Wow the computers were lousy with Rogues! At one point we had Matilde the Cranky Wiccan, Jimmy the Anonymous Snitch, Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine and three members of The New Devil Twins Auxiliary League of Neighborhood Kids using at the same time. This is even more impressive than last week's Rogue Constellation Alignment when Mr. Big Stupid and Mr. Little Stupid were both using at the same time.
As usual, the League of Kids descended on us in a clump to sign up for computers. I went out and logged them onto the second, third and fourth computers on one side of the computer bank, skipping the first one, a 15-minute station that I'd logged off not five minutes before. I then returned to the sign in clip-board to mark which computers I'd placed them on and make sure they'd listed their sign on times. When I turned `round again, though, I noticed that one of the kids was seated at the 15-minute station and had its desktop loaded up and everything.
Dammit! They knew the passwords AGAIN!
Okay, so it wasn't exactly a difficult password to hack, especially considering it was actually the old password that the League already knew. With all the recent computer installation and printer and password issues that have been going on, we finally got the tech guys to go in and set all the logins and passwords to the same thing and make the stations all print to the same printer. Only, the tech guys changed all the passwords back to the old old password, the same single letter it had been back before we got them to change all the passwords to my initials. The League all knew the old old password, so here they were again with free access.
Not that it really matters in the grand scheme of things, since the only reason to have passwords—y'know, beyond our whole need to wield power over people and feel all mighty and stuff—is that requiring them forces patrons to come sign in at our clip board, allowing us to both count them as computer users in our stats and to know who signed on when so we'll know who to kick off when.
I busted the kid off the 15 minute station, didn't say anything to him about knowing the password and then went to write a note to Mrs. A explaining the situation.
We've now changed all the passwords, this time to the initials of a staff member other than myself.
Showing posts with label Jimmy the Anonymous Snitch. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jimmy the Anonymous Snitch. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Wednesday, December 08, 2004
Who's got the 10 and a half?
Yup. That's right. It's time for another 10 hour shift for the Juice
man. Mrs. A and Mrs. C are out for the day at a meeting of the minds
over in Town-D's branch.
Running tally for the day proceeds here...
8:50 a.m.-- I arrive at the library. There's a large SUV parked out front that I don't recognize. I figure it's a patron waiting for us to open, but no one is in it and no one is banging on the door to get in. I go to unlock the back door and find it's already unlocked and slightly ajar. Uh oh. Now I'm thinking the patron is inside, taking advantage of a door left unlocked by one of the librarians as they departed this morning. This kind of thing has happened before. As I cautiously round the corner of the computer hall, I get a line of sight on the circ desk and see Mrs. A there. Whew! Turns out it was Mr. A's SUV.
8:52-- I turn on the light switch for upstairs and blow the breaker.
9:00-- Mrs. C turns on the downstairs light switch and also blows the breaker. Mrs. A is irritated at this and swears we will not be paying to rewire the building since we're within a two year spitting distance of a brand new building altogether. As a result of the breaker blows, though, a third of the lightbulbs in the front room have gone. At 5'9", I'm still the tallest employee so it's always my job to change them. No doubt half the bulbs upstairs have also blown.
9:20-- Both patrons who've come in so far have given me cheerful yet marble-mouthed greetings that I don't understand. They are not together.
9:33-- First phone call for Mrs. A.
9:41-- Mr. & Mrs. Smiley arrive.
10:00-- I start changing bulbs.
10:19-- Boring assed task for the day: Stuffing fund drive envelopes. Mmm, boy howdy! At least I have Shawn Colvin's Whole New You album playing on the circ computer to keep me company. Great album.
10:35-- First computer patron of the day.
10:50-- A library staff member from Town-R's branch phones. Mind you, she doesn't identify herself whatsoever so I didn't know she wasn't a patron at first. The conversation followed:
11:19-- Out of coffee and in need of a change in music. I'm going to my car for some Neil Finn.
11:40-- The wife calls to say she's going to join me for lunch.
12:15 p.m.-- The wife joins me for lunch. She brings us tasty non-Atkins approved goodies such as pizza and a pecan encrusted stickybun, both baked by one of our fine downtown bakeries.
12:44--Holy shit! Stoner Lad just came in! I cannot believe my luck. Just when I thought today was going to be way more boring than I'd hoped, a long lost Rogue makes an appearance. We've not seen Stoner Lad in here for well over two years. He walks up to the desk and says, "Hey, uh, long time." Then he mumbles his way through a request to use a computer, saying he has something he really needs to print out. (Dare I hope more angsty half-literate teenage screw-letters?)
"Sure thing," I say.
After I log him on he says, "Uh, how clear are the lines today?"
"Pretty clear. We got DSL since you were here last."
"Sweet!"
Stoner Lad still dresses like he used to, which is to say small town gangsta wannabe, but with an auto-racing themed ball cap. His facial hair has gotten better too, as evidenced by his pointy goatee. He also dosen't seem to be actively "on" anything and has no trouble making eye contact when he speaking. Perhaps he's been away in rehab?
12:46-- A lady comes in and asks to use the bathroom. I don't figure this out until later when they leave together, but this turns out to be Stoner Lad's mom. Stoner lad prints out a few pages, pays for them and then leaves with mom, saying, "Bye." On their way out, she says something about having an old wallet of his with his library card still in it. Yeah, his OLD library card. Looks like maybe he's back in the area for a while.
12:55-- An assistant librarian in a neighboring county, who's head librarian is currently at the same meeting that Mrs. A is at, phones to ask to speak to Mrs. A. "Oh, wait... she's at that meeting," he says. Riiiiiiight.
1:02-- Oh, great! It's old rogue day! Jimmy the Anonymous Snitch just came in.
1:10-- Jimmy leaves after paying for his prints. I am irritated that he is coming here again, particularly since from everything we knew a few months back he was supposed to be going to jail for embezzling money from his employer. The last we'd heard he was supposed to have received his sentence in June, but we never learned what it was. He's been in a few times since then and was in yesterday. Evidently he's under house arrest or town arrest or maybe just was let off altogether. Who knows. Maybe he turned state's evidence against Bladderboy and was given a light slap on the wrist. Never did hear if the cops caught Bladders after their high-speed chase a while back.
1:22-- Harry the Killer Midget and Buddy come in. I've not written about Buddy before. He's a mentally handicapped man who comes in with an Unobstructed Doors aid. I call him Buddy because he once asked me if I would be his buddy, therefore I assume he is mine as well. Buddy is a really nice guy. His only major distinguishing characteristics, beyond the whole being my buddy thing, are that he's very tall and he always wants to know if Mary is working today. Nearly every time he comes in he asks one of the staff if Mary is working today. We always tell him, "No, Mary's not here today," at which point he responds, "Mary must be at home." None of us know who Mary is, nor has anyone named Mary ever worked here in the past thirty years, so we're not sure who he means. He didn't ask about Mary today.
2:48-- I've been running kind of silent. Mrs. C is supposed to come in to relieve me so I can go on break, but I don't know exactly when. Gotta keep my nose clean til then.
3:00-- Still no Mrs. C. One of our board members, Mrs. Aitch, comes in to do some fund-drive letter related paperwork. I'm jamming out to Neil Finn's One Nil when she arrives. Not sure if she approves.
3:50-- Mrs. C arrives to relieve me. I head to the post office to ship out ebay auction items, pop by the shoe store where I fail to find any decent shoes.
4:30-- I swing by the comic shop for the latest Bloodhound, Marvel Knights Spider-Man, the Supreme Power spin-off Doctor Spectrum book and something else I can't recall off hand. I'm terribly happy that the comic shop guy is now stocking Neil Gaiman's Sandman collections, after months and months of me bugging him about it. Now I'm going to have to do a Sandman symposium to get folks to buy it--uncultured peons!
4:45-- I pop by Ornathological Coffee, (not its real name), the local gallery/coffeeshop down the street for a cup of Sumatran coffee that is just slightly not hot enough, but is nevertheless tasty. While I'm there, I hear a familiar voice say, "So, how many books do I have now?" I turn to see Mrs. West, one of our regular patrons. Mrs. West almost always has books on hold with us. This is because she goes down the list of all the latest bestsellers that are out and has us put her on hold for them. Then she asks us to put her on hold for just about every other new fiction arrival as well. We're happy to do this. Trouble is, she NEVER answers the phone when we call. We have it on good authority that she's usually at home when we call, she just won't answer for whatever reason. This would be okay too, but she also refuses to purchase an answering machine saying they're annoying. Yes, they are annoying, especially when they don't pick up the phone and allow us to tell you your books are in. So our hold shelf is often CHOKED with holds for Mrs. West, which after 5 days have to be passed to the next patron on the list. I told her she had three waiting for her. She said that sounded like enough to justify a visit up the hill.
4:50-- I'm back on the job.
