- Left for work early to go to Walmart. Bought toothbrushes, sharpies, and marshmallows in bulk, as well as a few other things for other staff. Arrived at work at noon. Hauled stuff in, grabbed a few things, made some phone calls, and checked in with staff, then department head meeting from 12:15 to about 1:30. Worked on the staff schedule for August, which involved lots of texting with various staff, reviewed magazines.
- 3:30 food. Large, black cat arrived for Paws to Read at 4. Admired cat from a safe distance (I am allergic) and chatted with volunteer. Ushered people in and took pictures. Continued to work on the schedule. Went on the information desk a little before 5. Posted library wishlist to Facebook, followed up on comments, continued working on staff schedule. Assisted patrons with printing, computer questions, finding books, and placing holds. Asked circulation staff who adores animals to wipe down storyroom after cat departed. Talked to Ms. Pattie when she came in for storytime. Finished the schedule and sent it out to staff with other scheduling notes for August.
- Came in shortly after 9. Forgot about yet another construction project and had to go around. Started at the youth services desk. Workflows (staff end of our opac) is being updated, so I fiddled with that some. Looked at my desk, decided it wasn't worth it. Updated the schedule from emails I got last night. Chatted with patrons as they came in for storytime, handed out summer reading materials. Wrote up staff meeting minutes from yesterday, finishing things as I did them (sending out emails, updating job descriptions, etc.).
Updating magazines and comics. Going over stuff with staff as they come in for the afternoon shift. Started cleaning off my desk. Still have a sinus headache.
- 12:45ish grabbed lunch
- 1:15ish getting ready for snakes! A big group, including our Memory Cafe and a school. I took lots of pictures, many of them blurry (the presenter is very high-energy!), and played with the boa for a while. He has a lovely, leaf-shaped head. The little milk snake was not up for playing since they ate a mouse! I got pictures of that too! Gave volunteers and staff instructions during program. Room was rather hot and humid, but we can't "fix" the a/c because nobody will acknowledge it has issues. Snakes liked it anyways. Lots of books checked out.
- I went back to the youth services desk around 3. Still had a sinus headache. Answered questions, went through some new teen books, sent emails, made sure things were set up for my volunteer who cleans the toys and protects us from germs, tried to download all said wonderful pictures and somehow got a dead camera. Gave up on it because my brain hurt. Asked my staff to look at it. Possibly did something else but my brain hurts too much to remember.
- 5 went home (sinus headache finally went away around 10pm)
- 9 arrived at work. Grabbed stuff for outreach, including tops, markers, books, and aide. Left at about 9:10, got gas, then arrived at the daycare about 9:25. Set up while waiting for the young fours to come in from outside. We read This is a moose and Shake the tree. Then they got to make animal magnets and check out their Library on the Go books. No fights over the spider/bug books this time - now the battles were over who grabbed the pony book. Luckily I bought extra pony books! Moved on to the school-agers, 14 total. Set up while they were coming in. I brought wooden tops, as promised, which they were all quickly absorbed in decorating with permanent markers. Admired and chatted with the teacher about fall plans. Then I got the kids to check out their books and we packed up and took off back to the library, arriving around 10:30.
- Took my mom down the street to the post office (she's going back home, several states away, on Saturday and needed to mail some things too heavy for her suitcase) and drove around to the other side of the library so I could bring the rest of the book bins in.
- Took over middle school volunteers, supervised them packing activity bags for next week and other projects, went through stuff on my desk, uploaded offline transactions, Looked over August volunteer calendar, filled in some displays, talked to associate about her upcoming program.
- 12pm - middle school volunteers left, went to have lunch.
- 12:30 On the youth services desk. Two teachers waiting for me, I have a huge donation of flat magnets (about a hundred or more 50x12 inch pieces) that I am distributing. My associate had been showing them around the maker space stuff. Talked about possible collaboration in the fall, hauled up magnets and some other things for them. Brought out a cart of juvenile fiction I've been trying to weed for weeks. Helped kids find things, started on cart - pulling books to promote on staff picks shelf before weeding, stack of books to weed, etc.
- Brief pause while I remove the gerbils' squeaky metal wheel which is driving me crazy, gerbils are very upset, start running on their supposedly silent plastic wheel, turns out marathon wannabe Tumtum can make that one even noisier, give up and return his beloved squeaky metal wheel.
- 1pm - next middle school volunteer showed up. Set him to work cutting toothbrushes for tomorrow's program and cutting magnets for a program in November. Continued weeding on the desk, pulling books to make Series Swoop displays, answering questions, reminding people about the bee program. People start filing in around 1:45 and then there is a steady come and go as kids go in and out, play in the play area, wander up to ask questions. When the program finishes around 3pm, there is a big rush of excited and noisy kids, lots of questions and chatting, new baby twins to admire, etc. Mostly finished my cart of books, looked at desk, decided to finish it later.
- 4pm left early (taking my mom down to Milwaukee)
- 11 - arrived at work (after more adventures in construction). Meeting with my associate and school colleague to plan fall/2019.
- 12 - info desk. phone calls, going over the schedule, hold requests, etc.
- 1 - started volunteer on shelving movies, lunch
- 1:30 - returned phone calls, got called out from my desk multiple times to answer questions, middle schoolers wanted to ask if they could come help with this afternoon's program AND tell me there was an open (and possibly used) condom in the audio room. Working on the schedule.
- 3pm - working on calendar and schedule, going through new materials on my desk, sorting repairs, planning tomorrow's program.
- 4pm - next volunteer showed up, prep for maker workshop, got everyone started at 4:30, including giggly group of teens mentioned above; brushbots are very simple in the basic construction, but fiddly to make them do what you want.
- 5pm - my summer temp informed me that she had cut her thumb open on the paper cutter. Luckily, she is qualified to do her own first aid, and did so, because I needed her to supervise the second half of the program while I covered the info desk for my colleague who had to go to a city meeting which my director couldn't make. Does that make sense? Answered lots of questions, sent latecomers back to make brushbots, everyone finished around 5:30 and I finished some lengthy reader's advisory questions and then went back to help clean-up. My official volunteer took home the extras (sorry about the buzzing volunteer's mom) and we all decided we had worked hard and could leave early.
- 6pm - Left to go grocery shopping and go home!
- 9am - arrived at work. Set up for program. Email. Check job descriptions and other projects.
- 10am - Program. People trickled in. I was eventually done around 11? Supervised staff cleaning up and resetting the room for open lego building. Answered emails, moved stuff out to the youth services desk.
- 12:30 - gave info desk staff a break and worked on cutting out bookmarks, printing logs and calendars
- 12:45-1:30 lunch
- 1:30pm - Posting job ads, Friday volunteer came in a little before 2 and I got them started on shelving movies and then we went out to the garden for them to water. I found a squash and some beans. Emails to staff about what's coming up. Back to work on the fall calendar. Answered questions, supervised volunteers, worked on fall calendar and programs, scheduling fb posts, another staff break
- 5:30 - went home
