Home repairs and filtering the news

When I say, "Thrills, spills, and excitement," you probably don't visualize a trip to the nearest CVS drugstore to buy a new Brita water filter.  At CVS I could walk blindfolded to the location of the Brita filters, which could be a useful skill except that some yahoo moved the filters.

Wandering up and down the narrow drugstore aisles my brain could not make a link to the thinking of that drugstore yahoo.  The filters were not with the bottled water or with the chilled beverages or the household kitchen/cleaning items or the two for $5 summer seasonal items or mouthwash or adult beverages.  I wasn't walking blindfolded, but I still couldn't see the filters.  True, I am putting some seriously suspect items into my shopping cart. Who is going to eat those two-fer bags of Italian herb and parmesan-flavored Chex Mix?  Step away from the gum and no dental work will get hurt!

Finally asked the check-out clerk if the store had stopped selling Brita filters.  "No," she said, "they are right over there in Home Repairs and Hardware."  Right!  Next to the motor oil and American flags...

Our brains are wired to make associations and leaps, to connect mental images, scent recollections, words and ideas in a bizarre, incredibly efficient retrieval system. That particular drugstore night my brain was too tired to make the Evel Knievel leap across the Grand Canyon to locate the improbably-placed filters.

That's what I like the best and struggle with most in library cataloging.  How can we describe the book so that patrons easily access the record and find what they seek?

In recent years I've been filtering my daily news intake.  I gave up Nightly News except when I watched it with Dad at the nursing home.  I got frustrated with the local newspaper when it raised prices. So if I didn't hear something on NPR, I was blissfully ignorant. When I failed to learn of a recent local tragedy in a timely fashion, friends convinced me it was time to let a newspaper back into my regular routine.  The newspapers are piling up already, and I haven't even gotten to the crossword puzzles.


I once was lost, but now am found,
Was blind but now I CVS.


© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Spelling Man and time in a bottle

Pretty sick of hearing the phrase "time is running out" regarding the debt ceiling debate.  Time, though, is of the essence, or at least a recurring theme this weekend.  So let's share a brief horological moment. Horology? Yes, indeed:


horology   


science of time, 1819, probably from Gk. hora “hour” (see hour) + -logy. Earlier it meant “clock, clock dial” (c.1500), from L. horologium. Related: Horologist.
Spelling Man phoned the library yesterday, and it was my good etymological fortune to answer his call. Spelling Man wondered how to spell the name of an antique French country clock that chimes on the hour for prayer, and again a minute later to signal the end of prayer.  Spelling Man seemed insulted when I asked if it was a domed clock.  No, like a grandfather clock! It was difficult to distinguish the consonant sounds as he pronounced them, and also French.  I know Spelling Man was not impressed, but a quick search of the reference desk dictionary provided no answer.  I would have to find some references for antique French clocks and call Spelling Man back with an answer.

Books in the 749 Dewey category had pages that crumbled at my touch, but I eventually found the word "Morbier".  Could that be Spelling Man's clock?  Later online searching confirmed that Morbier clocks had the prayer chimes described by Spelling Man:

Another unusual feature that Morbiers have is that they strike twice on the hour: for example, at 6:00, the clock strikes six times, and at 6:02, the clock strikes six times again. My understanding is that the first strike was a call to prayer and the second strike was to indicate when to begin prayer. The clock also strikes once on the half hour. The religious tradition seen here dates back to the 12th Century, when most clocks were built for churches. People listened to the church bells to know what time it was, when to pray, and when to eat. The plates holding the gears together in Morbier clocks are somewhat similar in design and construction to the medieval church tower clocks, made of strips of forged iron, as if the Morbier clocks were small versions of the great tower clocks. 

Every library has a Spelling Man who calls with impatient requests.  I'm not sure how many library staffers return the call to be answered by an automated sexy-voiced virtual assistant named "Sharon". This seemed straight out of a Clive Cussler novel.  And, okay, here I must admit my firm belief that reading a Dirk Pitt book keeps my airplane safe when I am a passenger if I also drink Mr. & Mrs. T Bloody Mary mix with my peanuts.

A friend recently visited Munich and brought these postcards of the famous clock tower glockenspiel. The cards turned up under the newspaper comics section where Bizarro showed a man strapping a cellphone to his wrist with Velcro so he could tell time.

It is time, indeed, to clean up the stacks of papers around the condo! But first we must dust the cobwebs off the condo debt ceiling...  And that will take at least a five-hour energy drink.


Should we turn back the hands of time, or keep fretting?  Maybe we could encourage our dang congresspersons to work together by playing Jim Croce's "Time in a Bottle" on a continuous loop at loud volume in their chambers until they find a solution.

But there never seems to be enough time

To do the things you want to do
Once you find them
I've looked around enough to know
That you're the one I want to go
Through time with

What hands?  What time? What bottle?

This link is to an NPR interview with Howard Mansfield about his book, Turn and Jump: How Time and Place Fell Apart. Time is a strange, abstract, evolving concept. We all know people for whom time stands still or slows to accommodate their over-booked schedules.  Perhaps they are horologymnasts. But they better not make the economy jump through hoops.