4:55-- A different board member, Mrs. Emm, comes in from the meeting they were having next door and asks if its true we have music CD's. It is. We got the same allotment of Remainder Closet material all libraries got after the big music industry settlement. I tell her that I don't promise it's all good, but there are some gems here and there. I guarantee her that the Shawn Colvin and Ben Folds Five are quality. She goes over and finds lots of things she likes (including the Colvin & Folds), then begins suggesting music to me, including Kas3y Chamb3rs and Gr3g Br0wn. "Br0wn's kind of folky," Mrs. Emm says, adding, "I like all sorts of music, though. Folk, rock, country, rap... I love Eminem!" I sort of just stared at her blankly for a few seconds on that one. Nothing against Em, but I just had trouble reconciling whether Mrs. Emm was really into his stuff or if she was just searching for some kind of street cred with me and Mrs. C.
5:00-- Mrs. C leaves via the back door before any of the other board members she see's lurking out front can find her and assign her something she doesn't want to have to stay extra to do. Good for her!
5:10-- Oooh. I'm asked by a computer patron to override our internet blocking software. It's the same guy who always asks us for overrides. In fact, I think he's the only guy who's ever asked us for an override. He's always trying to look at some album cover involving J essica Ra bbit. For some reason in the past I've never been able to get the override to work properly, but today it does. (And no, I didn't get a peek at it before I turned the station back over to him.)
5:27-- We are paid a brief and pleasant visit by the brother of the Purple Nun.
5:39-- Mrs. West, true to her word, comes in for her books.
6:03-- I begin attempting to eat my supper; a nice hunk of pork roast that I first cooked two nights back, plus some cheese and a spinach/artichoke dip I made. Mmm tasty, I love it.
6:22-- Still haven't been able to finish my food. We're plenty busy.
6:32-- A patron asks if he's smelling good food from one of the nearby restaurants or if that's coming from my food. I say, "Yup, that's probably my pork roast." It's not even heated and it smells good.
7:00-- The last patron departs, making sure to print out four pages just after I finish the daily cash box count. Thanks! I lock the doors and try to finish up my closing duties.
7:03-- Still closing up when someone starts pounding on the door to get in. Sorry, we's closed.
7:05-- Going home. It's a day.
Running tally for the day proceeds here...
8:50 a.m.-- I arrive at the library. There's a large SUV parked out front that I don't recognize. I figure it's a patron waiting for us to open, but no one is in it and no one is banging on the door to get in. I go to unlock the back door and find it's already unlocked and slightly ajar. Uh oh. Now I'm thinking the patron is inside, taking advantage of a door left unlocked by one of the librarians as they departed this morning. This kind of thing has happened before. As I cautiously round the corner of the computer hall, I get a line of sight on the circ desk and see Mrs. A there. Whew! Turns out it was Mr. A's SUV.
8:52-- I turn on the light switch for upstairs and blow the breaker.
9:00-- Mrs. C turns on the downstairs light switch and also blows the breaker. Mrs. A is irritated at this and swears we will not be paying to rewire the building since we're within a two year spitting distance of a brand new building altogether. As a result of the breaker blows, though, a third of the lightbulbs in the front room have gone. At 5'9", I'm still the tallest employee so it's always my job to change them. No doubt half the bulbs upstairs have also blown.
9:20-- Both patrons who've come in so far have given me cheerful yet marble-mouthed greetings that I don't understand. They are not together.
9:33-- First phone call for Mrs. A.
9:41-- Mr. & Mrs. Smiley arrive.
10:00-- I start changing bulbs.
10:19-- Boring assed task for the day: Stuffing fund drive envelopes. Mmm, boy howdy! At least I have Shawn Colvin's Whole New You album playing on the circ computer to keep me company. Great album.
10:35-- First computer patron of the day.
10:50-- A library staff member from Town-R's branch phones. Mind you, she doesn't identify herself whatsoever so I didn't know she wasn't a patron at first. The conversation followed:
CALLER: Is MRS. A there?
ME: No, I'm sorry, she's out of town for a meeting today. Can I take a message?
CALLER: Well... When I turned on my computer it said I have an error.
ME: (Realizing this is probably another library and not some derranged patron) Uhhh. What sort of error?
CALLER: (Dimly) It said "an error."
ME: Okayyy. Did you try turning it off and back on?
CALLER: Yes. It still says I have an error. I just want to know how to get it to stop telling me I have an error.
ME: (Since our branch is the regional hub for all computer issue requests, I realize I'll need to note this.) Well, if you'll give me your name I'll tell MRS. C when she gets back this afternoon.
CALLER: (Ignoring my question) I can still use the computer. I just want to know how to get it to stop telling me "error."
ME: (Trying not to get angry) I realize that. If I can have your name, please, I'll let MRS. C know about it.
CALLER: (Adopting a tone that says I should know full well exactly who I'm talking to) This is TOWN-R library.
Actually, I really should have known. If I were to make a list of the most computer illiterately staffed libraries in the area, Town-R would top it.
11:19-- Out of coffee and in need of a change in music. I'm going to my car for some Neil Finn.
11:40-- The wife calls to say she's going to join me for lunch.
12:15 p.m.-- The wife joins me for lunch. She brings us tasty non-Atkins approved goodies such as pizza and a pecan encrusted stickybun, both baked by one of our fine downtown bakeries.
12:44--Holy shit! Stoner Lad just came in! I cannot believe my luck. Just when I thought today was going to be way more boring than I'd hoped, a long lost Rogue makes an appearance. We've not seen Stoner Lad in here for well over two years. He walks up to the desk and says, "Hey, uh, long time." Then he mumbles his way through a request to use a computer, saying he has something he really needs to print out. (Dare I hope more angsty half-literate teenage screw-letters?)
"Sure thing," I say.
After I log him on he says, "Uh, how clear are the lines today?"
"Pretty clear. We got DSL since you were here last."
"Sweet!"
Stoner Lad still dresses like he used to, which is to say small town gangsta wannabe, but with an auto-racing themed ball cap. His facial hair has gotten better too, as evidenced by his pointy goatee. He also dosen't seem to be actively "on" anything and has no trouble making eye contact when he speaking. Perhaps he's been away in rehab?
12:46-- A lady comes in and asks to use the bathroom. I don't figure this out until later when they leave together, but this turns out to be Stoner Lad's mom. Stoner lad prints out a few pages, pays for them and then leaves with mom, saying, "Bye." On their way out, she says something about having an old wallet of his with his library card still in it. Yeah, his OLD library card. Looks like maybe he's back in the area for a while.
12:55-- An assistant librarian in a neighboring county, who's head librarian is currently at the same meeting that Mrs. A is at, phones to ask to speak to Mrs. A. "Oh, wait... she's at that meeting," he says. Riiiiiiight.
1:02-- Oh, great! It's old rogue day! Jimmy the Anonymous Snitch just came in.
1:10-- Jimmy leaves after paying for his prints. I am irritated that he is coming here again, particularly since from everything we knew a few months back he was supposed to be going to jail for embezzling money from his employer. The last we'd heard he was supposed to have received his sentence in June, but we never learned what it was. He's been in a few times since then and was in yesterday. Evidently he's under house arrest or town arrest or maybe just was let off altogether. Who knows. Maybe he turned state's evidence against Bladderboy and was given a light slap on the wrist. Never did hear if the cops caught Bladders after their high-speed chase a while back.
1:22-- Harry the Killer Midget and Buddy come in. I've not written about Buddy before. He's a mentally handicapped man who comes in with an Unobstructed Doors aid. I call him Buddy because he once asked me if I would be his buddy, therefore I assume he is mine as well. Buddy is a really nice guy. His only major distinguishing characteristics, beyond the whole being my buddy thing, are that he's very tall and he always wants to know if Mary is working today. Nearly every time he comes in he asks one of the staff if Mary is working today. We always tell him, "No, Mary's not here today," at which point he responds, "Mary must be at home." None of us know who Mary is, nor has anyone named Mary ever worked here in the past thirty years, so we're not sure who he means. He didn't ask about Mary today.
2:48-- I've been running kind of silent. Mrs. C is supposed to come in to relieve me so I can go on break, but I don't know exactly when. Gotta keep my nose clean til then.
3:00-- Still no Mrs. C. One of our board members, Mrs. Aitch, comes in to do some fund-drive letter related paperwork. I'm jamming out to Neil Finn's One Nil when she arrives. Not sure if she approves.
3:50-- Mrs. C arrives to relieve me. I head to the post office to ship out ebay auction items, pop by the shoe store where I fail to find any decent shoes.
4:30-- I swing by the comic shop for the latest Bloodhound, Marvel Knights Spider-Man, the Supreme Power spin-off Doctor Spectrum book and something else I can't recall off hand. I'm terribly happy that the comic shop guy is now stocking Neil Gaiman's Sandman collections, after months and months of me bugging him about it. Now I'm going to have to do a Sandman symposium to get folks to buy it--uncultured peons!
