We've Got Letters (and Resolutions)!

Michelle the Academic Librarian writes:

Hi Juice,

I've been reading your blog for a couple of years now, but I think I need to take a break. I love the entries about the rogues, but we've been reading a *lot* lately about the inner workings of your bowels and what you find in the liberry's bathroom. I'm often reading as I have my breakfast, but even if I weren't, I think it would still be a bit much.

Just wanted to know I really enjoy what you do, but the entries about rogues and your life with your sweetie are much better fodder for reading than entries about doo and speculation about the goings-on in your liberry's bathroom.

Although I'm being honest here, I remain a fan. I hope that's okay. I'll check back in later and see if you have "moved" out of bowels of bathroom lit.

Yours,
Michelle, the academic liberrian.

P.S. Sorry to hear about your fish. We are pet lovers around my house.

Michelle,

Thanks very much for the letter.

I suspect you're right about there being a few too many bathroom-related entries as of late. It's not my intention to write a gross-out blog, it's just that the bathroom-related problems we're having are the ones driving me the most insane right now. Still, I have actually been thinking along similar lines myself, particularly after penning last week's And Now, We Now Return to Our Regularly Scheduled Program entry. It was chock full of disgusting bathroom-related material and got me to thinking that I might be dwelling on it a bit much.

A few years ago, I had a similar realization that much of my output had become devoted to the patron who was driving us most insane back then, the man known as Parka. Rather than continuing to devote the majority of my blog output to chronicling his annoying behavior, I decided to just let readers take it as a given that he was continuing to behave annoyingly and just not write about it anymore. Of course, there was still the occasional incident that deserved chronicling, but by and large I left him out. And not terribly long after I stopped writing about him, he went into a self-imposed exile from our branch after figuratively showing his ass one day. He eventually returned, like a big, annoying, Michelin Man-parka-clad, bad penny, but within a couple of months had actually left town, seemingly for good. This may yet be more evidence in my theory that the more energy and thoughts you beam toward the Rogues the more power they gain; which is why I never mentioned his ultimate departure here AT ALL, so as not to jinx it. (And let us hope this note doesn't accomplish that.) I guess the lesson to be learned about poop humor is: a little goes a long way, but a lot can stink up the place—kind of like Fred Schneider songs.

So, that said, barring any major newsworthy poo-festivals or stank ho-downs that occur, my official New Year's Resolution for the blog is to let my readership assume that the horrors in our restroom are continuing unabated, though unchronicled. Believe me, I have plenty of material to cover beyond it. (Plus, maybe if I stop obsessing over everyone else's mookystinks, they'll stop leaving them behind for me to find.)

Don't go anywhere just yet, Michelle. I enjoy having thoughtful, honest people such as yourself as readers.

--juice

PATRON FIIIIIGHT!!!

"You missed all the fun on Friday," Ms. M told me upon my arrival for work Monday. "We had a fight."

"A fight?!" I said, practically salivating that fisticuffs were engaged in and wondering what on earth could have caused a "liberry" throw down. Maybe someone finally hit Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine in the mouth? Maybe Parka came back and got into a fight with Mr. Creepy Guy over which one of them was rightfully the skeeveist? Maybe there was some sort of Mr. Stanky and Bear Piss Man Vs. the Sweatiest Woman in all the Land and Mr. Stankier tag-team stank off?

"What happened? What happened?" I asked.

Ms. M shrugged. "I don't know," she said.

"You... you don't know?"

"Nope."

Perhaps after seeing my confused expression, Ms. M then explained that on Friday, while everyone else was out at lunch and she was running things solo, there had been two adult women in the library who apparently got into some sort of intense disagreement with one another and decided to take it outside. Evidently it was the least disruptive intense disagreement in the history of such things, because despite the fact that they and Ms. M were all essentially in the same room, Ms. M's first and only clue that anything was amiss came when a police officer entered the building twenty minutes later to inquire what Ms. M might have witnessed of the fight.

"There was a fight?" she reportedly asked.

"Yeah. In the parking lot. You didn't see it?" the no doubt surprised officer reportedly then said. After Ms. M admitted her cluelessness, he went on to say that, according to the ladies themselves, they'd started out arguing in the library and then resolved to take their argument outside and transition it into one of a more physical nature. Ms. M told the officer that she never heard any raised voices, nor saw any other indication that anyone was unhappy with anyone else inside the library or out. It was all news to her. The officer took her statement and went away.

Later in the day, the husband of one of the ladies phoned the library and spoke to Ms. M to apologize on behalf of his wife for causing such a ruckus. Ms. M assured him it was fine and that she hadn't actually noticed any of it, had no idea what it was about and didn't need to know.

This, of course, just pissed the rest of us right off, cause if there's going to be fighting in the "liberry" we damn well want to A) see it for ourselves, or B) get all the juicy details about it otherwise. Ms. M had clearly fallen down in her duties as a member of the "Liberry" Clubhouse Junior Detectives and/or "Liberry" Junior Gossip-Observers League.

Mrs. A has now vowed to use her connections in the police department to learn the details, but so far everyone is keeping mum.

Footnotes from the Quattuorvirate of Lameness III: Narcoleptic Nelson ("LOST" ROGUES WEEK DAY 4)

Much like his name suggests, Narcoleptic Nelson was a genuine narcoleptic. At any given point in the day, his head might nod forward and he would find himself asleep. This no doubt caused problems for him while walking and driving, but we only ever witnessed him nodding off while he was using our patron computers. Each week, on the same day, Narcoleptic Nelson would arrive to use a computer and the staff would begin making wagers as to how long it would take the man to surrender to the sweet grasp of Morpheus. It usually took no longer than 10 minutes.

Narcoleptic Nelson's computer sleeping habits were really not a problem for us otherwise. No, the only hassles we endured as a result were usually doled out by other patrons, who didn't appreciate having to wait to use a computer that was currently occupied by someone who was fast asleep. The usual complainant in such cases was our old friend Parka, however, a person whose happiness in life we couldn't have cared less about. Our point to him was twofold: A) while we don't encourage it, we technically have no policies against sleeping in the library; and B) we give each of our patrons half an hour on the computer and if they choose to use their time asleep it's all the same to us. Parka was not amused. We were.

Narcoleptic Nelson has not been seen in quite some time. I hope this means he's off being the subject of an intensive sleep study, rather than the less-pleasant notion that he crashed his car on the way there.

Stinking Innanet Crowd!

I'm so disappointed in our computer patrons. Now that Crusty Dave has provided us with a genuine threat to temperament, nose and the holding down of lunch, none of our regular innanet crowders seem willing to help us get rid of him. 

See Crusty has proven himself perfectly willing to stay on our computers all day long, and, provided no one is in need of his computer due to the other two computers being taken up by patrons, he can actually get away with it. In order to bust him off, we need at least three other people who want computers at the same time. The trouble is, Crusty Dave is very very stinky. It's not quite the slap-you-in-the-face-with-a-dead-fish stench of Mr. Stanky, but it's ultimately a more pervasive stench because it has so much time to build up. Once any other computer user gets around him, they find their desire to stay there quickly diminishes and rarely stay for their full half hour. So for most of the day, there was at least one and often two computers open. 

At one point, Crusty had some competition from Gene Gene the Geneal0gy Machine, a relatively recent addition to our benign irritants gallery whose major claim to infame is his tendency to tell anyone who gets too close to him the mind-numbingly boring details of his geneal0gy research. (We make it a point never to engage him in conversation of any kind because he forcefully steers it back around to his favorite topic every single time.) 

Gene got his computer a couple hours after Dave's first sign-in and I was glad to have him, because Gene can hog up the computer time better than most and has the added bonus of not stinking. Soon, another patron took the last computer and before long a kid came in and signed up for Crusty's. I let Crusty know he needed to get off, but by the time he actually got around to getting off the kid had left the building and I didn't technically have anyone waiting. I kept that bit of information to myself, though, and Crusty departed. 

I had barely had time to clean up his crust and spritz down his chair with Febreeze when he returned and signed up again. By then, unfortunately, the other computer patron had also departed, leaving only Gene. And by the time I had another computer-competition-trifecta, I then had to bust Gene off. 

Gene, while signing out, said something about possibly coming back later. I tried to get him to go ahead and sign up for another session right then. I was even willing to stand there and engage him in geneal0gy talk until his turn came up, but he decided he would go away for a bit first. 

