wheel chair and, presumably, the inflatable wang. And that wasn't even why I hated him. No, my ire was because his first step toward his goal (besides putting his bong down for one whole hour) was to come pester us for ways to achieve that goal. But, naturally, a guy as smart as Billy saw himself didn't really need our help. He already knew everything there was to know about the business world; he just needed us to confirm it for him. And therein lay the basic conflict.

EPISODE 34 (134): Dawn of the Dufus

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 20:04:56 -0400

The major problem with patron access computers are the patrons. They don't have computers at home, so they have to come use ours.

And that's great, until it's not.

Such was the case with a Rogue Patron I came to call The Dufus. He was a guy from the area who'd gone out into the world for, to hear him tell it, a storied career as a minor deity on the West Coast, where he hobnobbed with rich and powerful celebrities all of whom adored him. Again, to hear him tell it. And tell it he was more than willing to do. Somehow he got it into his head that such minor matters as time limits on the patron computers didn't apply to him and no matter how many people we had waiting to use his, there he sat, pissing all of us off. Ironic and moronic, because he was using our computer to try and get a job working for the library in the first place.

EPISODE 33 (133): The Crustacean Menace!

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 21:53:17 -0400

In the past, I've chronicled small tales of Mr. B-Natural and Mr. Smiley, the first and second grumpiest old men in all the world respectively. However, the third grumpiest old man in all the world actually proved to be one of the more active antagonists in the history of the Tales from the "Liberry" blog. As I said <a href="http://www.liberrycast.com/2011/10/episode-32-132-blue-hair-group.html">last week</a>, he's an honorary old white lady and for good reason; not only is he on par with the O.W.L.s in mere surliness, but he could go up against the worst of them in the <font style="font-style: italic;">Forgetting Your Library Card and Getting All Worked up About it to the Point of Leveling Threats Against the Staff 400 meter dash. </font>One for the record books, people.

EPISODE 32 (132): Blue Hair Group

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 15:34:43 -0400

Customer service people, back me up here. When it comes to the ability of customers/patrons to deliver huge consignments of shit during the course of a basic transaction, the group of human beings most likely to be making that delivery are Old White Ladies. Yessir. More than any other group on the planet, they are the least easy to please. Maybe it's a southern thing. I dunno. But that has been my experience over the course of 20 years of dealing with the public, and four such tales are presented in this week's podcast. (Featuring an appearance by Delva Poopoohead, of the New England Poopooheads.)

EPISODE 31 (131): Troubled Youth

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 9 Oct 2011 20:45:39 -0400

Children are not angels. Sometimes they break bad and have to be sent away for a while to a place where they can be broken of the badness, or simply be removed from a bad situation. (I know, I know, that's a huge over simplification, but that's how it seems.) We had a couple of homes for troubled youth in Tri-Metro and they were frequent visitors to the "liberry" along with their usual hulking, pro-wrestler style Troubled Youth Wranglers. Getting materials back from them was often a problem. Getting them to stop asking if we had The Anarchist Cookbook, an impossibility.

EPISODE 30 (130): Shhhhh!

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 2 Oct 2011 19:07:15 -0400

Libraries are supposed to be places of quiet study. Mine, not so much. Our patrons were very louLinkd. Sometimes they suffered from no-inside-voice syndrome, a sad condition in which their parents never taught them proper indoor voice technique. Other times they used blood curdling screams as their only form of communication. And, on the rare occasions when they were quiet, they were excessively quiet and were in danger of having their voices drowned out by the sounds of typing. Presented for your modulated listening, three tales spanning the history of the original blog.

Notable appearances by Kanji the Kid, the Screamer.

EPISODE 29 (129): Banned

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 14:51:29 -0400

In honor of National Banned Books Week, we present an expanded version of an Actual Conversation Heard in an Actual Library on that very topic. Directly interwoven with this tale is the story of my abiding love of the Walter the Farting Dog series and how my "liberry" self-banned it for several months to avoid the nonexistent wrath of coddling parents.

All in all, four different Tales from the "Liberry", each involving Walter to some degree, are covered in today's podcast, yet none of them are in their original form from the blog. Eat new content!

