Library Day in the Life - Day 5

Friday, July 31, 2009

6:30am: Wake up. Shower, prepare lunch and thermos of coffee, give cat small amount of milk as treat and appeasement for the upcoming daily abandonment. Grab granola bar for breakfast (still wary of opening cereal after the ant incident earlier this week). Take trolley into work (rain and I don't feel like biking in it).

8:10am: Arrive at work.

8:13am: Login to work network. Login to email, calendar, other various and sundry programs. Open up Voyager cataloging and acquisitions modules and OCLC Connexion. Check voice-mail (blinking light). Staff person out sick today. Make note on calendar and update HR spreadsheet accordingly. Other staff person on vacation. Looks like it's just me today. Pour coffee.

8:23am: Email. Forward and respond to necessary messages. Catch up on news feeds, Tweets (TweetDeck FTW!), work email listservs. Scan subjects and then delete mass numbers of listserv messages. Start this post.

9:00am: Gave tour of library, had coffee, and chatted with a representative from my library school. Nice break to walk around and just talk about where I work and the kinds of things we're doing here.

10:51am: Back at desk. Check email.

11:23am: Editing and finishing my ALA reports. Must be done by the end of the day today.

11:36am: Look into question from colleague about if something is a title change or not. Yes, in fact, it is. Sigh. Means more work to do for both her and me.

11:47am: Back to editing my reports. Can you tell I can only focus for short periods before I have to take a brief break?

1:02pm: Lunch break. Nearly done with first report (lordy there was a lot of information in that session!), only 6 more to finish! But need to refuel.

1:39pm: Update my Remember the Milk: complete tasks, add new ones. Read comics.

1:58pm: Finish eating. Back to report editing. Wondering how I'll get them all done today. My rough drafts were really really rough this time and it's taking much longer than I expected to make them reader-worthy.

2:46pm: Finish second report. Check email. w00t! Email that we can extend my intern's appointment until the end of the month so she can finish her project!! That means we won't have to distribute the bits to various people for completion since she'll have the time to do it! YAY! And I do a happy dance in my chair like the dork I know I am.

2:56pm: Start on editing next report.

4:16pm: Finish third report with a few interruptions during editing by IM chats with colleagues. Send first three off to colleague for next round of editing before publishing and let him know the remaining three will be in his inbox Monday morning. I will have to clean up the remaining rough drafts over the weekend.

4:23pm: Last review of email and deletion of various listserv messages. Log off of various and sundry programs. Schedule the publishing of this post. Shut down (restart) computer. Pack up. Pouring nasty rain. Accept fact that I will be completely soaked even if I take the trolley home just by walking out the door and across the street. Head home anyway, hoping to not discover more wet apartment flooding woes when I get there.

UPDATE (5:39pm): Arrive home, shoes completely soaked through. Inspect apartment. Absolutely NO FLOODING/LEAKS!! w00t!! My apartment is dry. Relief! And bonus, the rain really cooled down the humid heat. :)

Library Day in the Life - Day 4

Thursday, July 30, 2009

6:30am: Wake up. Shower, prepare lunch and thermos of coffee, give cat small amount of milk as treat and appeasement for the upcoming daily abandonment. Take trolley to work since I left my bike there last night due to weather.

8:02am: Arrive at work.

8:07am: Login to work network. Login to email, calendar, other various and sundry programs. Open up Voyager cataloging and acquisitions modules and OCLC Connexion. Check to-do list made yesterday before I left. Check daily calendar and remember that I am doing some hands-on training for staff this morning (yay for calendars...if it isn't written down it doesn't exist!). Realize I forgot granola bar breakfast (*&%#@!). Go through stash in desk to find something to eat for breakfast. Decide on honey-sesame almonds and raisins.

8:13am: Check in with staff person. Remind her that the training is this morning, bring her handout, and it's starts at 9:30am.

8:15am: Read email. Forward and respond to necessary messages. Finally get around to pouring coffee from thermos and drinking it. Catch up on news feeds, Tweets (TweetDeck FTW!), work email listservs. Scan subjects and then delete mass numbers of listserv messages. Start this post.

8:43am: Pull up file of records our system kicked back into an error file during a MARC record set load. There's only 5 of them. Decide to load records individually and notify Metadata Specialist. Find titles in OCLC, import into our system. Done. Send email to Metadata Specialist with the system IDs.

9:01am: Pull out training materials for session this morning. Review my notes. All I need now is the login information for the machines in the electronic classroom from our tech people so we can access the library staff software on them. Serials Librarian opens chat with me and tells me he still has code we used last time...hmm...decide to test and hopefully it will work.

9:15am: Find 4 computers where we can log on and use the catalog! w00t! We got "run time" errors on the others. Still, four out of 16, while not great, are enough to do the training session. No more postponing!

9:30am: Hands-on training session for staff on how to search our local system more effectively. Stress that they must always do more than one type of search for a journal in our catalog - giving up after one search is NOT an option due to issues with how current our records are, typos, search errors on the part of the user, etc. End with a discussion with staff about online versus print, ISSNs and other fun serials related peculiarities.

11:18am: Return to desk. Check email. Check in with staff and answer questions about ebook records and duplicates in OCLC (the provider neutral record won't be implemented until Aug. 3rd). She gives me a large stack of duplicate ebook records in WorldCat (same vendor, 2 records) to report for de-duplication. Other staff person gives me several print titles that need help via CONSER work. My staff are trying to bury me in paper, clearly.

11:57am: Back to reviewing my intern's original cataloging serial records. Must. Finish. Today.

12:07pm: Draw on khaki pants with red pen. *%$@#! Find Tide-to-go pen in my desk drawer and use. Red ink gone! [Note: I spill things on myself regularly enough that I have a Tide-to-go pen stashed in multiple places at work, in my bag, and at home. And quit laughing. They work.]

