Author Archive

Those shameful teens.

Sunday, February 3rd, 2008

I just realized that after the two last posts, one might think that I hate teens or something, when, in fact, the exact opposite is true. I mean, I’d be lying if I didn’t say they don’t drive me crazy sometimes, but I love their free spiritedness, emotions and individuality. I think that teens are so often given the short stick, because people just expect the worst. Here’s an example (and then I’ll get on with my reason for the post): on Saturday the page that was working (high schooler) said that one of the older patrons kept following her around and giving her dirty looks. She was furious, and rightly so I think. She went on to say that she’s on National Honor Society, she does extracurricular stuff and she gets really good grades.

Why should this older guy think she’s up to something? And really, why should he? 1. She’s in the library (of course, that often doesn’t mean anything anymore). 2. She was hardly dressed like a gangsta or other kind of hardened criminal, unless you count a gray sweatshirt and jeans gangsta material. 3. She was quietly putting books away.

Sometimes I really don’t understand adults. Its like as soon as they hit a certain age, the forget what it was like to be a teenager. They forget that you don’t need to talk to small children like they are completely mindless… you know what I’m talking about. Loud, high pitched and slow. Sometimes with that cutesy sing-song voice that I absolutely abhor. When I write it out, I realize that people do that with old people too. Talk to them really loud and slowly. I guess that’s why I like working with old people too. I like working with those people that really appreciate what you do for them, because the vast majority want nothing to do with them.

ANYWAY. After all that, all I really wanted to say was that on twitter, one of the people I follow is “youthlibrarian” and she found this site called lazy library. Its a site that finds books on different topics under 200 pages. Any more than 200, it won’t be on their site. They even rate it, tell you how much it costs and where you can buy it. Of course I had to look up librarian. High schoolers around the world rejoice.

Tweens.

Saturday, February 2nd, 2008

There. I said it. The dreaded “T” word. Not as dreaded as actual teens, but close enough. I made the decision at my library about a month ago to add tween only programs at my library… I’m considering tweens 4-8 graders. Some people say 3-6, but I can’t bear to go as low as 3rd, and my high schoolers don’t want middle schoolers at the teen programs. So starting on Monday, I will see who shows up. Probably not many or any at first, but once I start going to the schools and talking to the kids, people may start making an appearance. I’m sort of hoping that it works out the way my teen programs did. Word of mouth. The programs are pretty similar to the teen programs and family programs, but I’d like to give these kids a time of their own to relax and hang out. Most of my programs are just that. Relax and hang out with a thin facade of actual programming. I think if it gets too structured, the kids get scared and run away.

Once I get a small group of regulars, I’d like to see if I can get a grant to create a tween zine. … Oh that’s catchy! I’d get money for a camera, scanner, copier, maybe for a beginner class on writing (in general or journalism style). I think it could be really exciting. Of course, I’ve got to get them in first.

Wish me luck. I’ll need it, especially since my story times start next week too, and I NEVER have any luck with those. … I’m thinking that I may have to start traveling for story time, by going to preschools, daycares and kindergartens. Ack. Oh well. The life of a librarian is never dull. NEVER. Don’t believe the fairytales. Quiet and peaceful. Time to read novels. Bun and sensible shhhhoes. None of its true. Well except for the sensible shoes. Usually. Oh and I do have my shushing librarian action figure when I need her. (I even have the deluxe one with the book cart that doesn’t steer straight) Although I usually tell the kids that its my nose picking librarian. I think they like that better.

NKOTB

Tuesday, January 29th, 2008

I have been composing a post on my vacation… which will come soon. However, today while I was working on adding (a gargantuan amount of) rss feeds onto my yahoo page (I was actually quite pleased with the turn out), I found a news article about New Kids on the Block. That’s right. I just said news and New Kids on the Block in the same sentence.

It turns out that according to this yahoo article they may be getting back together. Of course, most of their information is based on their extremely cryptic official website.

