Never use a mobile phone while you're peeing

As part of our ongoing commitment to the healthy living agenda we're stocking a lot more information about Men's Health Issues. You know what I mean: Men's. Health. Issues. Quite so. In particular, we're stocking a few monthly magazines that explore the issues concerned in the discrete and unsensational manner fitting for The Stoic Northern English Gentleman that they can use for easy reference in the reading room upstairs in Helminthdale Central Library.

All they have to do is know that we stock them, go to the enquiry desk, ask for a copy of one of the magazines; sign a receipt; read the magazine; go back to the enquiry desk; return the magazine and receive the cancelled receipt as a receipt of return.

To read a magazine in the reading room.

"We've had people steal magazines before now," explains Eileen.

Asking Liberace to powder his own piano

A 'phone call from the Reference Library.

"The new PC in the Ref. office isn't printing," says Eileen.

"Are you getting any error messages or anything?" I ask.

"No, it just says 'Printer can't be found.'"

"Which printer is it set up to use?"

"I don't know."

"Which one should it be using?"

After a full minute's silence I blink first.

"I'll come up and have a look at it."

(The techies amongst you will have guessed that it's the printer on the Ref. desk and that for some reason somebody had changed the PC's settings to print to a non-existant printer.)

Changing rooms

There are times when Eileen baffles me. She is not unintelligent and can be quite industrious and has a good understanding of electronic information issues. She just isn't especially productive and is astonishingly conservative and set in her ways.

They're playing musical chairs up in the reference library at the moment, shifting all the shelving round and making some space for group learning. The most difficult parts of the process are the moving of the enquiry desk, so that it's actually easy for the customers to get to, and the daily newspapers (they've been told that they should let the customers read them).

Seth's scheduled to move the desk this morning, ready for the usual Friday afternoon rush (unless they're both watching the tennis).

"I'm just going to move your desk," he told Eileen.

"Right-o, I'll get out of your way then."

"Erm... Aren't you moving all the crap off the top of the desk first?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, there's all that scrap paper. And the newspapers you've put there this morning. And all them boxes you were supposed to be getting shut of last month. And why is there a pile of pencils?"

"Customers might ask for a pencil."

"Can you move it please?"

"I'm busy at the moment, can it wait a bit?"

"Busy doing what?"

"I've got to stamp these newspapers."

A bit like the DVD extended edition

'Phone call from Eileen in the Reference Library.

"A gentleman wants to know if he can download some software so that he can run a programme on his USB stick."

"Has there been any time in the past decade where we've let customers download and run programmes on our PCs?"

"No...

...So what should I tell him."

"Sorry, no you can't?"

"OK."

I have this conversation with her once a fortnight.

Poetry woven into the general consciousness

More gems from our reference library. You'll need to bear in mind that:

(a) We are a small public library service somewhere in the North of England;
(b) We are not a research library;
(c) We are many miles from the sea; and
(d) This is the 21st Century.

So this is a selection of what we have proferred as being current and accurate information for the lay public. I include publication dates for further enlightenment.

2nd Report Of The Committee: A Comparison Of Transition Temperatures   1960
Determined By Small And Large Scale Tests On Five Steels
Brief History Of The National Gallery Of Scotland                      1961
Chance For Charities? Distributing The Proceeds Of The National        1993
Lottery To Charitable Organisations
Draft Agreement Between The Government Of The United Kingdom Of Great  1984
Britain And Northern Ireland And The Government Of The People'S
Republic Of China On The Future Of Hong Kong
Guide To Parliament And What Your Mp Does                              1997
Guide To The Loading And Unloading Of Fishing Vessels Regulations 1988 1988
Language For Life: The N.U.T'S Commentary On The Bullock Report        1976
National Minimum Wage: Report Of An Inter Departmental Working Party   1969
New Training Initiative: A Programme For Action                        1982
The Work And Organisation Of The Legal Profession                      1989
Tourism In The UK: Realising The Potential                             1992
Trade Unionism: A Basic Guide                                          1978
Training For Community Care: A Joint Approach                          1991
Bayonets: An Illustrated History And Reference Guide                   1968
British Lighthouses                                                    1947
Cameras Photographs And Accessories                                    1966
Conservative Manifesto 1979                                            1979
Going Into Hospital                                                    1988
How To Conduct An Election By The Single Transferable Vote             1976
Make The Difference: The Liberal Democrat Manifesto 1997               1997
Meeting The Challenge In Europe: Labour'S Manifesto For The European   1989
Elections 1989
New Directions: The Path To A Green Britain Now, General Election      1992
Campaign Manifesto 1992
Surveying: Instruments And Methods                                     1968
Future Shape Of Local Government Finance                               1971
National Blood Transfusion Service                                     1976
National Curriculum: A Survival Guide                                  1989
Nomenclature Of The Hominidae: Including A Definitive List Of Named    1965
Hominid Taxa

There's always someone worse off than yourself

A colleague sends me a photograph of a huge mound of tatty old reference books and assorted magazines. A football pitch-sized huge mound of tatty old reference books and assorted magazines.

