Our “employee” Lennie has shifts on Monday and Thursday afternoons. I’m usually gone by the time he arrives on Thursdays, but toward the end of my shift he came in a bit early. After some small talk, Lennie held up a small pamphlet.
“Some guy gave me this,” he said. “He’s giving them to everyone.”
I took a look at it and saw that it was a gospel tract, the kind given out by door to door missionaries or left tacked to the bulletin board at Wal-Mart.
Within a few minutes, the front door opened and an older man entered carrying a thick manila folder. He wore the largest pair of wrap-around blue-blocker sunglasses I’ve ever seen. I didn’t recognize him, but he recognized me.
“Hi, there. Brian, isn’t it?”
“No.”
“You’re not Brian?”
“I’m not Brian.”
“Is there a Brian here?”
“There’s no Brian here.”
“Huh. But I’ve met you before,” he said. “At least, I recognize you from somewhere. What’s your name?”
I told him my name.
“I’m pretty sure I know you from here,” he said. “I think you helped me out by typing up some documents once.”
I have never in my life typed up documents for a patron, so I was pretty sure he didn’t know me at all.
“Yes!” he then exclaimed. “You typed up the Declaration of Independence and Constitution for me a while back.”
Recognition sucker-punched me and I realized the man’s identity: he was Grandpa Sam, the elderly gentleman who, back in the summer 2005, plagued not only my “liberry” but several libraries in two counties, by phoning them up and asking for copies of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. All of the libraries had the documents and offered to produce copies of them for him, but ours was the only one he actually showed up at to check in person. We’d provided him with copies of those documents and I had been the one to print them for him from the internet, taking time to adjust the text and repaginate them myself so that they would fit comfortably in around 25 pages so he wouldn’t have to pay a lot for them. And after walking from our building with those documents in his hand, he turned around and phoned up some senator in Arkansas and made the false claim that we’d refused to give them to him. Yes, this was the same Grandpa Sam who had showered us and all our patrons with gospel tracts back then, proclaiming himself an associate pastor at a local church—a church I phoned after we later learned of his deception to make sure their real minister knew the full story before Grandpa Sam had a chance to spread false rumors to their congregation. The pastor had then told me that Grandpa Sam was sadly suffering from Alzheimer’s and had likely done what he had in some sort of delusional state.
For an Alzheimer’s sufferer, he certainly was doing better job in the memory department than I was. I would never have recognized him, for Grandpa Sam looked quite a bit thinner than during his previous visit.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “Now I remember.”
Grandpa Sam then brandished his manila envelope at me. He explained that since we’d been so kind as to type of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution for him, two years back, he had another typing job he wanted us to do for him. He then told me that he’d been doing a lot of writing recently and had composed something of a memoir of inspirational stories from his life, in long hand, and was hoping to have the whole thing typed up.
“I’d pay for it, of course,” Grandpa Sam said.
Sensing the danger of the situation, I quickly explained that we hadn’t actually typed anything for him when he last visited. We’d only printed the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution from the internet. We didn’t type them up ourselves. Furthermore, typing documents for patrons was not a service that we offered at the library. We offered computers on which people were welcome to type documents, but we ourselves did not type them for patrons.
"But, I’d pay you for it,” Grandpa Sam reiterated.
“I understand, but this is simply not a service we offer.”
Grandpa Sam didn’t seem very happy about this. It seemed to him that if he brought something to us to be typed and offered to pay, we should type it. I told him he was welcome to speak with our library director, but she was out at lunch that moment. He didn’t press the issue further. Instead, he asked where we kept our exercise books. He said he’d been sick for the past few months and had lost a lot of muscle mass that he was looking to get back. I wrote down the call number for him and directed him toward nonfiction. He passed out a gospel tract to a nearby patron, gave one to me, and off he went.
Normally, I might consider doing a bit of typing for cash, particularly for an elderly patron who clearly didn’t have the skills to do it himself. However, for this particular elderly patron, I was not having any of it. Anyone who phones around to all the area libraries, demands copies of historical documents, is given them and then phones up some senator’s office, in a seemingly random state, and then lies and says we refused to give him the documents, even if only doing so under a delusion, is not someone I’m interested in doing business with.
Friday, April 13, 2007
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Dishin' It Up: A Cautionary Tale (THE EPILOGUE)
If you recall from the DirecTV saga in February, we told DirecTV off, assuring them that we had no intentions of remaining with their service, nor of paying their $258 cancellation fee, due to the fact that they mislead us on numerous occasions by, essentially, promising us that we could have distant networks when it turned out we couldn't. At that point, after nearly 40 minutes of holding and waiting and speaking to managers and then the manager of the managers and then requesting to speak to the manager of the manager of the managers, the 2nd manager of managers we were talking to finally relented and said he'd been authorized to give us a confirmation number that would allow us to get out of paying the cancellation fee. The trick, he explained, was that we had to wait for our final bill to arrive with the $258 fee on it, then phone them up with the number and they would credit us the $258.
Three weeks back, we received said bill, phoned DirecTV up and completely expected them to tell us the guy we'd spoken with before had been talking out of his ass. (There are lots of examples of this very sort of thing floating about the net.) They did not, however. Instead, after nearly 20 minutes of waiting on hold between their phone rep in India and the Crisis Customer Counselor he'd rolled our particular ball of dung to, the CCCounselor came on the line and told us our account had been sent to their credit-claims department and it should no longer be a problem for us. We'd heard that before too, so our skepticism remained strong.
We've now received a notice from DirecTV saying that they had credited our account $275 and we owed them nothing. In fact, because they'd only billed us $258.68 for the cancellation fee in the first place, we have a $16.32 credit with them, which means they now owe us money. They owe us an apology too, but I think we'll get the $16.32 sooner.
(TO BE EPILOGUED AGAIN...)
Three weeks back, we received said bill, phoned DirecTV up and completely expected them to tell us the guy we'd spoken with before had been talking out of his ass. (There are lots of examples of this very sort of thing floating about the net.) They did not, however. Instead, after nearly 20 minutes of waiting on hold between their phone rep in India and the Crisis Customer Counselor he'd rolled our particular ball of dung to, the CCCounselor came on the line and told us our account had been sent to their credit-claims department and it should no longer be a problem for us. We'd heard that before too, so our skepticism remained strong.
We've now received a notice from DirecTV saying that they had credited our account $275 and we owed them nothing. In fact, because they'd only billed us $258.68 for the cancellation fee in the first place, we have a $16.32 credit with them, which means they now owe us money. They owe us an apology too, but I think we'll get the $16.32 sooner.
(TO BE EPILOGUED AGAIN...)
Monday, April 09, 2007
Bad Friday
There’s been a nettin’ war brewing between Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine and two members of the New Devil Twins Auxiliary League of Neighborhood Kids. Actually, it’s really between Gene and anyone who gets in the way of his geneal0gy research. On Friday things began heating up.
Gene must have had the day off for Good Friday, because he settled in fairly early in the morning hoping for a full day of computer time. See, Gene’s learned that despite its DSL speed, our innanet connection slows way down in the afternoon about the time the West Coast crowd kicks into gear. So instead of haunting our computer hall in the afternoon, he’s been trying to come in earlier in the day. Unfortunately, Tony and Delbert, the aforementioned NDTALONK members, also had the day off and nothing better to do than surf the net, so in they came too.
After all three had been on for over half an hour, another patron happened in wanting a computer and Gene had to be busted off since he’d been on the longest. He immediately signed up for another session, causing Tony to be busted for Gene. Tony then signed up for another session, causing Delbert to be busted for Tony. Then Delbert signed up for another session and the cycle began anew. My coworker, Mrs. C, was running the circ desk solo, at that point, for Mrs. B was out for the day, and she rapidly grew tired of having to run back to the computer hall every ten minutes or so to bust someone off in favor of someone who’d already been busted off several times already. She decided she’d had enough and resolved to reinact an obscure bit of library computer policy that hasn’t been enforced in years. Our policy has already been that patrons who sign up for computers are given one half hour’s worth of time, on a first come first served basis, and are not asked to get off unless we have someone else waiting to use the next available computer. The reactivated bit of policy would add that patrons who have already been given a full half hour’s worth of time may sign up for another session, but will only be granted a computer when one becomes available, rather than us busting anyone else off to give them one.
Mrs. C thought this would not only cut down on the number of trips amount we’d be making to the computer hall but it would deter abusers from abusing the system in the first place. I knew this was very very wrong. What it would do is give Gene more than enough excuse to sit around the circ desk, yammering on about his damned relatives to anyone who would stand still long enough while he waited for the next computer to open up. This is far more torturous than having to run back and bust people off every few minutes, but with the new policy addition effectively ties the staff’s hands in getting rid of him. (And on that note, I’ve been lobbying for the purchase of a Geneal0gy Taser, to be used on any geneal0gy researchers who attempt to tell us about their research--which would be all of them.)
By the time I arrived at work, Gene and the boys had been told of our revised policy. Mrs. C and Mrs. A then told me about the policy and about how Gene and the boys had been told as well. Then they make a fast break for lunch, leaving me solo. Sure enough, within minutes someone else came in for a computer and I had to go bust Gene off for them. Gene knew that the boys were both past their half hour limit too, so he ran to sign up for another session, no doubt in the hopes I hadn’t been told about the policy.
“That boy on the first computer is out of time,” Gene said, helpfully as he signed up anew.
I ignored him and went back to typing spine labels. I kept my back to Gene and made no eye contact, lest it give him an opening to talk about his relatives. The more I typed, though, the more something about the policy bugged me. I can understand not busting new computer patrons (Tier 1) off in favor of ones who’ve already had their half hour (Tier 2), but what about patrons who’ve already had more than their share of time, such as Delbert and Tony? My brain rationalized that it seemed unfair to allow them to remain on the computers while other Tier 2 patrons such as Gene had to wait. To me, it seemed fair that once a patron became a Tier 2, they could effectively compete with other Tier 2 patrons for computer time, but not with Tier 1s. I didn’t much want any of them in the building, but it seemed far less dangerous to have Tony & Delbert busted off than to have a bored and conversation-starved Gene lurking around the desk.
After a few more minutes, I went back and told Tony someone was waiting for a computer. Tony logged off, then came to the desk and complained that Delbert was actually next in line to be busted off.