4:45-- I pop by Ornathological Coffee, (not its real name), the local gallery/coffeeshop down the street for a cup of Sumatran coffee that is just slightly not hot enough, but is nevertheless tasty. While I'm there, I hear a familiar voice say, "So, how many books do I have now?" I turn to see Mrs. West, one of our regular patrons. Mrs. West almost always has books on hold with us. This is because she goes down the list of all the latest bestsellers that are out and has us put her on hold for them. Then she asks us to put her on hold for just about every other new fiction arrival as well. We're happy to do this. Trouble is, she NEVER answers the phone when we call. We have it on good authority that she's usually at home when we call, she just won't answer for whatever reason. This would be okay too, but she also refuses to purchase an answering machine saying they're annoying. Yes, they are annoying, especially when they don't pick up the phone and allow us to tell you your books are in. So our hold shelf is often CHOKED with holds for Mrs. West, which after 5 days have to be passed to the next patron on the list. I told her she had three waiting for her. She said that sounded like enough to justify a visit up the hill.
4:50-- I'm back on the job.
4:55-- A different board member, Mrs. Emm, comes in from the meeting they were having next door and asks if its true we have music CD's. It is. We got the same allotment of Remainder Closet material all libraries got after the big music industry settlement. I tell her that I don't promise it's all good, but there are some gems here and there. I guarantee her that the Shawn Colvin and Ben Folds Five are quality. She goes over and finds lots of things she likes (including the Colvin & Folds), then begins suggesting music to me, including Kas3y Chamb3rs and Gr3g Br0wn. "Br0wn's kind of folky," Mrs. Emm says, adding, "I like all sorts of music, though. Folk, rock, country, rap... I love Eminem!" I sort of just stared at her blankly for a few seconds on that one. Nothing against Em, but I just had trouble reconciling whether Mrs. Emm was really into his stuff or if she was just searching for some kind of street cred with me and Mrs. C.
5:00-- Mrs. C leaves via the back door before any of the other board members she see's lurking out front can find her and assign her something she doesn't want to have to stay extra to do. Good for her!
5:10-- Oooh. I'm asked by a computer patron to override our internet blocking software. It's the same guy who always asks us for overrides. In fact, I think he's the only guy who's ever asked us for an override. He's always trying to look at some album cover involving J essica Ra bbit. For some reason in the past I've never been able to get the override to work properly, but today it does. (And no, I didn't get a peek at it before I turned the station back over to him.)
5:27-- We are paid a brief and pleasant visit by the brother of the Purple Nun.
5:39-- Mrs. West, true to her word, comes in for her books.
6:03-- I begin attempting to eat my supper; a nice hunk of pork roast that I first cooked two nights back, plus some cheese and a spinach/artichoke dip I made. Mmm tasty, I love it.
6:22-- Still haven't been able to finish my food. We're plenty busy.
6:32-- A patron asks if he's smelling good food from one of the nearby restaurants or if that's coming from my food. I say, "Yup, that's probably my pork roast." It's not even heated and it smells good.
7:00-- The last patron departs, making sure to print out four pages just after I finish the daily cash box count. Thanks! I lock the doors and try to finish up my closing duties.
7:03-- Still closing up when someone starts pounding on the door to get in. Sorry, we's closed.
7:05-- Going home. It's a day.
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Bladders Running on Empty
Learned some very encouraging news, yesterday.
Sometime on Sunday afternoon, Mrs. C heard on the police band scanner that an officer was in pursuit of a green Jeep with its top down. The officer had run the plates on the Jeep and discovered that its owner had around 6 outstanding tickets and a suspended drivers license. Before the officer even said the man's name, Mrs. C knew who the owner of the vehicle was going to be... The Amazing Bladderboy!
That's right, the Amazing Bladderboy, the cohort/lover/hater of Jimmy the Anonymous Snitch and the prime suspect in the theft of our library's laptop computer last January. He's also the only one of the two who remains at large, being as how Jimmy got packed off to prison for embezzling from a former employer. Also, Bladderboy's Jeep license plate number was originally provided to the police by none other than the staff of our "liberry" back when we were trying to play clubhouse detectives in the latptop theft case.
As Mrs. C described it to me, she listened intently to the play by play of the chase over the scanner for several minutes until it petered out. Bladders was able to lose his pursuers fairly quickly. For a while the police coordinated efforts to find him again, but beyond one possible sighting of the Jeep near police headquarters itself (where there were no available officers to give chase) Bladderboy was not to be found.
Still, we are overjoyed at this turn of events for Bladderboy will now have warrants issued for his ass, possibly an APB, and will most likely see the inside of a jail for his crimes. And, if he shows his face around the library itself, we now have carte blanche to call the cops on him.
Ain't life grand?
D-MINUS: 8
Sometime on Sunday afternoon, Mrs. C heard on the police band scanner that an officer was in pursuit of a green Jeep with its top down. The officer had run the plates on the Jeep and discovered that its owner had around 6 outstanding tickets and a suspended drivers license. Before the officer even said the man's name, Mrs. C knew who the owner of the vehicle was going to be... The Amazing Bladderboy!
That's right, the Amazing Bladderboy, the cohort/lover/hater of Jimmy the Anonymous Snitch and the prime suspect in the theft of our library's laptop computer last January. He's also the only one of the two who remains at large, being as how Jimmy got packed off to prison for embezzling from a former employer. Also, Bladderboy's Jeep license plate number was originally provided to the police by none other than the staff of our "liberry" back when we were trying to play clubhouse detectives in the latptop theft case.
As Mrs. C described it to me, she listened intently to the play by play of the chase over the scanner for several minutes until it petered out. Bladders was able to lose his pursuers fairly quickly. For a while the police coordinated efforts to find him again, but beyond one possible sighting of the Jeep near police headquarters itself (where there were no available officers to give chase) Bladderboy was not to be found.
Still, we are overjoyed at this turn of events for Bladderboy will now have warrants issued for his ass, possibly an APB, and will most likely see the inside of a jail for his crimes. And, if he shows his face around the library itself, we now have carte blanche to call the cops on him.
Ain't life grand?
D-MINUS: 8
Sunday, August 01, 2004
Sunday Shift
So with our weekender Miss E effectively out of
the picture, I hit the library at 1 today for my first Sunday shift in
quite a while.
Sunday shifts are usually plenty boring, but I knew I was going to have a busy enough day. See, Mrs. H has now been recruited to become our new Saturday "liberry" ass. leaving Mrs. B and I to rotate Sundays. This is fine with me. Trouble is, Mrs. H doesn't seem to know how to prepare and pack up the week's worth of interlibrary loans, so it's fallen to the Sunday shifter to do that for the past couple of weeks. This is okay too. I'd rather have something to do. Beyond that, though, today's shift was far from boring.
There was, of course, a crowd at the door as I arrived at 12:55. Great.
When I went upstairs and flipped on the light switch, the lights all came on then immediately went back off as the breaker tripped from the surge. Double great. Even greater is the fact that I have no idea where the breaker switch box is. I looked around for it, but it wasn't in any of the obvious places like closets or bathrooms or walls. Damn, it was probably in the basement.
Mr. B-Natural was among the crowd outside and was the first to sign up for a computer. More followed, including Brent & Brice, two twin teenagers who have been making a nuisance of themselves for reasons which will become apparent. They're not related to the Devil Twins, of Rogues Gallery fame, but they probably should be.
The wife turned up around 1:30 with lunch for the two of us. She's on her way out of town, headed back to Clarksburg until later in the month. After lunch, I decided that while she was there and was able to guard the desk, I'd go to the basement and see about the breaker. I was headed for the door on that very quest when Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch came in and started signing in for a computer. Jimmy's been in a couple of times recently. One day last week, I actually had to ask a patron I liked to get off the computers just to give one to frickin' Jimmy's dumb criminal ass. And just minutes earlier, I'd had to bust another favored patron off to give one to Parka. At the time I thought, Who's next? Chester? The computers were all full, though, and not due for any openings for 16 minutes. I mentioned that to Jimmy on my way out the door.
Despite high expectations, I could find no evidence of a breaker box in the basement. I didn't want to spend a lot of time in there, though. Jimmy was lurking in the library and while the wife was standing guard on the cash box no one was guarding the upstairs restroom, where Jimmy's pal Bladder Boy once found and stole our laptop. I rushed back up to the main library and then upstairs. Jimmy was sitting in a chair at the top of the stairs near the periodicals. I walked behind him and into Mrs. A's office where I retrieved the restroom key from its hiding place then made a big conspicuous production of locking the restroom door as loudly as I could.
Back downstairs, a few minutes later, I was telling the wife what I had just done when she suddenly signaled to me to be quiet. Too late, I was still finishing my sentence, "...conspicuously locked the bathroom door" when Jimmy entered the room behind me. He had to have heard what I was saying and he would also have to know what it meant. I realized that I didn't care if he did hear me. I really don't mind if he knows that I know he's a sneaky little weasel. If I were really ballsy, though, I would ask Jimmy how his sentencing went this month. I'd honestly like to know, cause I haven't heard.