He has been stock-editing his reference library.

It has not been done in the thirty-odd years before he took over. I assumed the figure half-buried by old copies of the Nursing Times was for illustrative purposes but it turns out not to be so. One of the Reference Librarians helpfully told a customer that they had 'just the thing' for a particular enquiry and that it had been sent for recycling but was easy to retrieve.

Another colleague writes:

"I've been heartily amused by a staff consultation exercise our council's got on the go at the moment. We're in the midst of a whole-council cross-departmental cuts and efficiencies review. It reported to Council last week for decision, as yet unknown. This is the point at which they launch the staff consultation exercise.

"'What efficiencies do you think the council could achieve?" it asks. And gives you 100 characters' space in which to respond.

"Best yet: throughout the survey it was at pains to say that it was an anonymous staff survey. The final questions? Your date of birth, your gender and the section you work for!"

Another colleague has had fun:

"Our mobile library driver's off sick this week and we've got a relief driver. I had to accompany him on the van. 'Oh good, I've got a dolly bird!" he said, cheeky sod. Just after lunchtime we had a bit of an accident.

"'I think I've clipped that car's wing mirror,' he said.

"I got out and had a look. Clipped? He'd annihilated it. And the front bumper and front panel. And caved the offside door in. Bloody hell! After ringing in to report the accident I was told we should take the van back to the depot to make sure it was OK.

"'When was the accident?' asked the fleet manager.

"'We crashed into the car at 1.45, we knocked over the railings at 2.05 and we knocked over all those dustbins at quarter past two,' I told him.

"'By gum, you're efficient!' said the driver.

"It's not my turn with him tomorrow, thank God!"

A bit like a bidet: you don't know what it is but it adds a touch of class

Some people are right up there at the cutting edge of electronic reference librarianship some people are.

Not us. We're still ripping up railings for to make Spitfires.

Maybelle's covering up in the reference library for reasons which elude me. She's just had a customer query which she knows can be answered using one of the online reference services we subscribe to. Unfortunately, the password's changed and she doesn't know it. So she has a look around the desk, in the desk, on the PC and then, finally and desperately, in the Red & Black notebook that passes as the Reference Librarians' Vademecum. No luck whatever. So she has to ring Eileen.

"Hi Eileen. Sorry to disturb you during your break but I need a password to log onto..."

It was in the Red & Black notebook.

Under W for "Web sites."

Representing the cultural DNA of the nation

We hear that there's going to be some tarting up of the reference library. The enquiry desk and the shelves along the long wall are going to be replaced and they're 'repurposing the business library section.' which we hope is code for chucking out those Balkan trade directories they bought that time. And who knows, perhaps even using some of the computers to provide access to some of the online companies information services we've bought into.

Work starts in a couple of weeks, apparently.

"Have they started sorting stuff out so that they're ready for the big move-around?" I ask Seth.

Seth does a good withering glance and I deserved every inch of it.

Stap me vittles, we're back on the merry-go-round!

We gather that the Reference Librarians are having a meeting.

"Are they doing anything good?" I ask.

"They're coming up with a list of standing orders," says Noreen.

"Haven't they already given you a list of standing orders?" I ask.

"Yes."

"That they rewrote in February?"

"Yes."

"And that you've sent to the suppliers...?"

"Yes."

A glimmer:

"They can't remember what was on the list, can they?"

"No."

It's all done with nostril control

The world has turned upside down and Sibyl is burning feathers under Noreen's nose to try and bring her back to her senses.

The Reference Librarians have cancelled a standing order.

Pull up a tin of pineapple chunksthey're playing our song, Matilda

Phone call to Noreen from the Land Beyond The Veil:

"We don't seem to have received this year's edition of Proctor's Directory of Assemblages. Could you chase it up for us please?"

"You've not got it because it's not on your standing order list."

Breaking news

There's no easy way of saying this. You might want to sit down.

Harold MacMillan is dead.


(Sorry about that. Some time soon somebody's going to have to tell the lotophagi in the Reference Library that the 1950s are dead and gone. I'm just getting some practice in, in case it turns out to be my job to do it.)