12:08pm: Back to reviewing.

12:38pm: Quick break to walk the printout from OCLC for a title I want over to the Monographic Acquisitions librarian. Ask nicely. She agrees to order it. No arguing or temper tantrum on my part needed! She also promises to hand deliver my copy of Notes for Serials Cataloging, 3rd ed. (edited by friends/colleagues of mine!) to my desk when it arrives. w00t!

12:48pm: Back to desk and reviewing. Realize I need to eat lunch soon...right after I finish this stack.

1:08pm: Finish stack. Return to intern for corrections and final processing. She gives me back a whole new set of titles for review. Will tackle those tomorrow.

1:11pm: Lunch. HUNGRY. Also, need coffees. Go outside to find iced coffee. Hello, humid Philly summer. Think my hair grew outwards a good two inches in frizz during the 1 block walk to *bucks.

2:16pm: Settle in for an afternoon of report writing with an iced coffee and my iPod (to block out the mumble-grumbles from my neighbors in cube land). On tap: ALA reports, Committee reports, and a letter of recommendation for a colleague. Periodically checking on HandHeld Librarian Online Conference tweets via TweetDeck (tag = #hhlib). Technology problems mean I couldn't get a connection to participate in the online conference if I wanted too...so I'm monitoring instead and will track down presentations if anything seems applicable to my job. Also engage in amusing twitter conversation regarding difficulties of explaining RDA and the impact that may have on training. And yes, I said amusing. Really. We're thinking RDA shouldn't be a text, but rather in picture-dictionary style. The text is too confusing.

3:16pm: Take break and visit Serials Librarian in his office to discuss withdrawing of a large number of back issues of cataloging journals (online now) and the next steps in staff training follow up on searching the catalog more effectively/accurately.

3:32pm: Return to desk and writing.

4:01pm: Check in with colleague about a project I'm giving to one of his staff people. Am given go ahead to send her the spreadsheet and instructions. w00t! Have him read over and edit the recommendation I'm writing. He offers several excellent suggestions for clarification/enhancement of my letter.

4:13pm: Back to desk to finish up letter of recommendation.

4:37pm: Recommendation for colleague done and submitted (after a few error messages when attempting to upload a .doc file, I finally just copy and paste into the box on the screen instead of uploading). Email copy of recommendation to colleague for her records. First drafts of ALA reports done. Will review/revise drafts tomorrow morning and send them to colleague for possible publication.

4:50pm: Update to-do list for tomorrow (does it ever get shorter? apparently not!). Update/sync desktop work calendar with online Google calendar. Last review of email and deletion of various listserv messages.

5:16pm: Log off of various and sundry programs. Schedule the publishing of this post. Shut down (restart) computer. Pack up. Bike home in awful humid Philly summer heat.

Library Day in the Life - Day 3

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

7:35am: Wake up. Alarm still going off. LATE!! *%$#@ neighbor boys were moving furniture out of their apartment at midnight last night and woke me up with they dropped the couch outside my bedroom window (with much cursing and loud banging, of course). Didn't get back to sleep for sometime and clearly didn't wake up to my alarm when it went off at 6:30am. Shower, prepare lunch and thermos of coffee, give cat small amount of milk as treat and appeasement for the upcoming daily abandonment. Grab granola bar for breakfast (to be eaten once I get to work) and ride my bike into work.

8:25am: Arrive at work. Run into staff that arrives early while locking my bike up as she's on her way to her weekly shift at the Information Desk (a directional desk located by the library entrance).

8:30am: Login to work network. Login to email, calendar, other various and sundry programs. Open up Voyager cataloging and acquisitions modules and OCLC Connexion. Check to-do list made yesterday before I left. Debate eating key lime cookies (a gift from my staff person who was on vacation last week) for breakfast. Decide to be good and eat granola bar.

8:50am: Read email. Forward and respond to necessary messages. Finally get around to pouring coffee from thermos and drinking it. Adrenaline from bike ride wearing off and need to caffeinate appears. Catch up on news feeds, Tweets (TweetDeck FTW!), work email listservs. Scan subjects and then delete mass numbers of listserv messages. Start this post.

9:21am: Check in with second staff person who just arrived. Turns out she was out because she had to put her cat to sleep...I nearly start crying for her (the pain of losing my dog in early June is still pretty fresh).

9:30am: Back to email. Catch up on messages and create new email folder for a semi-new project I got roped into courtesy of the decision by collection development to participate in a cooperative print preservation project. And what do you know...they need input from tech services, specifically the serials cataloger about bibliographic and holdings records fields for containing preservation decisions. We're now onto phase 2; I commented on phase 1 and thought we were done. Apparently not. This is a "short term" project (this phase to be completed by December). I have no doubt we'll have a phase 3.

9:50am: Sort through folders on my desk, separate into "committee/project" pile, "daily work" pile, and "library/department" pile. Put appropriate folders into vertical rack. Realize folder for electronic resources record sets is large and unwieldy and needs to divided into sub-folders for various vendors/collections. Will tackle that monster later.

10:05am: Asked about withdrawing entire print run of several cataloging/tech services related journals by librarian head of original cataloging. We have a procedure for this. Explain procedure. Make note to discuss stamping of issues and physical removal with Serials Librarian and/or librarian head of Quality Management.

10:19am: Return to reviewing my intern's original cataloging serial records.

10:55am: Chat with a friend who shared some very exciting news. Congratulations!! (And no, I can't be any more specific than that.)

11:00am: Respond to email from librarian in charge of copy cataloging regarding the electronic series my intern has been working on. Meeting about the process and the impact of the provider-neutral e-monograph record (to be implemented August 1st, PDF of final report) will happen early next week.

