Thursday, August 25, 2005
Going to other libraries 'on relief' is much like a first day at a new school, you don't know anyone, you don't know where the toilets are and you can't wait for playtime so you can go and run around outside.
This was my first time back at The Greenhouse since the Reopened Library reopened. When it was still closed and I was working at The Posh Library I was regularly going to the Greenhouse, my working Saturdays at the least. But coming back to it for the first time in around almost a year is almost like going somewhere new, only it isn't. Going there today I realised how bad things can be there, how dull. If the library was in some nice middle-class area then it would probably be closed down because the issues must be very low. I had to do some shelf-tidying in the non-fiction, that didn't take much effort because I was just running my eye along the
(Gah, my Dad has just phoned, ruining my train of thought. I've told my parents that I use the answerphone to screen my calls, the silly sod phoned and then didn't say anything after the tone, so I thought it was an automated phonebot.)
shelf, there was little work that needed to be done because the books were in the right order. Probably from the last time the shelves were tidied, a month or two ago. The non-fiction doesn't go out much here. The only reason this library stays open is because it's in the middle of a big council estate which is probably an area of social deprivation, so we're doing a social good, despite the fact that people only really come in to read the papers, take out the odd video and use our computers. Really the only sensible thing to do would be to rip out the non-fiction and replace the space with computers. That's what the people on this estate seem to want from a library. Definitely not books.
When you work at a big library you can get away from people but the Greenhouse doesn't have much space, so the only time you can get away from the other staff is at lunchtime if you sit down the other end of the library. It does tend to make me rather short-tempered, being stuck there all day. I have to work there again on Saturday. At least after that I'm on holiday for a week while I do my birthday.
This was my first time back at The Greenhouse since the Reopened Library reopened. When it was still closed and I was working at The Posh Library I was regularly going to the Greenhouse, my working Saturdays at the least. But coming back to it for the first time in around almost a year is almost like going somewhere new, only it isn't. Going there today I realised how bad things can be there, how dull. If the library was in some nice middle-class area then it would probably be closed down because the issues must be very low. I had to do some shelf-tidying in the non-fiction, that didn't take much effort because I was just running my eye along the
(Gah, my Dad has just phoned, ruining my train of thought. I've told my parents that I use the answerphone to screen my calls, the silly sod phoned and then didn't say anything after the tone, so I thought it was an automated phonebot.)
shelf, there was little work that needed to be done because the books were in the right order. Probably from the last time the shelves were tidied, a month or two ago. The non-fiction doesn't go out much here. The only reason this library stays open is because it's in the middle of a big council estate which is probably an area of social deprivation, so we're doing a social good, despite the fact that people only really come in to read the papers, take out the odd video and use our computers. Really the only sensible thing to do would be to rip out the non-fiction and replace the space with computers. That's what the people on this estate seem to want from a library. Definitely not books.
When you work at a big library you can get away from people but the Greenhouse doesn't have much space, so the only time you can get away from the other staff is at lunchtime if you sit down the other end of the library. It does tend to make me rather short-tempered, being stuck there all day. I have to work there again on Saturday. At least after that I'm on holiday for a week while I do my birthday.