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Larry Festival Day Two

Backtracking to the beginning of the story, we shared Young Larry during afternoon line time. Larry, the polar bear creation of Daniel Pinkwater, was a middle-sized bear when his mother indicated he should fend for himself. Larry and his brother, Roy, were each nine and a half feet tall.

How tall is that? What does nine and a half feet look like? We found that it looks like two and three quarters preschoolers placed head to head and toe to toe on the rug and measured with a ruler. A full-grown male polar bear would be about three and a half preschoolers tall standing up on its hind legs.

Charged up from attending a weekend literacy workshop, I'm ready to let the students sit closer to the picture book when I read, and intent on reinforcing listening comprehension after stories. We spent a lot of time discussing jobs--Larry's job as a lifeguard, our parents' jobs, our own classroom jobs. Then we spent time considering swimming and muffins. Larry wanted a job so he could get money to buy muffins. What do parents buy with the money they earn at their jobs?

One student has learned to alphabetize simple words, giving my cataloging heart great joy. To demonstrate the power of his new skill, we spent time in the index of the great big book of animals. We looked up lemurs and polar bears. I'm very fond of both animals, as I spent so much time watching them with my little sons at Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo.

It is only Day Two of the Larry Book Festival, and already I'm feeling cool and refreshed. If I can teach just one child to use an index, it will help preserve civilization such as it is. Remember the ancient proverb:

Give a kid a fish and he can feed a polar bear.
Teach a kid to alphabetize and he can look up "polar bear" in the index.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Somewhere over the rainbow

Thought it would be fun to have a sort of drop down menu on the sidebar for color-related posts. Click on a color in the rainbow, and it would take you to all the posts with that color label. Pink, Red, Magenta, Purple, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, White, Black, Gray

True, I've just been fooling with it for an hour, and my knowledge of coding fits in a hummingbird's egg. So far, I can't even get a drop down menu to work with my color labels. I was using HTML Basix to generate the code.

Ideas anyone?

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Failure to communicate

So many Monday afternoons the elementary kids slog through their homework. You remember those workbook pages photocopied on pastel paper, full of graphite and eraser smudges. The kids struggle to copy the list of vocabulary words, and that's just the appetizer for a meal of searching the dictionary and using the words in sentences.

This is the circle of Dante's hell where compulsive alphabetizers like myself are doomed to learn patience for all of eternity. Forget Chinese water drips. Forget nails on the chalkboard. Forget sitting through the Kevin Costner "Waterworld" and "Wyatt Earp" movies. True torture is waiting for elementary students to find words in a children's dictionary.

Should a student locate a vocabulary word in the dictionary, she must copy the entry onto the cantaloupe- or mint-tinted paper in her wobbly handwriting. He must decide if the word is a noun or verb, or, gag, both. Then it's time to use the word in a sentence.

Homework sentences always remind me of "Cool Hand Luke" in the rural prison. I'm sentenced to homework life without parole. It's good to know I'm not alone!



What we've got here is usually a failure to communicate complicated by some misguided expectations. Kids who have trouble singing the alphabet song are not going to be able to locate "coil" or "crest" in the dictionary.

When I am in charge of the world, all kids will sit on tall stools filing cards in those grand old wooden card catalog drawers. They will put an orange "check" card behind each one they file so a qualified grown-up could check their work. They will begin filing cards by first letter, then by two letters, then by three:

c
ch
chr




In the background the kids will hear the metallic swirrrrr-clink-swirrrrh of the institutional ceiling fans, and the batting of moth wings against the library screen windows. Tennis shoes will squeak on the concrete floor. Chronological stacks of decaying newspapers will scent the air. Librarians will stamp the date due on index cards.

Monday's homework is due on Thursday. It just seems generations longer!

© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Cool cats and copy kittens

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I'm flattered that the preschoolers pay so much attention to my brown bag lunches, and that they go home and tell their parents. This past week I took two Old El Paso corn taco shells in my handy divided stacking plastic box, with some cut-up Kroger rotisserie chicken in the little section. Microwaved that box for thirty seconds. In the second box I had lettuce, plain yogurt, grated cheddar, salsa, and part of an avocado.

The kids gave their total attention as I built my tacos. They found it hilarious that my tacos fell apart as I ate them. Sometimes adults are just as messy eaters as kids.

Two days later two preschoolers brought their own version of a "healthy taco", sliced meat, cheese, and lettuce in a taco shell. The next day a child brought homemade taco fixings in her Hello Kitty Bento box.

What happens in preschool doesn't stay in preschool. It goes home. Good or bad. What a motivator to be the best influence for each child every day!

Attended a seminar at eight a.m. Saturday morning with three hundred other preschool educators in a hotel ballroom. Not much was available beyond vending machine snacks, but it was scary to see so many in attendance consuming a breakfast of Coke and Cheetos. I've got to hope they don't eat like that in front of their students.