Do I want to believe that kids fifteen to (gasp) twenty years younger than me will be screaming over the guys that I liked (and bought those huge buttons, tons of posters and books, a couple of t-shirts and lots of other random things) when I was in middle school? Do I think thirteen year olds will find mid to late thirty year olds dreamy? BTW, Jonathon is the oldest at 40 and Joey is the youngest at 35. I suppose its more likely that it’ll be a bunch of thirty year old women throwing their bras and panties at the stage, rather than fifteen year olds.

Hopefully I won’t need to worry about this, because according to Danny’s myspace page, he’s not positive that they are getting back together… of course this probably means that they are getting back together. Yeesh.

I guess I sort of view this thing in the same way I view Strawberry Shortcake, My Little Pony, Transformers, and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. These were all things I had when I was a kid, and I don’t like that companies are bringing them back to make tons of money off of all us reminiscing children of the 80s. I also think that there should be a certain point where you need to say, “Hey! I’m an adult. I probably shouldn’t be in a boy band.” Jonathon sells real-estate for goodness sake. To me that doesn’t scream boy band.

But hey, more power to them, I guess.

Girly Trip!

Thursday, January 17th, 2008

It feels almost strange to say. I don’t go anywhere with out my men! Here it goes… I’m going to the Bahamas with girl friends. No guys allowed. We’re going on the ship the Majesty of the Seas, which is part of Royal Caribbean. We’ll be starting in Miami and going to Nassau and CocoCay.

Here’s the schedule:

Saturday 01.19 – Leave Rochester at 6am, spend the day in Miami, Florida
Sunday 01.20 – spend another day in Miami, Florida (get a tattoo?) 😛
Monday 01.21 – board the ship sometime in the afternoon
Tuesday 01.22 – land in Nassau, Bahamas – spend the day
Wed 01.23 – land in CocoCay, Bahamas – spend the day
Thur 01.24 – land in KeyWest, Florida – spend the day
Friday 01.25 – back to Miama at 7am, home by 4pm
Tuesday 01.29 – back to the grind :O

When we are in Miami we are supposed to go clubbing and at some point, we are going on a glass-bottom boat thanks to one of the other girls going. Other than that, I have absolutely no idea what we are doing.

Jeff says that I’ll forget all about him and Jack, but how could I? I mean look at that little face! I miss Jack already. 🙁

Family Christmas

Everyone loves Star Wars

Monday, January 7th, 2008

Its practically unAmerican not to like Star Wars. Then I came across this blog post. There is this neat thing on wordpress.com, where I have all my work blogs, that shows a smattering of interesting wordpress blogs whenever you log on. Which is how I came to read the article. I think its an interesting take on Star Wars, and so true.

In the original series the Rebels destroy the Death Star and are awarded medals for bravery. But what about all the regular people doing their jobs. Taking care of the park, cleaning toilets, doing laundry, or serving food in the cafeteria. Its no different than when Darth Vader blew up Alderaan… well except that Alderaan couldn’t blow up planets. Also, when Luke blew up the Death Star, shouldn’t he have felt all those people dieing? Isn’t that what happened when Alderaan blew up?

I think it makes a great comparison to what’s going on in society right now. There are tons of regular people living in Iraq, and yet often times I think people forget that. They also forget that not everyone is an extremest. They are just trying to survive…

Anyway, I loved the article, because it makes us think of Star Wars in a whole new light. Plus it had a link to a great Star Wars Lego’s video. Perfect!

There’s one thing I need to get off my chest. When I was looking up the spelling of Alderaan, I came to this great site called Wookiedpedia. One thing led to another, and I looked at the bio of Padmé and they claim that “a medical team tried to save Padmé; sadly, they discovered that she was dying, having apparently lost the will to live.” Oh, come on now! Sure her husband has turned into the ultimate form of evil, but she just gave birth to twins! — Although, I’m sure that my husband would think that it would cause him to lose the will to live. I’m sorry, but one look at my newborn children would give me a new lease on life. I don’t blame her though, Star Wars was written by a man who didn’t know any better and thinks that us women live and breath for our men. I DON’T THINK SO. Small babies that we have just spent months carrying and hours delivering outweigh any crazy lunatic husband that has gone to the darkside. I am not losing the will to live for no man… and I’m just a regular chick, not a QUEEN who has fought in wars and argued with powerful politicians. I DON’T THINK SO. Well, I guess you know how I feel about that. Couldn’t there have been an assassination at least? I think this is just a slap in the face for women all over the world.

