Bullet Point: Sam Colt Revised

God created mankind, but the library makes them equal.

The phrase to which I've given a twist--"God created men, but Sam Colt made them equal"--is portrayed as a frontier adage, but all I've found suggests it's a modern invention.

ALA Anaheim: The Dog Ate My Homework (Carnegie 1)

"Eighty percent of life is showing up."--Woody Allen

     The ceremony for awarding the Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Non-fiction was to begin on Sunday evening at “8”--but it was a soft 8, a ragged 8, a late 8, a several minutes after 8.

     There were six nominees, split between fiction and non-fiction. Only two of the six authors were present, and neither received the prize. Of the four who weren't on hand, their excuses were:

a sick family member (one of the winners);
was in Ireland, where she lived (the other winner);
was in Europe, where she was traveling (but she did give a cute talk, via an internet transmission)

The last nominee had the best excuse. He had died.

Why Weeders Have Nightmares

"A good book can wait for a reader hundreds of years. Once lodged in the Library, it is unexpensive & harmless while it waits."--Ralph Waldo Emerson (Emerson in His Journals, p. 553)

Pity the poor librarian whose duty it is to weed. Then (wouldn't you know it) along comes a reader who asks for the title that the librarian has just, after much delay and procrastination, sent to that library in the sky. If there is an afterlife, maybe this is one of the punishments for librarians who were too zealous in their duties.

Weed This

“A library is not just a building full of books. It is a garden to cultivate individuals” —Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon (quoted in American Libraries Direct).

With this quote in mind, consider how some terms associated with the library relate to the garden and horticulture:

• annual

• arChives

• browsing

• carr(ot)els

• currant periodicals

• dew date

• I pea address

• jour(mi)nal

• kaleword searching

• microfarm

• newspepper

• on vine database

• peariodical

• refe-reed

• serial

And would those who dig into text, but remain uncultivated, be "weeders"?

Different Versions

Reading about the value of being an introvert at the American Libraries column, I was reminded of this Doctor Johnson quote:

"When I was running about this town a very poor fellow, I was a great arguer for the advantages of poverty; but I was, at the same time, very sorry to be poor. Sir, all the arguments which are brought to represent poverty as no evil, shew it to be a great evil. You never find people labouring to convince you that you may live very happily upon a plentiful fortune."

That is, people praise introversion because they instinctively know it requires a defense, whereas extroversion does not.

Bacon and Mutton

"Some books," stated Sir Francis Bacon, "are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested." In The Book of a Naturalist (George H. Doran, 1919) W. H. Hudson tells of a sheep who "would steal quietly in [my home] and finding a book would catch it hastily up and make off with it. Carrying it off to the plantation she would set it down, put her hoof on it, and start tearing out the leaves and devouring them as expeditiously as possible. Once she had got hold of a book she would not give it up—not all the shouting and chasing after her would make her drop it" (p. 124-125).

Flying Cars of Yesterday (2)

To counterbalance my skepticism in a prior post about the rosy-painted future of 3D printing, I offer this too-good-to-be-true quote attributed to a U.S. Patent Office Commissioner who in 1899 is purported to have said, "Everything that can be invented has been invented."

(For those who can't get enough of forecasts that went wrong, there is "Incorrect Predictions" at Wikiquote.)

Flying Cars of Yesterday (1)

Where are the flying cars promised so long ago? Unfortunately, they may be in the same future-past junk heap as 3D printing for libraries. Bracing, exciting is the concept presented on the American Libraries video. But so much of it is infiltrated with wish fulfillment, a projection of what would be were progress assured and circumstances utopian. As Voltaire said, if every infant grew up to the promise of its potential, the world would overflow with geniuses.

Blogged Down (4): Yours, Mine, and Hours

Since the hook for blogs is content, what makes up blog fodder?

A seasonal list of library hours, for one. This is very reliable in popularity and uncontroversial. Just the facts, m'am.

Yet there is a problem. A blog consists of timely (a coincidental pun) entries, and a person who wants to know library hours may have ado to journey through a blog to locate this. For the deliberate searcher, it is better for hours to live on the library's homepage.*

*A favorite novel with a gratuitous quote: "From a corner the morning hours run out."--James Joyce, Ulysses

ACRL Philadelphia: Nice

At this and previous library conferences, people "nice" me. That is, they are inevitably pleasant and polite, and I return the favor. Any problem in this?

Well, you become hesitant to bring any thoughts (to vendors, to speakers, to colleagues) that challenge this tacit amiability of atmosphere, since they may smack of discord or non-conformity.

"I respect faith, but doubt is what gets you an education"--Wilson Mizner

"One in an ACRL Philadelphia series. Collect the whole set."

Interruption: The Sponsor Strikes Back

In breaking down on Thursday, Blogger ate my latest post. Heretofore, I will prudently save each in Word, then transfer them to mercurial Blogger. In this bow to caution I am following the famous Mark Twain cat.

“We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it—and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again—and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one any more.”

[Post-post, I discovered Blogger had saved my draft, so the set-back has proved temporary and even illusory.]

ACRL Philadelphia: Shhhh

In the time before a program commences, the white noise of harmless pop music fills the auditorium. Here's the principle that any music is better than none. I wish those in charge took to heart the maxim, "Don't speak, unless you can improve on silence."



"One in an ACRL Philadelphia series. Collect the whole set."

Quote: Ashleigh Brillant

"My sources are unreliable, but their information is fascinating."

If this is not a challenge for librarians evaluating what they find online, it is for critical thinking. And the internet is chockablock with agreeable but suspect facts.

As a contrast to the above quote, consider John Adams' "Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."

Quote: James Russell Lowell

"Blessed are they who have nothing to say and who cannot be persuaded to say it."

The meta-quote I gathered from the erstwhile NewsScan Daily. I have no way of knowing the accuracy of the quote or even if Lowell ever uttered it. The internet must have any number of apocryphal attributions from actual figures (I'm thinking Albert Einstein). Subscription quote collections that I've checked do not have it.

Quote: Nathaniel Hawthorne

"The world owes all its onward impulses to men ill at ease." (From The House of the Seven Gables)