Boredom Busters and a Halloween Story Action Pod

Today marks the 6 month anniversary of me starting my job, and it's also when benefits kick in. I'm using a floating holiday to take off Thursday, thereby turning an unthinkable 10 day stint into a slightly grating though bearable 8 days of library goodness [2018 edit: I believe there was a time a few years later that I worked 17 days in a row. Having grown up in Downriver Detroit, getting ready for work at all means "work day" so if I work 4 hours I might as well have just stayed for 10. Not that I did, but the feeling, dude.]

This is also Day 3 of a week-long Reference Question Tally. We do these twice a year in our department, which I understand is way better than the daily tallies others make, but it is the first time I've ever done this.

Being me, I usually go about unaffected by any kind of crazy questions or requests I get. But, now that I am forced to think about it, my humor radar is sharply attuned.
Here's a few choice questions I've heard in the past few days:

“Where’s the librarian?” (To her credit this was a no-blazer day for me)

“Can’t you just use your computer to look it up?” (Well, yeah I could, but the quickest way to find out if we have a book here is to look for it here. Case in point :)

“Do you have to use your computer? The last one took so long, it was like ten minutes.” (Well, yeah, because you want really weird things, and you have  child's sense of the passage of time. I told her to go look around and I’d bring it to her—such service!)

“What’s the first month of summer?” (Am I doing your homework for you?)

 “Do you have the magic pickle with the peapod shooter?” (Okay I actually found this book for her, it was in the Magic Pickle series of graphic novels; it’s just funny to actually spell out common questions we hear every day. Sounds like it would make for a great Christmas toy)

“Can I get a book about mermaid fairies?” (This is a new one and someone needs to makes millions of dollars off a series like this immediately. Especially if they fight crime. Thanks)

 “Where are your fall books, like about apples?” (On the wall by the clock, see it?... Under the sign that says Fall Apples. And the picture of the bushel of apples)

In other news, I've updated my Story Action Pod for Halloween. It's based on "Even Monsters Need Haircuts!" The kids can give the clip-art ghost a hairstyle and then write or draw about it. When they bring it up to turn it in (and say "Trick or Treat" because I'm cheesy) they get a skull ring.

It's also renamed "Spooky Action Pod"



Additionally, I started an oddly successful area called Boredom Busters for school-age kids. It has books, Play-doh, dice, playing cards, and a Halloween checkers game. Everything here was found in the basement. The stand for the sign is a re-purposed graduated cylinder with wrapping paper and a bag of screws at its base. The sign, simply enough, reads: "Boredom Busters. Do something! Clean up when you're done. Thanks!" It actually helps kids pass the time after their designated 1 hour/day on the computers is completed. Crowd favorite is obviously the Play-Doh because come on, Play-Doh is always fun!*

"Boredom Busters" area on a table. Includes a basket of games and a few books.
Described in detail in above paragraph.

*unless you happened to sit by someone in preschool who sneezed on her Play-Doh and just left it, and then you never found out what happened to it. The memory still haunts me.