EPISODE 28 (128): The Dreamcast

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 21:57:25 -0400

Libraries are places full of dreams. (Just ask Lucien.) Sometimes they can be literal, such as a nightmare I once had regarding a particular problem patron discovering the blog, or my dream of revenge on Joss Whedon for... well, Firefly fans know what Joss did. Other times, in title alone. And other times, it can be the dreams of a patron, dashed by a surly "liberry" ass. such as myself. They can all be found in today's DreamCAST.Link

EPISODE 27 (127): Anniversaries and Origins

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 15:47:59 -0400

Today's 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks brings to mind where I was during that time a decade ago and how it coincided with my hiring at the Tri-Metro "liberry." Today's podcast presents an adaptation of that portion of Secret Origins of Tales from the "Liberry" as well as a commentary bit containing the actual never-before-revealed secret origin of the blog.

EPISODE 26 (126): D-Con Kills Nerds Dead

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 4 Sep 2011 11:58:22 -0400

As you might have noticed, I'm an enormous nerd. Maybe not quite as nerdy as the Nerdist Podcast, but nerdy all the same. As such, I'm fond of heading out to nerd gatherings such as the infamous Dragon Con in Atlanta. In honor of this being Dragon Con weekend for 2011, I present some non-"liberry" tales of my D-Con experiences of the past decade. Included are dealer's room encounters with gerbil-cleavaged sci-fi heroines; Annoying Brit Track Boy's near-death-experience at the hands of both the panel audience and the 5th Doctor Who; an awkward encounter with Biff from Back to the Future, Harlan Ellison laying verbal waste to one and all; and, as always, the guy that played Boomer in the 70s Battlestar Galactica.

EPISODE 25 (125): Odd Birds, Strange Encounters, and Fragmentary Dilemmas (and cussin')

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 17:44:01 -0400

Libraries always have their odd bird patrons. Flocks of them, usually. Ours was no exception. Presented for your consideration today are five tales of such in-the-wild encounters with odd bird patrons, and/or tales featuring some cussin'. That's right, it's the All Cussin' Episode (#$%& yeah!) with nary a censor tone to be found and Explicit right on the Tag. Fire it up for Grandma!

EPISODE 24 (124): Who's Got the 10 and a Half?

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 21 Aug 2011 14:20:03 -0400

For most of my "liberry" career, I was a part time employee. Once in a while, though, when EVERYONE else was out of town, I was called upon to take on not only a full 8 hour day, but sometimes a full 10 hour day, almost entirely by myself. This is when my experiments with real time blogging began to take shape. It's not all funny material, but it was often surprising.

Guest stars include: Mr. Smiley, Parka, Kanji the Kid, Brent & Brice the New Devil Twins, Chester the (Potential) Moletster, and more.

EPISODE 23 (123): The Amazing Mr. Kreskin

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 18:34:34 -0400

One of the most astounding figures I encountered during my time at the "liberry" was our board president, Mr. Kreskin (not his real name). He was a very nice and capable human being, tirelessly juggling multiple complicated projects on the library's behalf. And from those projects arose many questions, only our two librarians were capable of answering for him. Unfortunately the ONLY time he was ever known to phone us at all were on the rare days when both librarians were out of town and unavailable. It was more reliable than Old Faithful.

(This episode also includes a cameo by Mrs. Carol Satan.)

EPISODE 22 (122): Summer Reading Blues

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 7 Aug 2011 13:20:49 -0400

Summer Reading, oh how it burns!

Yes, it's the time of year when snot-nosed crumb-crunchers descend upon the "liberry" to craft crafts, hear stories, fill out reading logs and create chaos. That is, if their parents can manage to get them signed up to begin with.

And who is the queen of Summer Reading Chaos? Why our old nemesis, Little Kayla, of course.

(This episode also includes a cameo by Parka as well as one by his shag carpet of torso hair.)