Oh and I watched Snakes on a Plane last night. It may have been the worst movie ever made. I don’t know if it even deserves another sentence, but maybe later. All I need to say for now is RUN AWAY! More to follow.

New Years Resolutions

Friday, January 4th, 2008

Everyone has them and everyone breaks them. I’m just going to pretend for a while that I won’t break these ones, because I think that they’re pretty necessary in my life. And no, its not “I will lose weight and exercise more”… blah blah blah. We all do that one, and break it as soon as we think it. So maybe if I don’t think about losing weight, it’ll happen. Right? Oh, well. At least I’ve cut out the bagels, and I try to DDR.

Here are my real new years resolutions, and honestly, these may be even harder than saying I’ll lose weight or that I’ll write more blog posts. Here it goes.

Time and Organizational Management. Yup I said it out loud. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m pretty scatterbrained and unorganized. Even my day planner looks like it was hit by a twister. Auntie Em wouldn’t be found for years. (BTW, I am once again trying to make use of my PDA) I do try. I think its pretty funny that I’ve chosen a field that prides itself in being organized into categories and yet…

If I’m being honest with myself (and you guys too) I really didn’t become a librarian because I liked the Dewey Decimal System or even Library of Congress for that matter. I became a librarian because I like being a little social butterfly. 🙂 Plus I like programming. I like playing Cranium with seven year olds and watching a nearly three year old play DDR and come racing up to me and say “Miss Cathy! Miss Cathy! I beat it!” In this high pitch ADORABLE voice, that makes you want to eat her up. She is this adorable little blonde who is incredible bouncy and adorable. Did I mention adorable? As the program was ending, her mom said that she (the little girl, of course) and Jack should get married, because then they would have the MOST ADORABLE CHILDREN IN THE WORLD!!! Mwahahah! Okay, tangent.

I like being a librarian because I like programming (when people come). I also like talking to people and being there when needed. Organization Goddesss I am not, and its not really high on my list of most important qualities, although I logically know that its important.

I also want to work on time management, because this is not a Kyle skill. We are still working on our “Fashionably Late Kyle Christmas Cards”. We still have a graduation card for a high schooler at our church. We still have a sympathy card for a friend who’s mom died, umm a couple of months ago. Granted, her mom was turning 105 in a couple of days, but that’s really not the point. And yes, that is her mom. My friend in question is in her 70s.

I have checked out the series on time and organizational management, but I haven’t managed to read them.

There’s just so much to think about! So much to read, so much technology, so many PSP games, so much DDR to play. So much coloring and puzzle putting-together to do with my son. (And then there’s the cleaning, which we don’t need to talk about right now) How do people find time to do anything?  I find it absolutely HYSTERICAL that I have an obsession with watches and (to a lesser extent) calendars. This should be telling me something, shouldn’t it?

Anyway, what are some of your guys’ new year’s resolutions? I know, don’t all answer at once. I’m sure I’ll get quite a few resolutions to enlarge something or other, or to be better at “something else”. That’s okay, I know that you’re still thinking about your resolutions.

Another resolution. Go to bed earlier. Good night.

Christmas Vacation programs for kids

Saturday, December 29th, 2007

Okay, so maybe I shouldn’t expect too many people for the programs I offered during the vacation, but this is just ridiculous!
Over the vacation I offered:

  • Wednesday
  • : Make a Gods Eye ALL DAY – ZERO PEOPLE

  • Thursday
  • : Make a Felted Bowl – Three people, included in this are the girls mother and brother, who played Uno and Chess while we made our bowls.

