Not like I've got people hanging on my every word, but sorry about the long delay between entries, I swear one of these days I'll get round to doing it semi-regularly.
Inside the mind of a cynical bastard librarian - Part the Second
1:00pm - Ok, back from lunch and ready to do some serious, productive work. Thankfully this only lasts about 15 minutes and I spend the rest of the hour reading Metafilter. Curse those damn right-wingers! If I wasn't too lazy to create an account I'd destroy them all with my cunning logic and overly complex flames using archaic English insults. Remember kiddies, calling someone a dunderheaded poltroon never gets old.
2:10pm - More static electric shocks. Sigh, this is just getting stale fast.
2:35pm - Oh-kaaaay, yet more proof that the library attracts only the finest in complete fucking nutters. Some bloke walks in with no shirt on, looking slightly red, sounds like he's wasted on something, booze, drugs, could be anything really. He then proceeds to lie down on the floor of the library and stay there. I go to ask him if he's ok (noone else had the guts to) and he tells me he's Jesus and he comes from Jerusalem. Righto then. Rather unsurprisingly, I pass the matter on to security.
3:10pm - There is a man standing in the corner of the library for the last 10 minutes with his back bent back so far he's looking at the ceiling. What the hell is he doing? Doesn't that hurt?
4:35pm - Ugh, I just very nearly called a 70-year-old man baby because I was thinking of my girlfriend while stamping his books. I got to about 'ba' then managed to turn it into an incoherent mumble. Still, day's nearly over
5:00pm - Praise the Lord for the miracle known as the end of the working day!
Inside the mind of a cynical bastard librarian - Part the Second
1:00pm - Ok, back from lunch and ready to do some serious, productive work. Thankfully this only lasts about 15 minutes and I spend the rest of the hour reading Metafilter. Curse those damn right-wingers! If I wasn't too lazy to create an account I'd destroy them all with my cunning logic and overly complex flames using archaic English insults. Remember kiddies, calling someone a dunderheaded poltroon never gets old.
2:10pm - More static electric shocks. Sigh, this is just getting stale fast.
2:35pm - Oh-kaaaay, yet more proof that the library attracts only the finest in complete fucking nutters. Some bloke walks in with no shirt on, looking slightly red, sounds like he's wasted on something, booze, drugs, could be anything really. He then proceeds to lie down on the floor of the library and stay there. I go to ask him if he's ok (noone else had the guts to) and he tells me he's Jesus and he comes from Jerusalem. Righto then. Rather unsurprisingly, I pass the matter on to security.
3:10pm - There is a man standing in the corner of the library for the last 10 minutes with his back bent back so far he's looking at the ceiling. What the hell is he doing? Doesn't that hurt?
4:35pm - Ugh, I just very nearly called a 70-year-old man baby because I was thinking of my girlfriend while stamping his books. I got to about 'ba' then managed to turn it into an incoherent mumble. Still, day's nearly over
5:00pm - Praise the Lord for the miracle known as the end of the working day!
Inside the mind of an embittered, overly cynical Librarian:
8:10am - Christ, it's far too fucking cold to be getting up this early, I'm sure if I go for a piss it's going to turn into an icicle before it hits the basin. Time to hit the showers
8:50am - I'm going to be late! I'm going to be late and I've got a meeting first thing with the site manager and I'm GOING TO BE FUCKING LATE! ARGH!
9:01am - BITCH! I risk falling over in frost, asthma/heart attacks due to extreme unfitness and all sorts of unpleasantness involved when someone who really shouldn't is forced to run and you're not fucking here! Gah!
9:25am - BWAHAHAHAHA! Ok, this more than makes up for it, some crazy old lady called up just now to complain. Apparently she wanted to speak to the head of the library services for the entire Borough of Merton (an area of London, population of about 500,000 I think). The reason she was calling? Well, our library provides free Internet access to anyone who wants to use it and apparently the day before she had come in and used the Internet access, gone into some kind of Internet chatroom, and someone had swore at her. Yes, that's right kiddies, she was complaining to the head of the library service because some random person on the Internet swore at her.
9:57am - Dammit, first static electric shock of the day. There's a reason I keep track. It appears this library is home to a vengeful and angry spirit who wishes to visit destruction on ruination upon the world. Unfortunately, in ghostly terms, he's a bit of a pussy and has to settle for giving me a static electric shock every 5 goddamned minutes.
10:30ish am - More static, this time twice from the same till in under 10 seconds. I need to come into work wearing marigolds (rubber gloves)
11:00ish am - Oh Christ, so I got another static shock, this time from the cabinet where we keep the enw release videos. However, I was holding a pen loosely in my hand at the time and when it got shocked I jerked it back, inadvertently flinging the pen into the face of a rather sour-faced old man waiting at the counter. He seemed to accept my rushed apologies, but I get the feeling he still believes I assaulted him with a ballpoint.