Heard the reknowned One O'Clock Lab Band of the University of North Texas perform a jazz concert on the University of Texas-Dallas campus Friday. That's nutrition for the soul! So fantastic to see the college students playing at this level, and to hear several of their own compositions and arrangements.



The Jazz Studies Division in the UNT College of Music was formed in 1947 with one teacher and a handful of students as the first program of its kind. The UNT Music Library holds the Stan Kenton bequest of the famous band leader and early jazz educator's entire orchestra library of charts plus photos(and wouldn't that have been fun to catalog!).

If you need a nutritious soul lunch of jazz about now, try KNTU-FM online. I borrowed the Lab Band photo from the UNT website.

© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

My Two Front Teeth

Dear Blogger.com,

I've figured out what I really want for Christmas, or much sooner. Pretend I'm editing posts and ready to add the labels. At the bottom of the form, you see the SAVE AS DRAFT and the PUBLISH buttons. Just above them are the Post Options, then Labels for this post: e.g. scooters, vacation, fall. This always distracts me. Did I fall off the scooter on vacation, or did I take that scooter vacation in the fall? Was it like Arte Johnson riding the tricycle on "Laugh In"? Did I crash the scooter into a post because I had no options?

Back on track, I start typing in the labels for my post in that long, skinny rectangle. Last thing in that row is Show all to open a list of all my blog's labels in alphabetical order. This, my dear Blogger.com, is where I want a choice. I want to click Show all for alphabetical order, then be able to click again for Show all by frequency. Then I could decide if I wanted to add more general labels, or something more specific. Right now I've got about a blogillion labels. Like any library subject cataloger, I'm trying to make those labels more useful. Is a label with 123 posts useful? Is a label with one esoteric post useful to the reader? I have 123 posts about art class projects, but a reader might be looking for the seventeen posts about using paper towel tubes, or the one clay project related to leprechauns for ages 3-4. If I could Show all first alphabetically, then by frequency, I could see that the best label would be Preschool art class projects.

And so, fondest Blogger.com, that is my wish. I want to click once for alphabetical order, and twice for frequency. It's just so Paul Reveresque. One if by land and two if by sea, and I on the opposite shore will be having a really bad flashback battle of the bands between the young Motown Michael Jackson and Jackson 5 wailing about ABC, one two three", and Alvin & the Chipmunks chirping out "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth."

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride,

Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride

On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.

Now he patted his horse's side,

Now he gazed at the landscape far and near,

Then, impetuous, stamped the earth,

And turned and tightened his saddle girth;

But mostly he watched with eager search

The belfry tower of the Old North Church,

As it rose above the graves on the hill,

Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.

And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height

A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!

He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns,

But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight

A second lamp in the belfry burns.

Koo-koo-ka-choo, Mr. Longfellow,
Bloggers loves you more than you will know.
God bless you, please, Mr. Longfellow.
Heaven holds a place for those who pray,
Hey, hey, hey


© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Dear Blogger.com again

Just wishing that the Edit Posts page had a toggle switch in the left column to see blog labels by frequency OR alphabetical order. Or maybe better, two columns to show both simultaneously. I love being able to add subject labels, but the process of making the labels useful requires some new tools.

© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Dear Blogger.com

I love "labels" for blogs. I love that they bring in new readers. It's great that assigning labels is helping me understand the nature of my pontifications. My dad refers to my posts as "pontifications". I prefer to give them a rose-colored title of "ponderings". Thanks to my brother, I've been terrified of ending a sentence with a prepostition for, oh, so many years. "Helping me understand the nature of my pontifications," is just a way of writing, "figuring out what I blog about." Is there such a thing as prepositiphobia?

But really, dear Blogger.com, couldn't you create an easier way for folks with hefty blogs to edit past posts and add labels? I'm working on over one thousand posts. It takes way too long to navigate through my pontifications using <<Newest < Newer 101-150 of 1026 Older > Oldest>>

© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Labels & LePage's

What a LaBrea of melted caramel are these blog labels to the library junkie?! I'm sucked into the warm, soft, stickiness of sorting a thousand plus blog posts by subject. What could a cataloger like more than a hot caramel sundae with heaping considerations of generality, specificity, nuts and whipped cream ? I'm slowly seeing that this blog is a strange collage of loosely glued connections.



My early school years were not just spent taste-testing white paste. We also used brown LePage's mucilage glue in the curvy bottle with the pink rubber dispenser cap. My mom used fragrant rubber cement to make my baby scrapbook. Elmer's didn't appear in my world until the mid-Sixties.



Mucilage is not to be confused with the obnoxious, fat, and green ad campaign character for Mucinex.
c.1400, "viscous substance from vegetable material soaked in water," from O.Fr. mucilage (14c.), from L.L. mucilago "musty or moldy juice" (4c.), from L. mucere "be musty or moldy," from mucus "mucus." Meaning "adhesive" is first attested 1859.

Officer Krupke! Gee, it's a mystery!