I had to tell Brice and Brent to relinquish their computers to let Jimmy and another patron have them. B&B, who are probably 13 years old, are infamous for coming in, using our computers, printing lots of pages and either leaving the pages unpaid for or, more often, taking the pages unpaid for. Mrs. A and I both have spoken to them about this and told them they had to pay for everything they print, but they don't seem to care. I figured with the wife still guarding the desk they wouldn't dare grab their prints and leave, but they did. They probably even felt safe in doing it, since they're not card carrying patrons so we don't have their home number to rat them out to their mother. Unfortunately for them, they neglected to remember that we do have their phone number on file as part of their parental permission slip. Unfortunately for me, I didn't remember that until just now, so I'll have to phone her up next time I'm in. Should be fun.
Sunday shifts are usually plenty boring, but I knew I was going to have a busy enough day. See, Mrs. H has now been recruited to become our new Saturday "liberry" ass. leaving Mrs. B and I to rotate Sundays. This is fine with me. Trouble is, Mrs. H doesn't seem to know how to prepare and pack up the week's worth of interlibrary loans, so it's fallen to the Sunday shifter to do that for the past couple of weeks. This is okay too. I'd rather have something to do. Beyond that, though, today's shift was far from boring.
There was, of course, a crowd at the door as I arrived at 12:55. Great.
When I went upstairs and flipped on the light switch, the lights all came on then immediately went back off as the breaker tripped from the surge. Double great. Even greater is the fact that I have no idea where the breaker switch box is. I looked around for it, but it wasn't in any of the obvious places like closets or bathrooms or walls. Damn, it was probably in the basement.
Mr. B-Natural was among the crowd outside and was the first to sign up for a computer. More followed, including Brent & Brice, two twin teenagers who have been making a nuisance of themselves for reasons which will become apparent. They're not related to the Devil Twins, of Rogues Gallery fame, but they probably should be.
The wife turned up around 1:30 with lunch for the two of us. She's on her way out of town, headed back to Clarksburg until later in the month. After lunch, I decided that while she was there and was able to guard the desk, I'd go to the basement and see about the breaker. I was headed for the door on that very quest when Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch came in and started signing in for a computer. Jimmy's been in a couple of times recently. One day last week, I actually had to ask a patron I liked to get off the computers just to give one to frickin' Jimmy's dumb criminal ass. And just minutes earlier, I'd had to bust another favored patron off to give one to Parka. At the time I thought, Who's next? Chester? The computers were all full, though, and not due for any openings for 16 minutes. I mentioned that to Jimmy on my way out the door.
Despite high expectations, I could find no evidence of a breaker box in the basement. I didn't want to spend a lot of time in there, though. Jimmy was lurking in the library and while the wife was standing guard on the cash box no one was guarding the upstairs restroom, where Jimmy's pal Bladder Boy once found and stole our laptop. I rushed back up to the main library and then upstairs. Jimmy was sitting in a chair at the top of the stairs near the periodicals. I walked behind him and into Mrs. A's office where I retrieved the restroom key from its hiding place then made a big conspicuous production of locking the restroom door as loudly as I could.
Back downstairs, a few minutes later, I was telling the wife what I had just done when she suddenly signaled to me to be quiet. Too late, I was still finishing my sentence, "...conspicuously locked the bathroom door" when Jimmy entered the room behind me. He had to have heard what I was saying and he would also have to know what it meant. I realized that I didn't care if he did hear me. I really don't mind if he knows that I know he's a sneaky little weasel. If I were really ballsy, though, I would ask Jimmy how his sentencing went this month. I'd honestly like to know, cause I haven't heard.
I had to tell Brice and Brent to relinquish their computers to let Jimmy and another patron have them. B&B, who are probably 13 years old, are infamous for coming in, using our computers, printing lots of pages and either leaving the pages unpaid for or, more often, taking the pages unpaid for. Mrs. A and I both have spoken to them about this and told them they had to pay for everything they print, but they don't seem to care. I figured with the wife still guarding the desk they wouldn't dare grab their prints and leave, but they did. They probably even felt safe in doing it, since they're not card carrying patrons so we don't have their home number to rat them out to their mother. Unfortunately for them, they neglected to remember that we do have their phone number on file as part of their parental permission slip. Unfortunately for me, I didn't remember that until just now, so I'll have to phone her up next time I'm in. Should be fun.
Friday, May 28, 2004
Gonna be a Nettin' War
Had us an Internet
Crowd Gang War on Thursday. Nearly all the IC Rogues turned up at some
point during the day and most had to wait a while. They were thus very
grumpy campers. Oddly, Parka
was not among them. I kept trying to keep all the computers tied up by
letting patrons log back on (including Nearsighted Dave and his apparent
step-son, who's not nearly as nearsighted) just so he'd have to wait
when he got there, but he didn't turn up. Almost as bad, though, Mr. Big
Stupid lurched through the door with his usual, "Got`ny `puters?" Oh, so sorry. There's a 10 minute wait for you. He looked satisfyingly disappointed.
Two Rogues who did turn up and who were summarily turned away were Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch and The Amazing Bladderboy. I had to bite my cheek to keep from saying, "Hey, I thought your ass was in jail."
The computers were all full when they came in. I told Jimmy that it would be a 15 minute wait at the very least. (And by the end of 15 minutes, we would be hovering at 15 til closing time, at which point I could shut the computers down due to all the signs we have posted saying that the computers will be shut down at 15 til, thus sparing Jimmy the use of a computer at all.) My master plan was only partially foiled, though, when Jimmy and Bladders simply left.
Suddenly, at 15 til close, ALL the computer users gave up and fled the library all at once. I quickly dashed back and turned the computers off to prevent future attempts. Not that this stops some of the computer crowd. One of our newer internet addicts turned up exactly at closing one day last week and asked if she could check her e-mail "real quick."
"I'm sorry, but we're closed," I told her.
"Guess that means you turned off the computers, then?" she said hopefully.
"Yes," I said, dashing her hopes. She'd already been in three separate times that day. What more did she really need?
By the end of the day we had 37 computer users. ("Thirty seven? In a row?") Which is a good 10 more than usual.
Two Rogues who did turn up and who were summarily turned away were Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch and The Amazing Bladderboy. I had to bite my cheek to keep from saying, "Hey, I thought your ass was in jail."
The computers were all full when they came in. I told Jimmy that it would be a 15 minute wait at the very least. (And by the end of 15 minutes, we would be hovering at 15 til closing time, at which point I could shut the computers down due to all the signs we have posted saying that the computers will be shut down at 15 til, thus sparing Jimmy the use of a computer at all.) My master plan was only partially foiled, though, when Jimmy and Bladders simply left.
Suddenly, at 15 til close, ALL the computer users gave up and fled the library all at once. I quickly dashed back and turned the computers off to prevent future attempts. Not that this stops some of the computer crowd. One of our newer internet addicts turned up exactly at closing one day last week and asked if she could check her e-mail "real quick."
"I'm sorry, but we're closed," I told her.
"Guess that means you turned off the computers, then?" she said hopefully.
"Yes," I said, dashing her hopes. She'd already been in three separate times that day. What more did she really need?
By the end of the day we had 37 computer users. ("Thirty seven? In a row?") Which is a good 10 more than usual.
Thursday, May 13, 2004
Petty Theft
Thursdays are a busy day for us and most of the "liberry" staff is
present at one time or another during the day. This is partially due to
Thursday being Story Hour day, with a high kid population, but Thursdays
tend to be pretty busy all around.
Today we had Mrs's. A, B, C, Mrs. H and me in house all at the same time. This only leaves out Mrs. J, who's out for a few days with a bum shoulder, and Miss E, who only works weekends. Mrs. H took off shortly after I arrived, leaving the rest of us standing around the circulation desk to shoot the breeze until such a time as it struck us as necessary to find something productive to do.
"Hey, you wanna take this to the post office?" Mrs. A asked Mrs. B, handing her a letter. Mrs. B said sure, as we also had several interlibrary loan packages to go out too. Mrs. A decided it would be good to see if we actually had any money in petty cash to pay for such a venture. She took out our petty cash envelope from its place by the cashbox and began counting through it, tallying up the receipts with what was supposed to be in there. The rest of us continued to converse until Mrs. A announced that the bag had come up short. Real short. Real short to the tune of $80 short.
Now, we've been very careful about keeping track of money since our laptop theft incident with The Amazing Bladder Boy and Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch. The petty cash had come up short around then too and we wondered if they, or another unscrupulous patron (take your pick, really) might have had something to do with it. We'd even toyed with the notion that The Untalented Mr. Ripley might have returned to rob us again or that at some point in the past he might have managed to sneak himself a door key and was now using it. No one's seen him around, though.
Since we've been doing a daily drawer count and have been far more careful about our receipts, we've not had much problem with money turning up missing. Sure, we might come up a dollar or so behind some days, but other days we come out a dollar ahead and such occurrences are usually due to someone not writing down copier or printing charges. (Mrs. A admits she is the worst at remembering to do this.)