So for the rest of my workday, Crusty and his intense stench held sway over the computer hall and indeed the landing above it. I spent the day cursing the usual innanet crowders for being so disloyal to us and Crusty for officially ruining Febreeze's Linen & Sky scent. 

Where the hell are our tried and true faithful? Why aren't they flocking to us in great numbers? (For it is only in great numbers that we will be able to stave off the evil!) I'll take nearly any of them, really, provided they're not stinky. Where is the Devil Twin Auxiliary League? Or the Devil Twins themselves?! I'd be willing to cut them some slack on fines if they'd just monopolize a couple of computers for a few hours for me. Where is Mr. B-Natural? Or Crazed Mom? Or Mr. Big Stupid? Or Kanji the Kid? Or The Dufus? Where are they? I'll take Mrs. Bellows or the Internet Neophyte, too, and will even show them how to load "the innanet." 

God help me, I'll even take Parka's dumb ass back. 

There! I said it! I said his name, have given him power and summoned him from the depths of whatever Stygian pit he's been trolling around for the past few blissful, Parka-Free months! Bring it on!!!

First Day Back

Today was my first day back in the "liberry" saddle following our two-week trip to Guatemala and El Salvador. It was largely uneventful as far as the usual "liberry" madness goes, but eventful in other respects. I popped in at 1p, laden with souvenirs for the library staff. Mrs. C and Mrs. B were the only ones in the front room, and they immediately asked how my trip went.

"Fantastic!" I said.

"I've got big news too," Mrs. C whispered.

"Yeah?"

She nodded furiously, then whispered, "I'm expecting."

This is huge news for Mrs. C. She and Mr. C have been trying to have a child for the past year and it's not been a fun time. Well, I'm sure it's been a fun time in some respects, but the results have not been what they've wanted. So congrats to Mr. and Mrs. C!

The staff, of course, had plenty of questions concerning my trip. Unfortunately, giving any kind of overview of a two-week mission trip in a short period of time is a very difficult thing to do. We had such an amazing time, saw and heard of such harrowing and heart-warming things and had so many mini-adventures in the process that you can't really Cliff's Notes it effectively. But I gave them a few highlights and lowlights. And once Mrs. A and Mrs. J came downstairs too, I gave everyone their souvenirs.

I bought five colorful pottery sun-faces at an Indian market in Antigua. They're essentially the same little ornamental sculpture, painted in different shades. Unfortunately, three of them were slightly chipped in a horribly true Continental Airlines-related incident at the Houston International Airport on the way home. (The chipping was actually getting off light in this case, as Ashley had part of a much larger pottery piece broken during the same incident.) Still, these were only chipped on the edges of a couple of the sun rays, so they’re still nice to display. I apologized for bringing them broken pottery, but gave them over anyway.

I also brought them each their own bag of fried plantain chips. These are plantains sliced lengthwise, salted and fried like potato chips. They’re just some of the most tasty fried chips you could ever want, though I doubt they are much better for you than potato chips. Sweet and salty all at once, they’re just tasty and good. Everyone broke open their bags and began sampling.

I asked what sort of incidents had occurred at the library in my absence? I fully expected them to relate something that I would fully regret having missed—like Chester and Parka having a shootout in the parking lot or something. Nope. The only notable incident they could recall was Mr. Stanky putting in an appearance yesterday and being particularly stinky even for him.

“You know,” I began, “I smelled a pretty wide array of B.O. when I was in Guatemala, but none of it came anywhere close to touching his.”

The only other possible incident was reported on our circ-desk note-pad. Our weekender, Miss K, noted that one of our long-time patrons, Mr. Crab, (who is also a long-time library donor and not afraid to let you know that should anything not go quite his way) had been in on Saturday and was completely pissed off that he couldn't use his old library card from the old nearly year-gone VTLS system. Mind you, Mr. Crab has a new library card on the new nearly year-old system, but he still carries his old card with him and is insulted that he can't use it. Miss K reported that Mr. Crab said he thought the way we had set up the new system was done in an unintelligent fashion and he insisted that we put his old barcode number from his old card in the new patron record so he could use it instead of his new card. I’m still not entirely sure what this man’s beef truly is, but even on his best days Mr. Crab could give Mr. B-Natural and Mr. Smiley a run for their Grumpiest and Second Grumpiest Old Man in all the World titles. Ms. K reported that she wasn’t sure what to do so she added the man’s old barcode to his patron record in addition to his new one just to shut him up. She indicated which barcode we should delete in case this was wrong. Mrs. A then had a note at the end of the account telling us to delete the old barcode.

I'm somehow sure this won't be the end of it.

Solo Monday Hell?

Well, my much dreaded Monday solo-shift was no problem at all. In fact, if I didn't know it was Monday, I would have sworn it was a Sunday shift.

There was none of the usual Monday rush whatsoever. The computers did steady business, but I only had to bust off patrons twice and then it leveled out.

We didn't even have a call from Mr. Kreskin--an almost unprecedented occurrence considering that both Mrs. A and Mrs. C were gone. In fact, we didn't even have any calls specifically for Mrs. A or Mrs. C. I was dumbfounded.

Of course, Parka rolled in around 2. I told him I'd have a computer for him as soon as I could ask a patron to get off. He went back to wait in the next room. At that point, I noticed a woman standing in the front room who was giving me the stink eye. It occurred to me that she'd been standing there for quite a while.

"Um, can I help you?" I asked.

"Computer," she whispered. She seemed to have lost her voice.

"Ohhh... And you signed in already?" She nodded. "I'm sorry. I didn't know." I realized then that she'd signed in when I was out of the room about ten minutes before and I never realized what she was there for. And even though I'd already told Parka he could have one first, I didn't mind bumping him for the lady. Oddly, Parka didn't seem to care either, when I told him.

Once he got a computer, Parka stayed all the way to close. Correction: He actually departed at 10 til close, which was a good 5 minutes later than he should have. I had gone back at 4:35 to tell all the computer users that I was shutting the computers down at 4:45. I was hoping Parka would complain, but he didn't. Instead, he verbally acknowledged that he understood and thanked me for telling him.

The other computer users departed before the deadline, but I had to go back and remind Parka at 4:45 that it was time to get off. He didn't, but unfortunately I had a minor closing time rush to deal with up front, so I wasn't able to go back and tell him off. I so wanted to go back and say, "Look, I told you it was time to get off five minutes ago and I'm not playing around. Do you really want me to tell MRS. A that I'm having problems with you? Because she's already told me that she told you that if she gets one more complaint about you from her staff you'll be banned from the computers. Seems to me with as many computer access points as you've been banned from recently, you'd be a little more concerned about not pissing off the only one that will let you in."

Before I could get free from the desk to go do this, he finally relinquished his system and left at 10 til. He even shut it down for me. Bastard.

Parka Engulfed

At 6:35 yesterday—that’s 25 minutes to close for those playing at home—Parka rolled in for his daily online skank-chat. He didn’t even bother signing up on our clip-board at the desk. He just followed me on back, like I was really going to let him get away with that.

“Uh, did you sign in?” I asked.

“Oh. I forgot. Sorry,” he said.

He went back to sign in while I logged him on the little computer by the stairs. This might seem an act of malice on my part, as Parka has had a long-standing hatred for the little computer by the stairs. However, since we bought two new Dells to replace the other two patron computers a few weeks back, Parka has preferred the old one by the stairs. This is because when our tech guys set up the new machines they reset all the passwords, failed to tell us the new admin password and then promptly left town without installing Microsoft Office nor several other programs our patrons are used to having access to. In their defense, the tech’s didn’t have any of those programs with them at the time of installation. But there seems to be no timetable as to when they’re going to come back and do the job nor whether or not we can just have the admin password so that we can do so ourselves. (In fact, from what I’m told, the techs have even gone so far as to suggest that they cannot install Office on the new systems because of some security issues and that they will instead be installing Wordperfect—a.k.a. The Devil. That sounds like a load of stall-tactic crap to me, so perhaps the person I heard this from was misinformed.) The new machines, things of speed and beauty that they are, thus have no word processing, nor some sort of Sound/Chat program that Parka likes to use when chatting with his e-skanks. He now almost always requests to be put on the little old computer by the stairs, cause it still has what he wants. I graciously obliged, despite his attempt not to sign in first.

At 6:55, I went back at let Parka know that he only had 5 minutes until we closed. He acknowledged what I’d said by saying, “Okay.”