When it comes to Police*United States*Fiction, Los Angeles leads the nation. At my small, crime-fiction-friendly library, the score is LA 86 to NYC 56. Not even a contest! LA shoots and scores.

I'm vacationing in the lovely library catalog theme park as I often do at this time of year. It does me almost as much good as a real week on the beach with palm trees swaying. My wonderful former librarian employer actually pays me to go on this trip AND I get to do complex yet repetitive catalog maintenance tasks that require considerable concentration and attention to detail. It's like shiatsu massage for my brain.

Visualize a raked Japanese sand garden like the one at the Admiral Nimitz National Museum of the Pacific War down in Fredericksburg. How do those Zen monks keep the sand so perfectly ordered? Mindfulness. Or maybe working the bugs out of the subject headings!

There were so many books in the catalog listed as Police*United States*Fiction that it was time to add further specifications. Imagine being informed that your kitchen junk drawer needs to be sorted! Kitchen*Drawer*Collections isn't going to be sufficiently informative to those guys trying to find the marshmallow roasting skewers or the unidentified padlock key.

The results surprised me as each book was reclassified for a particular state or city. This is a totally unscientific analysis:

86 Police*California*Los Angeles*Fiction
56 Police*New York (State)*New York*Fiction
33 Police*Massachusetts*Fiction
26 Police*California*Fiction (all the non-LAPD officers)
25 Police*Florida*Fiction
20 Police*Washington (D.C.)*Fiction

No big surprises there, although I expected lightweight mysteries with American alligators to be more popular than the snow and history mysteries about Boston.

19 Police*New Mexico*Fiction (I call it the Hillerman factor.)
17 Police*Louisiana*Fiction

16 Ed McBain's imaginary 87th Precinct has to remain vaguely Police*United States*Fiction. Then I'm mystified by a tie between Illinois and Minnesota. Chicago needs all the fictional police, but Minneapolis doesn't catch my imagination as a fictional hotbed of crime.

15 Police*Illinois*Fiction15 Police*Minnesota*Fiction
12 The rest of New York (State)
12 Police*Georgia (U.S.)*Fiction Not to be confused with the former S.S.R.

11 Police*Michigan*Fiction
11 Police*Arizona*Fiction
11 Police*Pennsylvania*Fiction
10 Police*Washington (State)*Fiction I imagine all those Birkenstocked writers keying away on their laptops at tables in Starbucks without buying enough lattes need quite a bit of law enforcement.

9 Police*Colorado*Fiction
6 each for Texas and Alaska
Living in Texas, I would think we need lots more fictional police. It would take more than six just for the cheerleading squad scandal up the road in McKinney! Maybe we will make up for the shortage with Private investigators*Texas*Fiction.

5 for Virginia
4 each for Arkansas
3 for Oklahoma and Kansas
only 2 for Oregon, Ohio, and Iowa



As you stroll through the stacks remember the words of Sergeant Phil Esterhaus: Hey, let's be careful out there. You never know when you might need to rake some West Side Story lyrics out of your inner sand garden. I'm smiling at the memory of asking my mom, "What's a social disease?" I got the impression it was like sixth grade square-dancing in Phys. Ed. class with Brent, the boy with warts on his hand. That was better than breaking the pinata with Karen who needed twenty stitches after biting through her lower lip. Maybe the real mystery is how we all survive sixth grade!

ACTION Dear kindly Sergeant Krupke,
You gotta understand,
It's just our bringin' up-ke
That gets us out of hand.
Our mothers all are junkies,
Our fathers all are drunks.
Golly Moses, natcherly
we're punks!
ACTION AND JETS Gee, Officer Krupke,
we're very upset;
We never had the love that
ev'ry child oughta get.
We ain't no delinquents,
We're misunderstood.
Deep down inside us there is good!
ACTION There is good!
ALL There is good, there is good,
There is untapped good!
Like inside, the worst of us is good!
SNOWBOY: (Spoken) That's a touchin' good story.
ACTION: (Spoken) Lemme tell it to the world!
SNOWBOY: Just tell it to the judge.
ACTION Dear kindly Judge, your Honor,
My parents treat me rough.
With all their marijuana,
They won't give me a puff.
They didn't wanna have me,
But somehow I was had.
Leapin' lizards! That's why I'm so bad!
DIESEL: (As Judge) Right! Officer Krupke, you're really a square;
This boy don't need a judge, he needs an analyst's care!
It's just his neurosis that oughta be curbed.
He's psychologic'ly disturbed!
ACTION I'm disturbed!
JETS We're disturbed, we're disturbed,
We're the most disturbed,
Like we're psychologic'ly disturbed.
DIESEL: (Spoken, as Judge) In the opinion on this
court, this child is depraved on account he ain't had
a normal home.
ACTION: (Spoken) Hey, I'm depraved on account I'm deprived.
DIESEL: So take him to a headshrinker.
ACTION (Sings) My father is a bastard,
My ma's an S.O.B.
My grandpa's always plastered,
My grandma pushes tea.
My sister wears a mustache,
My brother wears a dress.
Goodness gracious, that's why I'm a mess!
A-RAB: (As Psychiatrist) Yes! Officer Krupke, you're really a slob.
This boy don't need a doctor, just a good honest job.
Society's played him a terrible trick,
And sociologic'ly he's sick!
ACTION I am sick!
ALL We are sick, we are sick,
We are sick, sick, sick,
Like we're sociologically sick!
A-RAB: In my opinion, this child don't need to have his head shrunk at all.
Juvenile delinquency is purely a social disease!
ACTION: Hey, I got a social disease!
A-RAB: So take him to a social worker!
ACTION Dear kindly social worker,
They say go earn a buck.
Like be a soda jerker,
Which means like be a schumck.
It's not I'm anti-social,
I'm only anti-work.
Gloryosky! That's why I'm a jerk!
BABY JOHN: (As Female Social Worker) Eek! Officer Krupke, you've done it again.
This boy don't need a job, he needs a year in the pen.
It ain't just a question of misunderstood;
Deep down inside him, he's no good!
ACTION I'm no good!
ALL We're no good, we're no good!
We're no earthly good,
Like the best of us is no damn good!
DIESEL (As Judge) The trouble is he's crazy.
A-RAB (As Psychiatrist) The trouble is he drinks.
BABY JOHN (As Female Social Worker) The trouble is he's lazy.
DIESEL The trouble is he stinks.
A-RAB The trouble is he's growing.
BABY JOHN The trouble is he's grown.
ALL Krupke, we got troubles of our own!
Gee, Officer Krupke,
We're down on our knees,
'Cause no one wants a fellow with a social disease.
Gee, Officer Krupke,
What are we to do?
Gee, Officer Krupke, Krup you!

