ACRL 2013: Fast Food

The drive from Missouri to Indiana took longer than I suspected. I was in the hotel room by 3:30 Wednesday, so even with picking up my badge I'd be able to squeeze into the first keynote at 4. But then an alarming discovery. The room clock showed 4:30. Like an expert three-card Monte player, Indiana's time shift from Central to Eastern had fooled me.

There turned out to be a silver lining. Not able to attend the keynote, I waited for the Exhibition Hall's 5:45 opening. Snackables were many and lines short. More people came in later. There is gloating satisfaction, perhaps with a taint of perversity, in seeing people in a long line that you have managed to avoid by a preemptive arrival. I figured they were just out from the end of the keynote and its associative ACRL housekeeping announcements.

Although this will dismay the organization, the non-Aesopian moral is that if attendees want short lines and first dibs on food, trade in the keynote for an on-time arrival at the Exhibit Hall opening.

Exchanging Vowels

Harvard has created what it calls a "labrary", its way of describing what a library will look like in the future. Apparently it is a descendant of the word "laboratory". Other substitute vowels don't form  neologisms so eloquently. Nothing fits "lebrary," barring an attempt at a construction in French (as in "Monsieur Le Brary"). On the other hand, going by the Oxford English Dictionary the "lob" part in an hypothesized "lobrary" has numerous meanings; for example, when "lob" signifies a "country bumpkin" it suggests a "lobrary" is a collection of reading material dealing with rural matters. An oversize, sprawling collection of items with simple words and lots of pictures fits a "lubbary" (from "lubber" as defined by the OED: a "big, clumsy, stupid fellow").

Book 'em, Danno

Perhaps with enthusiasm, perhaps with trepidation, you pick up a book to read, but as you go along you realize the book is not for you. A decision must be made: should the reading continue, or be given up? It is almost as though there's a fear that somewhere lurked a cadre of reader police waiting to arrest whoever balks at finishing a book.

Very different is the student assigned to read a book. He or she may find deceitful or ethically-challenged means to get around not only not finishing a book, but not starting it. They enlist the internet or maybe Masterplots and its ilk.

But it is the voluntary, reading-for-pleasure persons who feel the mystic obligation to slog on to the final page. Some who won't think twice about slipping aconite into a spouse's coffee will be nudged by guilt to finish a mammoth volume they hate from the get go.

Reading is the single form where this compunction dominates. People switch away from a television program, walk out of a movie, ruthlessly turn off a music CD, surf sporting events, nod during a speech, or daydream as a story is related.

There is a workaround for those who want to proclaim that they finish any book they start. They can follow the example of Forrest J Ackerman. The collector of a vast library of science fiction and fantasy books would tell listeners, “I've read every last word in every book in my collection,” then add “When I get a new book I turn to the last page--and read the last word!”

3D Libraries

Soon you will not be able to tell a library from a shop class. Slowly becoming home to 3D printers, libraries aren't so much a natural fit for them as other places offer a rounder hole for this square  technology peg. However, should 3D printing become popular and profitable enough, established places will accommodate themselves or new niches will crop up, luring away the audience that libraries fostered.

We All Scream

An imposing number of Americans are disconnected from libraries. The cause? Maybe there's too much passive marketing.
  
Sure, libraries do outreach, but it's through the traditional bookmobile. Rather, they should follow the ice cream truck model. As the vehicle goes through a neighborhood it plays a jingle through loudspeakers that will entice the attention of the underserved. A line from the Beatles' "Paperback Writer" can be adjusted from "come and take a look" to "come and take a book." Decorating the truck's outside can be book spines sporting bar codes that enable the contents to be downloaded into smart phones. It's done on the walls of subway stations, so how much more appropriate for a bookmobile.

And you wouldn't have to go inside to borrow a book.

Publisher's Progress (by John Bunion)

As I walked through the Wilderness of this World I came to a Place to lie down to sleep; and as I slept meseemeth to dream the following Dream. A large Publisher was coming down a slippy Slope whose Bottom is the Slough of Despond when He met a little, laden Library struggling up.
Publisher: Let Me assist You.
Library: Oh, thank You.
The Publisher proceeded to reach deep into the Pockets of the Library.
Library: What are You doing?
Publisher: I am lightening your Burden.
Library: How is that?
Publisher: I am removing your heavy Coins. Also your pound Notes. They weigh less, but every little Bit helps.
Library: What of my Bookes and the Rest that I carry?
Publisher: There is a Limit to my Charity.

ALA Anaheim: Escape from Disneyland

Like going down on the Titanic, one way to end your Anaheim trip is a visit to nearby Disneyland Park. At least aboard the ship there wasn't the hordes of baby strollers that roll over your toes and bring pedestrians traffic to a molasses-in-January slowness. If there is such an affliction as stroller trauma, this is the place to catch it.

Once in the park you may be forgiven for thinking that its founder, Walt Disney, should have been named "Wait" Disney, since waiting is the one certain thing that you will do when you visit either Disneyland or California Adventure. Lines are long and slow for rides that are short and quick.

The more the merrier is doubtlessly true at Disneyland, if you're a stockholder. But when you are one among the crowds you begin asking, why did I come here? and end with, when can I get out of here? On the other hand, space may be so constricted that you won't have breathing room to ask.

On the bright side, if you are not a children's librarian and forget what a child looks like, you are in luck, for they are everywhere and at every age.