arrows in outerspace

at long last, here is my earth day mobile, made out of a paper plates and strips of old fabric. man, i even amaze myself. my favorite kid made one and he colored in all the areas around the arrows black. it looked pretty sharp. so i said, "favorite kid, i like how you colored yours in black. it looks good." and then he said, "of course i made that part black. the arrows are in outerspace. and outerspace is black." he's so clever.

clean and serene

back at the 'brary on a saturday. as sad as that is there is a bit of joyfulness in knowing that i will not be working another saturday for 4 weeks! how is this possible? i don't know! and i don't care!
today the kid who hates hoboes came in. he was wearing a lanyard around his neck with a big white plastic skull hanging from it. and then next to the skull i noticed there was a tear-drop shaped leather keychain, with gold letters embossed in it. it read, "clean and serene for 2 years." obviously, the kid who hates hoboes is too young to have had a substance abuse problem and then have overcome said substance abuse problem 2+ years ago. so who is this person who gave him the clean and serene keychain? was it one of his parents? at first i thought it was innappropriate to give a child something like that. but then after i thought about it for a second, i thought maybe the kid who hates hoboes is really proud of this clean and serene person. maybe this person became clean and serene specifically for him.
and then the kid who hates hoboes told me he was really bored. and then i said that i too was bored. and then he told me that he was learning his 6 times tables in school (pause for me to rant about how he should already have learned his 6 times tables by now. he is entering 5th grade next fall!) so i quizzed him a little and found out he really hadn't retained any of his 6 times tables. so i gave him these flashcards i had made for my favorite kid, and told him that if he could learn all the 6s i would give him a prize. so he dutifully sat at a table and memorized the flashcards and a little later i quizzed him and he got them all right. and then i gave him a clown nose. these kids will do anything for cheap prizes.
and that dear blog readers was my saturday.

lonely litterbug seeks non-psycho

for earth day yesterday we made these very very cool Reduce Reuse Recycle mobiles (to be shown later) and today, as wednesday is usually craft day, my assistant and i decided we should do another earth day related craft. so i came up with this idea for a litterbug (shown at left). i brought in an egg carton and everything! i made cute little wings for it out of some colorful magazine pages and i gave it button eyes. it's so adorable and environmentally conscious. sadly, hardly any children came into the library today so my little litterbug sat alone. sigh. stupid warm weather enticing the children to be outside.
then i was sitting in the staff room catching up on last week's new yorker (will i ever be up to date?) and our "security guard" came in. she and i have this funny back-and-forth that we do where she tells me that i look so good i must have a man in my life and then i sigh in an overexaggerrated way and say "no, not me!" so we played this game for a while and then she said that she can tell that i will have a man in my life soon. very SOON. a man is on his way. now, this is the second time i've heard a comment like this, as earlier in the week my mother said the same thing. i then told the security guard how i tried to bet my mother $50 that i would in fact NOT be meeting any appropriate non-psychotic men anytime in the near future. my mother of course would not allow me to bet against myself. but the security guard was amused.
so as i was leaving the staff room the security guard reiterated that i definitely would have a man in my life oh-so-soon. so then i said to her, "well maybe i will meet this man before my birthday and then he will have to give me a birthday present." we both had a good chuckle about that.
may 31st ... mark your calendars.

passover weekend day 5: and on the fifth day god ran errands

yesterday was the last day of my little passover vacation. it was a lovely vacation and i was really sad to have to return to work. so i came back to brooklyn and had a very productive day. here's what i did:

first i checked out this coffeeshop that is in my new nabe. ooooh, this place could be my new coffeeshop. there is coffee and food and a variety of seating options and FREE wifi! so first i had coffee with my roommate and then she left so that i could sit with my laptop and research options for my upcoming birthday. ooooooh, my birthday is going to be awesome. just you wait and see.

then i went home and figured out some bills and stuff.

and then, then i did a dangerous thing ... i went to ikea. but i was SO good. i was walking around ikea with blinders on. i was a woman with a mission. i would buy a desk and filing cabinet AND ONLY a desk and filing cabinet.