11:08am: Drop off information about a class separately publication (i.e. analytic) with the Serials Librarian so appropriate notes about treatment can be added to the serial record.

11:18am: Meet with intern. Review stacks of problems/questions/issues remaining on her desk. Promise to have all the original records reviewed and returned to her by end of day today so she can process/finish them tomorrow.

12:02pm: Return to desk. Check voicemail (blinking light on phone). Message from Hebrew cataloging librarian looking for documentation. Return call. Walk her through webpages via phone to documentation. Also discuss current stack of serials in Hebrew script she has that need to be processed. Some are fine, some need edits. Determine plan of attack. She'll email me when they're ready for me to process.

12:09pm: Check email. Respond to a few emails that had quick-answer questions.

12:19pm: Read email with weird ISSN problem described. Sigh deeply as I realize I just finished updating that title recently and the ISSNs and cataloging are correct. Respond to email explaining how ISSN work and that each serial title gets a unique ISSN and in this case the publisher just hasn't caught up and has printed the previous title's ISSN on the new title in error. Also explain why we don't use non-English language cataloging records and that the Dutch language record in this case has the wrong ISSN b/c I checked with the ISSN Center. Assure him the cataloging in our local catalog is correct, nothing to see here, please move along and keep your hands and feet away from the edge of the path at all times.

12:43pm: Lunch. It's Wednesday which means there's a small farmers' market on campus 1/2 a block from the library. One stand is for the "fruit guys" who typically have fantastic fruit. Decide I need to go find out what they have. And get a whoopie pie from the Amish stand for dessert. Yum.

1:12pm: Return from farmers' market. New farm stand and they were selling giant cucumbers at 3 for $1. Purchase three with plans to make my grandmother's cucumber-dill salad this weekend. Get plums from the fruit guys. And then tragedy! No chocolate whoopie pies! Only pumpkin. But I want chocolate. So I am forced, forced I tell you, to purchase a slice of chocolate-raspberry cake instead. I ignore my mother's voice in my head to eat dessert first and am good and eat my fruit and tuna-green bean salad first. I even split the rather large slice of cake with my pregnant colleague (feed the pregnant lady...for your own safety and the safety of all your colleagues/friends, trust me).

1:29pm: Finish lunch, check, respond, forward emails.

2:09pm: Realize I'm a doofus and forgot to change my GTalk status. Apparently I'm still at lunch. Oops.

2:10pm: Return to reviewing intern's original cataloging serial records.

2:12pm: Colleague stops by to express his regret that he will not be able to attend the Supervisors' Group meeting this afternoon. *smack forehead* Profusely thank him for telling me because it reminded me of the meeting. A meeting for a group I'm chair of and have to run. Hurriedly print out various documentation for the meeting and review notes. Fortunately our head of library HR and I meet regularly to plan the agenda for these meetings ahead of time. Today we're facilitating a discussion on the University's computing policy.

2:20pm: Leave desk to go unlock door and fire up computer for meeting. Bring up various online documents for discussion.

4:10pm: Supervisors' meeting over. Shut down computer and lock up meeting room. Return to desk. Good discussion on creating a "best practices" document for all staff covering use of computer workstations in the library to supplement the University's computing policy.

4:15pm: Check email. Brief discussion with tech services Director about use of development server by bibliographers to preview the electronic resource record set loads. Also inquire about extending my intern by a few weeks to complete her project. Get go ahead to ask HR about intern policies. Promptly send email to person in HR.

4:31pm: Update calendar. Schedule 2 planning meetings for August Supervisors' Group meeting. Sync work desktop calendar with Google calendar (it's a manual thing...no auto-sync yet!).

4:57pm: Update to-do list for tomorrow. Last review of email and deletion of various listserv messages. Log off of various and sundry programs. Schedule the publishing of this post. Shut down (restart) computer. Pack up. Look outside and made decision based on nasty rainstorm to take the trolley home. Bike can have a sleepover in the library (we have a bike rack in the staff area so it's secure). Leave work.

Library Day in the Life - Day 2

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

6:30am: Wake up a little on the late side. Shower, prepare lunch and thermos of coffee, give cat small amount of milk as treat and appeasement for the upcoming daily abandonment.

7:15am: Eating my cereal. Discover ant carcass floating in milk. Feel nauseous. Throw out cereal in bowl and remaining cereal in tupperware container (can ants really get into tupperware?!?). Opt for granola bar instead.

7:45am: Biking to work. At one point, going uphill, a cab passes me, then abruptly turns on hazard lights and starts to pull in front of me less than 10 feet away. PANIC. I brake hard, making my brakes squeal and leaving a skid mark with my rear tire(again, going uphill), and scream/curse at him. He quickly pulls away and speeds to the next light. I catch up at the light, look at him through his open window and say "SERIOUSLY, dude?!?". He shrugs. What the &*$#@ does a shrug mean?

7:58am: Arrive at work. Slightly sweaty from humidity and very very annoyed and slightly shaky from cab incident. Not a good way to start the day.

8:00am: Login to work network. Login to email, calendar, other various and sundry programs. Open up Voyager cataloging and acquisitions modules and OCLC Connexion. Make to-do list. Check in with staff that arrives early. Check voice-mail (blinking light). Other staff person out sick today. Make note on calendar and update HR spreadsheet accordingly.

8:20am: Read email. Forward and respond to necessary messages. Curse when discover that a colleague ignored my request to send all emails to a particular vendor through me as we work to resolve a problem. He sent his own message without notifying me first. Grrrr. Send polite email reiterating request that all communications regarding catalog records for that collection are sent through me to prevent duplicating information.