  • Friday Morning
  • : Holiday Storytime – ZERO PEOPLE – I don’t offer it, people complain; I do offer it, no one shows up

  • Friday Afternoon
  • : Finish up your Felted Bowl – Two people – these are different people that didn’t come on Thursday. I included the mom because she hung around to talk and read a magazine as we made our bowls.

    Monday I’m going to be doing a New Year’s Eve dance. I was going to make that punch with ginger ale, Hawaiian Punch and sherbert and get snacks. I was also going to recreate or find a video to show of the ball dropping, but now I’m wondering how much I should bother doing.

    I try not to let it bother me, but still I get frustrated. Even if I spend money on hiring out people, they often don’t draw people either. Someone did ask if we were showing a movie. Maybe if I just sit people in front of our big screen tv so that they can rot their brains, they’ll come. You know they will. Don’t shake your head.

    Next year, I’m thinking of stealing Adrienne’s idea and doing a kids advisory group (she calls it “Library Club”). I think this would be a great idea to draw on the kids talents and their ideas of how they envision the library in the future.

    We shall see. Its midnight and I’m old and tired. Plus I rearranged stuff at the library in the staff area, so that it won’t effect patrons, thank goodness. They definitely can’t handle change. Of course, we occasionally have people who ask for the card catolog, and actually mean card catalog. I thought it would be best to do this while Sally was gone on vacation. Otherwise, she would find other things for me to move. 🙂 I can’t wait until she comes back so that she can see! Yippee!

    Christmas, Christmas Time is … gone.

    Saturday, December 29th, 2007

    Christmas was busy but fun. Jack had a lot of fun playing with his (three) cousins. We went to my in-laws first, and had yummy baked eggs and icy orange drinks. Plus tons of cookies and pastries, all hand done by my mother-in-law.

    Of course, first Jack had to break into the presents. Wrapping paper went flying everywhere. In fact, once when I was trying to get someone with a wad of wrapping paper, my brother-in-law was trying to get someone else, and we managed to collide at the perfect moment, missing our original targets. The kids got tons of plastic gadgets, although the hit of Christmas was the Shake ‘n’ Go Crash-Ups Speedway, given to Jack by his aunt and uncle. The littlest one, Ben, insisted in trying to sit in the track.

    My favorite present would have to be what I’m typing on, my new ThinkPad. Wee! I love it! I like the noise that the keyboard makes and the little nubby that you use as the mouse. I like the handy little keys to switch to and from previous websites. I like the size of the screen – 15.1″.  I just really like this laptop! What I like most however, is that there is no “Mickey’s Kitchen” game on it. This is my computer.

    Whenever I would go on my computer, which is in the living room, Jack would run over and say “Mickey’s Kitchen” or “Caillou” with this adorable, questioning look on his face. Darn him for being so cute! The worst of it is that he would look up at you and say something like “Play Caillou train game?”, and each word gets progressively higher in pitch. Oh my gorsh! I don’t know how parents say no to their kids. I will definitely have to get this on video to embarrass him in the future. It is the right thing to do.

    Being the wonderful wife that I am, I bought Jeff the seven disc Carl Sagan Cosmos series, the NINE disc Aliens Quadrilogy and a four disc Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle collection. Let us ignore the fact that I purchased things that I would want to watch too and instead consider how long it will take us to watch all of these DVDs.

    During an earlier post, I had mentioned that I was going to make all the kids tote bags. Well I finished them. On Christmas Eve at about 9 pm. They came out pretty good and I’m quite proud of myself. I will, of course, be posting pictures later.