i feel i must have a proper desk in order to be a proper writer. and since my novel writing class is starting up again on wednesday i must be prepared! but man, it was tough ... there are so many fabulous things to buy in ikea.

so without further ado i would like to introduce you to the newest members of my family: mikael and gustav (am i the only one who refers to their ikea furniture by their proper ikea names?) anyway, gustav (my desk) is actually a very dark brown. and my filing cabinet, mikael, is a matching dark brown with white drawers. the whole thing looks very fab together.

and it only took me FOUR HOURS to assemble it all! yay! i of course was distracted by a dvd of season 3 of 90210 (dylan and kelly are finally settled into their new romantic relationship and will be touring europe after graduation!) but eventually i got it all set up and it looks lovely (especially with my white laptop sitting on it. soon it will be covered in crap, but right now it looks all monochromatic and minimalist and nice) anyway, it took me so long to assemble it that i didn't actually get to put anything away or organize or anything. but soon ... soon things will be organized.

passover weekend day 4: the cleansing of the hands and the cleaning of the car

there are certain parts of the seder we skip every year. we like to have a thorough, but compact seder. no need to waste time with an inefficient seder. so one thing we never do is the cleansing of the hands. and since we've never done it i can't even tell you what it's all about. but you're supposed to wash your hands.
the night of my mom's seder i stayed over my brother and sister-in-law's house and my brother informed me that in the morning he would be washing his car. this sounded awesome and i asked if i could wash the fancy mobile. so in the morning i went out to the driveway and i was just blown away by all the fabulous gadgets and accessories that my brother owns for the purposes of washing cars. first he has this high-pressure hose that runs on what appears to be a lawnmower engine. you get to hold this gun type thing, it's almost like an uzi of cleanliness. so i take it, very excited to be using such high tech tools, and he warns me to be careful. man, that thing has some kickback. you really have to hold onto it. so i am power blasting the fancy mobile and i am suddenly realizing that my car is filthy, you have no idea, she's hardly fancy at all. even with the uzi of cleanliness there are still several layers of dirt on that thing. then i vacuumed it using a shop vac (who owns a shop vac? crazy!) and now the fancy mobile is all shiny and sparkly and looks like a new car. it looks nothing like my car at all.
oh yeah and then later i went to another seder, with REAL haggadahs.

passover weekend day 3: the case of the missing haggadahs

the day of my mother's seder i drive over to my brother's house to pick up our seder plate and our set of haggadahs. we have these really nice haggadahs with pretty watercolor illustrations and excerpts from anne frank's diary and blurbs about civil rights and justice and all this other good stuff. i love our haggadahs. so it was very upsetting when i went to my brother's house and he confessed that he had searched far and wide and could not find our haggadahs. then, like a super sleauth, i tried to figure out where the haggadahs might be. were they still at my mom's ex-boyfriend's house, never to be seen again? did we leave them at my mom's cousin's house after last year's seder? at this point i realized i had completely forgotten all the details of last year's passover celebration. so after several phone calls, a few family interrogations, and many vain attempts to retrace my steps, i realized that there was no way we were getting our haggadahs any time soon.

at this time my mother informed me that if i went to king kullen they have these "free" haggadahs from maxwell house. so i went to king kullen and indeed there was a display of haggadahs put out by maxwell house. in reality they were more like pamphlets than haggadahs. and they were not free, you were supposed to buy coffee and then take ONE complimentary haggadah. i bought no coffee, and took 5 haggadahs. here is how i rationalize that one:
stealing = sin
reading from the haggadah = mitzvah

sin + mitzvah = okay

ahhhh, reformed judaism ... how i love your ethical relativism!

so i went back to my mother's house with my stolen maxwell house haggadahs, and finally the seder could begin.

turns out, maxwell house haggadahs suck. none of the stuff we usually talk about was in there. so we were all shouting out stuff that we were supposed to have discussed, asking things like "mom, what about the part with the egg?" or "mom don't we need to bless the wine?"

the whole thing was kind of a mess. but it was kind of funny. and the food was awesome (i made this excellent cauliflower leek casserole). so in the end, i think everything was fine. but damned, we really need our old haggadahs for next year.

