mmm hmm

A few minutes ago I was walking upstairs to drop off a couple book orders. Two male students were walking a few steps ahead of me and were also heading for the second floor. When they reached the landing, the one on the left opened the door, and the one on the right stepped aside so that I could walk through first between them.

As I walk between them, the one on the right says, "Mmm hmm, now that's a hot librarian," as if I'm deaf and can't hear them.

I look at him with I would imagine a bit of an incredulous look on my face. He says, "No offense or anything. I'm just sayin' ..."

I just kind of waved it off and went on my way, but seriously?!? Rude, offensive, and inappropriate all spring to mind to describe my feelings about this. Someone never learned about manners and appropriate public behavior.

Sigh.

student journalism strikes again

Having spent four years working at The Volante as an undergraduate, I have a certain affection for student newspapers in a very vague, general sense. I also tend to be highly critical of them. I know how important that experience can be for an aspiring young journalist, but I also know how crucial it is for them to learn certain lessons early on in the game.

Lesson 1: Do your homework before showing up to the interview. Even if you just received the assignment 45 minutes ago and are on a tight deadline, have a list of questions to bring with you. Do a little preliminary research. Your interviewee will respect you more and likely give you more information if you appear to know what you're talking about.

Lesson 2: Ask permission prior to recording someone. Your source may have reasons for not wanting to be recorded. Plus, recording may be prohibited in certain locations.

Lesson 3: Get the facts right. Yes, it matters if little details are correct in your story. Your credibility as a journalist and that of your newspaper depend upon it. Fact check, fact check, fact check!

Lesson 4: Get your sources' names right. This is certainly related to lesson 3 and is just as important. No one likes to see their name mangled, no matter how difficult it is to spell, so show your sources the courtesy of spelling theirs correctly.

Thus ends our journalism lesson for the day.

Sorry, an article just came out in The Breeze, our student paper, about the banned book reading that I planned and hosted in the library last week. Said aspiring journalist either forgot or never learned the above lessons. The interview was so poorly executed it was comic. The article said the reading was on Thursday when it was on Wednesday (he even attended it, so he should have known that).

But my favorite part is that from the article, I learned that my name is actually "Michelle Van Vurren." I'm so glad to know that. I'll have to correct my business cards and e-mail signature. How intuitive of him to discern the proper spelling and first name when the card I gave him and the e-mails I sent him contained such erroneous information. Silly me.

Said article may be read here: http://breezejmu.org/2009/10/05/printed-controversies/

signs of the semester break

The students have cleared out as finals week has drawn to a close. The students who filled every nook of the building earlier this week have dispersed for other places as they each finished their final paper, project, or exam. And in their stead we are left with the following:

* Two white Rastafarian wannabes with crazy dredlocks
* A handful of students frantically trying to finish that last paper before 5 p.m. (tick tock, tick tock)
* One middle-aged man watching porn films on one of the reference computers

The end of the semester is upon us.

sigh

Yesterday a student literally shoved the table I was eating lunch at a good 6 inches when he hit it with his bicycle. He had ridden his bike down a set of stairs, cut in to close to the table, and almost face planted into the sidewalk. He was fine and just laughed it off and rode off without a word of apology.

Today I had to say something to a student (or possibly townie) who was watching porn on one of the library computers. Yes, libraries are all for free speech and all that, but seriously, that's not exactly an appropriate use of the library's computers. And of course he and his buddies thought it was hilarious that they were caught.

Sigh.

Repeat after me: I'm so excited the students are coming back. I'm so excited the students are coming back. I'm so excited...

poor me (not really)

I haven't completely disappeared from the face of the planet. Not yet at least... Classes started again last week Monday, and I've been just slightly swamped at work ever since. I'm expecting things to calm down a bit after this week. No, I don't want to teach 6 instruction sessions each and every week, thankyouverymuch.

Truth be told, I'm glad the students and faculty are back. They provide an energy and diversion that are really missing in the summer months. Librarianship is much less rewarding when there's no one around to use the collections and need research assistance.

caution: construction underway

This summer I work in the middle of a construction zone. Campus is virtually littered with jack hammers, dynamite (more on that later), heavy equipment, and construction workers.

Right outside the front entrance to the library, they've decided to repave the pedestrian mall. I'm sure it will be very lovely when they're done, but until then they've made it so difficult to find the entrance to the building that our number one question phone these days is "How on earth do you get into the library?" There's just one little, tiny walkway they've left open so that people can get into the front entrance. It's lined with orange netting and honestly doesn't really look that inviting. Plus, there are always about 10 to 15 construction workers just sitting around doing nothing but watch people who walk in and out of the library.

The other major construction project is that they've decided to lower the Quad and dig a tunnel under Main Street to connect two parts of campus. Also, they're trying to make it safer for pedestrians. Evidently several pedestrians have died while jaywalking in this particular spot. They used to have a crosswalk there, but the locals complained that it slowed down traffic.

So now instead of doing something simple, like putting in a crosswalk, they're literally blasting a tunnel under the street. I'm convinced it would be more cost-effective, easier, and less time consuming to build a walkway over the street, but that's now to be... For a while there were blasting zone signs posted around that part of campus as they were using dynamite (or some other explosive) to blast through the rock.

Oh, and did I mention that to accommodate all this construction (they're also renovating the classroom building next to the library) they've taken over all of the parking lots anywhere near the library. So I usually end up parking in the lot across Main Street (yes, by the blasting zone) and jaywalking. Funny how that happens.

For a while all of the major roads between my apartment and campus were also torn up for resurfacing. My entire route to work--both by car and on foot--was under construction. Ridiculous. Do they not want me to go to work? Because it's hard to imagine how they could have made it more difficult. I'll take time off if you really don't want to be at work, and I won't even complain. Promise ;)