8:40am: Finally get around to pouring coffee from thermos and drinking it. Adrenaline from bike ride wearing off and need to caffeinate appears. Catch up on news feeds, Tweets (TweetDeck FTW!), work email listservs. Scan subjects and then delete mass numbers of listserv messages.

9:00-10:00am: Meet with Rare Books Cataloging Librarian to discuss a plan for addressing rare serials in collections and up in rare books stacks. Starting with an existing project as a test case. Will start training staff on what a serial record is and recognizing good copy next week. Later I'll train her on editing existing copy and eventually basic original cataloging.

10:15am: Oh look! A locally done latest entry catalog record sent to me by the Serials Librarian for updating/splitting into successive entry. And even better, it has a title of "Journal". Yup, just "Journal" in the 245. That's helpful (NOT). Print out bib record and give to staff person to update/fix. Fortunately, record in OCLC is for successive entry...apparently we invented the need for latest entry on this title locally. Fabulous.

10:30am: Take some time to read the comments on the ALA Connect Event Planner survey post and then add my own comments. Have ALA Connect and the Event Planner talk to each other and pre-populate my calendar with required meetings at conferences? YES PLEASE!

10:45am: Install the Voyager development clients, AGAIN. First install (done several weeks ago) seems to be borked. Delete old clients. Find instructions/link email to reinstall. Test...and it works!

11:10am: Start reviewing problems associated with record set loaded into development server for testing by Metadata Specialist. She also sent an email highlighting some of the obvious issues. Problems include: URL problems (what?), record merges (hmm...) and general mayhem/weirdness. Compile email to Metadata Specialist as I identify and find solutions to various issues.

12:45pm: Send completed email response to Metadata Specialist with instructions how to fix some of said problems. Others, unfortunately, will have to be fixed by hand (including 16 problem URLs with no conceivable reason for existing).

12:46pm: New email from "fixopac" that an ebook is not actually available in the collection it says it is. Detective work needed. URL in record actually points to a completely different title in the collection that's not in our catalog. The title in our catalog isn't on our custom collection title list on the website. Clearly we have an issue and need to reconcile the records in the catalog with the custom title list maintained by bibliographers. Forward email to bibliographer in charge of custom collection title list for clarification: which title are we supposed to have?

1:05pm: Response by colleague to earlier email from Director of tech services that no one has responded to her request to lead a training for tech services department staff on the University's online email client. Colleague has volunteered himself and yours truly. Training set for end of August. Now must find tutorials and teach myself webmail (in depth...I can use it, but I don't use it regularly) so I can teach others.

1:12pm: LUNCH. OMG hungry. Also, need to seek out soda or other caffeinated beverage. Catch up on feeds, Facebook, and other social networking stuff while eating. Also, read comics. Visited by and received grief from the building manager (no clear reason why other than he felt like it - word to the wise, make friends with the building manager where ever you work, it will be to your benefit, grief from said building manager is an extra bonus). Confirmed dinner plans with friend at the Indian place near us both (it's Dining Days - price fixed meals at restaurants in my neighborhood!).

1:45pm: Colleague stops by with idea for webmail training for tech services staff. Do a staff survey (SurveyMonkey?) to find out what exactly they want info about so we know how to target our training session.

1:58pm: Finish lunch. Check email.

2:08pm: Staff person informs me she was stuck in the elevator. We have three elevators at this end of the building. Right now one is completely out of service, one works (but takes forever), and the third is erratic. It's elevator roulette in the library! Good times.

2:12pm: Going in search of caffeine as I didn't go during my lunch. Give colleague grief that it's his fault since he stopped by to chat about training while I was noshing.

2:20pm: Find email I thought I had sent to vendor, and told bibliographer I had sent to vendor (which the bibliographer sent email supposedly duplicated), sitting in drafts folder. Send mea culpa email to bibliographer. Edit email to vendor so as to not duplicate what bibliographer sent, as well as answer other vendor questions. Sigh. And grrr at my sieve-for-brains self. Actually SEND email at end of day this time.

2:51pm: Email technology department inquiring about login and password combo for electronic classroom computers that will allow the Serials Librarian and I to do some Voyager training for staff on Thursday morning. There's a separate/different login needed to access library staff programs (like the catalog) on those computers as they are generally used for bibliographic instruction sessions for students. However, it is the only classroom of computers in the building so we also have to use it for hands-on staff training on various library programs.

3:00pm: Begin reviewing intern's original cataloging serial records again. Must. Finish. Today. My intern's last day of work is this coming Tuesday. OMG PANIC. I thought I had her until mid-August!! How I am going to suddenly absorb 20 more hours worth of work into my already full days is a complete mystery.

3:05pm: Realize that a colleague needs to prep her staff to take over cataloging of an online book collection my intern has been doing (no set of records available for download/purchase, so must be done by hand individually). Email to colleague in charge of copy cataloging, reminding her that my intern is leaving and that someone in her department needs to be lined up to take on the individual title by title cataloging of an ebook collection we subscribe to via new-title alerts from vendor.

3:08pm: Back to reviewing my intern's original cataloging.

3:25pm: Break to check email, Facebook, TweetDeck, etc.

3:35pm: Back to reviewing my intern's original cataloging.

4:24pm: Submit single ISSN record upgrade information to the ISSN Center webform.

4:30pm: Give up on reviewing for the day. Will finish in the morning before I meet with my intern at 11am. Yet another day taken over by electronic resource issues.

4:37pm: Brief chat with dinner friend about pre-dinner beers at Local 44. I'm so in. Beers at 5:30pm, dinner at Desi Village at 6:30pm, and roasted peach ice cream for dessert at my place. Oh yeah. Happy foodie librarian!