5 day passover weekend: day 2

that's right ... i made myself a FIVE day passover weekend! and where am i spending it? tropical lawn guyland. yesterday i spent the day sipping tea in the park with my bff, catching up on the state of the world. then i drove out to long island where i sat in a record breaking THREE HOURS of traffic. yay! but i made it here.

this morning i woke up ridiculously early for no reason whatsoever. i read books about iceland. did you know that they are unable to grow fruits and vegetables in iceland? true story.

every year my mother and i spend hours upon hours in the kitchen getting ready for passover. it is one of my favorite things ever. there is much joking around and many jewish hijinks ensue.

first, we always consult our special passover cookbook. this happens to be the smallest passover cookbook in the world. we bought this cookbook together about 20 years ago when i was "refurbishing" my dollhouse. we found all these little jewish dollhouse accesories: passover cookbook, menorah, etc. but the best part of this cookbook is that there are REAL recipes inside. so every year my mom will turn to me and say, "can you read me the harosset recipe?" and i will dutifully turn to this miniscule book and find the recipe. ahhhhh, passover hijinks.



then i decided it would be best to take some pics of my mom for her match.com profile. we took some pictures of her with a kugel, but they didn't turn out so great. but i like this picture i took of her holding a defective box of matzoh. this box actually came as part of a 6 pack, and although it is completely sealed it is EMPTY! there is NO matzoh in there! wtf?! somewhere i heard that streit's is leaving nyc. well, good riddance! your empty matzoh boxes aren't welcome here!

but anyway, for some reason the pictures of my mom holding a basketball are always the most flattering. i don't know if it's because of her prowess on the basketball court that just puts her at ease or what. but you don't want to play a round of horse with her. she will kick your ass.

things you should not do to your expensive new laptop

turns out, you should not spill tea (even very small amounts of tea!) on your laptop. apparently, this messes them up. so poor little miss mary mac (all dressed in white, because the black ones are more expensive) is now in the shop getting a "diagnostic" done. of course, when i explained to the good people at the computer repair shop that all the keys on the right side of the keyboard stopped working, i opted not to mention the tea incident. because my laptop is still covered under warranty, but i bet they have some sort of "tea clause" for people like me.

my craftiness and my jewishness will blow your mind

you must bask in the glory of my continually crafty craftiness! after a while you would think i might run out of ideas. maybe i would get all dried up and washed out. maybe i would lose my idealistic ideals and become a sell out. but no, this is not the case.
today i will be discussing passover with the children and then we will be making these fabulous seder plates. you are probably thinking to yourself, "how on earth did miss dewey decimal make such a lovely seder plate?" well, it was not as easy as one might think. surprisingly, all the passover crafts i found on the internet were for children who will actually be celebrating passover. stuff like matzoh covers, afikomen holders, passover place cards ... you know, things that the children of the hood would never need. so i had to scour the internet for pictures of the seder plate items that were appropriate for coloring, and then i glued them onto a paper plate which i had colored in with magic marker. then, in the center, as the piece de resistance, i wrote my name in hebrew (hebrew spellings are approximated). so i will be giving all the kids a little print out of the hebrew alphabet and they will figure out how to spell their names in hebrew. what fun!
seriously, i love exposing the children to jewish culture. i am such an oddity to them. none of them have ever met a jew before. i am truly a stranger from a strange land. they are always enthralled whenever i say crazy things like, "well, as a jew i don't celebrate easter." then they collectively gasp and shout in amazement. oh, it will be such fun to describe passover to them. it will blow their minds.