EPISODE 21 (121): The Doc Ock Fetishist Society

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 15:36:15 -0400

An odd tale of an odd bird encountered in the wild, AWAY from the "liberry" proper. Doc Ock Fetishist Woman was never a patron, but she was about as nutty as any of our patrons ever got. Not a bad human being in the slightest, just exasperating. In fact, if she has committed any crime, it's probably that she cares too much... about inanimate objects.

Also included in this tale is the story of the first time I was busted as a "liberry" blogger. Having your secret identity revealed to you is always disconcerting, but is even more bewildering when it comes with a large dollop of synchronicity on top.

EPISODE 18 (118): Parka Life (REPOST)

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 11:11:39 -0400

(THIS EPISODE IS A CORRECTED VERSION OF THE ORIGINAL, WHICH HAD EDITING ERRORS -- JUICE)

Just when we thought we had it bad enough with frequent visits from Chester the (Potential) Molester, another seeming sicko fell into our midst. And, unlike Chester, this one actually had computer skills. He also had a habit of exclusively wearing a puffy white Michelin man winter parka in the warmth of April, so his nickname officially became Parka.

While I didn't know it at the time, he would become the MOST chronicled member of the "Liberry" Rogues Gallery by proving himself to be the MOST irritating patron we had to deal with, in a multitude of ways.

Your challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to play the Five Tacos and a Taco podcast game Dick, Douche, or Dumbass and see if you can tell which category Parka falls into best. Or worst, as the case may be.

As an added bonus, the final story of the podcast features a magnificently satisfying tale of both a massively unprecedented event for our library as well as one of the aforementioned Chester getting his comeuppance at the hands of another library.

EPISODE 20 (120): Barbie T: Combat Pay

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 09:38:42 -0400

Last week's podcast presented how Barbie Turdmurkle drove us nigh unto insanity in helping her log into one of her many online services that she doesn't have the necessary skillset to access by herself. One year later, she returned to do much the same thing, having learned no lessons on doing so from our previous encounter on the matter.

As an added bonus, I have also recorded my heretofore unpodcasted first encounter with Barbie T. It was the first of many exasperating telephone conversations I was to have with her.

EPISODE 19 (119): Barbie T: Master of the Internet

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 17 Jul 2011 09:22:46 -0400

This podcast marks a return appearance by previous podcast rogue patron Barbara Turdmurkle, a.k.a. the titular Barbie T.

Barbie T has repeatedly proven herself to be incapable of using technology, especially computers, yet she continues to sign up for services that require internet access. This coupled with her constant fear that someone is trying to steal her identity and ruin her credit, coupled with some truly strange phone calls, meant someone at the "liberry" was going to have a bad day. Too bad it was me.

EPISODE 18 (118): Parka Life

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 14:41:22 -0400

Just when we thought we had it bad enough with frequent visits from Chester the (Potential) Molester, another seeming sicko fell into our midst. And, unlike Chester, this one actually had computer skills. He also had a habit of exclusively wearing a puffy white Michelin man winter parka in the warmth of April, so his nickname officially became Parka.

While I didn't know it at the time, he would become the MOST chronicled member of the "Liberry" Rogues Gallery by proving himself to be the MOST irritating patron we had to deal with, in a multitude of ways.

Your challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to play the Five Tacos and a Taco podcast game Dick, Douche, or Dumbass and see if you can tell which category Parka falls into best. Or worst, as the case may be.

As an added bonus, the final story of the podcast features a magnificently satisfying tale of both a massively unprecedented event for our library as well as one of the aforementioned Chester getting his comeuppance at the hands of another library.

EPISODE 17 (117): The Nastiest Patron Ever

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 3 Jul 2011 18:18:26 -0400

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 our eyes with her claws. Any encounter with her left you feeling violated and dirty. She gave harpies a bad name. Dipped in the River C, she was.

Fortunately, we were at last able to defeat her in a most public manner.

This is that story.

EPISODE 16 (116): Stanky Patrons and other Dusty Turds

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 16:34:39 -0400

Public service brings with it one constant: The Public. And not everyone among the public is an avid fan of bathing nor is capable of comprehending that noxious fumes are produced by their butts, nor the readily available ways to combat said fumes. This was a reoccurring problem at my "liberry" that drove me nigh unto insanity. Today's episode presents one of the simple and elegant remedies to our library's ass fume problems that I actually proposed to my bosses.

