ACRL Philadelphia: Bird Calls

Some poster proposals are not accepted because they show the library as technologically backward. For example, if one were sent suggesting the use of carrier pigeons to fly e-mails between library workstations.





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

ACRL Philadelphia: Sucker

In my first visit to a Philadelphia restaurant I ordered a soft drink, which came with a straw. When I put my mouth on the straw I was chagrinned to taste paper. The wrapping had been removed except for the top two inches. Presumably this was a compromise to please both a customer's sanitary finickiness and desire for convenience--this was a restaurant where you didn't even have to tear off the covering of a straw, for the waiter was tough enough to do it. After this experience I looked exactingly before sucking on a straw, and indeed found this custom repeated in other restaurants. Maybe it is native to the East Coast.

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

ACRL Philadelphia: Keynote vs. Keynote

The two keynotes bookending the last day were a contrast in content and dress. The first speaker, Jaron Lanier, was a t-shirt/jeans kind of guy who spoke about technology. He reflected his subculture. The last speaker,  dapper and dandiacal Clinton Kelly, spoke on fashion. (I found his subject removed from librarianship and of small interest, but going by the number of questioners he attracted, whoa! was he popular.)

The more philosophical might find the two different speakers symbolic of the split betwixt the mind and the body.



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

ACRL Philadelphia: Slay That Again

 The first keynote speaker bore the handle of Tiffany Shlain. To a person self-conscious about having slurred speech, her surname is a godsend.
 





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

ACRL Philadelphia: Not(e)

During talks species of audience attendees were divisible among:

(1) Those who took no notes. Self-confident in their memory, they were, in appearance, unencumbered by pen and pad or laptop that would get in their way of listening to the speaker.

(2) Those who took notes. Writing in a manner that ranged from surreptitious to ostentatious, and industrious to a fault, these individuals didn't trust to memory.

(3) Those who had pen and pad or laptop for display alone. Maybe they forgot the implements were there, or heard nothing worth recording.

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

ACRL Philadelphia: Tuna and La Scala

Across the street from the conference was a food market, full of crowds and bustle. During a break between meetings I discovered that in one case displaying fish was a type with the sign "porgy" that fortuitously lay next to another, "sea bass." There they were: Porgy and Bass.






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

ACRL Philadelphia: Why There

What a coincidence. The conference for librarians was next-door to a former railroad terminal named Reading.







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