my secret love of umbrellas OR things you never knew about me

did you know that today is national library worker day? well, it is. so today i was given an official library umbrella with our logo on it. this would actually be really handy, as i love umbrellas as well as free gifts. however my lovely mother just gave me this awesome coach umbrella (shown at left). it's unfortunate that all rain gear will now have to live in the shadow of my fabulous new coach umbrella (with white mod handle!). it's so pretty. i shouldn't even use it to repel rain. i should just take it outside and twirl it on sunny days while singing that incense and peppermints song.

so lonesome i could cry, so bored i could shelf-read

back at the 'brary on a perfectly good saturday afternoon. the kid who hates hoboes came in and after a rousing conversation debating whether or not my arms bend weird (which they do NOT), he was off to the computers to play mind-numbing videogames. now i am all by my lonesome. i've been fairly productive for a saturday. i was so bored i actually spent some time shelf-reading. this is when we go over to the shelves and read all the dewey decimals numbers and see if anything is out of order. it's terribly tedious. i'm sure many men have gone mad shelf-reading. that's why i would typically punish one of the pages with this type of chore. but it was actually kind of relaxing. i may go back and do some more.

then, after searching forever for a passover puzzle i broke down and created my own passover crossword, complete with informative blurb describing pesach. fun fun fun. now i will search the internet for fabulous passover craft ideas.

(one time when i lived in albany we had these really rude uptight neighbors who would always steal our parking space. they would decorate for every holiday with very boring tasteful decorations. like a scarecrow to celebrate fall! yay! and somehow my roommate and i decided that we would "get back" at them by putting up the most tasteless and tacky decorations, one of my favorites being a carboard witch that was missing a leg. anyway, for passover i made a seder plate out of construction paper. then my roommate made a construction paper loaf of bread with one of those big red circles and a line through it. get it? no leavened bread on passover. anyway, hopefully i can come up with something better than that for the children to do.)

warding off illness as well as evil spirits

today i had off from work and it had been my original plan to volunteer at a writing conference during the day and then at night, mr. katz and i would go to a met game (did i tell you i got free mets tickets at work? it was very nice of them. i like free things.) but then last night i came home from work and as the evening progressed i soon became afflicted with a level of sinus congestion that i can only describe as being "of biblical proportions." and then my very educated mother suggested that maybe, after being sick for an entire fortnight, that i might want to maybe just possibly consider seeing someone about this. that someone being a medical professional. so that dear blog readers is how i spent my day off. not at a fancy pants writing conference or at a met game, but at the doctor's office. oh how life is unfair, let me count the ways.

so i went to my ear nose and throat specialist (that's right! i see a specialist!) and unfortunately my regular doctor wasn't in so i had to see someone else who is unfamiliar with my tragic series of chronic illnesses. so this someone else was kind of impressed by illnesses. "so you're sick now and you were sick back in december?" yes! i said proudly. and i didn't even mention how i was also sick in january and in march, but i just didn't feel like coming in.
then she looked at my throat and was a bit amazed by not only how irritated my throat was but also that this has been going on for some time and i've just been trying to ignore it.

then she asked what i do for a living to be sick so often. maybe she thought i was a coal miner or that i worked with asbestos. so i tell her i work with children and then she says that i really need to work harder at fighting off illness. oh really? well, i was a bit offended by that remark. so i tell her how i have an excellent diet and i don't smoke and i exercise regularly and i take vitamin C daily (and i am now officially also taking vitamin B just for the hell of it) and i use hand sanitizer. what else should i be doing? maybe i should be wearing an amulet? or perhaps i need to surround myself with crystals? (i once dated this guy who told me his mom had all of her tap water run through crystals before drinking it. i was very impressed with this, imagining she had some brita like device but made with big shiny crystals and this would somehow cut down on the mercury levels in tap water. but then he said she did it so that she could get the "power" of the crystals into her drinking water. then i said something terribly clever like "uh-huh.")

so then the doctor tells me that i should use a neti pot. do you know what this is? its like a very little tea pot and you use it to pour water through your nose and it clears out your sinuses. now, i am sure that this is a fabulous idea but i don't think this is some obvious solution that i have overlooked and warrants me being chastized. so i agree to the neti pot. why not? my evening routine has gotten so long anyway, why not add on pouring warm saline solutions through my nostrils. i will do this after taking out my contacts and brushing my teeth, but before exfoliating and moisturizing. check!