As an added bonus, following today's reading is an interview with friend and former fellow library compatriot from another state, Glen B (no relation to Mrs. B), who will enlighten us as to the exact stench classification of some of the patrons in his library. He'll also enlighten us as to what one does when one's home is swallowed by a lake and how that smells afterward. This is one for the Hobo Power record books, gang.

EPISODE 15 (115): Deception as the Rule

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 10:53:54 -0400

One of the oddest tales in the entire "liberry" catalog has to be that of Mrs. Lying D. Sackashit, a lady who proved to have in her possession a never-ending fountain of horseshit which she turned in our direction whenever we encountered her. I don't know the true nature of her particular brand of mental flaw, but she had an impressive ability to calmly reinvent reality on the spot regardless of the MOUNTING evidence to the contrary staring her in the face. Why did she do this? To get what she wanted, of course. And, unfortunately, in our battles with her, she often won.

EPISODE 14 (114): The (Vid) Borrowers

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 19:17:46 -0400

EPISODE 13 (113): Superfreak, the Worst of Paranoid Rick James

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 5 Jun 2011 16:51:59 -0400

Upgrades in technology often bring upgrades in hassle. So was the case when our "liberry" network upgraded our circulation software, requiring us to rebarcode not only our entire collection, but our patrons as well. And when it came to patrons freaking out on us in a super fashion about policy issues concerning their library card, no one won the race ahead of Paranoid Rick James. His apparent fear that the "gubmint" was trying to keep track of which Joan Medlicott books he read led him down corridors of patron deception we could scarcely keep track of ourselves.

EPISODE 12 (112): Conspiracy Theory and Other Abused Substances

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 29 May 2011 21:01:03 -0400

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?)

EPISODE 11 (111): Now THAT's some Monday for your ass.

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 22 May 2011 17:36:00 -0400

Mondays. Who needs `em? Can't stand them. Wouldn't live next to them.

Okay, so this attitude is pretty much a universal one. But I assure you that Mondays at the "liberry" sucked even more than most Mondays despite the fact that we didn't even open until 1 in the afternoon. No, Mondays at the "liberry" sucked even worse than Halle Berry's Catwoman and, as your average goat will tell you, that movie sucked A LOT.

This episode is a prime example of why I hated Mondays at the "liberry" and the awful events that fell upon me on one particular Monday.

EPISODE 10 (110): Open Letters, part the first

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 15 May 2011 14:55:43 -0400

In these days of miracle and wonder, with all our email and forum snark, the craftily-worded complaint letter is nearly a lost artform. Even at the library, a place where the patrons had no problem complaining about the tiniest of perceived infractions, we rarely received them in letter form. That's why I decided to turn the tables and start writing open letters of complaint to the people who drove me nuts--albeit, online and in a place where they were unlikely to ever see them, especially considering that one of them is dead.

EPISODE 9 (109): Bad Mother's day

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 8 May 2011 17:57:26 -0400

From the cast of 16 And Pregnant to the Octomom, bad moms are in the news and are seemingly more common than ever before. And while the majority of the moms who I knew at the "liberry" were awesome, there were a handful whose parenting skills I at least had to question, when not being actively driven nuts by the ladies themselves. Welcome to the Tales from the "LiberryCAST" Bad Mother's Day Special.

EPISODE 8 (108): The Boy With One Red Shoe (and other Tales of the Martins)

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 1 May 2011 18:00:21 -0400

Two of the more exasperating and amusing child patrons we had at the "liberry" were Little Kevin and Little Chuck Martin. They were very intelligent, sometimes bitingly funny, but often a bit spacey and prone to making the job of "liberry" ass. a difficult one. I still count them among the good eggs, but that made them no less challenging (or funny) to deal with.

EPISODE 7 (107): The Patron Who Must Not Be Named

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 24 Apr 2011 17:13:33 -0400

Pedophiles: Public enemy #1. You've tried smelly sprays and perverticides, but pedophiles can smell too. They avoid sprayed areas and keep coming back for more. What you need is CHESTERKILL...