“Fine,” I said, and went back and told Delbert he had to get off too. Tony & Delbert were confused as to what this meant and what they were to do next, so they both wound up leaving instead of Tony taking one of the two free computers. I gave one of them to Gene, who then managed to stay on it for at least the next four hours.
I still don't think this policy adjustment is going to work. Meanwhile, I'm comparison pricing tasers.
Gene must have had the day off for Good Friday, because he settled in fairly early in the morning hoping for a full day of computer time. See, Gene’s learned that despite its DSL speed, our innanet connection slows way down in the afternoon about the time the West Coast crowd kicks into gear. So instead of haunting our computer hall in the afternoon, he’s been trying to come in earlier in the day. Unfortunately, Tony and Delbert, the aforementioned NDTALONK members, also had the day off and nothing better to do than surf the net, so in they came too.
After all three had been on for over half an hour, another patron happened in wanting a computer and Gene had to be busted off since he’d been on the longest. He immediately signed up for another session, causing Tony to be busted for Gene. Tony then signed up for another session, causing Delbert to be busted for Tony. Then Delbert signed up for another session and the cycle began anew. My coworker, Mrs. C, was running the circ desk solo, at that point, for Mrs. B was out for the day, and she rapidly grew tired of having to run back to the computer hall every ten minutes or so to bust someone off in favor of someone who’d already been busted off several times already. She decided she’d had enough and resolved to reinact an obscure bit of library computer policy that hasn’t been enforced in years. Our policy has already been that patrons who sign up for computers are given one half hour’s worth of time, on a first come first served basis, and are not asked to get off unless we have someone else waiting to use the next available computer. The reactivated bit of policy would add that patrons who have already been given a full half hour’s worth of time may sign up for another session, but will only be granted a computer when one becomes available, rather than us busting anyone else off to give them one.
Mrs. C thought this would not only cut down on the number of trips amount we’d be making to the computer hall but it would deter abusers from abusing the system in the first place. I knew this was very very wrong. What it would do is give Gene more than enough excuse to sit around the circ desk, yammering on about his damned relatives to anyone who would stand still long enough while he waited for the next computer to open up. This is far more torturous than having to run back and bust people off every few minutes, but with the new policy addition effectively ties the staff’s hands in getting rid of him. (And on that note, I’ve been lobbying for the purchase of a Geneal0gy Taser, to be used on any geneal0gy researchers who attempt to tell us about their research--which would be all of them.)
By the time I arrived at work, Gene and the boys had been told of our revised policy. Mrs. C and Mrs. A then told me about the policy and about how Gene and the boys had been told as well. Then they make a fast break for lunch, leaving me solo. Sure enough, within minutes someone else came in for a computer and I had to go bust Gene off for them. Gene knew that the boys were both past their half hour limit too, so he ran to sign up for another session, no doubt in the hopes I hadn’t been told about the policy.
“That boy on the first computer is out of time,” Gene said, helpfully as he signed up anew.
I ignored him and went back to typing spine labels. I kept my back to Gene and made no eye contact, lest it give him an opening to talk about his relatives. The more I typed, though, the more something about the policy bugged me. I can understand not busting new computer patrons (Tier 1) off in favor of ones who’ve already had their half hour (Tier 2), but what about patrons who’ve already had more than their share of time, such as Delbert and Tony? My brain rationalized that it seemed unfair to allow them to remain on the computers while other Tier 2 patrons such as Gene had to wait. To me, it seemed fair that once a patron became a Tier 2, they could effectively compete with other Tier 2 patrons for computer time, but not with Tier 1s. I didn’t much want any of them in the building, but it seemed far less dangerous to have Tony & Delbert busted off than to have a bored and conversation-starved Gene lurking around the desk.
After a few more minutes, I went back and told Tony someone was waiting for a computer. Tony logged off, then came to the desk and complained that Delbert was actually next in line to be busted off.
“Fine,” I said, and went back and told Delbert he had to get off too. Tony & Delbert were confused as to what this meant and what they were to do next, so they both wound up leaving instead of Tony taking one of the two free computers. I gave one of them to Gene, who then managed to stay on it for at least the next four hours.
I still don't think this policy adjustment is going to work. Meanwhile, I'm comparison pricing tasers.
Friday, April 06, 2007
Cap'n Cold
Turned a bit nippy on us yesterday. Temperatures dropped, snow was spat, wind was howled and Cap'n Crossdresser was appropriately attired in a ladies' gray sweater with fleece pullover, mauve-colored slacks, a brown woolen wrap and big, black, clunky, snow boots.
That is all.
That is all.
Thursday, April 05, 2007
Actual Conversations Heard in Actual Libraries #77
SETTING— My "liberry." Two ladies are searching through our collection of tax forms, trying to figure out which forms they will need for their respective tax preparations. At this point, one of them had already approached me for tax form advice, which I refused to give on the grounds that I have no business giving anyone advice on taxes even if library policy allowed me to, which it most certainly does not. We provide forms, we do not provide advice on what to do with those forms. So she returned to our tax form display and continued her search.
LADY 1— They say you can go on the computer and it will tell you everything you need to know. (NOTE: By "they" she was referring to THEY, not us.)
LADY 2— Hm. You should go to the library and do that.
(Pause)
LADY 1— Go to the library?
LADY 2— Yeah. You should go to the library and check on that.
(Pause)
LADY 1— This IS the library.
(Pause)
LADY 2— Oh, yeah. (Pause) I meant the library in TOWN-M.
LADY 1— They say you can go on the computer and it will tell you everything you need to know. (NOTE: By "they" she was referring to THEY, not us.)
LADY 2— Hm. You should go to the library and do that.
(Pause)
LADY 1— Go to the library?
LADY 2— Yeah. You should go to the library and check on that.
(Pause)
LADY 1— This IS the library.
(Pause)
LADY 2— Oh, yeah. (Pause) I meant the library in TOWN-M.
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
You open a mere hour and a half late and they never let you hear the end of it! Shiiiii
None of the staff was upset that I neglected to open the library on time, Monday. The patrons, however, haven't stopped talking about it.
When I arrived, yesterday, Mrs. C said that people had been coming in all morning long and mentioning how we were not open immediately at 1 on Monday. Mr. B-Natural came in a couple of times to bring it up again. And people who hadn't even attempted to come to the library during its unfortunate extended closed hours dropped by to mention it, having heard about it from the mouth of Lennie, who has apparently told every single person he's encountered since that we didn't open on time and that he "did good" in tracking down Mr. A to let him know. (No one has yet been able to figure out how Lennie knew where Mr. A works, nor where exactly in the building his office is located, but find it he did.)
With my luck, Mr. Crab was probably one of the folks who turned up at 1 and this little hour and a half incident will become transformed by Mr. Crab's legend-spinning abilities into The Week and a Half the library failed to open.
When I arrived, yesterday, Mrs. C said that people had been coming in all morning long and mentioning how we were not open immediately at 1 on Monday. Mr. B-Natural came in a couple of times to bring it up again. And people who hadn't even attempted to come to the library during its unfortunate extended closed hours dropped by to mention it, having heard about it from the mouth of Lennie, who has apparently told every single person he's encountered since that we didn't open on time and that he "did good" in tracking down Mr. A to let him know. (No one has yet been able to figure out how Lennie knew where Mr. A works, nor where exactly in the building his office is located, but find it he did.)
With my luck, Mr. Crab was probably one of the folks who turned up at 1 and this little hour and a half incident will become transformed by Mr. Crab's legend-spinning abilities into The Week and a Half the library failed to open.
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
Monday Attack!
So there I was, enjoying my Monday off, when round about 2:20 my phone rang. It was Mr. Piano, a recently added member of our "liberry" board of directors.
"Hey, JUICE, is the library open today?"
"Yeah, it should be--" I began. Then a horrible thought passed through my skull. I dashed to my fridge, where my brand new April work schedule was attached with a magnet. Sure enough, my horrible thought was made real. "Aw crap," I said. "I'm supposed to be there."
Mr. Piano wasn't calling to bless me out, or anything. He'd simply dropped by to pick up something board-related and found the place locked up. I told him I'd be there in 20 minutes and made a break for the car.
As I've detailed here many times, Mondays are evil evil things at the "liberry." We're only open from 1 to 5, but this time limitation does not limit the amount of chaos we experience. Instead, it compresses the amount of chaos we experience on a normal 10 hour day into a four hour block. And while we went through a rather enjoyable year or two of having two employees scheduled to work on Mondays, thus having enough staff on hand to help stave off the Monday Madness, traditionally and currently it's been a solo effort.
For years, Mrs. C used to do them by herself. Then, after I had to fill in for her one too many times nearly being driven insane by the process, I successfully lobbied for double employees and was given the job of being Mrs. C's Monday wingman. After Mrs. C took maternity leave the day fell to me and a revolving cast of corhorts and greenhorns. Upon her return, Mrs. C realized how much more enjoyable life is without Monday shifts in her life, and stopped doing them altogether. Then Mrs. A decided she couldn't justify having two employees on a day with such low circulation numbers and for the past several months it's been a revolving solo shift, with each "liberry" ass. taking one Monday per month. Well, I say "solo shift," but Lennie, our mentally slow volunteer "employee," works them too.
As I was nearing the library, fully expecting to find 20 innanet crowders lined up at the door, feet a-tappin', I spotted Lennie standing on the corner and looking very concerned. I imagined that he had probably been confused to show up for his Monday shift only to find the place locked up. There were no patrons banging on the door to get in, but there were quite a number of boxes of book donations. (We always tell people not to bring book donations on Mondays because we don't have the staff on hand to deal with them. What day of the week do you think we get the most? You guessed it!)
At 2:34, I unlocked the back door and then broke a speed record for opening duties, before actually unlocking the front door. Lennie was the first in. He didn't mention anything about the "liberry" being closed earlier, preferring to default to his usual conversational topic of the latest basketball scores for WVU. He helped me carry in all the dontations.
I tried to phone Mrs A at home, to let her know what had happened, but got no answer. After a few minutes, though, Mr. A phoned and he seemed relieved to hear someone answer. He said Lennie had walked down to his office to let him know that the library wasn't open, but he figured he'd call first before phoning Mrs. A at home.
"Well, we weren't open on time," I admitted. "In fact, I was trying to phone MRS. A to let her know, but didn't get an answer."