One of the ways we've been more careful with money that I wasn't even aware of until today has been to hide the petty cash bag in a safe place elsewhere in the library. However, for the past week it has been tucked away in its former home down by the cash box. Why was it there? Cause when I returned from a trip to the post office last Friday, that's where I put it as no one thought to tell me it didn't live there anymore.
"Someone just unzipped the bag and took the twenties," Mrs. A said. "There were five or six twenties in there and now there's only one."
Something about this didn't gel with my memory, though.
"Wait a second," I said. "There weren't five or six twenties in there when I went to the post office last week. I can't swear to it but I'm pretty sure there were only three or four." I explained that I rememberd this because I had to use practically all the twenties that were there to pay for shipping the ILLs and buy a roll of stamps. A roll of stamps is $37 and even at library rate the 10 or so packages would have come to... Well, we didn't know off hand, so we decided to consult the receipt...
...only the receipt wasn't in the petty cash bag.
Mrs. A figured that this solved the mystery. She thought I'd just forgotten to put the receipt in the bag at the post office and that accounted for the missing $80. This sort of thing has been known to happen. Trouble with this theory is, I had NOT forgotten to put the receipt in the bag. I'm the guy who had to stand in the post office for ten minutes while the new guy at the desk slowly weighed and put postage on each of the ILL packages then sold me a roll of stamps. I had the petty cash bag with me, had to take money out of it to pay for everything and I put the receipt right in there when it was handed to me. Plus, the total of my post office purchase was not $80 but more like $65, if memory serves. The receipt for the envelopes I had bought at Dollar General immediately after leaving the post office was still in the petty cash bag, but nothing from the post office.
Even with the missing receipt accounting for $65, there was still around $15 missing and unaccounted for. And I'm not convinced that $15 or $20 or whatever wasn't missing from the bag before last Friday. Like I said, I don't think there were that many $20 bills in the bag when I had it at the post office. However, I may be remembering wrong and I can't prove it either way. This doesn't make a lot of sense to me from any angle, though, because the petty cash bag had been in safe hiding before it was placed in my hands then.
The whole situation made me very angry. It's not like Mrs. A or Mrs. C suspect me of taking the money, though I couldn't blame them if they did. I am, after all, the poor starving spouse of a med-student who's been known to mention how short money tends to get. (Of course, the reason I mention this is so that I might get a few more hours of work thrown my way.) What made me angry, though was that the thing took place on my watch to some degree and I was the guy who brought the bag back and unknowingly put it by the cash box. It just looks bad to me, even if no one else seems to think so. Whether I'm at fault or not, I always feel like I'm the guy who screwed this up and who has fingers pointing at him.
Mrs. A's new theory is that whoever took the $15 to $20 that is genuinely missing probably grabbed it quickly and managed to snag the receipt from the post office as well. I don't know if I can go along with this theory. If the one receipt is gone, who's to say there aren't $15 worth of receipts gone also, accouting for the amount that seems to be missing. I know I put that post office receipt in the bag. I just don't know how it could have gone missing unless someone took it out. Then again, why would anyone remove receipts from the bag?
Only a few months ago we were so loose with the money rules that everyone on staff was able to put IOU's for lunch money in there and pay up a couple days later. Or even wait til payday. I fear such days are behind us.
Today we had Mrs's. A, B, C, Mrs. H and me in house all at the same time. This only leaves out Mrs. J, who's out for a few days with a bum shoulder, and Miss E, who only works weekends. Mrs. H took off shortly after I arrived, leaving the rest of us standing around the circulation desk to shoot the breeze until such a time as it struck us as necessary to find something productive to do.
"Hey, you wanna take this to the post office?" Mrs. A asked Mrs. B, handing her a letter. Mrs. B said sure, as we also had several interlibrary loan packages to go out too. Mrs. A decided it would be good to see if we actually had any money in petty cash to pay for such a venture. She took out our petty cash envelope from its place by the cashbox and began counting through it, tallying up the receipts with what was supposed to be in there. The rest of us continued to converse until Mrs. A announced that the bag had come up short. Real short. Real short to the tune of $80 short.
Now, we've been very careful about keeping track of money since our laptop theft incident with The Amazing Bladder Boy and Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch. The petty cash had come up short around then too and we wondered if they, or another unscrupulous patron (take your pick, really) might have had something to do with it. We'd even toyed with the notion that The Untalented Mr. Ripley might have returned to rob us again or that at some point in the past he might have managed to sneak himself a door key and was now using it. No one's seen him around, though.
Since we've been doing a daily drawer count and have been far more careful about our receipts, we've not had much problem with money turning up missing. Sure, we might come up a dollar or so behind some days, but other days we come out a dollar ahead and such occurrences are usually due to someone not writing down copier or printing charges. (Mrs. A admits she is the worst at remembering to do this.)
One of the ways we've been more careful with money that I wasn't even aware of until today has been to hide the petty cash bag in a safe place elsewhere in the library. However, for the past week it has been tucked away in its former home down by the cash box. Why was it there? Cause when I returned from a trip to the post office last Friday, that's where I put it as no one thought to tell me it didn't live there anymore.
"Someone just unzipped the bag and took the twenties," Mrs. A said. "There were five or six twenties in there and now there's only one."
Something about this didn't gel with my memory, though.
"Wait a second," I said. "There weren't five or six twenties in there when I went to the post office last week. I can't swear to it but I'm pretty sure there were only three or four." I explained that I rememberd this because I had to use practically all the twenties that were there to pay for shipping the ILLs and buy a roll of stamps. A roll of stamps is $37 and even at library rate the 10 or so packages would have come to... Well, we didn't know off hand, so we decided to consult the receipt...
...only the receipt wasn't in the petty cash bag.
Mrs. A figured that this solved the mystery. She thought I'd just forgotten to put the receipt in the bag at the post office and that accounted for the missing $80. This sort of thing has been known to happen. Trouble with this theory is, I had NOT forgotten to put the receipt in the bag. I'm the guy who had to stand in the post office for ten minutes while the new guy at the desk slowly weighed and put postage on each of the ILL packages then sold me a roll of stamps. I had the petty cash bag with me, had to take money out of it to pay for everything and I put the receipt right in there when it was handed to me. Plus, the total of my post office purchase was not $80 but more like $65, if memory serves. The receipt for the envelopes I had bought at Dollar General immediately after leaving the post office was still in the petty cash bag, but nothing from the post office.
Even with the missing receipt accounting for $65, there was still around $15 missing and unaccounted for. And I'm not convinced that $15 or $20 or whatever wasn't missing from the bag before last Friday. Like I said, I don't think there were that many $20 bills in the bag when I had it at the post office. However, I may be remembering wrong and I can't prove it either way. This doesn't make a lot of sense to me from any angle, though, because the petty cash bag had been in safe hiding before it was placed in my hands then.
The whole situation made me very angry. It's not like Mrs. A or Mrs. C suspect me of taking the money, though I couldn't blame them if they did. I am, after all, the poor starving spouse of a med-student who's been known to mention how short money tends to get. (Of course, the reason I mention this is so that I might get a few more hours of work thrown my way.) What made me angry, though was that the thing took place on my watch to some degree and I was the guy who brought the bag back and unknowingly put it by the cash box. It just looks bad to me, even if no one else seems to think so. Whether I'm at fault or not, I always feel like I'm the guy who screwed this up and who has fingers pointing at him.
Mrs. A's new theory is that whoever took the $15 to $20 that is genuinely missing probably grabbed it quickly and managed to snag the receipt from the post office as well. I don't know if I can go along with this theory. If the one receipt is gone, who's to say there aren't $15 worth of receipts gone also, accouting for the amount that seems to be missing. I know I put that post office receipt in the bag. I just don't know how it could have gone missing unless someone took it out. Then again, why would anyone remove receipts from the bag?
Only a few months ago we were so loose with the money rules that everyone on staff was able to put IOU's for lunch money in there and pay up a couple days later. Or even wait til payday. I fear such days are behind us.
Sunday, May 09, 2004
Fate (and the Law) finally catches up to Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch
After darn nigh three months of down-time, there is a bit of movement for the Junior "Liberry" Detectives and the Case of the Illustrious Bladder Thieves.
It seems that Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch, the man whose friend and lover/hater The Amazing (Bashful) Bladderboy, (a.k.a. our prime suspect in the theft of the "liberry's" laptop computer last January), is about to go up the river. Not, as you might expect, for having a role in the theft of the library's laptop, but instead for embezzlement from a local fast-food restaurant at which he had been previously employed.
Jimmy's had something of a long history with embezzling from various employers. He'd been to trial once before for embezzlement charges, but from a different restaurant. In fact, our very own Mrs. C served on Jimmy's jury and firmly believed that he was guilty but the prosecution's evidence left more room for doubt than the jury was able to handle so Jimmy walked free and went on to be hired by the above mentioned fast food restaurant. They wound up firing him in 2003 on suspicion of embezzling over $1000 and this is the matter that finally came to trial last week. Jimmy now faces 1 to 10 years in the slammer.