...Oh, I can't do it anymore. I so want to make light of our library's resident pedophile Chester the (Potential) Molester, but I just can't stand to do it. He was never a joke to us when I worked there and he's still not now.

Unfortunately, guys like Chester, who have more than a dusting of interest in underage girls, are a part of life when you work in a library. They don't tell you in the interview that it's part of your job to defend the patrons these sick bastards might (or might not) like to prey upon. But when you see them in action, you gladly do it because every fiber of your being screams for you to.

And Chester was particularly infuriating for many reasons, but two primary ones: 1) monitoring Chester's activities when he's in the building becomes a full time job from the moment he arrives; 2) Chester above all other patrons can magically appear at the sound of his own name.

This is less of a Funny Ha-Ha episode and more of a Holy Shit, I Can't Believe That Guy Is Walking The Earth, Where's Chris Hanson When You Need Him? kind of episode.

EPISODE 6 (106): Tax Time Blues

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 17 Apr 2011 14:27:42 -0400

Tax season is one of the more annoying seasons at the "liberry." Not only do you have people descending on your head, asking for financial advice you're not qualified to give, but they refuse to read all signs to that effect that might have saved them a trip to the reference desk. Don't bother putting any up to direct them to the tax forms, either. Patrons, as a rule, don't read signs.

Episode 6 (106) presents three different tax time tales, some of which are amalgams of a handful of other stories originally presented on the Tales from the "Liberry" blog.

Hope your personal tax season is going better than mine used to.

EPISODE 5 (105): The Ballad of I.N. Phyte

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 17:12:47 -0400

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.

EPISODE 4 (104): "They Live" and other stories of Language Lessons and DMVictims

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 3 Apr 2011 14:16:47 -0400

Anyone who's ever worked the reference desk in a library has heard tale of the infamous THEY--that secret cabal of advice-givers who send people to the library in search of the of odd-assed things no library should be expected to have. They cause an awful lot of trouble. And it doesn't help that the patrons They send to libraries have difficulty communicating the instructions from They in the first place, necessitating the consultation of English/Patronese dictionaries and, quite possibly, a divining rod.

They said you should listen to this podcast. They said doing so will make you fabulously wealthy. They said it contains the answers you are seeking. They said it has a creamy nougat center. They said you should forward the podcast on to five people you know and three you don't, or it will bring bad luck. They said it does a body good. In fact, They said if you don't listen to it, Slim Goodbody will come to your house and kick you squar in the junk. They said if you do not possess "junk," that's okay, neither does Slim. You can both listen to the podcast together.

EPISODE 3 (103): The Horse Pissperer

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 12:16:25 -0400

Unfortunate Fact: human patrons often read their library books on the toilet, where they are apt to accidentally, or otherwise, contaminate them with various mookystinks. (Think about THAT the next time you sit down to read a borrowed book over your lunch break.) Horse patrons rarely read books on the toilet. However, as evidenced by this week's podcast, they are also apt to be a bit liberal with their distribution of waste products around them. A classic tale of love, compassion and disinfectant.

And in our bonus story, we have another tale of finding the wrong video in the right case, only this time without as much discomfort involved--er, well, depending on your cinematic tastes, I guess. It's probably a tale only Stephen King could love.

EPISODE 2 (102): FAX Guy Goes Nutzoid

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 18:30:02 -0400

The second episode of the LiberryCAST features a classic story of both poor customer service and insane customer behavior. It also marks the debut appearance of long time "Liberry" Rogue Barbara Turdmurkle on the podcast.

EPISODE 1 (101): DP for DPenedetta

juice.s.aaron@gmail.com — Sun, 13 Mar 2011 15:17:48 -0400

Yessir, it's the premiere episode of Tales from the "LiberryCast." This is an audio adaptation of stories from a blog I wrote for five years called Tales from the "Liberry." It was a chronicle of my quest to remain sane while working in a public library where the patrons could double as extras in a David Lynch film. This podcast will adapt my favorite stories from the run of that blog along with some behind the scenes commentary and DVD-style commentary.