L-RAT, the Bad Dreams Exam

Part One

1. Did you ever find, at an inopportune moment, that the sheet of dryer Bounce you didn't know was inside your clean slacks when you put them on in the morning had now worked its way down to the bottom of your pant leg and was hanging out looking ever so much like toilet paper? Oh, come on! Admit it.
2. How do you feel about rodents? (in 100 words or less)
3. It is the Super Bowl of the Animal Kingdom. The Rodents are playing the Reptiles. Who will you cheer on to victory and why? (100 word essay)

Part Two
Some children are traumatized by the death of Bambi's mother, the flying monkeys in the "Wizard of Oz", or pretty much the entire Disney "Pinocchio". Other children wait in dread for that scene in everybody's Christmas ballet favorite, "The Nutcracker", when THE MICE COME IN.

1. Do they ever get over it?
2. What would be a good age to introduce these classics to children, assuming that you actually like children?
3. What would be a good age to introduce these classics assuming you are the parent who has to get up in the night with children experiencing bad dreams?

Part Three

1. Did you see your first Indiana Jones movie before or after you read George Orwell's classic novel of totalitarianism, "1984"?
2. Did you actually read books in your high school English class, or did you watch videos?
3. Did you ever thank your English teachers for making you read those books that you swore were of absolutely no use in real life, but now come to mind far more often than Iron Butterfly's "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida"? It's not too late!
4. As a child, did you have a neighbor that you suspected of being the real farmer's wife who cut off the tails of the three blind mice?

Science Section

1. Why can't rats be more like lemmings? [Alas, lemmings don't really jump off cliffs.]
2. Where can a condominium complex rent a live rat snake? Herpe-Rent-All?
3. Will rat snakes also eat dachsunds and poodles if they get really hungry?
4. Is that a bad thing?
5. Do you remember when we had enough mental energy to worry about hantavirus back in the Nineties?
6. Should lab rats have to run through mazes, or should they get to drive in the HOV lane?

Arts and Literature

1. If the Pied Piper showed up in your neighborhood would you make him/her the Mayor?
2. Will Samuel Jackson star in the new film, "Rats on a Cruise", about a diabolical plot onboard a Disney cruise ship?
3. Would you put up with a few rats to sail with Captain Jack Sparrow?
4. What percentage of books in the children's room of your local public library are about rodents?*
5. Why did Jack put a sack of malt in his new-built house? What was he thinking??

Television Regulations
Many cable tv systems have a basic channel that is nothing but a camera on an aquarium of fish swimming around to music from a local radio station. This allows viewers to enjoy the sensation of being in their dentist's waiting room any hour of the day or night.

1. Should the FCC require cable systems to also offer a Habitrail hamster and gerbil channel with local radio traffic reports in the spirit of fair and balanced reporting?
2. Should there be a reality show based on Mother Goose rhymes? Seems like Simple Simon stepped right out of a Seinfeld episode.