then the doctor tells me that i should really be doing something for my allergies. "you mean besides taking singulair and asteline daily?" i ask. then she looks at my chart and sees that my story adds up. then she congratulates me on dealing with my allergies properly. which was nice, i appreciate that she is acknowledging my effort (a while back i even purchased a weekly pill holder. you know, those ones for old ladies that have each day of the week on them? yup, that is how committed i am!)

then she tells me that i should take antibiotics, drink fluids, blah blah blah. and then, and i loved this part, she tells me that eventually i will become immune to the germs of the little ones. "really?" i ask, "when?"

"oh," she says, "it usually takes about five years."

great.

more fun than a barrel of bus puppets

i almost cancelled my class visit with the kindergartners today, due to the worsening of my perpetual sore throat. it kind of feels like i swallowed a large marble but instead of actually swallowing it, the marble is lodged in the back of my throat to obstruct the passage of important things like air and food. but i am a trooper. i will not call in sick or go to a doctor. that is for pussies. i will continue on with my life, martyr that i am, and in the end i did not cancel my class visit. i met with the little ones and a good time was had by all. they really love me now. we have a whole routine. i read:

is your mama a llama? (no she is a librarian!)
dear zoo

i'm the biggest thing in the ocean

baby bear, baby bear what do you see?

i ain't gonna paint no more

five little monkeys jumping on the bed

the hungry little caterpillar

it looked like spilt milk

the wheels on the bus

they have half these books memorized and they just love to shout out the stuff they know. they're so cute. somehow they convinced me to make a bus puppet with them next time. what is a bus puppet? that doesn't sound like a very fun puppet.

try not to be too jealous of my crafty craftiness

seriously, how do you stand it? you must say to yourself all the time, "self ... i just wish i could be even half as crafty as miss dewey decimal. why, god? why have you forsaken me?" okay, maybe you don't say that to yourself. but you should! anyway, today we will be making collage kois. you find pretty shiny colorful pictures in magazines and then cut out little circles that will act as scales. i think it is best to cut out solid colors. or, if you want to be clever you can cut out stuff that is part of something larger but is unidentifiable once you cut it out. for instance, i have a picture of a hieroglyphic, a monarch butterfly's wing, a mcdonald's salad, grass, a brick wall, a cheerleader's pompom, etc. then you glue these little circles in a scale-like formation to a koi template (cut out of old manila folders. i am recycling!) then voila! you have a beautiful collage koi. sometimes i even amaze myself.
p.s. happy 400th post!

things which will never change: a short list

1. it has now been two weeks that i have had a sore throat. TWO WEEKS! i feel like a child. do i need to get my tonsils out? what is my problem? i have drank tea and eaten soup and stayed in and gone out. nothing works. so now i am at the point where i am just accepting this as my life. i will always have a sore throat. i will never be well again. this is the way it will be from now on. i will perpetually be on the brink of sickness.

2. i am a peach raspberry swirl. not everyone likes peach raspberry swirls. and that is okay.