In his trial, Jimmy wound up entering a Kennedy Plea, which means he admits no wrongdoing but is still adjudged guilty by the court and sentenced as such.
Still no word on what became of our laptop, nor of any further cooperation from Jimmy in the matter. Seeing what he knew he was facing, though, it's no wonder he wanted to come forward and rat out his friend who took it. He didn't need any more heat on him. Unfortunately, he seems to have fizzled out when it came to actually cooperating with the authorities (perhaps because we, in turn, ratted him out to them, and didn't allow him to remain anonymous in the matter, as he so desired) so we'll likely never see the computer again.
Than again, after his sentencing in July, it'll probably be a while before we see Jimmy again either.
It seems that Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch, the man whose friend and lover/hater The Amazing (Bashful) Bladderboy, (a.k.a. our prime suspect in the theft of the "liberry's" laptop computer last January), is about to go up the river. Not, as you might expect, for having a role in the theft of the library's laptop, but instead for embezzlement from a local fast-food restaurant at which he had been previously employed.
Jimmy's had something of a long history with embezzling from various employers. He'd been to trial once before for embezzlement charges, but from a different restaurant. In fact, our very own Mrs. C served on Jimmy's jury and firmly believed that he was guilty but the prosecution's evidence left more room for doubt than the jury was able to handle so Jimmy walked free and went on to be hired by the above mentioned fast food restaurant. They wound up firing him in 2003 on suspicion of embezzling over $1000 and this is the matter that finally came to trial last week. Jimmy now faces 1 to 10 years in the slammer.
In his trial, Jimmy wound up entering a Kennedy Plea, which means he admits no wrongdoing but is still adjudged guilty by the court and sentenced as such.
Still no word on what became of our laptop, nor of any further cooperation from Jimmy in the matter. Seeing what he knew he was facing, though, it's no wonder he wanted to come forward and rat out his friend who took it. He didn't need any more heat on him. Unfortunately, he seems to have fizzled out when it came to actually cooperating with the authorities (perhaps because we, in turn, ratted him out to them, and didn't allow him to remain anonymous in the matter, as he so desired) so we'll likely never see the computer again.
Than again, after his sentencing in July, it'll probably be a while before we see Jimmy again either.
Wednesday, February 18, 2004
More Tales of the Bladder Thieves
Both the official and unofficial investigations into the theft of the "liberry's" laptop are going frustratingly slow. [See Legion of Evil Doers (with Bashful Bladders), Tales of the Bladder Thief and Drama, Drama, Drama to find out where we last left our Junior "Liberry" Detectives.]
The suspects in the case, Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch and the Amazing Bladderboy, continue to flaunt their guilt by coming in to use the computers. Actually, only Jimmy uses the computers; Bladderboy usually goes upstairs, (where I'm happy to say he's found the upstairs restroom annoyingly locked at all times, should he have attempted to get into it), or sits in a chair near the computers.
It annoys me tremendously that they do this, mostly because I'm not allowed to give them dirty looks and make snide comments about their not needing to use our computers since they already stole our #$!%ing laptop, as I don't want to tip-off Bladderboy that we're onto him, prompting him to ditch any incriminating evidence, or, as is the case, tip off the current possessor of our laptop into ditching it.
Herein lies the problem. According to Jimmy the Snitch's original anonymous letter, the laptop is no longer even in Bladderboy's possession, as he's already passed it off to a third party friend.
Meanwhile, there's been little word from the police as to whether they've contacted Jimmy the Snitch regarding his anonymous note to us claiming he knows who horked our laptop and that he's willing to turn-in said weak-bladdered asshole and his third party friend. Mrs. A decided to simply confront Jimmy the Snitch about the matter.
One day when Jimmy was in, sans Bladderboy, Mrs. A drug him up to her office and put the question to him: Are you gonna piss or get off the pot? I'm paraphrasing, of course, but that's the gist. Was Jimmy planning to get off his ass and rat out his thieving friends any time soon so we might have some hope of getting our laptop back?
Jimmy whined that the third party friend who has the laptop is out of town at the moment, but would be coming back and at such a time Jimmy thinks he can probably get the laptop and get it back to us. Mrs. A pointed out that this might lead to an asskicking or worse if Jimmy's friends ever noted that we had our laptop back. He didn't seem to concerned, which leads me to think he no longer has any intentions of helping us and is just trying to pacify Mrs. A. I say this because we know that Jimmy frequently gets beat up. We presume that Bladderboy is the one doing the beating, but we don't know that for sure.
(Of course, my solution to all this would be to inform Jimmy that if he doesn't hurry up and rat his thieving friends out, we're going to inform his thieving friends of his treachery against them and let them all sort it out on their own with their own methods. Unfortunately, this might lead to Jimmy's death and/or dismemberment, so I can't in good conscience go through with such a plan.)
Jimmy tried to assure Mrs. A that he didn't think his third party friend would try to sell the laptop, or if he did he might try to pawn it somewhere. (I imagine the police have thought of this.)
Unfortunately, our own Junior Detective work has lead to the discovery that the Compaq laptop serial number Jimmy quoted in his anonymous note is not in fact a serial number from a Compaq laptop at all, but is, at best, the part number from a Compaq laptop battery. (Asshole!) We have since confirmed the actual serial number of our laptop, after an irritatingly long time spent on the phone with Compaq, so if the police ever find the damned thing they can match it all up.
As to whether Jimmy's third party friend is planning to sell it, that's still up in the air. In fact, a startlingly similar Compaq notebook has appeared in the local want-ads of the paper. Mrs. A called the number of the guy who's selling it and asked him a few pointed questions as to what model it is. She managed to get a model number out of him on the pretense that she wanted to look it up on Compaq's website.
Now this is where it gets even foggier and more frustrating... As of this writing, I don't know if Mrs. A or Mrs. C has actually looked up the laptop to see if it's even the same kind as was stolen from us. I also don't know if they've passed this info on to the police. I'm hoping they have, but things have moved rather slow in that direction thus far and Mrs. A was not around for me to ask. Here's hoping Thursday goes better.
The suspects in the case, Jimmy the "Anonymous" Snitch and the Amazing Bladderboy, continue to flaunt their guilt by coming in to use the computers. Actually, only Jimmy uses the computers; Bladderboy usually goes upstairs, (where I'm happy to say he's found the upstairs restroom annoyingly locked at all times, should he have attempted to get into it), or sits in a chair near the computers.
It annoys me tremendously that they do this, mostly because I'm not allowed to give them dirty looks and make snide comments about their not needing to use our computers since they already stole our #$!%ing laptop, as I don't want to tip-off Bladderboy that we're onto him, prompting him to ditch any incriminating evidence, or, as is the case, tip off the current possessor of our laptop into ditching it.
Herein lies the problem. According to Jimmy the Snitch's original anonymous letter, the laptop is no longer even in Bladderboy's possession, as he's already passed it off to a third party friend.
Meanwhile, there's been little word from the police as to whether they've contacted Jimmy the Snitch regarding his anonymous note to us claiming he knows who horked our laptop and that he's willing to turn-in said weak-bladdered asshole and his third party friend. Mrs. A decided to simply confront Jimmy the Snitch about the matter.
One day when Jimmy was in, sans Bladderboy, Mrs. A drug him up to her office and put the question to him: Are you gonna piss or get off the pot? I'm paraphrasing, of course, but that's the gist. Was Jimmy planning to get off his ass and rat out his thieving friends any time soon so we might have some hope of getting our laptop back?
Jimmy whined that the third party friend who has the laptop is out of town at the moment, but would be coming back and at such a time Jimmy thinks he can probably get the laptop and get it back to us. Mrs. A pointed out that this might lead to an asskicking or worse if Jimmy's friends ever noted that we had our laptop back. He didn't seem to concerned, which leads me to think he no longer has any intentions of helping us and is just trying to pacify Mrs. A. I say this because we know that Jimmy frequently gets beat up. We presume that Bladderboy is the one doing the beating, but we don't know that for sure.
(Of course, my solution to all this would be to inform Jimmy that if he doesn't hurry up and rat his thieving friends out, we're going to inform his thieving friends of his treachery against them and let them all sort it out on their own with their own methods. Unfortunately, this might lead to Jimmy's death and/or dismemberment, so I can't in good conscience go through with such a plan.)
Jimmy tried to assure Mrs. A that he didn't think his third party friend would try to sell the laptop, or if he did he might try to pawn it somewhere. (I imagine the police have thought of this.)
Unfortunately, our own Junior Detective work has lead to the discovery that the Compaq laptop serial number Jimmy quoted in his anonymous note is not in fact a serial number from a Compaq laptop at all, but is, at best, the part number from a Compaq laptop battery. (Asshole!) We have since confirmed the actual serial number of our laptop, after an irritatingly long time spent on the phone with Compaq, so if the police ever find the damned thing they can match it all up.
