In Which I Expiate Some Shame

[serinde]

During lunch today, spride and I went spelunking in the main college library. This minor, harmless event sparked several humbling realizations in me, to wit:

0. It has been a really, really long time--on the order of years--since I have set foot in an actual library. And me with scholarly pretensions?!

1. I couldn't remember how to find a specific book. Dimly I recalled "oh yes, the card catalog", but the march of progress appears to be several miles down the road. (Eventually a computer was located that had the appropriate searchy things.)

2. I failed at finding sections, too, because though I do have distant memories of the Dewey Decimal System[1] and the numbers within it relevant to my life, I am wholly unfamiliar with the Library of Congress system, which is what Hunter uses. (In spite of this, I managed to make a beeline for the history-of-costuming shelves. MAGIC!~)

I assign myself the penance of, on every lunch when I have no commitment and the weather is too inclement to go walkies, spending it in the library re-acquainting myself with its mysteries. Because my current situation is insupportable. (It might be argued that, for me, this is not as who should say penitential. But!.)

[1] I really wanted to make that a link to the panel from Tick #6, where the Red Scare is going to start his rampage by smashing up a park dedicated to "that decadent and imperialist American, Melville Dewey". The Intarwubs fale me. You'll just have to imagine it.

Comments

[erinfinnegan.livejournal.com]

I recently acquired the knowledge of how books are organized at Book Off and Kinokuniya! Wow... it's like Barnes and Noble OR a library.

In any case, is your email address the same as ever, even though you have a new job?

[syringavulgaris.livejournal.com]

Yep.

[syringavulgaris.livejournal.com]

By which I mean, I saw your mail, and I thought probably yes, but now it is probably no. :(

[spride.livejournal.com]

I hold pieces of paper that claim I are an Librarian, and I wot not of your Library of Con Gross system. It is neither rational nor elegant. Dewey is acceptable as a form of groping towards the Light that is the Blessed UDC, much as an atheist will tolerate an agnostic. But LC is a pit of howling chaos. It's not even properly faceted, for Ranganathan's sake!

[syringavulgaris.livejournal.com]

Yes, but you get a bye because you are Strange and Foreign. Similarly, I would not expect you to know how to make tuna casserole.

(Behold my Weltanschauung, mortals, and tremble!)

[lillilah]

I am blessed to live near a wonderful public library. However, when I lived in the NYC area, it seemed like it was harder to find a good ole public library rather than some building filled with fancy books that you have to make a reservation to look at.