4:45pm: Update to-do list for tomorrow. Last review of email and deletion of various listserv messages. Log off of various and sundry programs. Publish this post. Shut down (restart) computer. Pack up and leave work. Bike home to drop off bike before the food and fun activities of the evening begin.

A new and car-light approach to shopping

Not using my car has caused me to change the way I shop for pretty much everything.

Before I used to make lots of trips, going to whatever store I needed on any given day. I didn't think twice about running to a store one night, and then the next night driving back to the same shopping area for another errand (either to the same place or one nearby). Each store was viewed as a separate element.

Not so anymore. For example, now my food shopping trips are smaller, more frequent. I also buy less and smaller sizes knowing I have to carry it home myself. I still do the "stocking up" kind of shopping, but in smaller batches. I'll stock up on pasta one trip, and on cereal/grains the next time. It's just more staggered now.

I'm also doing my grocery shopping in different places, places closer to home or convenient to biking/public transit. I do the bulk of my fresh fruit and vegetable shopping at the farmers' market, which is walking distance from home. Things I can't get there (admittedly, there's not much...I even get beans, pasta, milk, meat, cheese and yogurt at the Clark Park farmers' market because it's all kinds of awesome), I get from my neighborhood store (biking and walking distance!) or by taking the trolley down to Trader Joe's.

It's actually impacting my approach to eating as well. It's no longer easy to stock up on frozen meals/ice-cream/anything (they'd never make it home in the humid Philly summer heat!), so I'm being forced to eat only fresh or make my own frozen meals. Refrigerated goods travel in a soft sided insulated bag. I talked about the general shift I've made to eating fresh foods in this post, but the having to make changes to how and when I shop has only solidified my shift to primarily fresh and homemade foods. Ice cream I'm making myself, thanks to the Christmas gift from my grandmother of the ice cream bowl for my KitchenAid stand mixer (which rocks, FYI). Frozen dinners are now portioned out and frozen servings of homemade soups, stews and other meals. And believe you me, it all tastes SO much better when it's homemade.

Frankly, shifting the way I shop for food was easy. I was already half way there thanks to my CSA (I signed up for a summer 1/2 share) and the close proximity of the farmers' market.

The challenges I'm finding to this new approach to shopping are things that I have to buy in larger quantities, such as cat litter, and bulky items, such as paper towels. I'm also having to plan trips more. No longer am I running to the same shopping area more than once in a week. Now I'm waiting until I have a major list of things before I hit the stores. Now I'm planning so I go to multiple places at once. And making lists so I don't forget anything. There's no just hopping back in the car to retrieve what I forgot. Shopping trips are no longer viewed as a individual elements (each store individually), but rather one big trip with multiple pieces.

I'm coming up on the need to run errands for cat food, cat litter, and other such items that require a trip farther away than my bike can take me (and for not really bike friendly purchases) and not really accessible by public transit. Since I've never done this before, I'm planning my trip for Sunday and will most likely grossly overestimate the amount of time I'll need. Ah well. It's a learning process, right?

Library Day in the Life - Day 1

So I'm going to see if I can actually manage to do this: http://librarydayinthelife.pbworks.com/

I'm slightly afraid as to what my days will look like all delineated out as it may reveal the complete disorganization my days and weeks frequently consist of. Not to mention this week is a "meeting-lite" week and my boss is on vacation so it's a bit out of the ordinary. Oh well, here goes!

Monday, July 27th, 2009

6am: Wake up. Curse humidity (hello typical humid Philly summer, sarcasm nice for you to have decided to visit us this year /sarcasm). Shower, breakfast, prepare lunch and thermos of coffee, give cat small amount of milk as treat and appeasement for the upcoming daily abandonment. Take trolley to work instead of bike so I can run by Trader Joe's after work.

8am: Arrive and login to work network. Login to email, calendar, other various and sundry programs. Open up Voyager cataloging and acquisitions modules and OCLC Connexion. Drink coffee. Make to-do list.

8:20am-9:30am: Read email. Forward and respond to necessary messages. Scan subjects and then delete mass numbers of listserv messages.

8:00ish and again at 9:15ish: Check-in/chat with staff. One works 7am-2:30pm and the other 9:15am-5:15pm. I work 8am-4pm (OK...I never leave at 4pm, usually 4:30 or 5pm) to overlap as much as possible with both of them.

9:20am: Yogurt and granola snack while finishing the email listserv scan. Find something interesting to forward to other librarians at my institution. Also forward a job posting to my intern.

9:30am: Begin analysis of various purchased sets of MARC records for electronic resources. All record sets must be analyzed before loading them into our catalog to make sure that a) we're getting what we're supposed to/paid for and b) they won't make the catalog blow up. Typical problems include: URL issues (incorrect or missing URLs - gah!), MARC coding validation issues (I love finding seriously legacy MARC coding in record sets from vendors. Sorry...that field is no longer valid. Try again.), and authority headings validation issues.

Create detailed list of notes for each set, including, but not limited to, determining an unique alphanumeric code to find the set easily in our 4-million-records-plus catalog in the future (for maintenance or deletion if needed), and the various and sundry edits and changes that need to happen so the records won't make said catalog explode. Detailed list then goes to our metadata person who writes a nice PERL script to fix all the problems and then loads the records into our development catalog to check for additional problems (like inadvertent overlaying of existing records - which is BAD).

Complete analysis of one new record set (1657 records) and begin the next set's analysis.

11:15am: Check in with staff again. Hear about one staff person's cruise last week (see pictures - jealous!) and other staff person's long weekend road trip.

11:40am: Brief email exchange with colleague at another institution about the deadline for my ALA reports for publication. Update Remember the Milk with deadline to remind myself. Also answer serials cataloging question for colleague in same series of emails.

11:45am: Update public-access spreadsheet detailing which records sets we've purchased and their status in the loading process. Will upload spreadsheet to internal staffweb page at the end of the day.

