One of Those Days

Today was just one of those days. It wasn't a *bad* day, not at all. In fact, despite being psychotic, it was a relatively pleasant day. But it *was* psychotic. Unbeknownst to, well, pretty much everybody, all the computer labs in the building I work in (at the university) were closed today, being used for testing for incoming students. This is all well and good for the students being tested, who presumably knew they would be using the rooms, but nobody else seems to have known. And, of course, today was the last day of this semester, so everyone was frantically running around trying to type, or at least print, their papers. The former issue, well, if there were available computers, great, though too often we were totally overbooked (I almost had to ask casual users to get off the computers, but it never quite came to that). The latter issue, needing to print something? More of a problem.

Because, of course, today of all days, the printer in the library decided to stop working. Don't misunderstand, the printer itself is fine. The connection between the printer and, oh, every computer in the room, *that* is what is shot. For some reason, the printer's connection to the network went fwoosh and, at least when I left two hours ago, that was how it was going to continue for a while. So, when this disaster (and disaster it was) was brought to my attention, I called my boss's boss (my boss being out of town this week) and asked if I could please pretty please let people use the printer at my desk. He said yes, which was great, except for one small problem: I lost my computer for a good long time. Now, there *are* two computers at that desk, but there were just *so* many people who needed to print that I ended up turning over my computer as well as the other computer. The only real problem with this is that I could not be on chat reference, and not only is it our day to do that but I had actually been getting questions today. So I ran around getting paper, ensuring people could get onto computers, fixing printing issues on the computers at my desk, and so forth. And, of course, this was the day I was alone on the desk for all but one hour of my shift and since the problem didn't start during that first hour, well...Of course, that also meant lunch was a problem. At a certain point I was just too hungry to wait much longer, so I went to the circulation desk I said "I *have* to eat lunch. I know there's a printer crisis but would you tell people to just wait a few minutes if they need me? I'll be right back..." The circulation librarian said not to worry, to take my time, because "they're getting free printing, they *better* be able to wait." I didn't take my time, which is good because there were people waiting for me when I returned, but she certainly made me laugh when she said that.

Oh, and before the crisis with the printers, I had a somewhat impatient young man asking for materials on a business topic that I completely did not understand (because, well, it's a financial analysis kind of question and that's just...a little over my head). I tried to get him articles and then discovered that he wanted books instead. Alright, fine, I can get that for him. But on first glance it seemed that everything we had was from the late 1980s and earlier. "Why do we have those? Oh right, they're artifacts." he said in the disgruntled tone I have heard on many occassions. "Well, what we have really depends on how much the school is willing to give the library for new books, and that isn't very much, so..." I said in response, tired of students who do not understand that they are not at a university costing $40k and thus having a huge, impressive library. He was in too much of a hurry to wait for me to try my other method of finding books when basic searches don't work (*cough*amazon*cough*), but I said if he'd be around I'd look. He sort of grunted and wandered off. I found something about two minutes later: it was from 1995, but he said anything from 1995 on would be fine. So I waited and waited for him to return, which of course he didn't. So I thought I'd pop upstairs, find the book, and hopefully find him (the crisis with the printer hadn't started yet, so I was able to leave the desk). I went upstairs and immediately saw him, so I grabbed the book and came toward him. He looked up and saw me coming and said "no way!" I showed him the book, explained it was a touch old but that it might work, and listened to him say "no way!" several times while he glanced. It turned out that I had found what he believed would be the perfect book, and thus he was extraordinarily grateful, which made me forgive his earlier impatience. I suggested another tactic for finding material if we didn't have enough, and returned to my desk. The insanity ensued about 30 minutes later. No rest for the weary.

All of this proves, of course, that I am awesome.

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As a side note, my public library has apparently decided that the Sherlock Holmes mysteries are YA Assignment. So are almost all of the classic novels and novellas (Pride and Prejudice, for example). Why? This makes no sense to me.