So, there I was getting ready to board the airplane, but there was something inside the sleeve of my sweatshirt. I reached in to pull out the sheet of Bounce, but pulled out a mouse instead. There was more wiggling inside the sleeve near my elbow. It slowly worked its way to the cuff, revealing another mouse. I was unable to board the plane as I had to have the bites treated. Nevermind the part of the dream about my ex not allowing enough time to check in the rental car, speaking of rodents.
Since I was already sweaty after my dork walk through 2.8 miles of the neighborhood, I attacked the overgrown vegetation around my patio. The cannas, ivy, and myrtle groundcover have not been affected by our watering restrictions this dry summer. They grew as thick as ever, providing a shady, protected commute for rodents racing between one neighbor's dog food bowl and another's bird feeder. I haven't hand-watered out back since mid-July, but the cannas had more red blooms enticing more hummingbirds than usual. After the mice-in-the-sweatshirt dream, it was time to make the patio a more dangerous crossing for rodents. They can run, but they can't hide. Plus, it makes it easier to watch the lizards leaping from leaf to fence. Go, Reptiles, Go!
*Library Catalog Search Results
I used my public library keyword search with "juvenile" as the Keyword Anywhere, and the animal name as the Subject Keyword.
Juvenile + = 105373 titles (the maximum allowed by the catalog search)
Juvenile + Mice = 1207 titles
Juvenile + Mouse = 894
Juvenile + Rats = 173
Juvenile + Rat = 165
Juvenile + Hamster = 70
Juvenile + Gerbil = 23
Juvenile + Lemming = 6
Juvenile + Bears = 1721
Juvenile + Bear = 1497
Juvenile + Lion = 320
Juvenile + Fox = 440
Juvenile + Cat = 1518
Juvenile + Dog = 2108
Juvenile + Rabbit = 644
Juvenile + Rabbits = 894

Wasting away again in Bloggeritaville

The Dewey Decimal side of my brain craves subject classifications easily accessed for my blog (and every other blog in this great land of ours.)

The librarian is dead. Long live the librarian! It shouldn't be all that difficult to sort the blog, but I seem to be wandering about in the dark, musty, old stacks without my library card, instead of quickly downloading a free service and immediately bringing order out of chaos.

This Itty Bitty Blog will just have to keep flowing along in stream-of-conscious mode. I'm searching for my lost shaker of salt. I've wasted way too much time trying out Del.icio.us and Technorati Tags for subject classifications. There will be no frozen cataloging concoctions tonight. This blog will have to keep simmering in the primordial stew crockpot, much as it pains me. Jimmy Buffett must not have any librarian ancestors:

But there's booze in the blender
And soon it will render
That frozen concoction that helps me hang on

Wasting a day again in Bloggeritaville
Searching for my lost catalog cards
Grouping my little posts in tiny subject groups
I bjust know it shouldn't be all that hard

Vocabulary PLUS history and home ec. at no extra charge

These aren't exactly Thursday words because they don't come from my young students. I still rated them worthy of note:

Cosmellision specialists are the technicians who can make your automohicularvebile all dent-free and painted just as purdy and sparkly as your toenails at the salon after your car crash. I would never have known about the art and science of cosmellision if I hadn't watched the local television commercials in Lincoln, Nebraska.

In my family it is quite normal to be asked, "Was anyone else was hurt in that accident?," when you show up at the breakfast table with bad bedhead. Remember those ribcord bedspreads from the Sears & Roebuck catalog? Nothing like falling asleep and waking up with one cheek all striped!



It might be better to climb under the covers next time. As a kid I enjoyed going to bed between fresh, clean, stiff sheets that had dried outside on the clothesline. The very best were the pink sheets for the brass bed at Grandma's house.

Most of my art students have never seen a clothespin before, let alone smelled clothes, sheets, and towels dried "out on the line". Just saying those words brings the remembered fresh laundry scent to life in my memory. Research indicates that olfactory memories are both our earliest formed and our last lost in life. Olfactory memories are usually linked to emotional memories. The scent memory of the line-dried pink sheets at Grandma's house evokes a wonderful sense of being loved, cherished, connected to family and neighbors, and tuned into the constant buzz of insects outside the window screens.

To a cataloging library person, a SEE ALSO* reference is the gift of many new lamps for old. Maybe our most primitive brain functions as a SCENT ALSO reference linking good food and family memories at a level so deep we rarely realize the connections. That might be the power of steamy, savory aromas of our comfort foods. If we were under siege, the scent memory of a baked potato with butter, pepper, and garlic sour cream would make me feel safe.

A World Cup announcer informed me that one team was "under seizure". Sure hope he meant "under siege here"! Could be a case of SIEGE ALSO:

*In some cases, “See also” or “See” entries appear when you enter a search. You will most often get “see also” and “See” entries when you have entered a subject search. These entries refer to Subject Headings that help you find items of interest when there are many possible words or terms used for one topic or when the term you entered is not an official Library of Congress Subject Heading. A “See” is a heading actually used in a full record. Click on that heading to redirect your search. A “see also” is another heading used in full records for other titles that may be of interest. Click on that heading to execute the same search with this new search term.

It's been a long day. Think I'll have a baked potato with all the toppings, then crawl into bed.

Back to the Bible. O.T.

Back to the library. I've had the good fortune in my lack of fortune to spend several days working at my old library job unsnarling cataloging problems.