spikey-haired librarians need not apply

a few months ago i went on an interview at a fancy pants private school. this was possibly the worst interview i've ever been on in my life. it was down right painful. and i interview pretty well. most people are very charmed by me. anyway, i would like to note that i had gone on two other private school interviews and they had been just lovely. so this is not to say that all private schools are awful. just this one.
i walk in and it is obvious that my interviewer holds me in complete disdain. i actually wondered if she had called me in for the specific purpose of putting me down so that she could feel better about herself. first whenever she would discuss my work as a librarian she would be sure to say public librarian as if i may be filled with germs. like a public bathroom. thanks!
then she said that she didn't understand why i was interested in working at a school library. and that public librarians are so pigeonholed whereas school librarians need to know a little bit of everything and need to understand so much more and aren't they so much smarter and better than little old me, pathetic germ-infested public librarian. it was at this point that i wondered why on earth she had called me in. i mean, she must have read my resume which clearly states that i have had several years of public librarian experience.
(i could go into a long diatribe about how she is the one who is pigeonholed, working in an ivory tower while i am out on the frontlines dealing with The People. but i won't)
i tried to maintain a positive attitude. we then got on the topic of music collections and i proudly told her that i was once in charge of a music collection. she asked me about collection development practices and i explained that i tried to maintain a balance between classical, jazz, and popular music. then, this part was great, she looked at me as if she was smelling something really gross and said, "well yes, you're obviously interested in pop culture ..." pause to look extra disgusted, "with your ... dress (expensive banana republic dress! what gives lady?!) ... and your spikey hair."
my hair is not spikey. my hair is 60s mod. it is feathered at best, but not spikey. i'll show you spikey lady. you want a piece of this?
then she went on to say that she was unsure if i would be able to "handle" her students. i then politely told her that i do in fact work in the ghetto and that i have on occasion had to discipline gang members and i think, i think, i can handle disciplining her extremely quiet well-behaved over-priveledged clientele. (at this point i looked out the window to see about 20 students sitting in the library in complete and utter silence. all reading books. yeah, i think i can handle that.)
finally, this painstaking process was over. i got up to leave and approached her with arm-outstretched to shake her hand and tell her it was nice to meet her (although this is a bold-faced lie). then she looked at me in shock as if this was a very odd thing to do. but i went with it. i shook her hand, damnit. and i walked out thinking that there was no way in hell that anyone would ever willingly work with this woman.
so it was a happy little validating surprise this morning when i saw that not only was the position still being listed on monster.com it was even re-listed recently (so there is no way that the position was filled and it is just up there accidentally). ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

smile you're on library camera

a woman came into the library yesterday with a print out of her account. it turns out she has three very overdue books on her card. she tells me that she returned these books back in january, before the due date. we get this all the time and there are only two ways it can play out:
Scenario A: this woman legitimately returned her items in our self-check-in machine (high tech machine that sucks books into a book drop whilst simultaneously scanning them in), but for whatever reason there was an error with the machine (happens often) and the items were not checked in. these items would then be found on the shelf.
Scenario B: this woman never checked these items in. either she is mis-remembering returning these items (like the time i thought i returned the VH1 best of the 80s CD but instead i found in wedged under the seat of my car 3 months later) OR she is flat out lying to me.
now, i never know which scenario i am dealing with but i like to give people the benefit of the doubt and assume that they did in fact return their items. that is, until i can prove otherwise. because as i have proven time and again, i am no sucker.
so we go to the shelf to look for the books and lo and behold ALL THREE are nowhere to be found. this is what we call in the biz, a clue. i mean, it is totally reasonable that one book could wind up not getting checked in and one book could be misplaced. but THREE books not getting checked in and THREE books all being misplaced. that is a stretch. sometimes the most obvious conclusion is the right one. the obvious conclusion here being that this woman never returned her books and that we are dealing with Scenario B.
but this woman is sticking to her story that she returned the books. i tell her that she should scour her home for the books and make sure they are not there. she looks at me in complete disgust and says that nothing could ever be lost in her home. her home is immaculate and the idea of something being misplaced there is absurd. i assure her that there is nothing to be embarrassed about if your library books fall behind the couch or wind up hidden under the bed. this happens to the best of us. but she is not budging. i reiterate that since it is THREE books, and since unfortunately i see no evidence that the books were returned, i can only assume that she never returned the books.
and this is where it gets good ....
"well i returned something here!" she says. "i even got a receipt, but then i threw it out."
this is always the case. the check-in machine gives receipts, but does anyone keep their receipt? no. i mean, at least check to make sure your account is clear and then throw away the receipt. i mention this to her but she is unmoved.
"then what did i return?!"
"well, i don't know" i say, "once you return books they are off your card." (we do this so the government can't spy on you. no need to thank us. it's just what we do.)
"don't you have cameras here?" she asks, then points to the dome cameras on the ceiling. "there's your proof. just look through the film."
at this point i am working very hard not to laugh in this woman's face. first, i have no idea if those cameras are actually filming anything. that's a lot of film, no? second, i have no idea who actually has access to that film and where that film is kept. i always assumed that the camera recordings would only be used 1. if something sizeable was stolen, like one of our computers OR 2. if there was a serious incident of violence. i cannot imagine that the cameras are there to see if this woman really returned three children's books.
"ma'am," i say, "this is the library. we're not james bond. we can't go through the past four months of camera recordings and find you and then zoom into a close up to see what books you are returning."
realizing that i won't budge, she finally asks me what she can do. i tell her that it is my recommendation that she go home and thoroughly search her house. then she walks off muttering about how clean her house is and she returned these books and oh, the injustice of it all.
i hope i am here to witness when she returns days, weeks, or months later having found the books under the seat of her car.