11:50am: Check in with intern via chat. Review job opening post forwarded earlier and upcoming week's activities. More original serials cataloging records to review; verified that latest round of titles in online series have been cataloged (no record set available so have to catalog by hand in response to alerts...boo!).

Noon: Figured out ugly analyzed series issue/question (old series and new unrelated series given same call number) given to me by staff. Luckily, this is not my responsibility as I don't have to deal with analyzed series, only serials. Forwarded email with information explaining problem to appropriate individual. (I do love being able to pass problems on!)

12:15pm: Take lunchtime walk to clear head and find more caffeine. Return with Pepsi. Lunch: tuna, potato, and green bean salad, with apricots and blueberries for dessert. Yum!

1pm: Lunch over. Back to record sets. Complete analysis of second record set (210 records). Easy sets done. One more massively-complicated mess to go (reserving it for tomorrow).

2:00pm: Fill out and email the order form to [company] requesting a copy of all the MARC records for our institution's dissertations going all the way back to 1945 that we've contributed to the database. Hoo boy that's gonna be a BIG file (over 22,000 records!). Send email to address given on order form instructions. Less than 5 minutes after sending, receive confirmation email of receipt (good), followed by email saying my email will be directed to someone better able to assist me (huh?). OK, they why not put *that* email on the order form?

2:10pm: Serials librarian stops by with a title that has no publication information in our system. Inquires if it's a good candidate for the repeatable 260 option (available after the Aug. MARC update by OCLC). Check OCLC. Publication information in OCLC record in a 260 and 500 note combo. So no, not a good candidate (not going to go back and edit all previously valid 260/5xx publication info combinations...not enough time in the world to update records every time new options/rules are implemented). Instead, update our local record with fuller and current OCLC record. One less legacy-non-current serial bib on our system!!

[Note: unfortunate history of lack of serial bibliographic record maintenance here for nearly 10 years prior to my arrival means every time we touch a serial bib we update it with the current CONSER record...it's an ongoing battle to bring the records in our catalog up to date.]

2:15pm: Break. Catch up on a few feeds and social networking sites. Read email, comics (needed mental break!).

2:30pm: Serials librarian and I play hot potato with an email dealing with a gift serial run for a title we already own (the branch library wants to replace certain volumes depending on condition). Determine that because it's a gift and replace/add for a title we already own and have cataloged, it doesn't belong to either one of us. Serials librarian forwards email to appropriate individual(s).

2:45pm: Given random publication to determine if should be cataloged as a serial or as a monograph by colleague from monograph cataloging department. Library of Congress cataloged it as a monograph (brief record). Foreword says "hope to be the first edition" but no evidence of subsequent editions published after an online search. Determine that without any indication on website of organization and without anything other than "hope" statement, best to catalog as monograph for now (can re-cat later as serial if additional editions are actually published). Return the publication to colleague for needed record enhancement.

3:00pm: Begin reviewing stack of intern's original serial cataloging records. Mark up with red pen. [Honestly, not too much mark up needed, she's learned a lot. :) ] Will definitely have to finish these tomorrow (it's a BIG stack...she's been very productive!).

4:00pm: Clean up messy merge to de-duplicate several serial bibliographic records in our catalog. Both an earlier title and a later title, the later of which had three bibs that needed to be collapsed, complete with moving of other records linked to the bib record, and then updating the bib with current cataloging.

[Did I mention that in addition to serial bibliographic records not being updated, when various catalogs were merged into one catalog they weren't de-duplicated in the process so in some cases we have 4 bibliographic records in our system for the print version of one single title? Yeah. Good times.]

During my daily activities, I also field periodic interruptions from my staff, additional interruptions from colleagues, and checking of email and TweetDeck. Multi-tasking FTW! Also, generally this defines my slightly ADD way of functioning/working (some days it disintegrates into that continuous partial attention thing instead...those are bad days).

4:35pm: Upload updated spreadsheet to internal staffweb pages. Last review of email and deletion of various listserv messages. Log off of various and sundry programs. Shut down (restart) computer. Leave work and head to Trader Joe's in Center City via trolley.

5:50pm: Arrived home with grocery goods. Put roasted peach ice cream mix (made day before and chilled overnight) in ice cream mixer bowl. Twenty minutes later, rewarded myself with a semi-frozen sample while packing rest into containers for freezer. Mmmm...tasty! Now that's an end of day treat!!

ALA Annual Conference recap

This years ALA Annual Conference was in Chicago, IL. The good news: I got to stay with my sister. The bad news: I didn't get to see that much of her because I was so busy!

I'm only getting to this a week late, but at least I'm getting it done this time, right? Right?!? (Lord I'm behind...and I swear the to-do list has a life of it's own now.)

Sessions attended:

Friday, July 10, 2009
*OCLC Enhance Sharing Session
*ALCTS CCS "Hot Topics" Forum: The Future of MARC

Saturday, July 11, 2009
*ALCTS CRS Policy & Planning Committee meeting (business)
*ALCTS Catalog Form and Function Interest Group discussion: Accentuating the "e-": Electronic Resources in the Public Catalog
*LITA Standards Interest Group: SERU and NISO update

Sunday, July 12, 2009
*CONSER/BIBCO/SACO-at-Large (I stayed for both CONSER and BIBCO)
*Program for Cooperative Cataloging Participants' Meeting: The Death of the Document (David Lankes)
*CONSER dinner

Monday, July 13, 2009
*RLG Print Archiving Project
*ALCTS CRS Continuing Resources Cataloging Committee Update Forum

Tuesday, July 14, 2009
*ALCTS CRS Executive Committee meeting (business)

There were many more things I would have liked to have attended, but unfortunately location and time were determining factors. As were conflicts. Seems all the sessions I was really interested in occurred in the same time slots. Lots of tough decisions. And my need to eat lunch played a role as well (feed me regularly or suffer the consequences!). Everything I attended was great, I just wish I could have cloned myself to attend some of the other sessions happening at the same time too!