12:00am - LUNCHBREAK! Sweet, blessed lunchbreak!
Second half some other time kiddies....
8:10am - Christ, it's far too fucking cold to be getting up this early, I'm sure if I go for a piss it's going to turn into an icicle before it hits the basin. Time to hit the showers
8:50am - I'm going to be late! I'm going to be late and I've got a meeting first thing with the site manager and I'm GOING TO BE FUCKING LATE! ARGH!
9:01am - BITCH! I risk falling over in frost, asthma/heart attacks due to extreme unfitness and all sorts of unpleasantness involved when someone who really shouldn't is forced to run and you're not fucking here! Gah!
9:25am - BWAHAHAHAHA! Ok, this more than makes up for it, some crazy old lady called up just now to complain. Apparently she wanted to speak to the head of the library services for the entire Borough of Merton (an area of London, population of about 500,000 I think). The reason she was calling? Well, our library provides free Internet access to anyone who wants to use it and apparently the day before she had come in and used the Internet access, gone into some kind of Internet chatroom, and someone had swore at her. Yes, that's right kiddies, she was complaining to the head of the library service because some random person on the Internet swore at her.
9:57am - Dammit, first static electric shock of the day. There's a reason I keep track. It appears this library is home to a vengeful and angry spirit who wishes to visit destruction on ruination upon the world. Unfortunately, in ghostly terms, he's a bit of a pussy and has to settle for giving me a static electric shock every 5 goddamned minutes.
10:30ish am - More static, this time twice from the same till in under 10 seconds. I need to come into work wearing marigolds (rubber gloves)
11:00ish am - Oh Christ, so I got another static shock, this time from the cabinet where we keep the enw release videos. However, I was holding a pen loosely in my hand at the time and when it got shocked I jerked it back, inadvertently flinging the pen into the face of a rather sour-faced old man waiting at the counter. He seemed to accept my rushed apologies, but I get the feeling he still believes I assaulted him with a ballpoint.
12:00am - LUNCHBREAK! Sweet, blessed lunchbreak!
Second half some other time kiddies....
So, for my first journal entry, I was planning to wax lyrical on the male orgasm. Not the usual kind of first entry, I'm sure, but hey, I wanted to make a splash *rimshot*
However, after today's events, I felt I just had to write about them instead. As about 4 or 5 of you may know, I'm a librarian. After working just on saturdays for about 4 years (long story, basically saturdays were the only day that'd fit into my schedule) I recently got promoted, so I'm working more hours, for better pay, at a new library branch.
So I was told on wednesday that today I'd be doing a corporate induction course for London Borough of Merton all day. Just to clarify, the borough that I've lived in for over a decade and worked for for more than 4 years, has just decided I need a corporate induction course to welcome me into the borough.
Riiiiiight.
Still, it's a free lunch and an easy day, and I'm paid for it, so it's all good, right? What follows is a stream of conciousness kind of deal, I remembere what Iw as thinking because I knew I ha to write about them.
I get there this morning, and it's not long before I start wondering whether all this is worth a free lunch. It started out innocently enough, with the terribly earnest, terribly friendly Anna, who I'm sure is a lovely, lovely person, but goddammit, I got 4 hours sleep last night and this kind of unrelenting cheery helpfulness this early in the morning just makes me surly and sarcastic.
Ok, next up, some guy called Richard giving us our second 'Welcome to Morden' speech, couched in all the right PC corporate doublespeak gobbledygook. Christ, this is going to be one long-ass day...
Things are taking a definite downturn. We're now being told how Merton is being continually harangued by the Government by a man who looks like he's going to pull out a hipflask, take a big slug, and tell us about how all those Whitehall bastards have got it in for him. He's already said 'bugger', 'crap' and 'bloody' (twice)...
Great googa-mooga, I feel like I've fallen into a Dilbert cartoon and I can't get out. We're now being lectured by the Health and Safety Officer, who quite obviously feels like all the other Council Departments mock her behind her back and she so desperately wants to be taken seriously. An actual quote "So if you do something like trip over in the parking lot, then it's really important that you submit a report to your line manager. Oh sure, it's possible the ground was completely flat and you just tripped over you own feet, but if the ground was uneven, or maybe if the lighting wasn't good enough, then we really have to get on that straight away to see what we can do about it before the bodies start piling up."
It was at this point that it was only the desire to remain in employment that stopped me from asking "Do I have to fill out an accident report sheet if I BEAT MYSELF TO FUCKING DEATH WITH YOUR CLIPBOARD to escape from this soul-atrophying nightmare?"
Things just got better from there. They wanted to take us on a bus tour of the borough. The borough where I've been living for 10 goddamne years. However, the first bus broke down. Then the second bus was too small to fit everyone in. Then the second bus broke down. Then we were too late to fit in the tour. Then I said fuck it and snuck off home for about an hour where I desperately tried to inject some life back into myself by indulging in the lovliness that is the second half of Veronica and Rose's set...