At 7 p.m. straight up, I went back and told him, “It’s about that time.” Again, he acknowledged what I’d said by saying, “Okay.” However, as I returned to the front room, I heard him return to typing in his e-skank chat window.

In the front room, I noticed the runner carpet was filthy from all the snow/mud traffic we’ve had today. It would have to be vacuumed. I waited for a little, hoping Parka would come on and leave so I could lock up and vacuum in peace, but the sounds of his incredibly loud typing did not ease up as though he were planning to stop any time soon.

At 7:01, I went back to get the vacuum from the Hobbit door beneath the stairs. The Hobbit door is located directly beside Parka’s computer. He didn’t even slow in his chatting as I lugged the vacuum out.

“It really IS that time now,” I said as Parka’s second warning. He didn’t even look up.

I returned to the front room with the vacuum, but I was getting progressively more pissed as the seconds and typing sounds ticked by. Parka wasn’t planning to move. Instead, he was back there thinking: “What grand fortune! Library boy’s gonna be busy vacuuming for at least a minute, giving me extra time to chat with my e-skanks. And I won’t make any move to leave until at least a minute after he stops. Puh-puh-puh-Parkaaaa Powerrrrr!”

I gritted my teeth and marched back to the computer hall where Parka was still typing away.

“Uh, no, really, it IS. THAT. TIME. NOW,” I said. I saw him look up at this, but he didn’t say anything. I returned to the front and began vacuuming, determined that if Parka hadn’t moved by the time I finished I was going to shut the computer off in his face and let him know he would never again be allowed to stay all the way until close. Hell, our official computer policy is that computers are to be turned off at 15 til close anyway. I was being more than generous in letting him stay til 7.

About mid-way through my vacuuming job, Parka came out. He said something to me that I couldn’t hear over the vacuum. I turned it off.

“What?”

“I said, what were you trying to say back there? I didn’t hear you.”

Bull, and might I add, shit. Sure, he’d had his headphones on, but even if he couldn’t hear my exact words there’s NO FREAKIN’ WAY he didn’t know exactly what the message was. Not as many times as this little closing-time scenario’s played out.

I blinked at him for a moment, then said, “I was letting you know, again, that we’re closed.”

“Oh. Okay,” he said. “Sorry. I had the headphones on and was kind of engulfed.”

“Uh huh.”

So let the word ring out. Officially, when Parka’s in house, I am forever more shutting off the computers at 15 til, just like our rules say we're supposed to. No more coasting past closing time for Mr. Parka A. Hole. And Lord help the man if he says a word about it.

Rogue Rumors & Confirmations

Been a lot of news on the Rogue Rumor front this week.

According to Mr. Rob, the librarian over at the local community college, The Patron Who Must Not Be Named, a.k.a. Chester the (Potential) Molester/Community College Janitor, has been ordered by his superiors that he is not to set foot on the grounds of the community college unless he's actually scheduled to work that day and actually working.  Another way to put this is that all of Chester's off-hours are to be spent ogling women elsewhere rather than on community college grounds. I suppose by inference this means that he's free to ogle-away provided he's on the clock, but they don't want to see his face otherwise.

That's actually the rumor portion of the message, as Mr. Rob is uncertain as to whether the janitor in question is one in the same as our Chester. We know it has to be, as we have other sources who've confirmed that Chester's employed there. If the janitor Mr. Rob has mentioned isn't Chester, then they seem to have something of a pervert-hiring policy.

The other pervert sighting came Monday, when Parka stopped by (clad, of course, in his namesake big puffy white parka) to look at as much porn as our internet filters will allow him to. It's apparently more than we'd usually care for and has caused me to wonder whether the filters are working properly on the new patron computers we recently purchased.

Parka was in there for a couple of hours that afternoon. During this time, a 20-something woman who looked very familiar to me came in and used a computer too. After about 15 minutes, she came up to the circ-desk, smiled and in a low voice said, "The, uh, `gentleman' on the middle computer back there..."

"Uh huuuuh?" I said, adopting my best I know what's coming next tone.

"He's, um, well... I don't know what your policy is about this, or if you have one, but he's back there looking at... well, pornography."

"Uh huh."

"I know he's doing that because he's been asked to leave the ORNATHOLOGICAL COFFEE SHOP (Not Its Real Name) for doing that on our computers. I know. I work there."

"Uh huhhhh," I said, both at the revelation of Parka getting kicked out of one of our local coffee shops and from the revelation that that's where I knew this girl from. I told her, "Well, we don't really have any policy against it, but we are well aware of what he does back there."

She smiled knowingly, nodded and then departed.

It somehow warms my heart to know that we're not the only folks in town that are annoyed by Parka.

I think Parka's still out of work. Maybe I should tell him the community college is hiring.

And the Password is (Addendum)

I'm still not convinced that Parka doesn't somehow have our new password.

A couple days ago, I put him on the little computer by the stairs cause the other two were full. This always brings me great joy, because he hates the little computer by the stairs, probably due to its high-traffic and high-visibility status. He's also not fond of the third computer down, cause it doesn't have a nice scroll-wheel mouse like the others.

A while later, another patron came in for a computer and I went back to tell the lady on the middle computer, next to Parka, that her time was up. I returned to the circ-desk to wait for her to finish so I could log off her computer and log it back on for the new user.

BEEEEEEP, I heard from the back.

Ah ha! And so it begins anew, I thought. That beeping was no doubt Parka rebooting his computer so he could either stage a coup and take the more comfy middle computer with the scrolly mouse or so he could come complain to me that he'd locked his machine up, had to reboot and needed me to log him in again, affording him yet another opportunity to try and get a look at our password. Well I wasn't going to put up with it. I resolved that if he came up to ask me to log him on again I was going to... I don't know... tell him he had to wait in the children's room while I did it so that he wouldn't be tempted to try and nab our password. Sure, this was dumb and would be tipping my hand that I knew what he was up to, but if I had the evidence from his previous visits I felt I needed to use it to show his smarmy ass up.

Parka didn't come up to ask, though, and I was unable to go back and see what he was doing due to an unfortunately timed ringing phone at the desk. While I was on the phone, the lady from the middle computer departed, so as soon as I was able to hang up I went back. Parka was still at the little computer by the stairs. His computer was already logged in, though curiously he only had the desktop up and seemed to be in the process of clicking on Internet Explorer.

Ah hah, Ah HAH, I thought. He'd had exactly enough time to reboot and illicitly re-login his own computer while I was away! I'd caught him at last!

Then I noticed the middle computer. I had expected to find it still logged on from the previous user and in need of a re-login itself. However, this had already been done and it was now sitting there in default rest mode, awaiting a CTRL ALT DEL to bring up the login panel. My evidence was shot, cause I knew that it was quite possible that the BEEEEEEP I'd heard was the middle computer restarting at the command of the previous user as she left. Even if Parka was acting suspicious, I had no accusatory legs to stand on. Dammit.

I logged the middle computer on for the new patron, making a big production of sliding the chair out of the way so I could wedge my holiday-spawned bulk in to block Parka's line of sight. He made no move to run up the stairs and look, which would have given me an excuse to kick him out. Dammit.

"I think we still need to watch PARKA," I told Mrs. C yesterday as a precursor to telling her the above incident.

"Ohhhh, I didn't tell you, did I?" she said. "I had to yell at him this morning."

Mrs. C said that Parka had come in earlier and signed in for a computer. Mrs. C went back to log him on and saw that the middle and third computers were still logged in from the previous patrons. She went to the middle computer and did a log-off and was about to proceed to the third computer to do the same when Parka came back to the hall. She was just flipping down the laminated orange "Get Thee To the Sign Up Sheet Or Denied A Computer Thou Will Be'est" sign that's taped to the top of the monitor when Parka spoke up.

"I want to use the middle computer," he reportedly said, no doubt in full Officer Barbrady monotone. Mrs. C noted this and continued on to log-off the third computer down, but she had already flipped the orange sign down over the screen before moving to log off the third computer. Parka was enraged.

"Hey, I said I want the middle one!"

Mrs. C said she turned on him, eyes blazing, and shouted back, "I heard you the first time! I have to log them off and wait for them to come back up before I can give one to you!"

Parka notched his anger down at this, but still said, "Well, you flipped the sign down."

"Yes. Yes, I did."