I want you out of town on the first stagecoach out of Elstree

A Manichean view of the library world would have it that there are people who take themselves very seriously, to the detriment of the service, and people who take the service seriously, to the detriment of themselves. I suspect I lie in the latter group.

We know one of the things that reference library staff do in the back room. Quarter of an hour before end of play you will notice Winnie leave the desk, go into the office, put her coat on and get ready to leave.

It's all from the learning tree

How modern reference librarianship works:

• The Reference Librarian rings the Regional Loans Assistant to say that we don't have a copy of the council's Unitary Development Plan.
• The Regional Loans Assistant finds the UDP on the council's web site.
• The Systems Librarian creates a catalogue entry for this online document, including the URL in the appropriate MARC tag.
• The Regional Loans Assistant sends the URL to the Reference Librarian and tells them that the customer can also look it up on the online catalogue.
• The Reference Librarian asks the Regional Loans Assistant if she can obtain a printed copy of the UDP.
• The Regional Loans Assistant suggests the Reference Librarian tries the "print" icon on the computer screen.
• The Regional Loans Assistant and the Systems Librarian wonder what the Reference Librarian is doing in that back office all day.

A red mist spread over the lawn

It wouldn't be fair to say that people aren't trying to engage in change. If I take a step back and look at what people are doing and the tentative steps they're taking then by any objective measure they are trying to engage in change, however fitfully or wrong-headedly.

But I don't want to be fair.

We've had public access PCs for the best part of a decade now (a sobering thought in itself). I get 'phone calls like this:

"There's a problem with the booking system."

"What's up with it?"

"It's so slow we've lost the connection with it completely."

"Let's have a look... Yes, I'll need to report that to the help desk, it looks like there's a problem with the server. There's nothing I could expect you to do to try to solve the problem."

"So what are you going to do?"

"I'm going to report it to the help desk."

"Well what do I say to the people standing here wanting to go onto the PCs?"

Now what would you do chums?

We board the good ship Saucy Gibbon in ten minutes

"We have heard a rumour," sighs Noreen.

"Oh aye?" I prompt, trying not to sound too inquisitive.

"The reference librarians are having a meeting next week to discuss the standing orders list."

Oh joy.

I could sit and count my hair

Bronwyn's turn to cover the Reference Library enquiry desk.

"We had four enquiries. One was: 'have you got a pencil?' Another was: 'can I borrow your pencil sharpener?'"

She is not impressed. Nor, indeed, is Posy who took her turn yesterday. They're both unhappy that they're having to sit at the enquiry desk while the reference library staff sit in the back doing things we know not what.

Especially when it turns out that one of the things they've been doing is typing out "Do not remove from the library" labels and sticking them all over the magazines that we've bought for the family literacy groups to borrow. They were only in the Reference Library temporarily for a month.

And we won't going into the items we've found that they've ordered by 'phone without an official order number; not from the authorised supplier; and to be paid from a budget they wouldn't have even if all the budgets weren't frozen...

Not standing

There's been a very mild relaxation of the spending of the book fund, though only enough to allow paying for advance orders committed in the autumn and for a small number of titles requested by the public (and these only because we charge for requests for items not in stock and we have an income target)(don't get me started on either aspect of that last parenthesis!)

Imagine Noreen's delight on finding that the Reference Librarians have been slipping in orders for titles they didn't include in their standing order list. The copy of "Wilkinson's Directory of Public and Private Organisations" that arrived today accounts for three-quarters of a week's permitted expenditure in one fell swoop.

"People are always asking for it," say the Reference Librarians.

Noreen and Betty muttered something in a similar vein.

Hysteria Lodge

Hoots of derision coming from Maybelle's desk. On investigating I find the woman herself wracked with laughter. I fear for either her pelvic floor or the shoulder she injured playing rugby the other day.

With faltering motions she points towards the cause. It's her turn for an email from the reference library.

Please could you ask all your staff to file the newspapers in such a way as to make them easily accessible. We are librarians, after all.

"It's probably not meant that way," I say.

"No, to be fair, it's probably not meant that way," agrees Maybelle.

"And it is a fair point that we need to make sure that materials are made easily accessible," I point out.

"Oh yes, that's a fair point," agreed Maybelle. "And it's probably not meant that way."

"No," I agree, "it's probably not meant that way."

We'll get no sense out of her until after lunchtime.

The never-ending story

Noreen gets an email from Helminthdale Reference Library.

To: Acq Team
From: Reference

These titles are updated monthly. We don't seem to have received them
recently. Please can you find out why.


From: Noreen
To: Reference

We've not been ordering updates of these titles because they aren't on your standing order list.


To: Acq Team
From: Reference

When can we expect to receive the updates?