today is such a very good day

a few weeks ago ms. b. cakes turned me onto the greatness of fiber one cereal bars. well you just cannot find these things anywhere! after searching my neighborhood grocery stores and bodegas i finally went to to the one place that truly has everything. amazon. i happened to have a "reward" for $25 for spending ridiculous amounts of money on my amazon credit card. so i had a case, A CASE, of fiber one bars sent to library-in-the-hood. and, my dear blog readers, they came today. i decided i would leave a few boxes in my locker and then bring the rest home. then our teen computer page came into the break room while i was scarfing one down and simultaneoulsy trying to stuff the oversized amazon box into my locker. so then i had to explain the whole thing to him. have i mentioned that he kinda thinks i'm crazy? not in a bad way, but just in my quirky idiosyncratic way. anyway, he was pretty amused that i ordered so many cereal bars, so then i offered him one so that he too could experience the magic and wonder of fiber one. "don't worry," i told him, "you can't taste the fiber at all!" but now i am wondering if i should get a lock for my locker because if word gets out who knows what could happen to my stash of cereal bars.

i'm okay ... you're kind of a mess

last night i met with the woman who works with incarcerated teens. she is so lovely. i totally want to woo her to be my friend. it turns out we have lots in common: both of us used to be engaged to men who we felt were unable to be "equal responsible partners" in a relationship. isn't that a strange coinkidink? but luckily neither of us took the plunge.
it was really nice talking with her. i told her of how i just don't seem to fit into the world of library-bureaucracies. i said this as a kind of sad fact, as if it might be a failing in myself. then she looked at me funny. "well why would you fit in?!" she asked, incredulously. " you're a creative passionate person! of course you don't belong in a bureacracy! no one likes a bureacracy!"
oh dear blog readers, that was music to my ears. because sometimes i wonder if the problem is me. and i mentioned that there are so many librarians that seem okay with The System and The Man and all that jazz. but she assured me that the problem is Them, so i will go with that.
then we had a grand discussion about hell's library (she knows alot of the hell's librarians), and public vs school libraries, and the collaboration or lack-there-of between public libraries and schools. oh what a fine time we had.
then i went home and caught up on america's next top model. can you believe they chose lauren over claire?! i am so sick of lauren and her weird voice and her frankenstein posture. (and i totally love claire. she reminds me of annie lenox, back in the day when annie lenox was fierce) i mean, i want to support lauren because she is from brooklyn (if i had to hazard a guess i'd say she's from greenpoint!) but what is her problem? why can't she walk properly?! i mean, i can walk better than she walks! just put one foot in front of the other! c'mon now girl, get it together. if you're gonna represent the nabe you need to up your game.

this is a test

i told my vegetarian spiritualist friend that i would figure out how to post music in blogs ... i have figured out how to add music to the main page of the blog, but how do you get music into a specific post (and only that post)? is that possible? i think it should be. let's see if this works.

money, money, money, money

i have just been approved for a summer reading mini-grant! yay! that means i get extra money to spend on crafty goodness as i see fit. what will be my first order of business? googley eyes! i am going to spend $180 on googley eyes! just kidding. but there shall be googley eyes. most def.