    My mother-in-law and my mom both made Jack sweaters. They’re adorable! I’ll have to post pictures of Jack wearing them. Jeff’s mom made one with a cable stitch and I can’t even imagine how long it would take me. My mom made Jack one with her knitting machine. I must say that I’m quite proud of her. She hasn’t really been knitting recently, so I know that it was an act of love. My mother-in-law also made really cute sweaters for the cousins: one with flowers, one with a cupcake and one with duckies. I should have taken pictures, but was I thinking of my fellow bloggers? Nope of course not. I was thinking of the comfy fuzzy lined crocs I got in two sizes too small. 🙂

    Lastly on the Christmas front. Our church had its yearly Christmas Pageant last Sunday. Jack got to be a sheep! He was about as easy to corral as a sheep. Jeepers! All these little kids wandering around in white t-shirts with felt sheep ears. Luckily everyone in the church loves the kids and they didn’t really care. Still, Jack was quite the pistol. At one point the sheep are supposed to go up the stairs to the alter and look at baby Jesus and then come back down the stairs. Was that good enough for my little Jack? Oooohh nooo. Nope he had to kneel down next to Mary and Joseph and keep baby Jesus company. Did I care though? Of course not! He was too friggin adorable! And a pest at the same time… how do they do this to us?

    Oh well. Now we get to enjoy the depressing January/February dreariness that is Rochester.

    Merry Christmas everyone!

    Sunday, December 16th, 2007

    Every year, we want to send out Christmas cards and I buy a box of cards. We now have four or five boxes of cards somewhere. Of course I can only find one… but that’s because I’m so organized!

    One of Jeff’s cousins decided to use shutterfly and send photo cards. I thought that would be fun, but its so late, we figured there wouldn’t be enough time to do it. Then Jeff came up with the idea that we should do the “Kyle Family’s Notoriously Late Christmas Cards” … I think that’s what he called them. I want to use this picture. What do you think?

    Family Christmas 2007

    The Work Christmas Party was…

    Sunday, December 16th, 2007

    at my house. Eek! I think everyone had a good time, although everyone got lost trying to get to my house. A couple of them said, “You have to drive all this way? Jeepers!” (I added the jeepers part because it sounded cool). Luckily I think everyone crowded into two or three cars so that everyone got lost as a group instead of everyone wandering around Henrietta for days.

    Everyone brought yummy appetizers and cookies (to share and bring home). Then we had ($10) secret santas. I was given this, which was obviously NOT $10. Luckily, I got the person that got me, and she wasn’t at the party, so I still have her present. It still won’t be absolutely as wonderful as what she got me, but since there is no way I’m leaving the house today, I’m going to make her something nice. I bought her some earrings (which I probably could have made myself, but oh well) and a little wooden cross from One World Goods (that I was going to add some beads to) and a bunch of plastic bangles from a store in Brockport. I thought they were cute! Here’s what I got:

    Expresso yumminess

    GOOD GRIEF!

    I told Sally that I would bring it to work, but she wouldn’t let me. She didn’t want all her staff coked up on caffeine. 🙂 Of course, she can’t even handle her hot chocolate without getting all crazy.

    After using it, I figured its probably better if I don’t bring it to work. It took me about an hour and a half to make one cappuccino and a huge mess. I guess the first time shouldn’t count though. I’ll get better with practice. I should probably practice a lot, so I can get really good and invite everyone over. I could be your barista for the evening. IMHO, a cappuccino party would be a lot yummier than a “drinking” party. I could get rid of the hard liquor on my counter and replace it with peppermint and caramel syrups like in coffee bars. What does that say about me?

    So anywho. I think I’ll take what I have and add some beads to the cross to make it a little nicer. Still not as cool as what she got me, but oh well.

    On another crafting front, a couple of posts ago, I had mentioned that I was going to make bookbags for all the kids. That was a HUGE disaster. I had no idea what I was doing. I put aside the whole day to go to my mom’s house and use her sewing machine. The directions I used didn’t make any sense to me, but I couldn’t ask my mom for help because everyone had gone out for a walk. Then I broke the sewing machine. For some reason, the thread would come out in a bunch, and before I knew it there was tons of thread everywhere. My mom tried to help me, but it still did it. By 4:30 I was fed up.

    Beh.

    So I decided that I would use felt and tote bags I have lying around and applique something on them. I still have some sticky back iron on adhesive (I know there’s a fancy word for it, but I can’t remember) so it shouldn’t be too hard. Famous last words. I know. We shall see. At least I’ll be fully caffeinated.