I thought telling Mr. A about the situation was remarkably good thinking on Lennie's part. I told him so, giving him a new conversational topic of the day: "I did good, didn't I, JUICE?"
The only patron who said anything about our odd hours was Mr. B-Natural, who'd probably been lined up at the door at 12:45, hoping to get the first computer of the day.
"Somebody sleep late today?" he asked.
"No," I said. "Somebody forgot to look at his schedule."
Around 3:30, Mrs. A finally phoned. She too seemed thankful to hear my voice and wondered how I found out the library was closed. I told her the story of Mr. Piano's call and of Lennie's attempt to save the day.
"It was MS. S's day, right?" she said.
"No, it was my day."
"No, it's MS. S's day," Mrs. A said.
"No, it's mine. I'm looking at the schedule right now and it says me, 1-5." I then paused as a warm thought passed through my skull. "You know, I should have just kept quiet about that and we could finally have been rid of her."
"Dammit, JUICE, why'd you have to say anything?!" Mrs. A said.
"Hey, JUICE, is the library open today?"
"Yeah, it should be--" I began. Then a horrible thought passed through my skull. I dashed to my fridge, where my brand new April work schedule was attached with a magnet. Sure enough, my horrible thought was made real. "Aw crap," I said. "I'm supposed to be there."
Mr. Piano wasn't calling to bless me out, or anything. He'd simply dropped by to pick up something board-related and found the place locked up. I told him I'd be there in 20 minutes and made a break for the car.
As I've detailed here many times, Mondays are evil evil things at the "liberry." We're only open from 1 to 5, but this time limitation does not limit the amount of chaos we experience. Instead, it compresses the amount of chaos we experience on a normal 10 hour day into a four hour block. And while we went through a rather enjoyable year or two of having two employees scheduled to work on Mondays, thus having enough staff on hand to help stave off the Monday Madness, traditionally and currently it's been a solo effort.
For years, Mrs. C used to do them by herself. Then, after I had to fill in for her one too many times nearly being driven insane by the process, I successfully lobbied for double employees and was given the job of being Mrs. C's Monday wingman. After Mrs. C took maternity leave the day fell to me and a revolving cast of corhorts and greenhorns. Upon her return, Mrs. C realized how much more enjoyable life is without Monday shifts in her life, and stopped doing them altogether. Then Mrs. A decided she couldn't justify having two employees on a day with such low circulation numbers and for the past several months it's been a revolving solo shift, with each "liberry" ass. taking one Monday per month. Well, I say "solo shift," but Lennie, our mentally slow volunteer "employee," works them too.
As I was nearing the library, fully expecting to find 20 innanet crowders lined up at the door, feet a-tappin', I spotted Lennie standing on the corner and looking very concerned. I imagined that he had probably been confused to show up for his Monday shift only to find the place locked up. There were no patrons banging on the door to get in, but there were quite a number of boxes of book donations. (We always tell people not to bring book donations on Mondays because we don't have the staff on hand to deal with them. What day of the week do you think we get the most? You guessed it!)
At 2:34, I unlocked the back door and then broke a speed record for opening duties, before actually unlocking the front door. Lennie was the first in. He didn't mention anything about the "liberry" being closed earlier, preferring to default to his usual conversational topic of the latest basketball scores for WVU. He helped me carry in all the dontations.
I tried to phone Mrs A at home, to let her know what had happened, but got no answer. After a few minutes, though, Mr. A phoned and he seemed relieved to hear someone answer. He said Lennie had walked down to his office to let him know that the library wasn't open, but he figured he'd call first before phoning Mrs. A at home.
"Well, we weren't open on time," I admitted. "In fact, I was trying to phone MRS. A to let her know, but didn't get an answer."
I thought telling Mr. A about the situation was remarkably good thinking on Lennie's part. I told him so, giving him a new conversational topic of the day: "I did good, didn't I, JUICE?"
The only patron who said anything about our odd hours was Mr. B-Natural, who'd probably been lined up at the door at 12:45, hoping to get the first computer of the day.
"Somebody sleep late today?" he asked.
"No," I said. "Somebody forgot to look at his schedule."
Around 3:30, Mrs. A finally phoned. She too seemed thankful to hear my voice and wondered how I found out the library was closed. I told her the story of Mr. Piano's call and of Lennie's attempt to save the day.
"It was MS. S's day, right?" she said.
"No, it was my day."
"No, it's MS. S's day," Mrs. A said.
"No, it's mine. I'm looking at the schedule right now and it says me, 1-5." I then paused as a warm thought passed through my skull. "You know, I should have just kept quiet about that and we could finally have been rid of her."
"Dammit, JUICE, why'd you have to say anything?!" Mrs. A said.
Monday, April 02, 2007
Been Locked Out
Having now owned it for 12 weeks or so, I find I still really love my Mp3 player, the Creative Zen Vision-M which I have dubbed Juice's Vision. It has, however, required something of an adjustment to my life that has not been without problems.
I take my Vision practically everywhere I go—cause you never know when you're really going to need to listen to an episode of This American Life—so I almost always listen to it during my 15 minute comute. Remembering to take it in the house with me when I return home, though, is a newly added step to the usual steps I have to take in parking my car. It's actually even more complicated than that.
By now in my driving career, the steps of parking my car—putting it in park, turning it off, taking the keys out of the ignition, remembering to lock the doors, etc.—are so ingrained that I don't have to think about them to perform them. Adding the Vision into the mix, though, adds quite a few more steps than simply remembering to take it into the house. I have to first bookmark the Podcast I was listening to (making sure to bookmark it over it's previous bookmarked position and not start a new position to clog up my list of other bookmarks), then turn the player off, disconnect it from its audio cable and cram it in a pocket, then make sure I've done all the other steps for parking before heading into the house. These additional steps sometimes prove too much for my feeble brain, which only seems interested in counting how many steps I've done, not whether or not they were the correct steps. As a result, I've occasionally found myself forgetting to put my car in park first before attempting to turn it off, or forgetting my keys in the ignition, or forgetting to turn the car off at all. Granted, I've gotten better about that over the weeks of Vision ownership, but it still plays havoc once in a while, particularly if I add even more steps to the process.
Take Friday.
Before work I popped down to the courthouse to renew my license plate. No problem there. On the way home, after work, I talked to my wife via cell phone. She said she had about an hour's more work. I figured I'd go home, start dinner and have it ready by the time she got there. I pulled into my driveway, put the car in park, took my keys out of the ignition, bookmarked my podcast, disconnected the player from its audio cable, made sure to put both the player and headphones into my shirt pockets, put my cell phone into its pocket, put away my new registration and proof of insurance, gathered up my new license plate sticker, fished out my container of Wet Ones with which to wipe the old sticker before applying the new one, opened the driver's side door being sure to lock it with the Lock-All-Doors thingy, climbed out, closed the door, headed back to the license plate and I was just pulling a Wet One from its container when I realized I'd left my keys in the car. Oh, sure, I'd remembered to take them out of the ignition, but I'd not kept them in my hand because of all the other steps I needed my hands for. They were left lying on the passenger seat.
Because we've not gotten around to hiding a spare key outside again and because we've long since fixed our security oversight that allowed us to break into our own house nearly 2 years back, I was well and truly screwed.
"I locked my damn self out of the car and the house," I said after phoning my wife back. I figured I might as well fess up, as she would find out sooner or later. She laughed at my dumbassity and offered to drop her work and come home early, but I declined. After all, it was a very nice day, the sun was shining, the air was warm, we had only just reinstalled the cushions into the patio furniture, and I had my Vision and headphones at hand. What more could I need to while away an hour than the crisp nasal voice of Ira Glass?
I take my Vision practically everywhere I go—cause you never know when you're really going to need to listen to an episode of This American Life—so I almost always listen to it during my 15 minute comute. Remembering to take it in the house with me when I return home, though, is a newly added step to the usual steps I have to take in parking my car. It's actually even more complicated than that.
By now in my driving career, the steps of parking my car—putting it in park, turning it off, taking the keys out of the ignition, remembering to lock the doors, etc.—are so ingrained that I don't have to think about them to perform them. Adding the Vision into the mix, though, adds quite a few more steps than simply remembering to take it into the house. I have to first bookmark the Podcast I was listening to (making sure to bookmark it over it's previous bookmarked position and not start a new position to clog up my list of other bookmarks), then turn the player off, disconnect it from its audio cable and cram it in a pocket, then make sure I've done all the other steps for parking before heading into the house. These additional steps sometimes prove too much for my feeble brain, which only seems interested in counting how many steps I've done, not whether or not they were the correct steps. As a result, I've occasionally found myself forgetting to put my car in park first before attempting to turn it off, or forgetting my keys in the ignition, or forgetting to turn the car off at all. Granted, I've gotten better about that over the weeks of Vision ownership, but it still plays havoc once in a while, particularly if I add even more steps to the process.
Take Friday.
Before work I popped down to the courthouse to renew my license plate. No problem there. On the way home, after work, I talked to my wife via cell phone. She said she had about an hour's more work. I figured I'd go home, start dinner and have it ready by the time she got there. I pulled into my driveway, put the car in park, took my keys out of the ignition, bookmarked my podcast, disconnected the player from its audio cable, made sure to put both the player and headphones into my shirt pockets, put my cell phone into its pocket, put away my new registration and proof of insurance, gathered up my new license plate sticker, fished out my container of Wet Ones with which to wipe the old sticker before applying the new one, opened the driver's side door being sure to lock it with the Lock-All-Doors thingy, climbed out, closed the door, headed back to the license plate and I was just pulling a Wet One from its container when I realized I'd left my keys in the car. Oh, sure, I'd remembered to take them out of the ignition, but I'd not kept them in my hand because of all the other steps I needed my hands for. They were left lying on the passenger seat.
Because we've not gotten around to hiding a spare key outside again and because we've long since fixed our security oversight that allowed us to break into our own house nearly 2 years back, I was well and truly screwed.
"I locked my damn self out of the car and the house," I said after phoning my wife back. I figured I might as well fess up, as she would find out sooner or later. She laughed at my dumbassity and offered to drop her work and come home early, but I declined. After all, it was a very nice day, the sun was shining, the air was warm, we had only just reinstalled the cushions into the patio furniture, and I had my Vision and headphones at hand. What more could I need to while away an hour than the crisp nasal voice of Ira Glass?