Now Mrs. C is on the Parka war-path. Later in the morning, he managed to lock his computer up again and then shut it down completely rather than simply rebooting. When Mrs. J came to log him back on she had to stand there for the minute it takes for it to completely boot up, Parka looming over her the whole while. Mrs. C wants to tell him that if he does that again he'll be banned from the computers. She has to wait for Mrs. A to come back from vacation to get the authorization for this, though. I somehow don't see Mrs. A having a problem with it.

He may also still have our new password, as a simple log-off of a computer, as might have happened with the middle machine, does NOT cause a BEEEEEEEP. Only if the previous patron had told it to RESTART would it have done so. Could be either way at this point, but I'm going to have my eye on Parka to make sure.

And the password is...

Last week, two girls and a boy began pestering me for the password to the children's room computer. They were probably 11 or 12 and therefore given to cheerfully pestering people. The ringleader of them was Caroline Turner, a regular patron of ours and a young lady I've had some confusing dealings with before.

At first I didn't even realize what they were up to. Caroline had come up to the desk around 6 p.m. last Wednesday night and asked me what Mrs. C's full name was. I told her. Then she wanted me to write it down for her, so I did. A minute later she was back, asking for my name to be written down. Okay, sure, I thought. It was odd, but I somehow imagined she and her friends were plugging our names into Mad Libs or something.

A few minutes later, she and her other cohorts came to ask me harmless personal questions, such as my pet's name, my favorite book, my favorite movie and my favorite number, (Winston Churchill: The Infinitely Bad Kitty, The Martian Chronicles, Raising Arizona and four, respectively). Having secured this information, they scurried away to the children's room again.

Finally, Caroline came back and just point blank asked me, "Would you just tell me what the password is for the kids' computer?"

Ah, so that was their game.

"No," I said.

"Pleeeeeease?"

"Noooooooo."

More minutes of pleading and banter followed during which Caroline even threatened to sign up to use the computer just so she could watch my fingers and get the password as I logged her on.

"Well, that's really gonna work for you now, isn't it?" I said.

"Aw come onnnnnnn! You can tell me!"

Sure kid, I tell you and soon everybody's playing Magic School Bus Vs. The Dinosaurs for free.

This sort of thing went on for some time, with Caroline coming up with wildly inventive reasons why I should tell her followed by threats of the crazy things she would accuse me of if I didn't. (This sounds alarming, I know, but her very worst threat amounted to her taking one of our books, tearing it up and then then telling Mrs. A that I had taken the book and let my dog tear it up. I explained to her that Mrs. A would never believe her because she knows I don't own a dog.)

For a while I even considered telling her that the password for the computer wasn't a word at all, just to see her race back to start trying number combinations. (The password really ISN'T a word, but there aren't any numbers involved either, so her search would be fruitless.)

Eventually, Caroline had to leave for her group French lesson next door, as did her comrades. So I was left in peace.

Caroline, however, would not be the first patron to try and acquire our password. The last patron to try it was an as yet unchronicled Rogues Gallery member from years past. However, before I could even start to chronicle that long lost Rogue, one of our current boobyhatch escapees tried the very same thing.


It seems that our old friend Parka has made it his business to try and learn the password to our patron computers. (See THE PARKA SAGA.) That's right. This festering butt-grape in our collective crack is trying to hack us.

Parka was in last Saturday to chat with his e-skanks. After he'd been on for around 40 minutes or so, I heard a distinctive BEEEEEP from the computer hall signaling that one of the computers had been rebooted from the ground up. I've noticed more and more of these beeps when Parka is using the computers. Usually it signals that he has managed to chat the computer into freezing up, in which case he wants to reboot it before asking us to log him back on, cause he somehow thinks we don't know what he's up to. Or sometimes it signals that he's about to leave and wants to reboot the computer to be sure that all evidence of his presence on a given machine is gone. (Surrrre it is.) Mrs. A has actually had to confront him over this rebooting business because until recently he didn't just reboot the machine when he left but would shut it down, forcing the next patron to use it, AND us, to have to stand around and wait around for it to reboot from the ground up before it can be used anew. He agreed to cut it out. I still listen for the BEEEEEPs, though, because it either means he's leaving or that I'm gonna have to go back and log him on again.

So Saturday I hear the BEEEEEP and wait to see what Parka's next move will be. Minutes pass and there is no movement from the back to either leave or ask for assistance. Curious. After nearly five minutes with no sign of Parka, I decide to go investigate. It could be that he just hopped onto a nearby computer that was not logged off from the previous patron. But I somehow doubted it.

I think Parka must have heard me coming cause by the time I reached the door to the computer hall he was up and moving.

"Could you log me on again it froze up and I had to reboot," he said, in his usual punctuationless monotone.

I went over to his computer which had our login screen up. Curiously, the cursor was NOT in the username blank, but the password blank. And while he had not typed in our usual username, which probably every regular "Intanet" Crowder knows by heart, the fact that he had been trying to do something in the password blank was suspicious. I moved closer to the computer and typed in our standard patron username. Then, keeping my back toward Parka to block his line of sight on the keys, I typed in our password, the letter Z, (not really the letter Z). As I did this, I heard movement behind me and, on turning, I saw that Parka was now half-way up the first section of steps on the staircase, a perfect position for him to have craned his neck and taken a gander in the direction of my hands as I typed. He wasn't actively craning when I saw him, but what other reason would he have for being on the stairs? I didn't think he had actually managed to see it, but the fact that he was trying at all was definitely one of the most irritating things this highly irritating man has done.

Yesterday afternoon, I broke the news to Mrs. C.

"I think we need to keep an eye on PARKA. I'm pretty sure he was trying to get our password Saturday."

"You too?" she said. Mrs. C then told me that Parka had been in on Sunday and had pulled the same trick on her, asking her to come reboot his computer and then standing there trying to watch her type.

What advantage, you might ask, would Parka gain by knowing the password to our patron computers? After all, it isn't as if we wouldn't catch him trying to log on without signing up at the clipboard up front first. The only reason he EVER comes to the library is to use the computers, so from the moment we saw his big dingy-white-Michelin-Man-lookin'-parka-clad ass trying to sneak back to the computer hall, we would know what was up.

Our theory is that after repeatedly locking up the system with his chatting he finds it inconvenient to have to come get us to log him on again. He would much rather be able to reboot at his leisure and continue on without having to muck around with such things as standing and walking through two whole rooms to see if we may or may not have a spare moment or sense of inclination to help.

"Think we need to change the password then?" Mrs. C asked.

"Couldn't hurt," I said. "In fact, it would royally piss him off if he has managed to get it and now it won't work for him." We grinned and laughed evilly at this. I even suggested we change the password to Parka's real last name, which he would never ever suspect. Instead, though, we changed it to a different letter in proximity to Z (not really the letter Z) which would look indistinguishable if typed really fast, further compounding his frustration.

As I said earlier, though, this is only one example of a smarmy little bowel irritant of a patron trying to get our password. A couple of years back, one such soul succeeded at getting it and got busted in a much more satisfying way. I speak of none other than The Evil Fed Ex Guy. 

I first met the Evil FedEx Guy in November of 2001. I'd had cause to engage the services of Federal Express after the processor-fan in my computer started to crap out on me and I found myself in desperate need of a new one. I'd purchased one online and had paid $9 extra to have it delivered via Federal Express's two day delivery service. As you probably suspect, my two day delivery did not occur as per the definition of two day delivery.  What followed were eight days of not only no deliveries, but repeated instances of official Fed Ex tracking records being altered by someone to show that delivery attempts and phone calls had been made when no such deliveries nor calls had actually been attempted--cause, I was, like, home the whole time and stuff.  When my new chip fan was finally delivered, A WEEK AND A DAY LATER, it was the Evil FedEx Guy who delivered it.

At the time, I didn't even know that the Evil FedEx Guy was actually evil; I just thought he worked for evil.  So I didn't hold a grudge when, for example, he came to the library on his lunch break to surf the web a few days later and managed to leave his wallet behind.  I didn't even consider doing anything nasty to his wallet or its contents.  Instead, I phoned him up and left a message that we had his wallet.  The more I've thought about it since, though, the more I've come to believe that the Evil FedEx Guy himself was entirely responsible for my delayed delivery. I'd been blaming the FedEx dispatcher, but really the clear line of deception and ass-covering in the delivery process points back to the guy who was failing to make his delivery.  And who else would further benefit by going back and falsifying even more such attempts after the fact to make it look like he was actually doing his job? Him Him Him. I understand that being a FedEx driver is hard work and the drivers are under the gun of deadline constantly. But altering records to make it seem as though I was at fault in the matter when I was not just burns me up.  Still, I'd not done that math yet, but would soon learn that the Evil FedEx Guy was a right bastard for a number of other reasons.

