I got a certificate!

According to you sad humans I have the best cat blog of the SAPL 23 things! Ha I knew I was great and this just proves it. Mom plans to have my certificate framed. I know some of you will say there was a disclaimer about it not being a real award but despite that, and much like gossip girl...you know you love me!

Flies

I love spring because that means the windows are always open at home. This in itself would be exciting enough what with fresh air to sniff and squirrels to bark at (or whatever that weird non-meowing sound is). But there is also my very favorite thing of all FLIES! Giant bee-like flies, small quick ones, little bitty gnats, I love them all. A particularly large one got in the other day and I caught it and ate it. Dad was very grossed out. Those silly humans will never know how much fun it is to chase food before eating it. So much sweeter for the chase.

mysapl databases

I can't decide if I like the new database search or not. It is both easier and more difficult than before. It is easy if you know what you are doing but difficult in that you have the danger of being bombarded with information. You also kind of have to know something about the databases you are trying to seach to get useful information. I find if you don't really know what you are doing you could just check categories and have a million search results. Regular patrons don't seem very savvy while doing research, they want everything handed to them on a silver plater with wine and cheese. Those may be difficult to convince they must read multiple entries to find what they are looking for; that the databases search isn't some magic machine that will spit out EXACTLY what they need. But then again that always has been the problem with research. You get patrons who know how to search and are willing to do the leg work, and those who want the magic box. Some people just don't realize the best search engine in the world is no match for the human brain to sort out and use the information.
Also, I am not too sure about the libguides. My mom loves the creation of the libguides as masses of fun. I just don't know who they are benefiting. It seems most of them list obvious or popular choices that most people will know any way. And there aren't too many books listed on each page. Now if I am interested in a subject, particularly fiction, I want to know every possible book out there written in the last ten years on that topic so I have a bunch to choose from. The jury's still out for me on whether or not I like this service.

What does the chill mean?

It's kind of a catch 22 isn't it? More unemployment means more people using the library but less money coming into the city which leads to less money for the library. So the more people there are that need the library, the less services the library is able to offer. Or something like that. Unless they will cut the book budget which would be a drag. If you cut hours or (goddess forgive) people then customer service will suffer. Although it'd be nice to have mom home more so she can open more cans of food. There are many, many larger library systems around the country that are open hours such as 10-7 on the weekdays and 10-5 on Friday and Saturday. Some of these even have no Sunday hours for branches and only the Central library is open seven days a week. I'm sure workers might really dig shorter hours but decision makers will likely favor cutting the book budget. Of course if you wanted to go really radical, cut the DVD and media items, leave only books on getting a job and put in more computers. Does anyone really NEED Children's programming? (that was a joke) Mom loves when someone who is looking for a job gets mad because they won't move them up on the computer list over "those kids just playing video games." Hey those kids were ahead of you and are way more interested in playing those games than in you getting a job. We're all treated the same at the library....for now!

My parents went to Austin

....and all I got was this lousy t-shirt. Actually it's a cool t-shirt. It says "Camp Half-Blood: Demigod in Training on it. If you don't know what that refers to you are just LAME!