People have strange interests and hobbies. I don't understand train and plane spotting or coin collecting. Why someone would collect army tanks (fullsize) is beyond me. Ditto for climbing the highest peak on every continent, Star Trek conventions, and editing Wikipedia.

You will not understand why I enjoy library catalog snarls. Can't explain it myself, except that it uses perserverance, patience, and attention to detail that were rewarded traits in my formative years, along with big doses of bifocal squinting. Cataloging is probably equal parts of nature and nurture and nuttiness.

Cataloging is a very slow game in which the rules change slightly every ten to twenty years. All the participants realize they are tiny workers in the cosmic ant farm. When the Human Genome Project runs out of work, the scientists can search for the markers in classification strands and trace the origin of librarians. Are we all descended from the original Dewey in the Library of Eden (where everyone whispered and no one had sticky fingers)?

So this week I've been cleaning up the Bible. It's a bad job, but somebody's gotta do it, as Noah once said. You could high-center the Ark on the mountain of confusion in the catalog of your town public library's subject heading tangle of O.T. and Old Testament mired in obsolete computer subfields and codes.

The only snarl I can remember worse than Bible headings was A.S.T.M. Originally the American Society for Testing and Materials, now known as ASTM International, it's a voluntary standards development organization which has created thousands of standard test methods by which materials and produced items are tested and evaluated and compared. And I have to add that for each of those thousands of standard test methods there are hundreds of committees, subcommittees, conferences, monographs, and annual reports. Then there are the cross references that lead a searcher through the acronyms and name changes since 1898. All that's needed is the word "begat", and maybe the seven sacks for the seven wives met on the way to St. Ives. In the olden days just after the dinosaurs died out, I used to glare at the card catalog (now obsolete and sorely missed), and think A Serious Thorn in My (backside).

In my hospital volunteer "Candy Striping" days (C.S.D.), I got off work at seven p.m. Dad would pick me up, and about the time I climbed into the '54 Chevy, the peppy theme song for "Back To the Bible" would be playing on the radio. "Back To the Bible" was based in my hometown, and perhaps prepared me in some small measure for my future life in the fundamentalist Bible Belt. On lucky Wednesdays, Dad would drive me to King's for a burger and fries, or a tuna frenchee sandwich (a tuna salad sandwich battered and deep-fried in holy hot grease). All I can remember of the song is:

Back to the Bible
Back to the Bible
The wonderful word of the Lord

A word for today
and a word for tomorrow
The wonderful word of the Lord

Barbie was a Candy Striper. She never got old enough to be a Pink Lady. She never got the library bug, either.

Liska Lou's Luby's Blog

I've been craving an archives-by-categories subject menu for the Itty Bitty Blog like the one The Language Guy has, and several other blogs I read. I did manage to set up the reverse-archive-list-in-a-dropdown-menu blogger hack. [No applause, please, just throw money!] Reading about del.icio.us, and various methods of using it to create categories in Blogger is so Monty Python* it turned my brain to cranberry sauce. I did glean** that the first step is to decide what categories I want to create.

Ay, there's the rub. This blog after two and a half years is more a collage of different themes than ever. I'm a walking, talking, blogging Luby's LuAnn Platter--one entree, two sides, and a roll. You can order Teaching with sides of Politics and Empty-Nesting, or Empty-Nesting with sides of Happily Divorced and Opera, or Politics with sides of Condo-Ownership and Parenthood, Condo-Ownership with sides of Teaching and Song Lyrics, Childhood Memories on Toast with or without Trauma Sauce and Recipes, Student Quotes with Perpetual Cash-Flow Issues and a Hot Kiln, Menopause with sides of Exercise and Health Insurance, Health Insurance with extra Politics and Crawford Slaw, Recycling with Auto Repairs and Diebenkorn...

*"Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is surprise - surprise and fear... fear and surprise... our two weapons are fear and surprise - and ruthless efficiency... our three weapons are fear and surprise and ruthless efficiency and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.. our four... Amongst our weapons - amongst our weaponry - are such elements as fear, surprise... I'll come in again."

Speaking of cranberry sauce, just who does Ocean Spray think it is anyway!!?? I'm very ticked that it changed the cans for cranberry jelly so you can't open both the top and bottom ends to push the jelly out. That is so entirely wrong, unamerican, and not at all what God in all Her infinite wisdom intended. Ocean Spray has issued new instructions for opening the cans, but I'm still blaming it all on Halliburton.

**Glean what afflicts me. Question and answer: On this Thanksgiving I'm grateful that my high school English teacher assigned Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead back in 1972. It's been bringing me joy for thirty-two years, though it seems like yesterday.

Check the freshness date

I do so wish I'd discovered that the Anchored Nomad blogger was seeking photos of refrigerators (and written inventories) from around the globe before the project expired on Friday. It would have been a good incentive to do just a little tidying up before telling my fridge to smile and say "Cheese".

There's something fascinating about staring into an open refrigerator. Of course, I am a woman of a certain age, and this is Texas, so coooolness is the main attraction.