After the above wallet snafu, the Evil FedEx Guy began making a nuisance of himself at our library as a member of the Liberry Intanet Crowd. On his lunch hour, he would pop by and park his enormous FedEx van in our half-hour parking, taking up well over his allotted parking space, and come on in to surf the web. This would even have been mostly okay with us if he didn't, in true Intanet Crowd fashion, constantly prove himself an enormous asshat. He had all the standard Intanet Crowd quirks, such as getting pissed off if he couldn't log on immediately upon arrival, or if he had to wait at all, or if he ran out of time and we had to ask him to relinquish his computer, or if the internet was slow, etc. That's standard issue. However, he was so possessive of his internet time that if we had to bust him off after his time was up he would rush the desk to sign up for the next computer and then get even more pissed off and start cursing if he had to wait at all. Dealing with him in any capacity was just unpleasant. This alone was bad enough to deserve our collective ire. However, he did us one better.

We didn't know that the Evil FedEx Guy knew our patron computer password until he decided to show off with it one day. He had come in for a computer, stayed his half hour and got booted off in favor of a new patron. The wait for a free computer was considerable and he wasn't finished with whatever it was he was doing, but oddly he didn't make a big stink about it like usual.

A few minutes later, Mrs. A came downstairs from her office to find Evil FedEx Guy using the computer in the children's room. She told us all later that right away she knew he had our password.

First of all, it's a hard and fast rule in the library that NO ADULT is allowed use the children's room computer because that computer is exclusively for the use of children. All the staff know this and it is not a rule that is ever violated. Second of all, when that computer IS used by children it is almost only used with the Children's Login setting, which preloads all our games and does not include access to the internet. It is technically possible to use the computer to access the internet, but only if logged in with the adult user name and password, so the chances of EFEG having spied this computer already logged in for adult access were very very slim.

"Excuse me," Mrs. A said, walking over to where Evil FedEx Guy was crouched down on the tiny, child-sized chair, his knees practically against his chest. "How exactly did you come to use this computer?"

Evil FedEx Guy had to know he was caught, but he tried to lie his way out anyway. He stared up at Mrs. A from his lowly position and said, "Um, the lady up front put me here."

"Which lady?"

"Um... Uhh... I don't remember."

Mrs. A no doubt chose this moment to look over her half-glasses at him as though he were a slow-witted child.

"You're telling me that you signed up for a computer and one of our staff logged you on this computer and you don't remember which person it was?"

"Yeah."

"You are not supposed to be using that computer. That computer is for children only. None of our staff would have put you on it either because they all know you're not supposed to be using that computer."

Evil FedEx Guy protested that he had been placed there by a duly appointed staff member, though he couldn't point out any of the ladies on duty specifically. Mrs. A told him in no uncertain terms that she didn't buy it. She told him she thought he had managed to figure out our password and had logged himself on because he didn't want to wait. (Mrs. A isn't afraid to get confrontational when she needs to, particularly when the person she's confronting is a dickweed like this guy.) Evil FedEx Guy slunk away to his truck and it was a good week before we saw him again.

We changed the password due to that incident and tried to keep a better eye out for patrons who seemed overly curious when we logged them on.

Over the following months, Evil FedEx Guy's Intanet Crowd behavior didn't really improve. He still had a tendency to curse often and unnecessarily when we asked him to get off, but he avoided doing so whenever Mrs. A was nearby. At one point, she told us that she had threatened him that if he didn't sit up and be smart he was going to be banned from using the computers. This had the most effect of anything, but he was still no angel. It got to the point that the entire staff would loudly groan in displeasure when we heard his big ol' FedEx van a-comin' up the hill.

Eventually the problem of the Evil FedEx Guy went away when he himself went away. I don't know if he was fired or just quit his job, though my wager is definitely on the former. We've not seen him in nearly two years. It's been bliss.

Medieval Coffee Torture

Parka was in when I arrived today. He'd brought a big ol' cup of coffee with him, which we forbade him to take back to the computer area, forcing him to leave it at the front desk, as is our policy. To punish us, he walked back and forth between the computer hall and circulation desk, taking sips of it every few minutes so he could enjoy it before it was completely cold.

This sounded like:  

*Typitytypitytypitytypetypitytypetypitytypetypitytype*
 *ENTER* 
*rolllllbackthechair*
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*SLUUUUUURP* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp* 
*stomp*
*PLOP* 
*Typitytypitytypitytypetypitytypetypitytypetypitytype* 

(repeat)

I realize I shouldn't begrudge patrons the right to enjoy perfectly good hot coffee they paid for while it's still hot, but, dammit, he KNOWS he can't drink it while chatting with his e-skanks, so why'd he bring it in at all?

Back in the Saddle

It actually felt good to be back at the library after a week and a half away.

Everyone had had a great Thanksgiving and were glad to see me, particularly since Mrs. B is out for surgery and recovery for most of this month and I'm nearly the only guy left who can run the desk.

On my way back for water, I found Parka chatting away on the computer (a privilege he should really appreciate considering how some libraries have banned it). He had slung his giant white Michelin Man parka over the screen by the bathroom. As I filled my water bottle at the fountain, I got a good close look at it. It is filthy! It's practically gray. It looks like he'd been truck-sneezed while walking along the side of a muddy road on a rainy day.

[Truck-Sneeze (truk sneez) n. A sudden rush of dirty road-water that is violently deposited upon your car or upon you after an 18-wheeler passes by at great speed on a rainy day.]

Back at the circulation desk, I noticed an enormous stack of FAFSA forms behind the desk. Chester will be overjoyed to see them.

"You think that'll be enough for him?" Mrs. C asked, sensing what I was thinking.

"Yeah. If I wrap a rubber band around them and chunk them at his head."

We decided we should ration the FAFSA forms out to Chester, only allowing him one per day and always keeping them behind the desk so he will have no excuse to go upstairs and search for one while ogling the pre-teens or steal our Teen People magazines.

Did I mention it was good to be back?

Conference Week: Day 1

(Reconstruction of Eaten Blog Entry, with a big thanks to Phil and Sam for sending me the original pre-chewed feed which I've now reincorporated)

Today is the first day of our state's "liberry" association conference, taking place in a resort hotel up in the northern part of the state somewhere.

Am I going? No.

Do I want to go? No.

Are me and Mrs. J the only staff members in house today? Yes.

Am I wearing shoes appropriate to a 10 hour shift? No. (These Skechers tend to start biting after about four hours. My feet are screwed, but it's my own fault.)

Am I anticipating "liberry" goodness/badness to shortly ensue? Hey, it's 10 hours in the crazy house here. Of course there's going to be standard issue "liberry" activity, both good and bad.

8:54 a.m.-- a full six minutes before we open, I get a phone call asking to speak to Mrs. C. I have a feeling that the phrase "I'm sorry, she's out of town at a conference for the rest of the week" will leave my mouth several thousand times today.

9:24-- Yet another call, this time for Mrs. A.

9:44-- And we have our first Rogue sighting of the day as Mr. Smiley comes in. He brings Mrs. Smiley with him. Mmm, that's some grumpy old people goodness for your ass.

9:58-- More people phoning for Mrs. A.

10:06-- We get our first computer patrons of the day. Two at once. Unrelated.

10:10-- Mrs. J informs me that some mischief-minded turd-blossom has removed the bolts that hold the back guard-rail portion of our rolling step-ladder in place. As a result, she nearly tumbled ass over teakettle off the top of it while trying to shelve a book. That's right, Mrs. J might have been killed because some asshat kid thought it would be funny to use his dad's leatherman to unscrew the bolts. The culprit seems to have stolen the bolts as well. Now I have to go put a sign on it telling patrons to stay the hell off of it before someone else tries to take a header.

10:11-- Someone comes in looking for Mrs. A.

10:15-- One of our board of directors, Mrs. Day, calls to say she's going to come in to sign checks and is on her way. This doesn't actually mean she's on her way. This means at some point during business hours today she'll roll in, probably at an inopportune moment, and will likely give me shit about having to come in and sign the paychecks two full days early, like I'm twisting her arm and forcing her to come in. SHE CALLED ME!