every summer new york state comes up with a theme for summer reading. i personally always hate the theme. here are some sample themes of yesteryear:

new york is read white and blue (post 9/11 theme)

get a clue @ your library

you never know @ your library

tune in @ your library (we heart the @ sign!)

i don't want to hate the theme. sometimes they're okay. but mostly i think i hate the theme because it is one of those things where only librarians understand it. for instance, the kids never seem to understand that the entire summer is revolving around a theme. they are oblivious to the theme. and us librarians work our butts off trying to relate everything to this one theme. and for what? i have found i've had more success ignoring the theme completely, and just trying to have really cool activities. but this year the theme is catch the reading bug, and although i do not typically like bugs i do have a fun idea for a theme-related program.

i am going to use some of my mini-grant money to buy a butterfly growing kit. yay! we will have caterpillars shipped to the library and the kids will feed them and try not to kill them and then watch as the caterpillars make coccoons and then the butterflies will hatch (do butterflies hatch?) and we will release said butterflies into the hood where they will instantly be killed by pollution. yesssssss! i am so excited. i think the kids will love it.

strutting forward and a secret confession

tonight i went to my local coffeeshop to work on my novel, and i met up with a colleague from work who happens to also hang out at the local coffeeshop. he is possibly my only true work friend. anyway we were discussing the state of library affairs, and even with all my legitimate work issues i was beginning to wonder if maybe i just need to “get over it.” because when i was recounting the various injustices which have befallen me, none of them have happened lately (except of course the vacation day debacle, but i won’t even get into that). so i have decided from this moment on that i am letting bygones be bygones. i will be moving on and approaching everything with a fresh new attitude (that new attitude being a positive one) startiiiiiiiing … NOW!

tonight i also went to the garage to discuss why my car is always bottoming out and it was brought to my attention that my “struts are shot.” struts apparently cost about $120 each, which makes me wonder … can i not strut enough for both me and my car?

and finally, i have a secret confession … let me start by saying that mr. katz gave me some words of wisdom regarding this blog. he said that whatever i write i should assume that everyone is reading it, specifically everyone who i wouldn’t want reading it. he of course told me this after stating that he believes i am reckless, both in my blog writing and in my personal life. well, i never. of course, if you look at the facts, he has a pretty good argument. but anyway … moving on … i make this secret confession knowing that those i don’t want to read it most likely are reading it:
i was kind of hoping that after running into the glam rocker the other night that he would be so beholden by my beauty (i looked so good! seriously, liquid eyeliner makes all the difference) and he would realize that ending things with me was a big mistake and he would call me on bended knee and ask me out. and in my head i decided that tuesday would be the deadline for bended knee begging. because that is 5 days and if a boy takes more than 5 days to contact me, he is not worthy of my time. and sadly tuesday has now come and gone with no contact from the glam rocker. i guess he is too busy keeping the rock alive.
and that, dear blog readers, is my life so far.

bidding a fond adieu to women's history month

oh, good bye women's history month display. or shall i say womyn's herstory month? today i made a fabulous poetry month book display, and then for my bulletin board i made a display of unbrellas and flowers topped with the phrase, "april showers bring may flowers." while i was creating this beautific piece of art i was reminded of the very bad joke, "if april showers bring may flowers, what do may flowers bring?" answer: pilgrims. and i was wondering if one of my kids might tell me this cheezy joke. and that is when i remembered that my kids don't know what the Mayflower is (as proved in the post the story of thanksgiving OR why i will never send my children to public school). and that, dear blog readers, made me a bit sad.

she's crafty ... she's just my type

i know you guys have probably been wondering to yourselves, "has miss dewey decimal been doing crafts? where are the crafts!?" well here is one, and isn't it a sight to behold? this monstrosity now hanging on the door to my apartment is a flower made out of a paper plate and a gazillion cutouts of my very own hand traced onto colored computer paper. isn't it glorious?