Friday, March 30, 2007
Actual Conversations Heard in Actual Libraries #76
SETTING— My "Liberry." A male patron opens and walks through the outer door of our building, passing through the open inner door, carrying a pile of books.
MAN— Any reason your book return's locked?
ME— Yes. We lock it during the day.
MAN— (Stares at me for a long moment, perhaps sensing my inner snotty attitude) You lock it during the day?
ME— Yes.
The man shakes his head, drops his books on the circ desk, walks back toward the exit, closes our inner door behind him as he passes through the outer one, doing so quickly so as not to give me time to say, "Actually, sir, that's a door we keep open during the day."
MAN— Any reason your book return's locked?
ME— Yes. We lock it during the day.
MAN— (Stares at me for a long moment, perhaps sensing my inner snotty attitude) You lock it during the day?
ME— Yes.
The man shakes his head, drops his books on the circ desk, walks back toward the exit, closes our inner door behind him as he passes through the outer one, doing so quickly so as not to give me time to say, "Actually, sir, that's a door we keep open during the day."
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Let's just hope he doesn't see his shadow.
Yes, despite what the calendar may say, spring has officially arrived in Tri-Metro.
How do I know this?
Fatty Manchild, my friends. Fatty Manchild.
Fatty Manchild is a patron who, I'd guess, is in his mid 30's and who, when weather permits and sometimes when not, consistently wears short pants and T-shirts at all times. Now, I'm not decrying short pants and T-shirts, cause I'm wearing both items right now and will likely go out in public wearing them later. However, my casual-wear wardrobe does not consist entirely of loud 80's style Jams and T-shirts, often sleeveless, that are at least a size too small and frequently in need of a good laundering.
I'm not making fun of the man's weight, either; he's not all THAT large as these things go and I'm hardly one to throw stones in that department myself. It's just that the combination of the too tight Ts and the Jams serve to give this guy an aura that causes you to question whether or not his fashion sense is in a state of arrested development. If you were to see him, you would realize how utterly appropriate the name Fatty Manchild truly is.
It's like a 14 year old boy from 1986 was hit by a car, went into a coma for 20 years, woke up and then was released into the world, in the Spring, without first having been given the prerequisite lecture on modern fashion trends. Knowing no better, he drove to the nearest beach, gravitated to the cheapest beach-wear store down near the shore, loaded up on 10 for $10 medium T-shirts and the loudest, most-inappropriate-to-wear-in-a-town-that's,-like,-five-hours-from-the-nearest-beach Jams, slipped on such an outfit, hiked his socks half-way up his calves, drove the five hours back and headed for the "liberry."
And it's not that the man doesn't own anything else. A couple years back, for several months, (summer months even), he consistently wore a shirt, tie and dress slacks when he visited. It was a respectable look befitting a man who might work in a bank or, perhaps, in sales. I think he must have left whatever job that required such a dress code, though, for he eventually returned to his Jams and tight T-shirt look and chucked all effort at maintaining his appearance to the winds.
His first appearance of the year, dressed thusly, has now occurred and spring has, in turn, arrived.
How do I know this?
Fatty Manchild, my friends. Fatty Manchild.
Fatty Manchild is a patron who, I'd guess, is in his mid 30's and who, when weather permits and sometimes when not, consistently wears short pants and T-shirts at all times. Now, I'm not decrying short pants and T-shirts, cause I'm wearing both items right now and will likely go out in public wearing them later. However, my casual-wear wardrobe does not consist entirely of loud 80's style Jams and T-shirts, often sleeveless, that are at least a size too small and frequently in need of a good laundering.
I'm not making fun of the man's weight, either; he's not all THAT large as these things go and I'm hardly one to throw stones in that department myself. It's just that the combination of the too tight Ts and the Jams serve to give this guy an aura that causes you to question whether or not his fashion sense is in a state of arrested development. If you were to see him, you would realize how utterly appropriate the name Fatty Manchild truly is.
It's like a 14 year old boy from 1986 was hit by a car, went into a coma for 20 years, woke up and then was released into the world, in the Spring, without first having been given the prerequisite lecture on modern fashion trends. Knowing no better, he drove to the nearest beach, gravitated to the cheapest beach-wear store down near the shore, loaded up on 10 for $10 medium T-shirts and the loudest, most-inappropriate-to-wear-in-a-town-that's,-like,-five-hours-from-the-nearest-beach Jams, slipped on such an outfit, hiked his socks half-way up his calves, drove the five hours back and headed for the "liberry."
And it's not that the man doesn't own anything else. A couple years back, for several months, (summer months even), he consistently wore a shirt, tie and dress slacks when he visited. It was a respectable look befitting a man who might work in a bank or, perhaps, in sales. I think he must have left whatever job that required such a dress code, though, for he eventually returned to his Jams and tight T-shirt look and chucked all effort at maintaining his appearance to the winds.
His first appearance of the year, dressed thusly, has now occurred and spring has, in turn, arrived.
Monday, March 26, 2007
Mr. Crab Finally Poops
Mr. Crab, third grumpiest old man in all the world, happened in this week, approached the circ-desk and inquired to Mrs. B as to the whereabouts of our copy of the Wa11 Street J0urnal. Now, it might seem odd that Mr. Crab would ask about the location of our Wa11 Street J0urnal copy when we have a perfectly good and well-identified periodicals section upstairs where one might expect to find such things as, say, periodicals. No, Mr. Crab's reasoning behind his question is two-fold: A) he firmly believes that, two years ago, we spent six full months without a subscription to the Wa11 Street J0urnal and he enjoys broaching that particular subject even though reality reflects that we only spent about a month and a half without it; and B) at our "liberry" the mail does not arrive on a schedule preferable to anyone, except, I assume, our postmaster.
For years, our mail used to arrive faithfully each morning at around 9:30. In the past few months, however, our mailman's route has been fiddled with by the postmaster on a number of occasions, causing it to arrive later and later in the day. (We know this because our mailman doesn't like it either and ratted out his boss to us.) First we started getting our mail around 1p. Then, it arrived closer to 2, then 3. Now it can come anywhere between 3 and 5 o'clock and arrives earlier only when the mailman has several large and heavy packages for us and doesn't want to have to lug them around all day.
Still, when the mail does finally arrive, we're rarely in any hurry to put the Journal in its place on the newspaper rack. The only people I've ever known to actually read it are Mr. B-Natural (first grumpiest old man in all the world), Mr. Smiley (second grumpiest old man in all the world, but who hasn't graced us with his presence for over a year now), Mr. Crab (the aforementioned third) and a long unseen patron who used to refer to the Wa11 Street J0urnal as "the Capitalist Tool," which, in turn, was how I came to refer to him. Often, the Journal just stays on the lower shelf of our downstairs shelving cart awaiting some good soul to haul it upstairs. Often, it remains there until closing time, when we finally do haul it upstairs and lob it atop the pile of its brethren. Also, due to rapid circ-desk duty employee turnover, the person manning the desk doesn't always know whether or not the mail has arrived, so if anyone comes in seeking the Journal, (i.e. Mr. B-Natural or Mr. Crab), we tell them to first check the shelving cart and if it's not there then it's either in the periodicals section upstairs or it hasn't arrived yet. It's a pretty simple formula, but these two horse's asses don't care to remember it and ask us every time.
During Mr. Crab's visit, Mrs. B happened to know that the mail had not arrived. She explained this to him and noted that the mail might not arrive for hours yet. Mr. Crab was, naturally, quite grumpy about this. Mrs. B told me that she had expected he would next probably complain about the lateness of the mail, but instead he complained about something else.
"Do you know what your library director said to me the other day?" Mr. Crab said, leaning closer.
"What?" Mrs. B asked.
"I asked her if the Wa11 Street J0urnal had arrived and she told me to look on this cart and if it wasn't there it might be upstairs." And he said this in a tone that suggested any right-thinking person should be appalled. Then he finally uttered the words we've been waiting to hear for years: "She won't be getting a donation next year."
Why Mrs. A's suggestion set Mr. Crab off when the rest of the staff have told him the exact same thing on multiple occasions, I'm none too sure. Mrs. A is not a fan of Mr. Crab, so perhaps his finely attuned senses detected her dislike. Whatever the case, Mrs. B didn't know how to respond to him. When she told me about it, though, my brain nearly hemorrhaged from the amount of possibilities that flew through it.
"You should have told him, `Oh, thank God it's finally over! At last, we can stop living in fear of you!' "
Mrs. B laughed.
"No, wait! You should have dropped to your knees, burst into tears and wailed, `Ohhhh no! Oh, dear God, no! Pleeease don't take away your donation! Please, please, pleeeeaaaaase! How can we possibly go on without all two hundred of your dollars?! Ohhh, our poor poor budget! We'll have to fire the staff!' "
" `And then who will let you check things out on their cards when you forget yours?' " Mrs. B added.
"`Oh, lordy lordy, what will we do? What WIIIIILLL we dooooooo?!!!' "
For years, our mail used to arrive faithfully each morning at around 9:30. In the past few months, however, our mailman's route has been fiddled with by the postmaster on a number of occasions, causing it to arrive later and later in the day. (We know this because our mailman doesn't like it either and ratted out his boss to us.) First we started getting our mail around 1p. Then, it arrived closer to 2, then 3. Now it can come anywhere between 3 and 5 o'clock and arrives earlier only when the mailman has several large and heavy packages for us and doesn't want to have to lug them around all day.
Still, when the mail does finally arrive, we're rarely in any hurry to put the Journal in its place on the newspaper rack. The only people I've ever known to actually read it are Mr. B-Natural (first grumpiest old man in all the world), Mr. Smiley (second grumpiest old man in all the world, but who hasn't graced us with his presence for over a year now), Mr. Crab (the aforementioned third) and a long unseen patron who used to refer to the Wa11 Street J0urnal as "the Capitalist Tool," which, in turn, was how I came to refer to him. Often, the Journal just stays on the lower shelf of our downstairs shelving cart awaiting some good soul to haul it upstairs. Often, it remains there until closing time, when we finally do haul it upstairs and lob it atop the pile of its brethren. Also, due to rapid circ-desk duty employee turnover, the person manning the desk doesn't always know whether or not the mail has arrived, so if anyone comes in seeking the Journal, (i.e. Mr. B-Natural or Mr. Crab), we tell them to first check the shelving cart and if it's not there then it's either in the periodicals section upstairs or it hasn't arrived yet. It's a pretty simple formula, but these two horse's asses don't care to remember it and ask us every time.