Hopefully over the next few days (or maybe this weekend) I'll pull together summaries of the sessions from my notes and post them.

Pics on Flickr: ALA Annual 2009

Is this balance?

So the weekend started with my massive disappointment in which I did not get NIN tickets despite being "in line waiting" before they even went on sale. Reportedly all the NYC shows sold out in 10 minutes.

The weekend then moved into the "are you f*cking kidding me" phase. We had a massive thunderstorm. Truly massive. The drains outside couldn't handle it. I even went out in the rain and removed debris from the drain to help and there still was a good 1 inch of water. The drain just couldn't keep up with the deluge. It rained like that for a good hour before it finally let up. When I went downstairs to go to bed (given my bedroom being in the finished basement), I thought the carpet felt a little squishy. So I leaned down to see what was up with my hand.

It was wet. WET CARPET IN MY BEDROOM. Clearly the deluge had overloaded the drains and the water table and the runoff had ended up in my bedroom, soaking part of my carpet. It had come in at one place along the wall, and then pooled under my bed. So I gathered up all the rag towels I had and started spreading them everywhere, lifting up the corner of the bed to put it under the bedposts. I also had to move my mattress to lift up the center support beam and put a towel under that leg given that was where the most of the water was. Much cursing was involved, and I think I bruised my knee banging it against the edge of the bed. Given that it was now midnight, there wasn't much more I could do so I collapsed into bed.

Then came the balance part of my weekend. My landlord was planning on coming by on Saturday to finish some repairs. Granted, several of these were repairs that should have been done 6 months ago (the end of the bedroom leak saga), but the timing ended up actually being a good thing. I was able to call her before she was on her way and let her know about the deluge induced bedroom flood, giving her time to find a wet-vac.

Saturday I had plans to meet up with my friend EM and hit the farmers' market in Clark Park and get breakfast tacos and Stumptown iced coffee from Honest Tom's taco truck. She arrived the same time as my landlord with the handyman (a different one this time...seemed to know more what he was doing, which made me very happy). I walked my landlord and the handyman through the apartment, reviewing everything that needed to be done to make sure we were all on the same page. Then EM and I headed out for breakfast and the farmers' market.

We returned a couple of hours later, bellies full of yummy breakfast tacos and bags of fresh farmers' market goods in hand, to find they were finishing up. They had to run out for a quick part to fix the toilet downstairs (the handle was being held to the plunger with a safety pin! which I discovered when it rusted through the other day), but otherwise they were done. Wow. The drywall mudding was done on the ceiling patches. He fixed the vent on my dryer that the gas company f-ed up recently. They had wet-vac-ed the bedroom, even putting the wet towels in the dryer. They moved my dehumidifier and my box fan in there to finish the drying process. Part of the carpet was still damp, where the most water had pooled, but certainly no longer soaked. They were really and truly done, the repairs completed in ONE visit as planned. This is new. I like it.

So EM and I headed back out to walk her bike down to the local shop (Firehouse Bicycles) to get a flat tire fixed. While we were sipping some nice iced coffees (from Satellite Cafe) and sitting in the park on the grass waiting for the flat repair to be finished, my landlord called to tell me they had finished replacing the flushing valve and handle and were now completely done. Miracles never cease.

EM and I had a lovely day. One random activity just kind of flowed into the other, no schedule, no plan, culminating in a gathering at Miss Plum's place for some grilling. The weather was gorgeous. The day overall was quite relaxing.

I'm guessing the lovely day was the balance for the hellish evening the day before. Went from high stress/frustration/anger to calm and relaxed. I'm not sure I like this flip-flopping stuff.

So, Universe, can we not do this one extreme to the other and instead just have some even-keel for awhile? I'd really appreciate it.

Disappointment to the NINth degree

There are few things in life that I would do pretty much anything for. One of those things is to see NIN one more time before Trent Reznor goes on hiatus for an "undetermined" amount of time.

Last June NIN came to Camden, NJ with Jane's Addiction for the NINJA tour. It was the same weekend as NASIG.

I was responsible and went to the NASIG conference like a good little serials librarian. Using my brain and doing what I "should" do.

I was FOOLISH. Idiotic. Stupid. [feel free to continue to add appropriate synonyms]

So a few weeks ago Trent announces they will be doing a last precious few shows in the US when they get back from Europe. The Wave Goodbye tour.

It was like the universe handed me a second chance on a platter. Especially after the completely hellish June I had. I was excited and blissfully happy for the first time in months. Truly happy at that moment. I vowed to do whatever I could to make one of those shows. Tickets were going on sale Friday, 7/17, at 5pm EST for the shows in NYC.

Well, it turns out the universe was fucking with me.

I was logged in at 10 minutes to 5pm. I was ready. I kept clicking on "buy tickets". I ended up in the "waiting room" about 3 minutes to 5pm.

And I waited.

And I waited some more.

Finally I get in to buy tickets at about 5 minutes after 5pm (nearly 10 minutes in the "waiting" room). I select a show in NYC (specifically the Bowery show). I select ONE ticket. Just one. That's all I needed. I plug in the necessary CAPTCHA phrase. I click "Purchase".

I get this evil message that "there are not enough tickets available at that number. Please select a different (fewer) number of tickets and try again."

SOLD OUT.

OMFG. Panic! I try another NYC show. And another. Same response over and over.

I try for one of the Chicago shows when I get home (work was closing so I had to leave...no choice, couldn't sit there until 5pm CST) and can't even get to the NIN tour page. So no Chicago show either.