I should have stayed at home. I'm at a question and answer session with a trade union representative and two people from various parts of the council. They both want to strangle the trade unions rep and dissolve his body in acid because he keeps undermining them with rather cutting remarks, but they're hiding it behind huge, fake 'we're all friends here' smiles. One of them's gone awfully quiet. I wonder if I should take away his ballpoint for his own protection...
At last! A sane person! I wonder why they left him till last. Finally someone who realises just how ridiculous this whole thing is. He's supposed to be giving us a quiz on the borough, to see how much we know about it. For God's sakes, why the hell are they asking us which Council department received 30% of it's budget last year? I'M A THRICE-DAMNED LIBRARIAN! Still, at least he does acknowledge how bloody dumb the whole thing is, even if he does ask the questions anyway.
Hmmm, an evaluation form for the course. Well, I've got to say it was good after all, I mean Christ, these things aren't even anonymous, you're supposed to fill out your names. I can't go telling them what I really think now, can I?...
However, after today's events, I felt I just had to write about them instead. As about 4 or 5 of you may know, I'm a librarian. After working just on saturdays for about 4 years (long story, basically saturdays were the only day that'd fit into my schedule) I recently got promoted, so I'm working more hours, for better pay, at a new library branch.
So I was told on wednesday that today I'd be doing a corporate induction course for London Borough of Merton all day. Just to clarify, the borough that I've lived in for over a decade and worked for for more than 4 years, has just decided I need a corporate induction course to welcome me into the borough.
Riiiiiight.
Still, it's a free lunch and an easy day, and I'm paid for it, so it's all good, right? What follows is a stream of conciousness kind of deal, I remembere what Iw as thinking because I knew I ha to write about them.
I get there this morning, and it's not long before I start wondering whether all this is worth a free lunch. It started out innocently enough, with the terribly earnest, terribly friendly Anna, who I'm sure is a lovely, lovely person, but goddammit, I got 4 hours sleep last night and this kind of unrelenting cheery helpfulness this early in the morning just makes me surly and sarcastic.
Ok, next up, some guy called Richard giving us our second 'Welcome to Morden' speech, couched in all the right PC corporate doublespeak gobbledygook. Christ, this is going to be one long-ass day...
Things are taking a definite downturn. We're now being told how Merton is being continually harangued by the Government by a man who looks like he's going to pull out a hipflask, take a big slug, and tell us about how all those Whitehall bastards have got it in for him. He's already said 'bugger', 'crap' and 'bloody' (twice)...
Great googa-mooga, I feel like I've fallen into a Dilbert cartoon and I can't get out. We're now being lectured by the Health and Safety Officer, who quite obviously feels like all the other Council Departments mock her behind her back and she so desperately wants to be taken seriously. An actual quote "So if you do something like trip over in the parking lot, then it's really important that you submit a report to your line manager. Oh sure, it's possible the ground was completely flat and you just tripped over you own feet, but if the ground was uneven, or maybe if the lighting wasn't good enough, then we really have to get on that straight away to see what we can do about it before the bodies start piling up."
It was at this point that it was only the desire to remain in employment that stopped me from asking "Do I have to fill out an accident report sheet if I BEAT MYSELF TO FUCKING DEATH WITH YOUR CLIPBOARD to escape from this soul-atrophying nightmare?"
Things just got better from there. They wanted to take us on a bus tour of the borough. The borough where I've been living for 10 goddamne years. However, the first bus broke down. Then the second bus was too small to fit everyone in. Then the second bus broke down. Then we were too late to fit in the tour. Then I said fuck it and snuck off home for about an hour where I desperately tried to inject some life back into myself by indulging in the lovliness that is the second half of Veronica and Rose's set...
I should have stayed at home. I'm at a question and answer session with a trade union representative and two people from various parts of the council. They both want to strangle the trade unions rep and dissolve his body in acid because he keeps undermining them with rather cutting remarks, but they're hiding it behind huge, fake 'we're all friends here' smiles. One of them's gone awfully quiet. I wonder if I should take away his ballpoint for his own protection...
At last! A sane person! I wonder why they left him till last. Finally someone who realises just how ridiculous this whole thing is. He's supposed to be giving us a quiz on the borough, to see how much we know about it. For God's sakes, why the hell are they asking us which Council department received 30% of it's budget last year? I'M A THRICE-DAMNED LIBRARIAN! Still, at least he does acknowledge how bloody dumb the whole thing is, even if he does ask the questions anyway.
Hmmm, an evaluation form for the course. Well, I've got to say it was good after all, I mean Christ, these things aren't even anonymous, you're supposed to fill out your names. I can't go telling them what I really think now, can I?...