During Mr. Crab's visit, Mrs. B happened to know that the mail had not arrived. She explained this to him and noted that the mail might not arrive for hours yet. Mr. Crab was, naturally, quite grumpy about this. Mrs. B told me that she had expected he would next probably complain about the lateness of the mail, but instead he complained about something else.
"Do you know what your library director said to me the other day?" Mr. Crab said, leaning closer.
"What?" Mrs. B asked.
"I asked her if the Wa11 Street J0urnal had arrived and she told me to look on this cart and if it wasn't there it might be upstairs." And he said this in a tone that suggested any right-thinking person should be appalled. Then he finally uttered the words we've been waiting to hear for years: "She won't be getting a donation next year."
Why Mrs. A's suggestion set Mr. Crab off when the rest of the staff have told him the exact same thing on multiple occasions, I'm none too sure. Mrs. A is not a fan of Mr. Crab, so perhaps his finely attuned senses detected her dislike. Whatever the case, Mrs. B didn't know how to respond to him. When she told me about it, though, my brain nearly hemorrhaged from the amount of possibilities that flew through it.
"You should have told him, `Oh, thank God it's finally over! At last, we can stop living in fear of you!' "
Mrs. B laughed.
"No, wait! You should have dropped to your knees, burst into tears and wailed, `Ohhhh no! Oh, dear God, no! Pleeease don't take away your donation! Please, please, pleeeeaaaaase! How can we possibly go on without all two hundred of your dollars?! Ohhh, our poor poor budget! We'll have to fire the staff!' "
" `And then who will let you check things out on their cards when you forget yours?' " Mrs. B added.
"`Oh, lordy lordy, what will we do? What WIIIIILLL we dooooooo?!!!' "
Friday, March 23, 2007
"Oh, the Irony!!!" (L is for Lazy Week: Day 5)
In addition to working at the "liberry" part time, our perpetual Newbie Greenhorn, Ms. S, also works in the fast food industry. Often she comes directly from a shift at her fast food job for a shift at the "liberry." You might think this would cause us problems of having to smell that fast-foody smell that tends to sink into your pores and follow you around (believe me, I've worked in enough pizza joints to know), but, both fortunately and oddly, she doesn't smell that way at all.
The rest of our staff have often speculated on the many ways she probably handles her fast food job, imaginging much the same behavior as we witness in her "liberry" job. None of us, however, have been brave enough to venture to her particular restaurant since we learned of her employment there.
Last week, while Mrs. B and I were engaged in some book processing, Ms. S arrived for her shift. She soon announced that she had been very annoyed at her fast food job. Mrs. B inquired as to why.
"There's this new girl there and I had to train her," Ms. S said. "I was showing her how to take orders and I took a few orders and was showing her how and then I told her to try a few on her own. Well, she kept stopping to ask me questions and ask the manager questions. It was just one question after another until I wanted to scream!"
Mrs. B and I became very silent at this point. I kept my eyes locked onto the circ-desk computer screen. I knew that if Mrs. B and I were to make eye contact at that point, we would both completely lose our shit due to having just been subjected to the most ironic statements we're likely to hear all year.
Yes, Ms. S—an employee who after 9 months on the job still has to be told and retold some of the more basic functions of her job—was complaining about a brand new employee not having mastered the finer points of taking a fast food order.
Yes, Ms. S—a person who thinks up the most inane and obvious questions, holding them like a pool of mercury in the hermetically-sealed vault of her little pea-brain, saving them until 5p when we are all headed out the door to leave her on her own, then releasing them upon us in a blinding, drowning, takes ten minutes to answer `em all torrent—had just complained about someone else asking too many questions.
Yes, Ms. S—the author of some of the dumbest questions on record, with the most painfully apparent answers, not to mention the same newbie greenhorn who thinks nothing of phoning up Mrs. C at home, repeatedly, over the course of an entire weekend, to ask said moronic questions, ("Uhhhh, hey, whut do I cover books with when I run out of ten inch book wrap?"; "Uhhhh, hey, whut am I supposed to do with the interlibrary loans that won't fit in our already overstuffed mail pouch?"; "Uhh, hey, one of our patron computers isn't working; should I keep putting patrons on it, anyway?")—was complaining about dumb questions being asked by a newbie greenhorn.
During the midst of my fight to keep from belting out cackles of irony-spawned laughter, Mrs. C entered the room and gave my quivering dam of a face a quizzical look. I tried to convey, "I'll tell you later" using only my left eyebrow, but didn't think the message quite communicated through my barely-contained amusement.
"I'm... going to go... take some books... to the basement," I said.
"Oh, take MS. S with you and show her where we keep the bindery books," Mrs. C said.
O.T.I.
The rest of our staff have often speculated on the many ways she probably handles her fast food job, imaginging much the same behavior as we witness in her "liberry" job. None of us, however, have been brave enough to venture to her particular restaurant since we learned of her employment there.
Last week, while Mrs. B and I were engaged in some book processing, Ms. S arrived for her shift. She soon announced that she had been very annoyed at her fast food job. Mrs. B inquired as to why.
"There's this new girl there and I had to train her," Ms. S said. "I was showing her how to take orders and I took a few orders and was showing her how and then I told her to try a few on her own. Well, she kept stopping to ask me questions and ask the manager questions. It was just one question after another until I wanted to scream!"
Mrs. B and I became very silent at this point. I kept my eyes locked onto the circ-desk computer screen. I knew that if Mrs. B and I were to make eye contact at that point, we would both completely lose our shit due to having just been subjected to the most ironic statements we're likely to hear all year.
Yes, Ms. S—an employee who after 9 months on the job still has to be told and retold some of the more basic functions of her job—was complaining about a brand new employee not having mastered the finer points of taking a fast food order.
Yes, Ms. S—a person who thinks up the most inane and obvious questions, holding them like a pool of mercury in the hermetically-sealed vault of her little pea-brain, saving them until 5p when we are all headed out the door to leave her on her own, then releasing them upon us in a blinding, drowning, takes ten minutes to answer `em all torrent—had just complained about someone else asking too many questions.
Yes, Ms. S—the author of some of the dumbest questions on record, with the most painfully apparent answers, not to mention the same newbie greenhorn who thinks nothing of phoning up Mrs. C at home, repeatedly, over the course of an entire weekend, to ask said moronic questions, ("Uhhhh, hey, whut do I cover books with when I run out of ten inch book wrap?"; "Uhhhh, hey, whut am I supposed to do with the interlibrary loans that won't fit in our already overstuffed mail pouch?"; "Uhh, hey, one of our patron computers isn't working; should I keep putting patrons on it, anyway?")—was complaining about dumb questions being asked by a newbie greenhorn.
During the midst of my fight to keep from belting out cackles of irony-spawned laughter, Mrs. C entered the room and gave my quivering dam of a face a quizzical look. I tried to convey, "I'll tell you later" using only my left eyebrow, but didn't think the message quite communicated through my barely-contained amusement.
"I'm... going to go... take some books... to the basement," I said.
"Oh, take MS. S with you and show her where we keep the bindery books," Mrs. C said.
O.T.I.
Thursday, March 22, 2007
"Get out of Blog Free" (L is for Lazy Week: Day 4)
Found out today that I fudged up in my reporting of yesterday's story.
It's become something of a weekly tradition for the staff to share stories about Ms. S on Thursday mornings. This is because we have the highest concentration of staff members at that point and also because Ms. S is never among that concentration. Today's discussion was jumpstarted by the fact that despite both I and Mrs. C having told Ms. S to stop cutting up the spine label sheets because they gum up the typewriter, we found yet another pile of her brutal label leavings. It looked like some kind of gruesome, mishapen paperdoll chain. Mrs. A left it by the typewriter and slapped a note on it reading, "There will be no more spine labels cut this way. It is wasteful and they stick to the typewriter."
My conversation with Mrs. C and Mrs. B progressed a bit more and I asked, "Has MRS. A said anything about why we haven't just gotten rid of MS. S?"
Both shook their heads. We then talked about the prospect somewhat. I wondered if perhaps Mrs. A, knowing how unskilled and newbie greenhornish Ms. S is, was just giving her the necessary time for our on-the-job training to finally kick in. After all, it took former Newbie Greenhorn Ms. M almost a full year to finally stop screwing things up on a near habitual level and become a cherished fellow "Liberry" Ass. Eight months ago we were calling for her head too, but now we love her and think she's doing a respectable job. There is kind of a learning curve to the job and even those of us who've been at it for years still get called up short by some new patron-spawned twist, on occasion. Getting into the rhythm of things can take a long time for skilled people, let alone someone with no discernible customer service skills such as Ms. S. That said, though, all evidence seems to point to Ms. S being a sour mixed drink composed of two parts lazy to one part incompetence, with a generous chaser of stubborn refusal to follow directions no matter how many times they're given.
"Did MRS. A hear the story about MS. S ignoring the patron while she made a greeting card?" I asked. To me, this was the latest prime bit of evidence that Ms. S just doesn't "get" it.
"A greeting card?" Mrs. B asked. "You didn't tell me about her making a greeting card."
I was taken aback. For a moment, I thought I'd slipped into a parallel universe in which Mrs. B hadn't been the person to tell me the greeting card story.
"No. Wait. You told..." I began.
"Ohhh, no. She wasn't making a greeting card," Mrs B said. "She was making a library card."
Thinking about the retelling I'd heard, Mrs. B had not actually said greeting card, but had only said that Ms. S had been making a card. My brain was the one that made the leap to greeting card. A library card at least made more sense. I can kind of see how Ms. S might be so absorbed in making a library card that she would ignore a patron. Not to say that this is at all excusable, it's just that the way her brain seems to work she would feel completely justified in ignoring her customer service responsibilities because she was so engrossed at "doing her job."
So, it looks like I reported the event incorrectly here through my own faulty journalism. I'm tempted to give Ms. S a "Get Out of Blog Free" card to make up for it, though at this point in the entry that's a bit moot.