As to whether Jimmy's third party friend is planning to sell it, that's still up in the air. In fact, a startlingly similar Compaq notebook has appeared in the local want-ads of the paper. Mrs. A called the number of the guy who's selling it and asked him a few pointed questions as to what model it is. She managed to get a model number out of him on the pretense that she wanted to look it up on Compaq's website.
Now this is where it gets even foggier and more frustrating... As of this writing, I don't know if Mrs. A or Mrs. C has actually looked up the laptop to see if it's even the same kind as was stolen from us. I also don't know if they've passed this info on to the police. I'm hoping they have, but things have moved rather slow in that direction thus far and Mrs. A was not around for me to ask. Here's hoping Thursday goes better.
Thursday, February 05, 2004
Drama Drama Drama
Okay. We've had a lot of drama at the liberry lately, but today really pushed it to a new level.
Remember a couple weeks back when we had our laptop stolen? Remember how, clever Junior Detectives that we are, we had narrowed down the list of suspects to two people, one of which had been a daily computer user UNTIL the theft of the laptop? Well there have been new developments in the case and we've FINALLY called the police about it.
Now, mind you, the entire "liberry" staff has been BEGGING Mrs. A to call the cops about the theft since it all went down. I don't know why she didn't want to, unless maybe it's because all our evidence as to who did it was based on a hunch. Thankfully, hunches have now been abandoned.
Today, (before I arrived, of course), one of our key suspects came in and asked if he could speak with my fellow Liberry Ass. Mrs. B in private outside. Let's call him Jimmy the Snitch. So Jimmy tells Mrs. B that he knows who took the laptop and he wants to turn the person in but he wishes to remain anonymous while he does it. He said that he didn't learn of the theft of the laptop for four days after it occurred and once he found out about it he decided he wanted no part of it. According to Jimmy, the laptop's hard drive has been wiped clean and has actually been given to a third party at this point by the second party who originally stole it. Jimmy is willing to provide evidence about the laptop, but he's scared and doesn't want the second party--let's call him The Amazing Bladderboy, as it was his bashful bladder that lead him to our private bathroom where the laptop was stored in the first place--to learn that Jimmy was the one who'd snitched on him. Jimmy also doesn't want the cops to think HE had anything to do with it because Jimmy the Snitch has a long history with the local law enforcement already. He's been brought up on embezzlement charges and taken to court on more than one occasion, including one several years ago where our own Mrs. C served on his jury and was only unable to help convict his ass that time because the evidence was too weak.
You think the drama's flying thick yet? Oh, no. It gets better.
Not only are Jimmy the Snitch and the Amazing Bladderboy friends... they are also LOVERS! Well, maybe WERE is the more appropriate word here...
Still, the fact that they ever were leads me to ask the question, what the hell is it with our library and half-assed gay master-criminals? I mean, we already had the Untalented Mr. Ripley and the Even Less Talented Mr. Ripley... now we've got Jimmy & Bladderboy too?
So anyways... Jimmy not only tells Mrs. B he knows who took the laptop, but he gives her a nice typed up anonymous note to that effect too. It even includes the make and serial number of the laptop for added authenticity. Pretty sweet no? What he doesn't give is the name of the person who took it, i.e. Bladderboy. Then Jimmy the Snitch leaves, saying that if the police are interested he's willing to cooperate.
Mrs. C calls Mrs. A, who's out of town, to let her know all of this and Mrs. A finally relents and tells Mrs. C to call the cops and get the ball rolling on the official investigation (I guess since we've already pretty much wrapped up the un-official one). So Mrs. C calls a guy on the force that she knows, but has to leave a message for him as he's out.
Bout this time, I amble in and hear the above sordid details. I say I figure Jimmy's probably telling the truth about not being in on the laptop's theft since he knows full well that Mrs. C works there and that she had served on the jury against him all those years before and has no great love for him in the first place so she would most certainly suspect his previously-nearly-convicted ass of stealing the laptop in the first place, which is exactly what had happened. Makes sense to me, at least.
Now it's all pretty dramatic up to this point. You'd think we were bout drama'd out for the day, no? Uh uh.
"Isn't that the guy?" Mrs. B said from her position by the liberry's front window.
A moment later the door bumps open and Bladderboy himself comes in. Not only that, but he looks SUPER PISSED. He stalks through our main room and then back toward the computer hall where he has a look at the people there. Evidently he was looking for buddy Jimmy, who wasn't there, so he stalks back through and out the door. Mrs. B, still at the window, quickly notes Bladderboy's license plate number as he drives off, earning her yet another gold star on her Junior Detective Score Card.
By mid afternoon we'd finally gotten through to Mrs. C's policeman friend and he came down to take possession of the anonymous note from Jimmy, plus Bladderboy's license number and to hear our version of the whole matter.
"Wow. You all are doing some detective work here," the officer said.
"Are you kidding? This place is information central," I told him.
"So I should probably be coming up here for tips more often?"
"Oh, yeah."
TO BE CONTINUED...
Remember a couple weeks back when we had our laptop stolen? Remember how, clever Junior Detectives that we are, we had narrowed down the list of suspects to two people, one of which had been a daily computer user UNTIL the theft of the laptop? Well there have been new developments in the case and we've FINALLY called the police about it.
Now, mind you, the entire "liberry" staff has been BEGGING Mrs. A to call the cops about the theft since it all went down. I don't know why she didn't want to, unless maybe it's because all our evidence as to who did it was based on a hunch. Thankfully, hunches have now been abandoned.
Today, (before I arrived, of course), one of our key suspects came in and asked if he could speak with my fellow Liberry Ass. Mrs. B in private outside. Let's call him Jimmy the Snitch. So Jimmy tells Mrs. B that he knows who took the laptop and he wants to turn the person in but he wishes to remain anonymous while he does it. He said that he didn't learn of the theft of the laptop for four days after it occurred and once he found out about it he decided he wanted no part of it. According to Jimmy, the laptop's hard drive has been wiped clean and has actually been given to a third party at this point by the second party who originally stole it. Jimmy is willing to provide evidence about the laptop, but he's scared and doesn't want the second party--let's call him The Amazing Bladderboy, as it was his bashful bladder that lead him to our private bathroom where the laptop was stored in the first place--to learn that Jimmy was the one who'd snitched on him. Jimmy also doesn't want the cops to think HE had anything to do with it because Jimmy the Snitch has a long history with the local law enforcement already. He's been brought up on embezzlement charges and taken to court on more than one occasion, including one several years ago where our own Mrs. C served on his jury and was only unable to help convict his ass that time because the evidence was too weak.
You think the drama's flying thick yet? Oh, no. It gets better.
Not only are Jimmy the Snitch and the Amazing Bladderboy friends... they are also LOVERS! Well, maybe WERE is the more appropriate word here...
Still, the fact that they ever were leads me to ask the question, what the hell is it with our library and half-assed gay master-criminals? I mean, we already had the Untalented Mr. Ripley and the Even Less Talented Mr. Ripley... now we've got Jimmy & Bladderboy too?
So anyways... Jimmy not only tells Mrs. B he knows who took the laptop, but he gives her a nice typed up anonymous note to that effect too. It even includes the make and serial number of the laptop for added authenticity. Pretty sweet no? What he doesn't give is the name of the person who took it, i.e. Bladderboy. Then Jimmy the Snitch leaves, saying that if the police are interested he's willing to cooperate.
Mrs. C calls Mrs. A, who's out of town, to let her know all of this and Mrs. A finally relents and tells Mrs. C to call the cops and get the ball rolling on the official investigation (I guess since we've already pretty much wrapped up the un-official one). So Mrs. C calls a guy on the force that she knows, but has to leave a message for him as he's out.
Bout this time, I amble in and hear the above sordid details. I say I figure Jimmy's probably telling the truth about not being in on the laptop's theft since he knows full well that Mrs. C works there and that she had served on the jury against him all those years before and has no great love for him in the first place so she would most certainly suspect his previously-nearly-convicted ass of stealing the laptop in the first place, which is exactly what had happened. Makes sense to me, at least.
Now it's all pretty dramatic up to this point. You'd think we were bout drama'd out for the day, no? Uh uh.
"Isn't that the guy?" Mrs. B said from her position by the liberry's front window.
A moment later the door bumps open and Bladderboy himself comes in. Not only that, but he looks SUPER PISSED. He stalks through our main room and then back toward the computer hall where he has a look at the people there. Evidently he was looking for buddy Jimmy, who wasn't there, so he stalks back through and out the door. Mrs. B, still at the window, quickly notes Bladderboy's license plate number as he drives off, earning her yet another gold star on her Junior Detective Score Card.
By mid afternoon we'd finally gotten through to Mrs. C's policeman friend and he came down to take possession of the anonymous note from Jimmy, plus Bladderboy's license number and to hear our version of the whole matter.