10:22-- A patron asks if we're closed tomorrow because of Toyota. I say, "No, it's Veteran's Day. What about Toyota?" He explains that Toyota will be filming a car commercial along mainstreet in Town-A, just down the hill from the library. They're apparently going to close off the entire area for traffic throughout the day. Good thing we won't be open.

11:34--Mrs. Day comes in to sign checks, several hours earlier than I expected. She doesn't even give me any crap, though she does have an ILL request for a book that does not exist in the entire state system.

12:40 p.m.-- I see a crabby looking lady trying unsuccessfully to put her books into our locked after hours book drop box out front. She must know that books that actually make it into the box are considered fine free, because when she finally brings them in I see that they are 89 days overdue.

12:51-- We're having surprisingly low traffic today. We did 169 checkouts yesterday, which is a busy day for us. I was expecting a patron flood since I'm the only guy manning the building. We've actually been able to search the shelves for overdues and mail the notices out, though. Ooh, that reminds me to remove Mrs. 89 Days overdue notice from the pile before we waste 37 cents on her.

12:55-- Parka makes his first appearance of the day. Oddly, he's not clad in his namesake parka despite how cold it actually is outside.

12:56-- I go to sign Parka on a computer. I have to wait for it to reboot from the ground up, cause the last user shut it down rather than just logging off. While I wait, two clients from the Unobstructed Doors Mental Health Assistance Organization come in and their aid heads them right for the restroom. One of them cuts a fart that is impossible to ignore. (*I will not let Parka see me laughing at the handicapped... I will not let Parka see me laughing at the handicapped* )

1:45-- After nearly half an hour of circulation silence, I attempt to eat my lunch. Staff lunches are an odd phenomenon here. No matter what time we decide to eat, as soon as food is unwrapped and begun to be consumed, the patron floodgates open up and we're suddenly swamped. Food presence also tends to act as a magnet for one or more of our board members to come in—usually the one who thinks it's just horrible that the staff eats at the circulation desk in front of God and everybody. Hey, once we get the new library built and actually have a break room we can move the party somewhere else. Right now it's either the picnic table outside in the cold or Mrs. A's tiny office or the restroom. Of course, the moment I unburped the lid of my salad container today, the front door started swingin'.

1:50-- Parka comes up to complain that the internet is slow. He's enlisted the testimony of a fellow internet crowd member to back up his claim. Naturally, he assumes I have the power to do something about it. I don't, but I go reboot his computer for him anyway. He's lucky I don't go into a diatribe about how slow things USED to be a year and a half ago, back when we had dialup speed instead of cushy DSL.

2:18-- The Toyota crew evidently thinks our nearly post-Autumn town isn't foliated enough for them. Patrons have come in and mentioned that the crew is downtown in a cherry picker attaching leaves to the bare trees in front of city hall. From our side window, I can see them doing this.

2:43-- A female patron returns eight John Grisham and Patty Cornhole books on tape all of which are in horrible condition, are 61 days late and some of which are missing tapes. The cardboard cases look as though she sat on them repeatedly. She fesses up to one of the tapes being missing, but I detect others. Her husband—who looks exactly like you'd imagine Hagrid's younger brother might—unleashes two very loud open-mouthed sneezes with barely an "excuse me."

2:55-- Parka returns for his second appearance. He's evidently waiting for a specific e-mail.

3:00-- Like a big ol' coward who is only scheduled to work til 3p, Mrs. J flees the building leaving me by myself for the rest of the day.

3:25-- Blogger EATS this entry and I have to reconstruct it from the ground up. Thanks guys.

3:27-- Shortly after discovering this, the circ desk becomes awash in patrons. A lady is irritated that she can't seem to log on from home into the practice test service we offer on our website. The community college library has told her she needs to come to us for the password. I explain that we don't have a password for it. The old testing system used to use the patron's library card number for it, but I don't think that's how it works anymore. She claims she's tried that, but can't actually demonstrate for me how poorly this works for her because she has—all together now—forgotten her library card. She's fed up with the site and with me. Her attitude and the fact that blog entry was just eaten, is pissing me off. I tell her that Mrs. A and Mrs. C, the two people with definitive answers for her, are out until Monday.

"So, what, I'm out of luck until next week?" she says.

"Not if I can figure it out for you now," I say.

She starts ranting at me again. While she's busy with that, I load the practice test site on the circ computer and see that it clearly does NOT require a library card to access, but simply and clearly asks the patron to choose a username and password of their own. Once I've told her this, she suddenly remembers what her username and password are, logs into the system and is now in love with me that I've solved her problem.

3:37-- Someone phones for Mrs. A. Turns out the caller was already fully aware that Mrs. A is out of town at the library conference, she just thought she'd call anyway. In fact, the phones will NOT. STOP. RINGING. I can't even hang it up from the two calls I've just taken back to back without another coming in.

4:15-- Dadgum, I wish I had a big stool to sit on. Stupid Skechers!

4:34-- Our first call of the day asking what time we close. Whoo hooo, take a drink!

5:05-- And the world comes to the library. For 20 minutes straight, we're slammed. And when does the circ computer decide that it's going to take a break and completely freeze up? Oh, only when there's suddenly a line four patrons deep, two of whom want new library cards. I beat the computer into submission.

5:30-- Man my legs are hurting. Okay. Fine. I'll sit down.

5:48-- I call a patron about a book she has on hold. Unfortunately, she had just been in half an hour earlier so I should have given it to her then. I hate it when I do that.

6:03-- By pure chance, I spy Chester the (Potential) Molester parking in our half-hour parking and then lurking into the darkness toward the community college. From what we're told by the college's librarian, Mr. Rob, Chester's been racking up quite the reputation around there too. The only good thing about that is that at least the girls there are of consenting age.

6:32-- Half an hour to go. We've had very little traffic at all for the past thirty minutes. I think I'll vacuum.

6:51-- Already finished my end of the day duties. One last patron (who I like) is left to go. My 10 hour shift is nearly over. I plan to go home, eat whatever delicious meal my wife has prepared, and completely skip church choir practice. (The choir director is just gonna make me stand up.)

Shite! I hear a car!

Ahhh... False alarm.

6:59-- That's a wrap. Wow... a whole day with both Mrs. A and Mrs. C gone and no call from Mr. Kreskin. I would have had money riding on that one if there was anyone around to bet with.

7:00 p.m.-- I don my coat and exit stage right. (After craftily deleting my saved reconstruction file and browser history, of course.)

Juice Vs. The Stench Volcano Part II: It's been Stankronized!

I sure hope this isn't a trend. Mr. Stanky was back today, and how! His girthful, crazy salt and pepper-haired, days unshaven, dispenser of foulness self had at least changed clothes, though not into clean ones.

Why? WHY? WHYYYY?!!! Why must he inflict himself upon us?!!!

Just like last time, I stuck him at the little wooden-chaired computer station by the stairs where he proceeded to spread his WMD-grade funk in radiating waves. Unfortunately, aspects of my job caused me to have to walk past him on several occasions, but I was able to hold my breath for the most part. I did manage to steal a glimpse at his screen on one such pass. He was surfing Amazon.com, though I didn't see what he was looking for. Mrs. A walked past him and caught a whiff, causing her face to contort in disgust and horror as she approached my position at the circ desk, where I was still trying to Febreeze away Mr. Stanky's funk wake.

"How can he stand himself?" she asked.

"No idea," I said. Spray, spray, spray.

Soon afterwards, Parka came in for a computer and Mrs. A bravely went back to log him on.

"Did you put him by Mr. Stanky?" I asked with evil glee upon her return. I was sure she would have, because Mrs. A has no love for Parka.

"No. I couldn't do that to even him," she said. I suppose it would have been rather cruel, but I would have done it. Regardless, Parka didn't stay long.

At one point, I snuck past Mr. Stanky and stole the small Glade automatic air-freshener from the restroom, turned it up to 11 and discretely hid it by the potted plant on the window-sill beside him. I don't think it actually helped, but I had fun doing it.

After nearly an hour, Mr. Stanky left the building and waddled away, presumably toward his stank mobile. Once again I was left with the task of fumigating the computer hall. Had just as much success as last week, which is to say very little. His funk had possessed the wooden chair in exactly the same way we had feared it would ruin our cloth chairs. Even the keyboard seemed somehow stinkier than before. The whole area had been Stankronized (tm).