It's entertaining, too, to watch other people stare into a refrigerator. Are they making mental shopping lists or imagining what new casserole they might invent? My youngest stares like he's waiting for a fully formed meal to spring forward like Athena from Zeus' forehead, then he eventually grabs a DP and the salsa. My middle son actually pulls out every fresh fruit and veggie, deli meats, cheese, and condiments to make something really yummy for himself. My oldest stands there holding an open book in one hand until he completely forgets about eating and goes back to reading.

Anchored Nomad's contributors have given us the opportunity to stare as long as we want into strangers' fridges wondering if they are the type who would drink straight out of the milk carton or what's the occasion for all that champagne. When I finally pull myself away, it's with regret that I couldn't see inside the freezer compartments, then study the magnets and calendars on the fridge doors, too.

Some of the refrigerators are so organized that they remind me of model appliance demonstration kitchens at the gas or electric company headquarters or the county extension office. Some really suggest cultural differences. None suggest that children or teens live in the homes. Obviously, none are from Texas, because there's not a can of Dr. Pepper to be seen!

And let me just add, I'm jealous of the librarian who got to catalog the Frigidaire Collection at Kettering University in Flint, Michigan. What a cool job!


Also, in the what's-this-world-coming-to category, you can buy a retro 1950-look refrigerator with "21st century" technology inside for about four thousand dollars (free shipping, though). I'm not talking about the Sims game here.

My first house in Omaha had a genuine pink 1950 refrigerator as big as a tank with the freezer at the bottom. We called it Big Pink.

Lights out at the library

Dear librarians, friends, Deweys, Elsies, and alphabetically-ordered readers,

Went on a road trip yesterday to look at the University of Arkansas to see if it would be a good location for my youngest. He's planning to study photography, so we are looking for scenic locations as well as academics. Financial aid plays a big part in the search, too. Some of our drive from Dallas was quite lovely, and would be even more so a bit later in spring. After visiting the Fine Arts building we wandered around campus. We got to the main library at 6:05 on Friday evening, and IT WAS CLOSED. Steven looked at me stunned. What kind of university closes its library at six on Friday, he wondered??? What if he wanted to do some research?? What indeed? We stared at the posted regular hours. Ridiculous! We went back to the car disgusted, and drove all the way home instead of staying overnight. The most impressive sight on campus is the abundance of grey squirrels.


Mullins Library at the University of Arkansas has regular hours Mon.-Thurs. 7 a.m. to midnight, Fri. 7 a.m.-6 p.m., Sat. 9 a.m.-6 p.m. , Sun. noon-midnight. (100 hrs./wk.)

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Love Library is where I spent many of my lovely, yet chilly, library hours as a student, student employee, and full-time employee. I worked shifts late at night, on weekends, and even during winter breaks with barely enough heat to keep the pipes from freezing. I do understand that library budgets shrink, costs rise, and hours have to be adjusted to meet usage. Love's regular hours are 8 a.m.-midnight on M-Th, 8 a.m.-8 p.m. Fridays, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturdays (even during Cornhusker home football games), and noon-midnight Sundays. (96 hrs./wk.)


Down in Austin at UT, the main Perry-Castaneda Library is open 122 hrs./wk. (M-Th 7 a.m.-2 a.m., Fridays 7 a.m.-midnight, Saturdays 9 a.m.-midnight, and Sundays noon-2 a.m.

Out in Lubbock at Texas Tech the University Library is available for use M-Th 7 a.m.-2 a.m., Fri. 7 a.m.-11 p.m., Sat. 10 a.m.-11 p.m., and Sun. 10 a.m.-2 a.m. (121 hrs./wk.) I hope my middle son is using those hours wisely!


My eldest son is in grad school at the University of Indiana-Bloomington. The Main Library has hours M-Th 8 a.m.-midnight, Fri. 8 a.m.-9 p.m., Sat. 10 a.m.-9 p.m., and Sun. 11 a.m.-midnight. That's 101 hrs./wk.


The Zimmerman Library at University of New Mexico in Albuquerque with its fine old reading room is open 100 hrs./wk.: M-Th. 8 a.m.-midnight, Fridays 8 a.m.-9 p.m., Saturdays 9 a.m.-6 p.m., and 10 a.m.-midnight Sundays.

Near the fourth floor elevators of the University Library of Arizona in Tucson you will see the old author/title card catalog which contains the catalog cards for books cataloged prior to 1984. After 1984 all cataloging was entered into the online catalog. It makes me sad for the good old days adding and withdrawing cards in UNL's wooden drawers. My right index finger still feels the drawer pull nearly thirty years after my filing career began.

I could gaze at the old wooden card catalog 142 hrs./wk. if I were a U Arizona student or faculty member. The library is open 24 hrs. a day M-Th, closes at 9 p.m. Fridays, has Saturday hours 9 a.m.-9 p.m., and opens at 11 a.m. Sunday. A student could sleep like Rip Van Winkle in a library carrel from 11 a.m. Sunday until 9 p.m. Friday. Maybe that room in the dorm isn't really necessary!