"Wow. You all are doing some detective work here," the officer said.
"Are you kidding? This place is information central," I told him.
"So I should probably be coming up here for tips more often?"
"Oh, yeah."
TO BE CONTINUED...
Tuesday, January 20, 2004
Legion of Evil-Doers (with Bashful Bladders)
Just got a call from Mrs. A. She asked if I had
borrowed the library's laptop computer at some point this weekend. I
had not. She sighed and said that it was now missing from its case,
which was hidden away in Mrs. A's private office restroom, upstairs.
The restroom situation in the library is not an ideal one. The only public restroom we have is located downstairs, in a small closet wedged beneath the staircase itself, which is at the end of the computer hall. There's only one toilet in there and the little room is hardly soundproof. The fact that it's right by the three computers also means that after you've used the restroom anybody surfing the net knows all your business. It's bad enough when doing a #1, but God help you if you have a #2 on the docket. Then, not only will everyone know your business, but our lack of a ventilation fan and far-wandering can of Glade means they'll probably smell it too.
Now, this might seem to be a deterrent to most patrons "making stinky" on a regular basis, but believe me it doesn't scare off all of `em. At least once a week, as I meander back toward the computer hall, I'm hit with the unmistakable odor of a post-drop bowl-sinker and have to fight my way through it to get to the bathroom and spray something—ANYTHING—that might cut the stench. Half the time, there's a VERY obvious and accessible can of Glade or Lysol right there in the restroom, but does anyone ever think to actually USE it themselves? Hell no! It's always ME that has to do battle with Sterculius, the Roman God of fecal fumes. And if there's no Glade in there, I'm apt to grab some Clorox Cleanup or whatever else is handy and let fly.
And it always makes me feel more than a little odd that the owner of the ass that unholy cloud was birthed from is probably one of the folks at the computer at that very moment and that I have to do THEIR job of fumigating the whole place as they watch.
No one but the legendary and as yet unchronicled Serial Shitter has any good feelings toward our public restroom. (Well, S.S. and another mentally handicapped man who used to enjoy shoving stuff down the toilet, who subsequently, one Christmas, clogged our Ty-D Bowl with a Christmas wreath and bells so thoroughly that city employees had to be called out to physically remove said toilet from the floor itself in order to fish out the offending decorations.)
The other restroom we have is allegedly private. It's a slightly bigger closet tucked away in one corner of Mrs. A's upstairs office. For a private office bathroom, it sure gets a lot of traffic from non-"liberry" personnel. I guess some folks just don't want to pee with an audience, so they wait for Mrs. A to leave her office and sneak in for a quick wee. We know this because the people who sneak in there tend to be awfully sloppy with their urination skills and leave a few drops on the rim of the bowl. Now, I'm no stranger to a few stray drips myself, but I at least have the decency to wipe `em up afterwards. Buncha savages in this town.
It got even worse two summers ago when we had to close off the entire computer hallway for a full week to repaint the bathroom, re-floor the bathroom and varnish the wood floors of the computer hall. In order to keep people out of there, we hung a couple of truly colossal sheets of plastic over the opening to the hall and put giant signs on it saying THIS SECTION CLOSED DUE TO WET PAINT. We also put signs on the front door and at the desk advising our patrons we would not have a public restroom available to them until the work on the restroom was complete. Well, as evidenced by our tax form situation, none of our patrons are capable of reading signs.
So one evening, I heard watery noises coming from beyond the no-fly-zone-warning-curtains-of-plastic and knew someone had gone in there anyway. Sure enough, some of the heavy tape holding the plastic sheeting in place had been unaffixed from the wall. I pulled it aside and marched on in to confront our urination violator. About the time I reached the restroom, out he came. Now, even giving the guy the benefit of the doubt and assuming that he was an illiterate moron incapable of reading the signs telling him the restroom was closed and not to pull aside the plastic and go in anyway, to actually get in and out of the restroom he had to move a huge stack of full paint cans in cardboard boxes that we'd piled in front of the door to prevent just this sort of thing. On his way back out, he had to squeeze past them again and didn't immediately see me standing there with my arms folded. When he did catch sight of me, you should have seen the amazing look of guilt on his face. He began trying to make excuses for himself even before I told him that he wasn't supposed to be in the bathroom because there was lots of wet paint in there. Then, in his embarrassed haste to escape, he managed to tear down the plastic sheeting covering the hallway. Like I said, buncha savages.
Our upstairs restroom got a lot more unauthorized use that week, but there weren't' any real problems other than a few cleanups.
Unfortunately, these days the upstairs restroom also serves as a storage area for unused computer equipment, old files and records, and, most recently, the library's laptop, which is now missing and presumed stolen.
Topping our list of suspects... all patrons with bashful bladders.
TO BE CONTINUED...
The restroom situation in the library is not an ideal one. The only public restroom we have is located downstairs, in a small closet wedged beneath the staircase itself, which is at the end of the computer hall. There's only one toilet in there and the little room is hardly soundproof. The fact that it's right by the three computers also means that after you've used the restroom anybody surfing the net knows all your business. It's bad enough when doing a #1, but God help you if you have a #2 on the docket. Then, not only will everyone know your business, but our lack of a ventilation fan and far-wandering can of Glade means they'll probably smell it too.
Now, this might seem to be a deterrent to most patrons "making stinky" on a regular basis, but believe me it doesn't scare off all of `em. At least once a week, as I meander back toward the computer hall, I'm hit with the unmistakable odor of a post-drop bowl-sinker and have to fight my way through it to get to the bathroom and spray something—ANYTHING—that might cut the stench. Half the time, there's a VERY obvious and accessible can of Glade or Lysol right there in the restroom, but does anyone ever think to actually USE it themselves? Hell no! It's always ME that has to do battle with Sterculius, the Roman God of fecal fumes. And if there's no Glade in there, I'm apt to grab some Clorox Cleanup or whatever else is handy and let fly.
And it always makes me feel more than a little odd that the owner of the ass that unholy cloud was birthed from is probably one of the folks at the computer at that very moment and that I have to do THEIR job of fumigating the whole place as they watch.
No one but the legendary and as yet unchronicled Serial Shitter has any good feelings toward our public restroom. (Well, S.S. and another mentally handicapped man who used to enjoy shoving stuff down the toilet, who subsequently, one Christmas, clogged our Ty-D Bowl with a Christmas wreath and bells so thoroughly that city employees had to be called out to physically remove said toilet from the floor itself in order to fish out the offending decorations.)
The other restroom we have is allegedly private. It's a slightly bigger closet tucked away in one corner of Mrs. A's upstairs office. For a private office bathroom, it sure gets a lot of traffic from non-"liberry" personnel. I guess some folks just don't want to pee with an audience, so they wait for Mrs. A to leave her office and sneak in for a quick wee. We know this because the people who sneak in there tend to be awfully sloppy with their urination skills and leave a few drops on the rim of the bowl. Now, I'm no stranger to a few stray drips myself, but I at least have the decency to wipe `em up afterwards. Buncha savages in this town.
It got even worse two summers ago when we had to close off the entire computer hallway for a full week to repaint the bathroom, re-floor the bathroom and varnish the wood floors of the computer hall. In order to keep people out of there, we hung a couple of truly colossal sheets of plastic over the opening to the hall and put giant signs on it saying THIS SECTION CLOSED DUE TO WET PAINT. We also put signs on the front door and at the desk advising our patrons we would not have a public restroom available to them until the work on the restroom was complete. Well, as evidenced by our tax form situation, none of our patrons are capable of reading signs.
So one evening, I heard watery noises coming from beyond the no-fly-zone-warning-curtains-of-plastic and knew someone had gone in there anyway. Sure enough, some of the heavy tape holding the plastic sheeting in place had been unaffixed from the wall. I pulled it aside and marched on in to confront our urination violator. About the time I reached the restroom, out he came. Now, even giving the guy the benefit of the doubt and assuming that he was an illiterate moron incapable of reading the signs telling him the restroom was closed and not to pull aside the plastic and go in anyway, to actually get in and out of the restroom he had to move a huge stack of full paint cans in cardboard boxes that we'd piled in front of the door to prevent just this sort of thing. On his way back out, he had to squeeze past them again and didn't immediately see me standing there with my arms folded. When he did catch sight of me, you should have seen the amazing look of guilt on his face. He began trying to make excuses for himself even before I told him that he wasn't supposed to be in the bathroom because there was lots of wet paint in there. Then, in his embarrassed haste to escape, he managed to tear down the plastic sheeting covering the hallway. Like I said, buncha savages.
Our upstairs restroom got a lot more unauthorized use that week, but there weren't' any real problems other than a few cleanups.
Unfortunately, these days the upstairs restroom also serves as a storage area for unused computer equipment, old files and records, and, most recently, the library's laptop, which is now missing and presumed stolen.
Topping our list of suspects... all patrons with bashful bladders.
TO BE CONTINUED...
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