Vacation!

I am on vacation until next Monday! Bookmobile is great, but it is nice to take a break from work and go on an adventure.

I am off to San Diego for Comic Con. While my coworker wanders about at panels and vendors for her library conference of the year, learning stuff like a good librarian, (she orders all the comics for our library)I will roam about aimlessly.

Library Career Romances

This is one of my favorite websites http://www.jenw.org/home.htm

featuring Library Career Romances! Some of them even feature the Bookmobile! Right now I am reading Books on wheels by Mary Rebecca Lingenfelter. http://www.jenw.org/books_wheels.htm

I'll let you know how it turns out.

Crazy Lab wants to play

While on the bookmobile yesterday, I saw this girl running after 2 dogs. One was a big black lab and the other was a small blondish terrier. They were running down the sidewalk, crossing the street. I thought the girl was crazy for walking her dogs without leashes.

Then I see her run after the lab and try to put his collar back on. Once she gets it on he takes off across the street. She gets a hold of him, then he lays down in the middle of the street and rolls over. He is having a really good time.

I went over to see if I could help, and the dogs were off and wandering again. I got a hold of the lab and tried to walk it, but he sat down and rolled over, with a "der, this is fun look" on its face. When I let go, he leapt up, and ran into the street again! And a car was coming, and he was plodding along, cause it was super fun that I was chasing him. He was within a few feet of the car, when I lunged and he took off again.

When we caught them, the girl wanted to use a cell phone. So, I ran back to the bookmobile to get the cell phone and also a bungie cord. When I got back the first thing the lab did was bound up to me and lick my face and glasses. It was sooooooooo gross. Ssomeone else had walked by and let the girl use her cell phone to call her mom to come pick her up. I tied the bungie cord to the lab's collar and that seemed to make him more manageable. I left her and the crazy dogs to be picked up and I went back to the bookmobile to clean my glasses.

Historic pictures of bookmobiles in Davidson County, North Carolina

Found this today:

BOOKMOBILE LIBRARY TIMELINE for the Davidson County Public Library System in North Carolina. It shows their first bookmobile purchased in 1929. Their bookmobile was "one of the first NC libraries to offer bookmobile service throughout the county to all residents."

If you go to the Davidson County Public Library home page there are more pictures under Lexington, Denton, North Davidson, and West Davidson.

There are lots of interesting pictures of historic bookmobile trucks. It's amazing!

Hot guy waves at Bookmobile

I was driving back from our Saturday stop, and I see this convertible with two young guys in it, one with a ponytail. Mr. Ponytail, who is sitting on the passenger side, turns around and waves. And he wasn't waving because there was a chick at the wheel (like that would ever happen). He was waving because it was the Bookmobile. It was awesome.

Brokeback Mountain - Well, are the man and woman married?

So yesterday on the Bookmobile, one of our regulars who is in her 70's brings on her daughter. Her daughter is in her low 30's. They are trying to pick out audio books for a trip. The daughter picks up Brokeback Mountain, and suggests it to her mom. She says it's a love story (and I am picking up on the slight sarcasm here.) She says it is a story about all kinds of loving. And emphasizing ALL kinds of loving. I pipe up that it excludes animal loving, because a librarian is supposed to correct patrons when they are wrong.

She goes on further to say that it is a story about a man loving his wife, a man loving his daughter, a man loving a man, and a man loving a woman.

Her mom says "Are the man and woman married?"

They did not check out the item.

Bookmobile adds temporary stop

So, I feel bad, I haven't written in this thing for a while now, but in my defense work has been crazy. (Hah! and people think librarians don't do anything!)

One of our libraries has been closed while they make the move to another library. (Brand spanking new and right next door) There is only one more week left, making that a total of 6 weeks that the library has been/will be closed.

In the interim, Bookmobile has added 4 extra days a week so there will be some sort of library service available while the library is closed. (Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday) We have 2 vehicles but normally only take out one of them 4 days a week. Now we are putting our older vehicle to work.

Bookmobile has a very small staff: 1 fulltime librarian, 1 partime librarian (That's me!), 1 partime library assistant and 1 partime clerk. The fulltime lib. and the partime lib. assistant and myself have all taken turns on who goes down to the new stop. We meet up with a worker from the other library and stay there for 4 hours.

I am pretty much working at fulltime these past weeks, while still subbing at other libraries, and my random web work. It has been crazy and I haven't had much free time.

It is interesting that many of the library patrons that we have been getting are kind of confused by Bookmobile. They don't really understand how it works. Some of them asked if it is ok to come on, or if children were allowed to come in.

Other frequently asked questions:
"This is all you have?"

Response: "We cram on as much as we can!"