And no matter how much Febreeze was dissipated into the air, I could still detect the ghost of Mr. Stanky hours later. I think we're going to have to give the whole place a tomato juice bath.  Or call an exorcist.

Maybe we can also start researching obscure city ordinances concerning intolerable levels of airborne offensiveness.

Patience Testing

We had a kid come in yesterday who needed to use the on-line practice-test service we subscribe to. I don't even know what test he was there to take, but I was sent back to show him how to log in from our home page. No prob.

There wasn't much competition for any of our three computers at the time, but that soon changed as the usual afternoon internet crowd began filing in. Chief among them was Parka, who entered clad in his namesake big white puffy Michelin Man parka despite the fact that it was only in the upper 50's outside and hardly warranted such heavy winter gear. Still, it did mark the first appearance of his coat this season, so those of you playing the official Tales from the "Liberry" drinking game may now have a swig of the adult beverage of your choice.

After about 45 minutes, someone came in for a computer and it was Parka's turn to get busted off. It's our policy to give on-line test-takers as much time as they need to complete their test, so the kid was immune from busting, as was the patron on the third computer who had come in after Parka.

I went back and told Parka we had someone in to use a computer, which is my usual code for "Get off!" I returned to the circ desk where a full four minutes crawled by with no movement from Parka. I can understand giving him a minute to wrap up his conversation with his e-skank chatroom buddy, but two minutes would be pushing it and four minutes shoves me right into pissed off mode. I grabbed up his timer and headed back. As I reached his computer, I pressed the reset button of the timer a few times, causing a shrill repetitive beeping.

"No, really. Someone is waiting," I told him. Then I stood there and waited for him to log off. After his computer was in reboot mode, I started to head back up front to alert the new computer patron when Parka stopped me in the children's room.

"That guy in the middle was there a lot longer than me," he complained. His near monotone "Officer Barbrady" voice was, as usual, unnecessarily loud and I have no doubt that the testing kid in the very next room heard him loud and clear.

"He's taking a test," I said, then turned away, feeling the matter had been adequately explained.

"He gets more time than me?"

"Yes," I said, still walking away.

"So some people get more computer time than others?"

I stopped and turned around, glaring at him. "He's... taking... a... test," I said. This didn't seem to compute for Parka. "We give people taking a test more time so they can finish their test." This still didn't seem to work for him, but he decided not to argue the point any further.

"Well, when's his time up?"

"I don't know."

"Well when can I have a computer?"

"I don't know."

This seemed to throw him long enough for me to start back to the circulation desk, where the rightful user of the computer was still waiting. Parka followed along behind me.

"You guys close at seven, right?"

"Yes," I said.

Oooh, Parka asked about our hours for the 327th time. Take another drink.

Prediction...

I predict that my Sunday shift will contain more than the usual suckage. How do I know this? Oh, maybe it's that the state office techs are taking their servers offline to do some work, so we will have no internet access and will be unable to use our internet-reliant circulation system. (Allegedly there's a mode to set it to that allows us to continue circulating without the net, but we've not really explored how to do any of that.)

What does this mean for me? Well, normally it would mean having to write out patron barcode numbers along with those on their books, on paper. And with the 14 digit barcodes we're using, that would be a royal pain. However, I came up with the novel idea of just using our barcode scanner to put the numbers directly into a Word document, saving them for later cutting and pasting.  Nice.

The big worry, though, will be that our internet addict patrons are going to be royally pissed off at me that they can't get their fix. I tried to head this off by putting up signs to this effect several days ago. I've even confirmed that Parka's already read one, cause he commented on it Saturday before asking about our hours.

"Are you going to be open on Monday?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Are you sure? It's a holiday."

"Yes."

"You're sure?"

I glared at him. "Well, we don't have any signs up that say otherwise. So, Yes, we're sure we'll be open on Monday."

Probably won't see much of him, but he's hardly the only net-addict who'll drop by.

Maybe it would be more fun to just take down all the signs and watch the flames shoot out of their ears as they try and try and try and try to get the net to work for them. I could keep moving them from computer to computer to let them try again, then shrug and scratch my ass when it doesn't work. If I were a real bastard, that's what I'd do. I probably won't do that, though. Not unless Chester comes in. Frankly, though, I'm not sure if he'd notice any difference.

Brownie Points

I have to give Parka some props here.

The other night, he had a poo in our restroom and actually used the spray.

Parka On Fire

We think Parka may have been fired from his job.  This came as kind of a surprise, as we didn't know he had a job in the first place. We've been operating under the assumption that he's just been sponging off his elderly mother for the past several months, when he's not on our computers chatting with e-skanks. Apparently, though, he has been working in some capacity for an area resort.

The reason we're pretty sure he's been fired from the resort is that two other employees of the resort happened to come in today, saw Parka and then had conversations with him concerning his firing. I managed to overhear portions of both.

I can honestly say I was not eavesdropping; our library is just really small and Parka is just really loud. It actually took a while to piece the theory about his firing together, though, as these conversations took place several hours apart. This is because being fired really opened up Parka's schedule, allowing him to spend THE WHOLE EFFING DAY at the library, chatting with e-skanks and breathing up our air.  I didn't even realize he was fired based on what little I heard of the first conversation. Instead, it just sounded like he was complaining about work. I heard him tell the first former fellow employee who'd recognized him that he'd been written up by his supervisor for eating something he wasn't supposed to (big sin at the resort from what I hear) and for paying "excessive attention" to the female guests (huge surprise there). Now I would be embarassed enough about at least one of those write ups that I would keep it to myself. (Actually, I'd probably just blog about it, further eroding my carefully-crafted reputation as a really together guy.) Not Parka. He was practically shouting it to the world, which is how I could hear it from an entire FLOOR away. I doubt he was even fired for either of those offenses, though. It's far more likely that he was merely seasonal help and the resort is entering its big slow down for the year, so lots of folks are laid off. But, again, I didn't even know he'd been fired at this point.

Hours later, the second former fellow-employee came in. This woman was truly frightening. She was still in her resort uniform, but had let her mostly bleached blond hair down. I say mostly because her hair was very long and very bleached except for about five inches near her scalp, which was colored the most strange and disturbing combination of hues I've ever seen in supposedly natural hair. I immediately christened her Ms. Rusted Roots, as THAT's what color those roots were. Well, one of the colors anyway. There were actually shades of rust and gold and gray and brown and baby-crap. I have no idea how she achieved it either, as most of the time when bleached hair grows out, the natural color shows up to replace it instead of a damn rainbow wig. Considering the Doc Savage look I'm currently sporting, I realize I'm not someone who should be lobbing insults about other people's hair... but, damn.

Ms. Rusted Roots went to look at books on tape and ran into Parka. I didn't hear specifics on what they were saying, but the general tone was one of complaint and lament. I was amazed at how much of a Chatty Cathy he was being.

After finishing up their gab-session, Ms. Rusted Roots came up to the circ-desk with her selections. She must have assumed I'd heard everything and that I somehow knew Parka had been fired because she told me, "They're getting rid of some of the best-looking people from over at the hotel."

I thought my head was going to explode from the sudden rush of implications in that statement. Everything I'd learned throughout the day suddenly added up in my head. If I understood her correctly, she not only meant that Parka had been fired from the resort but also that she, Ms. Rusted Roots, had classified PARKA as one of the "best-looking people from over at the hotel."  (Insert Scooby Doo "HrruuuuhhHH?" exclamation.)

Had the bleach affected her eyesight? Could she not see the shag-carpet of body hair straining to break free of the confines of his shirt? Did she not notice the pictures of the half-naked girls on his monitor while they spoke? And just why the hell did she feel the need to involve ME in any of this? Owww, it hurt to even think about!

"Well, whut can you do when you're at the bottom rung of decision-making?" she added, then thankfully left, taking her chemical-burn of a scalp with her.

So it looks as though we'll be seeing even more of Parka than usual for a while.

Joy.

BUSTED!

When I went to work yesterday, having my secret identity as a "liberry" blogger unearthed was the furthest thing from my mind. It was about to happen all the same, though.

Nearly nine months ago when I first started writing this blog I knew in all likelihood I was eventually gonna get caught. Sure, I tried to be careful about who and what I wrote about. Well, a little careful. I did rename most of the people and places that showed up—sometimes thinly—to limit the clues within the blog itself that could lead back to me. However, I've been plenty sloppy in a lot of ways too. Sometimes this has been intentional. Sometimes not.