It's become something of a weekly tradition for the staff to share stories about Ms. S on Thursday mornings. This is because we have the highest concentration of staff members at that point and also because Ms. S is never among that concentration. Today's discussion was jumpstarted by the fact that despite both I and Mrs. C having told Ms. S to stop cutting up the spine label sheets because they gum up the typewriter, we found yet another pile of her brutal label leavings. It looked like some kind of gruesome, mishapen paperdoll chain. Mrs. A left it by the typewriter and slapped a note on it reading, "There will be no more spine labels cut this way. It is wasteful and they stick to the typewriter."
My conversation with Mrs. C and Mrs. B progressed a bit more and I asked, "Has MRS. A said anything about why we haven't just gotten rid of MS. S?"
Both shook their heads. We then talked about the prospect somewhat. I wondered if perhaps Mrs. A, knowing how unskilled and newbie greenhornish Ms. S is, was just giving her the necessary time for our on-the-job training to finally kick in. After all, it took former Newbie Greenhorn Ms. M almost a full year to finally stop screwing things up on a near habitual level and become a cherished fellow "Liberry" Ass. Eight months ago we were calling for her head too, but now we love her and think she's doing a respectable job. There is kind of a learning curve to the job and even those of us who've been at it for years still get called up short by some new patron-spawned twist, on occasion. Getting into the rhythm of things can take a long time for skilled people, let alone someone with no discernible customer service skills such as Ms. S. That said, though, all evidence seems to point to Ms. S being a sour mixed drink composed of two parts lazy to one part incompetence, with a generous chaser of stubborn refusal to follow directions no matter how many times they're given.
"Did MRS. A hear the story about MS. S ignoring the patron while she made a greeting card?" I asked. To me, this was the latest prime bit of evidence that Ms. S just doesn't "get" it.
"A greeting card?" Mrs. B asked. "You didn't tell me about her making a greeting card."
I was taken aback. For a moment, I thought I'd slipped into a parallel universe in which Mrs. B hadn't been the person to tell me the greeting card story.
"No. Wait. You told..." I began.
"Ohhh, no. She wasn't making a greeting card," Mrs B said. "She was making a library card."
Thinking about the retelling I'd heard, Mrs. B had not actually said greeting card, but had only said that Ms. S had been making a card. My brain was the one that made the leap to greeting card. A library card at least made more sense. I can kind of see how Ms. S might be so absorbed in making a library card that she would ignore a patron. Not to say that this is at all excusable, it's just that the way her brain seems to work she would feel completely justified in ignoring her customer service responsibilities because she was so engrossed at "doing her job."
So, it looks like I reported the event incorrectly here through my own faulty journalism. I'm tempted to give Ms. S a "Get Out of Blog Free" card to make up for it, though at this point in the entry that's a bit moot.
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
"Get Well Soon!" (L is for Lazy Week: Day 3)
My intrepid reporter, Mrs. B, often gives me the best Ms. S stories, mostly because they have to work together more often.
Mrs. B related to me that one day, while Ms. S was working the circ desk, she became engrossed in creating an online greeting card using the circulation computer. Ms. S spent quite a bit of time at it, getting the details just right, and was so thoroughly absorbed with her task that when a patron stepped up to the desk for help, Ms. S completely ignored him. Mrs. B, watching from afar, kept waiting for Ms. S to pause and ask the gentleman how she could help him, being as how he was standing a foot and a half away from her, clearly waiting to be assisted. She didn't. As for the patron, he didn't interrupt her, cough politely, or even say "Excuse me" or anything. He just stood there, waiting for Ms. S to wrap up what she was doing and ask if he needed help. Again, she didn't. She just kept right on plugging away at her greeting card.
Seeing that Ms. S was entranced, Mrs. B dashed behind the desk herself and asked the patron if she could help him. He explained that he was looking for a particular book and had been unable to find it on the shelf and wanted help to make sure we even owned it. Since this was all said aloud, in direct proximity to Ms. S, Mrs. B waited politely for Ms. S to catch wind of the conversation and realize she was hogging up the circulation computer that Mrs. B needed for this search. She didn't. Mrs. B finally had to tap her on the shoulder and tell her to get out of the way.
Now, I'm no stranger for using the circulation computer to do non-work related projects. However, I do not do them to the exclusion of my job. Neither Mrs. B nor I could think of any reason beyond sheer, pig-headed stupidity that Ms. S would so actively ignore a patron like this. I shudder to think of what goes on during her solo shifts on the weekends.
Mrs. B related to me that one day, while Ms. S was working the circ desk, she became engrossed in creating an online greeting card using the circulation computer. Ms. S spent quite a bit of time at it, getting the details just right, and was so thoroughly absorbed with her task that when a patron stepped up to the desk for help, Ms. S completely ignored him. Mrs. B, watching from afar, kept waiting for Ms. S to pause and ask the gentleman how she could help him, being as how he was standing a foot and a half away from her, clearly waiting to be assisted. She didn't. As for the patron, he didn't interrupt her, cough politely, or even say "Excuse me" or anything. He just stood there, waiting for Ms. S to wrap up what she was doing and ask if he needed help. Again, she didn't. She just kept right on plugging away at her greeting card.
Seeing that Ms. S was entranced, Mrs. B dashed behind the desk herself and asked the patron if she could help him. He explained that he was looking for a particular book and had been unable to find it on the shelf and wanted help to make sure we even owned it. Since this was all said aloud, in direct proximity to Ms. S, Mrs. B waited politely for Ms. S to catch wind of the conversation and realize she was hogging up the circulation computer that Mrs. B needed for this search. She didn't. Mrs. B finally had to tap her on the shoulder and tell her to get out of the way.
Now, I'm no stranger for using the circulation computer to do non-work related projects. However, I do not do them to the exclusion of my job. Neither Mrs. B nor I could think of any reason beyond sheer, pig-headed stupidity that Ms. S would so actively ignore a patron like this. I shudder to think of what goes on during her solo shifts on the weekends.
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
"Label me Pissed" (L is for Lazy Week: Day 2)
It's pretty much been confirmed that the origin of nearly every problem we have with Ms. S can be traced back to her extreme laziness. She will actually do phenomenal amounts of work to get out of doing only a little work.
For instance, a few weeks back Mrs. C and Mrs. B went through our entire biography section to check which books had been inconsistently spine-labled with "BIO" instead of Dewey "92" by previous catalogers. They then printed new spine labels to replace the faulty ones. As Ms. S is ostensibly responsible for order in the nonfiction shelves (BWAH HA ha aha ahaaaah!), the task of affixing those new labels was given to her. It took her DAYS to accomplish this, because she insisted on cutting out each individual spine label from the two and a half larger computer generated sheets of printed spine labels. She left the wax-paper backing on each label so they could remain loose and not stick to anything, then arranged them pleasantly across the surface of one of our tables before even attempting to look for books on which to affix them. These extra steps, you see, allowed her the maximum amount of time for her ass to remain planted in a chair rather than pacing the bio wall, simply cutting the labels off the larger pages and affixing them to the spines with a bit of book tape, as needed. I was sent up to help her, at one point, and blew through an uncut page of labels in under an hour.
Even after Ms. S finished those label pages, we discovered that not all the incorrectly labeled books had been present and accounted for when Mrs.es C and B did their original survey. It became Ms. S's task to type up more labels for the missing books, which she was told to do using our typewriter and some of the narrow sheets of labels we normally use to do spine labels. Of course, after she'd typed some of them, she found it gave her more chair time to cut all of those labels out too, wax-backing and all. This gave her neat little loose labels, but left holes in the overall label sheets, rendering the blank labels left there unusable because they were then incapable of being fed back into the typewriter without gumming up the whole works. She tried anyway, of course, and then left a note to explain that the reason she hadn't finished all of her labels, nor affixed any of them to actual books, was because the typewriter was utterly jammed up and she couldn't get the labels sheet out no matter what she tried.
The following morning, Mrs. C was fuming about this. It was just one more log of poop on the fragrant pile of excuses Ms. S has used to get out of doing her job. Mrs. C marched right over to the typewriter and, with barely a tug, retrieved the allegedly utterly jammed sheet of labels with almost no effort. She then gathered them up, along with all the biographies to be relabeled, and left the whole towering pile of them for Ms. S to do. (We'd like to think Ms. S is quickly learning that the jobs she is assigned do not go away just because she manages not to do them immediately, but we too have long since learned from history.)
When Ms. S returned, a day later, she eventually noticed her pile of books and the instructions taped to them. "How'd they get the labels out of the typewriter?" she asked me.
"I'm not sure," I said. Then I spied Mrs. C coming into the room. "How did you get the labels out of the typewriter, again?" I asked her.
"Just pulled them out," she said. "Yep, they came right out. Riiiight. On. Out. Just gave `em a tug, really, and they came out. No problem. Easy. Right out."
Ms. S mumbled something about them being utterly stuck when she'd tried it, but she decided to drop the subject. After all, she had a dozen freshly typed labels to cut out of the paper. We told her to stop doing that because it gums up the typewriter. We also had to explain to her YET AFRIGGINGAIN that the spine labels are actually supposed to be placed on the SPINES of the book, rather than on the front cover of the book where no one can see them without pulling the book off the shelf, further tempting patrons to reshelve it incorrectly.
"Oh, but I was just--"
"No, no. They go on the spine."
For instance, a few weeks back Mrs. C and Mrs. B went through our entire biography section to check which books had been inconsistently spine-labled with "BIO" instead of Dewey "92" by previous catalogers. They then printed new spine labels to replace the faulty ones. As Ms. S is ostensibly responsible for order in the nonfiction shelves (BWAH HA ha aha ahaaaah!), the task of affixing those new labels was given to her. It took her DAYS to accomplish this, because she insisted on cutting out each individual spine label from the two and a half larger computer generated sheets of printed spine labels. She left the wax-paper backing on each label so they could remain loose and not stick to anything, then arranged them pleasantly across the surface of one of our tables before even attempting to look for books on which to affix them. These extra steps, you see, allowed her the maximum amount of time for her ass to remain planted in a chair rather than pacing the bio wall, simply cutting the labels off the larger pages and affixing them to the spines with a bit of book tape, as needed. I was sent up to help her, at one point, and blew through an uncut page of labels in under an hour.
