last day at work

Yesterday was my last day at the library before moving back to school. And oddly enough, it was probably the most interesting day I spent working there, if only for the variety of stuff I got to do.

Typically when I go in to work at the library, I steel myself in preparation for six hours of the same cycle of work: get a book from the cataloger, type up the label in the front of the book, affix the label with con-tac paper, check the label against the online catalog, fit it with "tattletape" so the sensor at the door beeps if someone tries to walk off with it, shelve the book. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Since the library is in the process of changing every book from Dewey Decimal System classification to Library of Congress, there is no dearth of labeling to deal with. Carts and carts of books on end, in fact.

Yesterday had its share of "processing" as it's called, but I also got to interact with patrons, something that doesn't happen a lot when all the students and most of the professors are gone from campus for the summer. I got to try various other things that librarians are responsible for, such as unlocking the conference room for a guy in PR to take pictures of the windowsill. Unlocking it again 20 minutes later because he took the "wrong" pictures of the windowsill. (We were baffled as to how you can take wrong pictures of a windowsill; we were both quite certain the remodelers who wanted the pictures would come look at the actual windowsill before building anything for it.) I supplied patrons with paper clips and hole punches, and took a trip to the business office to get my paycheck. And after lunch, I moved approximately ten times my weight in reference books.

And today, some coworkers and I are going out to eat a local Mexican restaurant as a "goodbye for now" to the job. It was a good job to have during the summer. I can't say I'll really miss it, but it was nice to have while I was here.