It's one thing, however, to not care if readers in other states and indeed other countries know my secret identity. It's a whole other ball of dung for someone here in the Tri-Metro area to find out and that's where the sloppy comes in.

I didn't realize just how sloppy I was in other less obvious ways until a few months ago when I started checking my stats and saw the kind of search engine searches that sometimes lead people in my direction. (And by the way, what the hell kind of person does a subject search for "Chris Farley's Dead Ass," anyway?) The stats showed me that even having such words as "West," "Library"and "Virginia" in proximity to one another on the same page could lead people right to my door if they were merely doing a search for something using those words. There are plenty of other words that, while innocuous enough on the surface, could lead someone local to the blog. So I went back and changed some references, eliminated others and tried to tart the place up a bit to further decrease the chances of someone accidentally stumbling in.

Still, there's only so much you can do to disguise yourself if you're writing a blog about working at a "liberry" in WV to keep those terms from coming up. Eventually, the state and the word library are gonna get together and someone is going to find them in a search. With that in mind, I figured it was likely that someone from library HQ would eventually find me. They may already have. If so, they don't seem to be inclined to rat me out to my boss, Mrs. A.

Frankly, though, I wasn't too concerned about being ratted out that way. I think most of my co-workers would really dig the blog and would quickly become some of my more avid readers were they to learn of it. I've even considered letting them in on it if only to get more accurate reporting out of them on the crazy stuff that happens while I'm not at work. I decided, though, that doing so would cause a chilling effect on what I could say. Granted, I've always made it a point not to talk too much trash about my co-workers, (except, of course, for those who abandon their jobs and make me have to pack up all their interlibrary loans on a day I would otherwise not have been at work—thank you oh so very much, Miss E). Still, I'd much prefer the freedom in which I have the choice to behave myself.

I figure they'll eventually learn of it, either by admission or by someone ratting me out. My hope is that if they're angry at me, it will be because I didn't tell them about it sooner.

No, my imagined worse case scenario was much different. In it, I would go in to work one day, walk back to the computer hall and find somebody there reading my blog. They would turn and look up at me with realization in their eyes and then either wink knowingly or give me the finger. Worse yet, what if they came up to the circ desk and yelled at me about it? Even worse still.... what if it was PARKA? That chest hair entry alone would net me at least a bloody nose. Hell, the rest of my rogues gallery practically rivals Spider-Man's already! Sure, I might do okay one on one with most of them, but what if they ganged up? Carol Satan would tear me to shreds with her talons! Wal-Mart Jesus would clock me with his cudgel! Ron the Ripper would try to rip me, or at the very least fart on me! And Cap'n Crossdresser would hit me with his purse!

No sir... I don't like it.

Like I said, though, when I went to work yesterday, I wasn't thinking about any of the above scenarios. And when I left to go on break, I still wasn't thinking of them. So when it happened, it took me by surprise.

As per my usual Wednesday afternoon routine, I ambled down to the local "mall" comic book kiosk, to see what the new shipment had brought. Garin the comic book guy was there at the desk as usual. For some reason, he seemed especially happy to see me. He just kept saying my name over and over, taking an unwholesome amount of glee at some unrevealed nugget of information. I was oblivious.

"You will NEVER guess what I saw... on... the... internet," he said with a devilish grin. Still, I was clueless. I was somehow picturing that he'd found stills from the new Sin City film adaptation, or the full script for Spider-Man 3, or clips from Catwoman: The Version that Didn't Blow Goats.

Garin continued, slowly letting out his verbal fishing line in preparation for yanking it back suddenly. "I found a website that mentions me and my shop."

That's when it hit me and I instantly knew I was busted.

I always expected such a busting to come with the requisite chills and stomach vertigo that usually accompany major revelations. I didn't get so much of that, though. I must have at least looked properly shocked for a few moments, because Garin just continued grinning triumphantly. Pretty quickly, though, I settled into my new role as the grinning little low-carb dieting kid caught with his hand in the Nutter Butters but who knows he's far too cute and adorable to be punished.

What had happened, as Garin explained it, is that one of his customers decided to look his shop up by name and see if it had a website. They typed the name into a search engine and came up with some ebay entries as well as a little blog entry called The Fix Is In. They took a gander at it and alerted Garin that someone was writing about him on the internet.

"So I see this Tales from the `Liberry' site that mentions my shop," Garin said. "I knew immediately who had to have written it! Just the language you used was SO EXACTLY YOU."

Not only did Garin read his own initial appearance in the blog, but read most of the other entries as well and liked them. (Hey, I told ya I was cute and adorable!) Even my slightly less-than-favorable early review of his store, ("I can't say this one ranks with the best of them. But then again, it's only a kiosk store—what can you really do with a kiosk store?"), written a mere one month after he opened for business was met with smiles and appreciation for my honesty. (And just for the record, I also predicted that his store had a lot of potential and in the ten months since then he's proven just what you CAN do with a kiosk store. It's become quite the quality comic retail outlet. *WAVES TO GARIN* In fact, Garin's search engine search also turned up an award he'd won from Marvel Comics themselves, but which no one at Marvel thought to tell him about.)

Garin's one complaint to me in the whole matter: "So why didn't you tell me about this sooner?"

I explained that I was trying to keep things on the Q.T. as far as local publicity went. As much as I didn't care that he knew about it, I'd much prefer most other locals NOT knowing about it. Particularly the mentally-unbalanced locals who occasionally turn up as subject matter. 

Then, as if somebody rang the crazy bell, who should show up at the kiosk right on cue... Doc Oc-Fetishist Woman!

This time she wasn't looking for the New Doc Ock or the Old Doc Ock or any Doc Ock. Instead, she had come to see if Garin had any other toys for her husband. Sure enough, a great huge Fantastic 4 Four Pack set of figures has been released, including figures of all four members of the FF plus Franklin Richards, Doctor Doom and even Robbie the EFFing Robot. This, apparently, is what DOF Woman's husband had ordered and she was overjoyed at its arrival.

Naturally, there had to be a wrinkle, though. In addition to the Fantastic Four Pack, a brand new Thing figure had also been released, which was a different sculpt than the version of Thing already in the pack. Garin just wanted to call her attention to it in case her husband was interested, as he knew the guy liked the FF characters. This completely threw Doc Ock Fetishist Woman into a tizzy, though. Garin had to explain to her several times that her husband hadn't ordered the extra Thing so she didn't need to buy it, but if her husband was interested it was there. I had to walk out of sight of her to keep from cracking up laughing as DOF Woman struggled with these concepts for a couple of minutes, dancing perilously close to but never actually crossing the line into understanding. Finally Garin took the extra Thing away from her and told her he would hold on to it and save it for her husband should he want it.

"You'll save it for him then?"

"Yes."

"You'll save it for him then?"

"YES."

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I cannot make up shit that crazy!

So guess what, Garin... If I do get drummed out of the library for this blog, I'm moving into your comic shop and starting a new blog there. Seems like it's just another station for the local Crazy Train.

Summer Reading Day 5 (or "AHHHH!!! MY EYES!! MY BEAUTIFUL, PRECIOUS EYES!!! WHY, DEAR GOD, WHY?!!! WHY, WHY, WHY?!!!")

Summer Reading Day 5 was suspiciously unchaotic. We didn't even have any of the usual Monday Madness. It was downright peaceful.

"Well, I guess that means we won!" Mrs. A said.

"Looks like it," I said. "Word has finally gotten out not to come to the library on Monday."

Course the fact that we had most of the parking spaces out front blocked off with bright orange road cones so the kids would have space to draw with their chalk might have had something to do with it too. We decided that, if we'd known that before now, we would have been using cones on Mondays LONG ago.

Toward the end of my shift, the door opened and Parka came through it. Instead of his namesake puffy white Michelin Man parka (which he hasn't actually worn since late April) or his usual too thin white t-shirt, Parka was wearing a bright red tank top. While I'm all for diversity in clothing, I SO did not want to see the shag carpet of body hair covering the entirety of his torso that was accented, nay HIGHLIGHTED, by his low cut red tank-top. We're talking front AND back covered in an inches-thick layer of dark fur. You could not see the man's skin from the shoulders on down.

I equate the sight to that old Saturday Night Live sketch with Jon Lovitz impersonating Today Show movie critic Gene Schalit where they showed a closeup of his chest hair with bugs crawling through it. It was exactly that nasty.