Even after Ms. S finished those label pages, we discovered that not all the incorrectly labeled books had been present and accounted for when Mrs.es C and B did their original survey. It became Ms. S's task to type up more labels for the missing books, which she was told to do using our typewriter and some of the narrow sheets of labels we normally use to do spine labels. Of course, after she'd typed some of them, she found it gave her more chair time to cut all of those labels out too, wax-backing and all. This gave her neat little loose labels, but left holes in the overall label sheets, rendering the blank labels left there unusable because they were then incapable of being fed back into the typewriter without gumming up the whole works. She tried anyway, of course, and then left a note to explain that the reason she hadn't finished all of her labels, nor affixed any of them to actual books, was because the typewriter was utterly jammed up and she couldn't get the labels sheet out no matter what she tried.
The following morning, Mrs. C was fuming about this. It was just one more log of poop on the fragrant pile of excuses Ms. S has used to get out of doing her job. Mrs. C marched right over to the typewriter and, with barely a tug, retrieved the allegedly utterly jammed sheet of labels with almost no effort. She then gathered them up, along with all the biographies to be relabeled, and left the whole towering pile of them for Ms. S to do. (We'd like to think Ms. S is quickly learning that the jobs she is assigned do not go away just because she manages not to do them immediately, but we too have long since learned from history.)
When Ms. S returned, a day later, she eventually noticed her pile of books and the instructions taped to them. "How'd they get the labels out of the typewriter?" she asked me.
"I'm not sure," I said. Then I spied Mrs. C coming into the room. "How did you get the labels out of the typewriter, again?" I asked her.
"Just pulled them out," she said. "Yep, they came right out. Riiiight. On. Out. Just gave `em a tug, really, and they came out. No problem. Easy. Right out."
Ms. S mumbled something about them being utterly stuck when she'd tried it, but she decided to drop the subject. After all, she had a dozen freshly typed labels to cut out of the paper. We told her to stop doing that because it gums up the typewriter. We also had to explain to her YET AFRIGGINGAIN that the spine labels are actually supposed to be placed on the SPINES of the book, rather than on the front cover of the book where no one can see them without pulling the book off the shelf, further tempting patrons to reshelve it incorrectly.
"Oh, but I was just--"
"No, no. They go on the spine."
Monday, March 19, 2007
"Deposit One Brain" (L is for Lazy Week: Day 1)
One day, a couple weeks back, my boss Mrs. A was scheduled to be in meetings in her office for most of the day. Likewise, Mrs. C had pressing business to take care of via phone and Mrs. B needed to process the backlog of book donations for our booksale. When Ms. S arrived, she was told she would need to work the desk to free everyone else up for their tasks. Almost immediately upon clocking in, though, she fled the desk for the nonfiction shelves to "read" the sections she's responsible for keeping in order. (And I shudder at the thought tht I may one day be sent to check her work.)
Mrs. C sent Mrs. B to drag Ms. S back to the desk and repeated to her that she was to stay there. Everyone then went to their tasks, some close by, some far off, and left Ms. S to it.
Shortly after this, the wife of one of the warring parties in our ongoing battle for the c0ntract0r's manuals came in to inquire about their status. The wife mentioned to Ms. S that she'd phoned about them earlier in the day. Ms. S, who lives in fear of our deposit books, because they are a hassle and require attention to detail, immediately denied all knowledge of anything this lady might or might not have been told about the books and tried desperately to weasel out of having to deal with the situation by pleading ignorance to Mrs. C. Mrs. C, who was by then very much on the phone in the midst of her business, indicated, using her eyebrows alone, that she would, in fact, slaughter Ms. S if she didn't go deal with the situation and answer the wife's question, which was merely to see if we had any of the deposit books on hand that she wanted. As it turned out, we didn't have all of them, but it took a long time for Ms. S to determine this because she kept nervously and unsuccessfully trying to check the computer for them rather than simply walking to the shelf and having a gander. Mrs. C had to put her call on hold for a moment to alert Ms. S to this shortcut, at which point Ms. S finally went and retrieved the books we did have on hand.
That done, Ms. S still seemed at a complete loss as to how to tell which books among those required for the c0ntract0r's exam were currently checked out and not in the stack she'd brought to the desk. Mrs. C finally had to put her call on hold again, drag Ms. S over to the c0ntract0r's manuals MANUAL (hanging exactly where it always is, right where Ms. S has been told it can be found at least twice before), then show her how to turn to the big obvious bookmarked page to find the list of required books for the c0ntract0r's exam, and show her how to read the spines of the stack of books there on the desk, comparing them against those listed in the manual to see which one's weren't present. Ms. S still screwed it up, declaring to the patron that we didn't have the very book that was sitting RIGHT THERE on the top of the stack--a book, I might add, that Mrs. C had JUST used as an example to show Ms. S how to do the job.
Mrs. B walked back into the room then, prompting Ms. S to gratefully explain to her patron that Mrs. B had been the employee to whom she'd spoken on the phone ealier. Then Ms. S tried to make a break for the nonfiction room in order to ditch the whole matter in Mrs. B's lap.
Mrs. C again had to put her call on hold and explain to Ms. S that she would not be escaping her duty and that she would be the person who to finish the transaction.
Upon hearing this tale recounted, I suggested that we need to get Ms. S her own Unobstructed Doors aid on the grounds that she's clearly retarded.
Mrs. C sent Mrs. B to drag Ms. S back to the desk and repeated to her that she was to stay there. Everyone then went to their tasks, some close by, some far off, and left Ms. S to it.
Shortly after this, the wife of one of the warring parties in our ongoing battle for the c0ntract0r's manuals came in to inquire about their status. The wife mentioned to Ms. S that she'd phoned about them earlier in the day. Ms. S, who lives in fear of our deposit books, because they are a hassle and require attention to detail, immediately denied all knowledge of anything this lady might or might not have been told about the books and tried desperately to weasel out of having to deal with the situation by pleading ignorance to Mrs. C. Mrs. C, who was by then very much on the phone in the midst of her business, indicated, using her eyebrows alone, that she would, in fact, slaughter Ms. S if she didn't go deal with the situation and answer the wife's question, which was merely to see if we had any of the deposit books on hand that she wanted. As it turned out, we didn't have all of them, but it took a long time for Ms. S to determine this because she kept nervously and unsuccessfully trying to check the computer for them rather than simply walking to the shelf and having a gander. Mrs. C had to put her call on hold for a moment to alert Ms. S to this shortcut, at which point Ms. S finally went and retrieved the books we did have on hand.
That done, Ms. S still seemed at a complete loss as to how to tell which books among those required for the c0ntract0r's exam were currently checked out and not in the stack she'd brought to the desk. Mrs. C finally had to put her call on hold again, drag Ms. S over to the c0ntract0r's manuals MANUAL (hanging exactly where it always is, right where Ms. S has been told it can be found at least twice before), then show her how to turn to the big obvious bookmarked page to find the list of required books for the c0ntract0r's exam, and show her how to read the spines of the stack of books there on the desk, comparing them against those listed in the manual to see which one's weren't present. Ms. S still screwed it up, declaring to the patron that we didn't have the very book that was sitting RIGHT THERE on the top of the stack--a book, I might add, that Mrs. C had JUST used as an example to show Ms. S how to do the job.
Mrs. B walked back into the room then, prompting Ms. S to gratefully explain to her patron that Mrs. B had been the employee to whom she'd spoken on the phone ealier. Then Ms. S tried to make a break for the nonfiction room in order to ditch the whole matter in Mrs. B's lap.
Mrs. C again had to put her call on hold and explain to Ms. S that she would not be escaping her duty and that she would be the person who to finish the transaction.
Upon hearing this tale recounted, I suggested that we need to get Ms. S her own Unobstructed Doors aid on the grounds that she's clearly retarded.
L is for Lazy Week
We've had a lot more fun from our perpetual newbie greenhorn, Ms. S, over the past few weeks (and by "fun" I mean "shit"). In fact, I have something of a backlog of Ms. S stories. I've been hesitant to share them, though, because every time I post a Ms. S story, people leave comments asking why we haven't fired her yet. I'm afraid that's possibly a mystery for the ages to be speculated upon by future historians with better minds than mine. Granted, I'd really prefer it if she was fired, cause it would make my job easier and my desire to strangle people somewhat less strong. However, there's also something to be said for the entertainment value of keeping her around, which may yet prove to be the ultimate reason for not firing her in the mind of my boss.
So how `bout let's all just take it for granted that Ms. S is here to stay, she'll not be fired and will never leave of her own accord. This way, we can just sit back, relax and enjoy the show...
So how `bout let's all just take it for granted that Ms. S is here to stay, she'll not be fired and will never leave of her own accord. This way, we can just sit back, relax and enjoy the show...
Friday, March 16, 2007
I'll take "Recently Deceased Actresses—the Older, Better Ones, Mind You; Not These They Got Today" for $100, Alex.
On Friday, shortly after I arrived for work, the entire staff fled the building once again for lunch. This is usually when the floodgates of people phoning to speak to either of our librarians occurs, but no such calls came through. Instead, Birthday Lady phoned to ask the date of birth of recently deceased actress Betty Hutton.
I must confess, before today I'd never even heard of Betty Hutton. But I Googled her up and found a Wikipedia entry for her. She was born February 26, 1921 and passed on March 11, 2007. I gave this information to Birthday Lady. She dutifully repeated the information back to me to make sure she had it spelled right in her scrapbook of obituaries for famous celebrities known only to people born before 1972.
"I phoned earlier, but I suppose the girl I spoke to didn't get a chance to call me back," Birthday Lady said. Then she added, "I keep up with the older actresses—not these they got today."
"Ah," I said.
"I think the older actresses were better, really."
"Probably so," I said.
After I hung up the phone, I noticed that someone had already written Betty Hutton's pertinent dates on a piece of scrap paper, along with Birthday Lady's real name and phone number. Once the staff returned from lunch, I learned that they actually had attempted to return her call several times, but it always just rang and rang and rang.
"She was probably on the phone, trying to get the information from a competing library," I suggested.
It's good to know Birthday Lady's contact information, though. Puts me in a mind to phone her up and ask if I could see her scrapbook.