ALL the NYC and Chicago shows are sold out. And Trent has made it clear that he will not be adding any additional shows. That this is truly it. And I honestly cannot afford to go one of the shows in LA.

I am seriously so upset that I start crying. I'M NOT GOING TO GET TO SEE NIN. Possibly ever again. And it was partially my fault for being so fucking responsible and doing what I "should" do by going to a work conference instead of seeing NIN this past June.

NIN is so much more than "just a band" for me. Way more. A friend once described me seeing a show as a kind of religious experience for me, and they are right. NIN's music touches my soul, reaches all those deep down dark places you never let anyone see. The music has gotten me through so much shit in my life since Pretty Hate Machine (halo 2) came out way back in 1989 I can't even begin to tell you (I wore that tape out three times and then I bought the CD). And I'm missing the Wave Goodbye tour. I can't stand it. What the fuck did I do to deserve this? My life has been hell recently and the additional tour dates actually made me excited about something again. And I can't get tickets. It's like the world just crashed in. I needed to get a ticket to one of these shows on so many levels. And unless some miracle occurs, it's not going to happen.

Universe, GO TO HELL. I HATE YOU RIGHT NOW WITH EVERY FIBER OF MY BEING FOR FUCKING WITH ME LIKE THIS. You already ripped my heart out once this summer, why did you have to do it again?

Learning to live without a car

I signed up to participate in a 30 day challenge sponsored by Zipcar to learn to live car free. The Low-Car Diet Challenge 2009. It just started, and there's been a couple of articles in the Philadelphia Inquirer about it already (including this one that I'm quoted in!).

My reasons for participating are varied, and I'm going to attempt to explain them a bit here.

1. Owning a car is expensive. Seriously. My insurance alone is $100 a month, plus annual tag and inspection fees (2 inspections!), plus maintenance such as oil changes, etc. Yeah. It adds up. If you average it out over a 12 month period, just owning my car, even without monthly payments since it's paid off, costs me about $130 per month, and I'm not including tolls and gas. Add in the gas, parking fees and/or passes, and any tolls when I do drive and it just keeps climbing. I only drive once, maybe twice a month, to run errands. I'm not sure that's the best return on investment...wouldn't you agree?

2. Driving in and around Philadelphia is a pain in the butt. And that's an understatement. Parking is a pain (plus the fees). Traffic is a pain. Routes tend to be convoluted rather than direct due to one-way streets, construction, etc. so navigating is a pain. Trying to drive in Center City is an exercise in breathing so I don't lose my mind. And don't get me started on the constant traffic present on the interstates through and around the city.

3. Environmental concerns. This reason shouldn't surprise anyone. Not driving is better for the environment. Duh. It means less oil, less pollution, less resources used. But it's also the ambient environment. Fewer cars means less noise (engines plus car horns from annoyed drivers), less congestion, and a safer place to live.

4. Health. Clearly by biking and/or walking I'm getting exercise. When I moved to Philly and started biking to and from work (only 2 miles in each direction), I dropped almost 20 pounds in about 10 months. Startling. But clearly the exercise is a good thing for me. Anything to help me continue to get that regular exercise is a very good thing.

But I also have some concerns about living without a car.

1. Emergencies. This is my biggest fear. My family is scattered all over the country, as are my friends. I have my cat. So I have a little worry in the back of my head about being able to get somewhere at a moment's notice if needed. I know I have friends that do this without a problem, but the fear is still there.

2. Convenience. OK, so this one is partially laziness. Right now I don't have to plan if I go somewhere. I don't have to plan when to do something, or how much time I think it will take. I just get in my car and go. If I want to go away for the weekend or night I just go. If I'm using a car sharing program, I am restricted to when I can reserve a car and how long I can have it. So clearly I'm going to have to work on budgeting my time and planning.

3. What my car (and having one) means. My car = freedom, independence. On some level I associate having a car with not having to depend on people. I've never lived without one except when living in Argentina for three months many many years ago (and having a car there wasn't a good idea...talk about crazy drivers!). I'm also attached to this particular vehicle emotionally. I've had it for over 11 years. It's gotten me through moves, cross country trips, and countless trips through the Michigan winters to visit family. It's reliable and I feel safe driving it. I'm not sure how I'll be driving multiple vehicles...I'm so used to mine and the way it drives. It's comfortable, like a broken in pair of jeans.

What I'm hoping from this experience is to see if living car free is really something I can do as I'd honestly like to be car free. It's an exercise in thought and learning as much as anything else. It will force me to think about what I do, the choices I make. It will also allow me to explore options, to learn variable routes and other ways I can get places. Philly is a very walkable and bike-able city, and the public transit here is light-years better than most places I've lived. I've been considering going car-free for sometime now because I don't need to use it here in Philly, but I keep stopping at taking that final step of selling my car. Clearly I need to work through some of the feelings I associate with car ownership and letting go of my car and my attachment to it.

It's also difficult to say "I will try living without my car for x number of days" to just myself and not cheat, forget, etc. By participating in the Low-Car Diet Challenge, I can't cheat or forget as I'll have regular reminders. I'm giving my word that I won't use my car, which is a huge impetus to follow through on that promise. Kind of like how it's easier to develop the habit of going to the gym regularly if you're partnering with someone. So I'm partnering with Zipcar to follow through and really learn how to live without my vehicle.

I may discover by the end of this that living without my car is not something I can (or want) to do. Or I could find that it's freeing and decide to take the step of selling my car. Either way, this will be a valuable experience.

It really will be a challenge in a few ways, but I'm up for it. I'll be blogging about it as we go along. Including my experience of using Zipcar for the first time (hopefully this weekend! if I can get my card in time).