I must confess, before today I'd never even heard of Betty Hutton. But I Googled her up and found a Wikipedia entry for her. She was born February 26, 1921 and passed on March 11, 2007. I gave this information to Birthday Lady. She dutifully repeated the information back to me to make sure she had it spelled right in her scrapbook of obituaries for famous celebrities known only to people born before 1972.
"I phoned earlier, but I suppose the girl I spoke to didn't get a chance to call me back," Birthday Lady said. Then she added, "I keep up with the older actresses—not these they got today."
"Ah," I said.
"I think the older actresses were better, really."
"Probably so," I said.
After I hung up the phone, I noticed that someone had already written Betty Hutton's pertinent dates on a piece of scrap paper, along with Birthday Lady's real name and phone number. Once the staff returned from lunch, I learned that they actually had attempted to return her call several times, but it always just rang and rang and rang.
"She was probably on the phone, trying to get the information from a competing library," I suggested.
It's good to know Birthday Lady's contact information, though. Puts me in a mind to phone her up and ask if I could see her scrapbook.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
If you put the forms out, they will come.
Yeah, I figured that would do it. Writing that we haven't had any problems with tax form people is the easiest way to summon precisely that sort of problem. Sure enough, today, just after everyone else on staff had left the building to go to lunch, a big ol' wingnut of a form-seeker ambled up to the desk.
"I need state tax forms."
"We have those," I said, warming up to direct him to the large display of forms he'd just walked past.
"I need s-corporation state forms for 2003, 2004 and 2006. And personal forms for 2003, 2004 and 2006."
Already I was at a disadvantage, for I've never heard of an s-corporation before, but I figured I could find it on the state's tax form page.
"Well, the personal forms we already have. At least, for 2006," I explained. "The rest I'll try to find for you from their site."
"Yeah, they said you'd probably have to look `em up," he said. Ah, yes. The mysterious THEY. "You say you got personal forms here?" he added.
"Yes," I said, pointing at the top of the floor shelf behind him. "They're on the other side of that shelf, in the bins."
The man walked around to the other side where he began staring at the piles of federal tax forms stacked directly next to the three bins containing state booklets. "Oh, in the bins," he said with the tone of a statement. He still wasn't seeing them.
"No, in the bins," I said. "In the plastic bins," I added. "In the yellow, white and black plastic bins," I continued. He looked in every conceivable place EXCEPT at the bins.
"The bins?" he said.
"Yes, the plastic bins... The bins.... No, the BINS... The PLASTIC bins," I said.
I don't know why I expected more from a man who, apparently, had failed to pay his taxes for the past four years for either himself or his business (except, apparently, for 2005). After a few more tries, he finally spotted them. As he dug around, I brought up the state's tax form site and began looking for s-corp forms. There were none to be found on just a cursory glance so I started a search for them. I did note, though, that the site only offered forms for years since 2004.
Another man came up to the desk while I searched, so I paused to ask if I could help him.
"Yeah, you're holding some c0ntract0rs books for me," he said. Aw great. As if searching for obscure forms wasn't keeping me busy enough during my solo desk time, I had to deal with deposit books and all the headaches they entail.
I hate the c0ntract0rs manuals and I'm usually none too fond of the people who seek them. I had nothing against this particular guy, except that he and another would-be-c0ntract0r have been competing for the same set of books for the past three weeks. They've been driving us crazy by phoning to place holds on them, then not picking them up by the prescribed pickup time, then getting pissy about it when the books aren't there for them when they roll in two days late, then the guy who did get the books gets pissy that he has to bring them back after his week's loan time has passed cause the other guy now has them on hold again too, then getting pissy again when told he will lose his deposit if he doesn't, etc., etc., etc. The checkout process on the books is also an enormous hassle, cause we have to calculate the deposit amount (over $500 if they want the whole set), make them sign two identical deposit book policy forms (one for us, one for them), then we have to make them go back and actually READ the frickin' forms they just blindly signed, not to mention TAKE their copy of the form, so they have no excuse to give us enormous amounts of shit a week later, etc., etc., etc. This guy was very patient, though, even after I told him it was going to be a minute due to my tax form search.
I came up goose eggs on the s-corps search. Then Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine came in and signed up for a computer. He looked impatient to begin searching for members of his fambly. I ignored him.
"Um, do you happen to know a form number for these?" I asked the tax form guy.
"No. I don't even know if there is a form," the man said so very helpfully three minutes after he should have. He offered to go home, call someone who knew and return better prepared. Of course, I had to look up the number for someone who knew, but I'd already assumed that much.
I found the number, printed some forms for him and sent him on his way. I then dealt with c0ntract0r wannabe, calculated all his crap for him, having to do it twice cause our tiny calculator has even tinier buttons, spouted a few euphamistic curses, then found out that the dude already knew how much all the books would be because he was just going to reuse the same check he'd given us two weeks ago. Yes, helpful our patrons be.
I started to apologize to Gene for the wait, but he insisted on telling me about some long lost female relative he was trying to pin down all the way back to the computers. Instead of apologizing, I demonstrated the politeness of not kneeing him in the gut.
"I need state tax forms."
"We have those," I said, warming up to direct him to the large display of forms he'd just walked past.
"I need s-corporation state forms for 2003, 2004 and 2006. And personal forms for 2003, 2004 and 2006."
Already I was at a disadvantage, for I've never heard of an s-corporation before, but I figured I could find it on the state's tax form page.
"Well, the personal forms we already have. At least, for 2006," I explained. "The rest I'll try to find for you from their site."
"Yeah, they said you'd probably have to look `em up," he said. Ah, yes. The mysterious THEY. "You say you got personal forms here?" he added.
"Yes," I said, pointing at the top of the floor shelf behind him. "They're on the other side of that shelf, in the bins."
The man walked around to the other side where he began staring at the piles of federal tax forms stacked directly next to the three bins containing state booklets. "Oh, in the bins," he said with the tone of a statement. He still wasn't seeing them.
"No, in the bins," I said. "In the plastic bins," I added. "In the yellow, white and black plastic bins," I continued. He looked in every conceivable place EXCEPT at the bins.
"The bins?" he said.
"Yes, the plastic bins... The bins.... No, the BINS... The PLASTIC bins," I said.
I don't know why I expected more from a man who, apparently, had failed to pay his taxes for the past four years for either himself or his business (except, apparently, for 2005). After a few more tries, he finally spotted them. As he dug around, I brought up the state's tax form site and began looking for s-corp forms. There were none to be found on just a cursory glance so I started a search for them. I did note, though, that the site only offered forms for years since 2004.
Another man came up to the desk while I searched, so I paused to ask if I could help him.
"Yeah, you're holding some c0ntract0rs books for me," he said. Aw great. As if searching for obscure forms wasn't keeping me busy enough during my solo desk time, I had to deal with deposit books and all the headaches they entail.
I hate the c0ntract0rs manuals and I'm usually none too fond of the people who seek them. I had nothing against this particular guy, except that he and another would-be-c0ntract0r have been competing for the same set of books for the past three weeks. They've been driving us crazy by phoning to place holds on them, then not picking them up by the prescribed pickup time, then getting pissy about it when the books aren't there for them when they roll in two days late, then the guy who did get the books gets pissy that he has to bring them back after his week's loan time has passed cause the other guy now has them on hold again too, then getting pissy again when told he will lose his deposit if he doesn't, etc., etc., etc. The checkout process on the books is also an enormous hassle, cause we have to calculate the deposit amount (over $500 if they want the whole set), make them sign two identical deposit book policy forms (one for us, one for them), then we have to make them go back and actually READ the frickin' forms they just blindly signed, not to mention TAKE their copy of the form, so they have no excuse to give us enormous amounts of shit a week later, etc., etc., etc. This guy was very patient, though, even after I told him it was going to be a minute due to my tax form search.
I came up goose eggs on the s-corps search. Then Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine came in and signed up for a computer. He looked impatient to begin searching for members of his fambly. I ignored him.
"Um, do you happen to know a form number for these?" I asked the tax form guy.
"No. I don't even know if there is a form," the man said so very helpfully three minutes after he should have. He offered to go home, call someone who knew and return better prepared. Of course, I had to look up the number for someone who knew, but I'd already assumed that much.
I found the number, printed some forms for him and sent him on his way. I then dealt with c0ntract0r wannabe, calculated all his crap for him, having to do it twice cause our tiny calculator has even tinier buttons, spouted a few euphamistic curses, then found out that the dude already knew how much all the books would be because he was just going to reuse the same check he'd given us two weeks ago. Yes, helpful our patrons be.
I started to apologize to Gene for the wait, but he insisted on telling me about some long lost female relative he was trying to pin down all the way back to the computers. Instead of apologizing, I demonstrated the politeness of not kneeing him in the gut.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Taxing My Patience 2007, Suspiciously Not
I realize we're still a month away from the deadline for taxes, providing plenty of time for things to go awry, but so far we've had surprisingly few problems with the tax form crowd this year.
In fact, yesterday was the first time all year that someone asked me where the state tax forms were located, prompting me to direct them to the glaringly obvious state tax booklets in the plastic bins directly beneath their nose. And, in their defense, they were looking for individual forms not booklets and were somehow unaware that our state preinserts the forms into the instruction booklets and issues them no other way, unless you print them from their website.
No one has yet come in asking us for W-2s.
No one has even futilly asked for a 1099 form.
And Amateur Accountaint Tax Form Lady Who Plagues Us Every Year has only been in a couple of times so far and was apologetic at asking us to print out of state or otherwise obscure forms for her.
One might even say it's been suspiciously quiet on the tax form front. Almost as if the tax form people are lying in wait to leap out at us later. I'm thinking April 13.
In fact, yesterday was the first time all year that someone asked me where the state tax forms were located, prompting me to direct them to the glaringly obvious state tax booklets in the plastic bins directly beneath their nose. And, in their defense, they were looking for individual forms not booklets and were somehow unaware that our state preinserts the forms into the instruction booklets and issues them no other way, unless you print them from their website.
No one has yet come in asking us for W-2s.
No one has even futilly asked for a 1099 form.
And Amateur Accountaint Tax Form Lady Who Plagues Us Every Year has only been in a couple of times so far and was apologetic at asking us to print out of state or otherwise obscure forms for her.
One might even say it's been suspiciously quiet on the tax form front. Almost as if the tax form people are lying in wait to leap out at us later. I'm thinking April 13.
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