You may find yourself holding a camera worth more than your paycheck with no idea how to use it

The Story:  It has been decided that the library needs a new camera, mainly for event documentation.  The one currently in use is owned by the children's department, as they take the most event photos (because let's face it--kids' programs take way more fun pictures than grown-up ones...there are only so many angles of person-talking-in-front-of-powerpoint to be shot).  However, it is the reference department that decides not only to get a camera, but which one to get, without any input from the library staff who actually use the current camera, an 8-year-old point-and-shoot that while simple to operate, has seen better days.
So, what you're left with is an expensive mystery that should be able to take the perfect shot every time, but somehow manages to fall short.  The shots are blurry, the camera takes forever to snap a picture and you've already missed about twelve shots while you're trying to get the right focus on the first one, plus what you see on the screen/through the viewfinder differ greatly from what gets uploaded to the computer.  There is a whole bunch of extra ceiling and floor space that doesn't show up on the screen or in the viewfinder, making all your pictures unnecessarily far away.  Sure, you can crop it, but who wants to sit there and do that for a hundred pictures that you're just going to dump on facebook for all the kids' parents to tag each other in the comments section of instead of hitting the share button?  Sorry, got a little off-topic there.
Not only that, but the pictures are much higher resolution than the ones your old camera used to take, which means they take up a whole lot more space on the memory card.  You'll have to buy a bigger one or else delete photos after every transfer so as not to slow down already pokey picture-taking to a crawl.  This wouldn't be a big deal if you sorted and uploaded your pictures in a timely manner, but since nobody else on your staff is presently comfortable with sorting pictures and uploading them online, this step of program documentation generally takes a backseat.
Having a staff that isn't necessarily 100% comfortable trying new technology can be a problem when something like this drops in your lap.  It can mean that they default to using the old camera, not knowing that the memory card is in the new one, and they don't notice the glaring error message popping up on the screen every time they press the shutter button telling them that the picture isn't actually being saved.  Or, it can mean that they don't like covering programs any more because they feel stressed and intimidated by the new camera.  You can solve this by having your staff practice taking pictures of displays in the library with the new camera, things that are not going anywhere, so there's nothing to "mess up".  It helps if you discover the automatic mode where it senses what kind of picture you're trying to take first, and if you discover the on-off toggle for auto-focus, and the toggle for stabilizers, and point these things out to your staff.  There is also a button to turn the screen on and off, and toggling it one way or another seems to help a little with the extra space problem, and also warn those using it to zoom in more than they think they need to, because there will be extra space on the borders regardless.


The Lesson:  If you're buying a camera or other equipment that is an upgrade and will be used by the whole library, maybe consult each department about what their plans for it are, what concerns they have, etc.  Communication here is key.  There's no reason to surprise a department with new technology.  Surprises are not always a good thing, and that department may not have the skills nor time to really develop them to actually make that surprise "upgrade" worthwhile.

The Resources:  Honestly, the user manuals, how-to camera books, online tutorials, etc., all got really damn technical.  I didn't have the time to take a whole photography class just to learn how to make the expensive new toy take a decent picture.  In an active program, which most children's programs are, I just need to point, shoot, repeat, in rapid succession.  I'm sure this camera could do that, but I didn't know how to make it.  Learning about the auto-focus and smart-shooting mode helped, but not enough.  We did have a professional photographer who said they'd come in and show us how to use the camera properly, but it wound up not being an issue.  See the aside for that story.

An Aside:  About six months after we got this camera, maybe a little more, it got stolen.  Someone from reference used it to take pictures of a program and forgot to lock it up after, leaving it sitting out on the desk.  While all librarians were distracted with helping patrons, somebody swiped it.  By this point, we had a new memory card in it so we could at least go back to the old camera with the old card for a while.  The higher-ups were so mad about the loss of camera that it looked like we'd be stuck with the 8-year-old model until it was old enough to drive.  Eventually, though, they were persuaded to replace the expensive mishap with a less-expensive, but still high-quality camera that had fewer bells and whistles.  Thankfully, this one was easier to operate, and now staff were very careful about putting it away after use.  The technophobic members of the staff were a bit more comfortable with it, and now that's the only one we use if we can help it.

You may come upon some fairy tale haters

The Story:  Unbeknownst to anyone on library staff, a patron comes in looking for a DVD of a 3 Little Pigs story.  They search it up in the catalog, and as luck would have it, only one of the several versions we have is available at the moment:  the Fairy Tale Theatre version.  As anyone who has seen even a snippet of these movies knows, these are some strange films.  They're technically for children, and not inappropriate, but they take a 5-minute fairy tale and turn it into an hour-long production, which includes some jokes and references that only adults would get.  Honestly, the biggest problem with showing this version of any fairy tale to a young child is that they will get bored.  However, this patron seemed to be incredibly offended that the library would have this available for preschoolers.  What one needs to keep in mind, however, is that it is cataloged as a juvenile non-fiction DVD, which is on the opposite end of the shelving unit from the preschool-aged DVDs.  We actually have them separated.  JJ DVDs for younger children, J DVDs for older children, and J Non-fiction DVDs after that.  This movie was not sitting next to Barney or Caillou.  It is even on the top shelf, where small hands can't reach it accidentally.  The real problem is that all the preschool-geared versions were out at the moment, and the patron never bothered to ask a librarian for help.  Had they done so, we would have recommended that they request a different version from another library, as this one is a little long for four-year olds.

I do appreciate a few things about this patron's complaint, though.  Firstly, it was done so nicely, handwritten, on nice stationary, sealed and dropped off with the DVD in question upon return.  Secondly, they didn't seem to want a confrontation, as they wrote the note and left.  They didn't march in demanding to speak to the person in charge.  We later did look them up and call them, offering to put other versions of the story on hold for them, and explaining that had they asked, we wouldn't have recommended this particular title for a four-year-old.  Thirdly, they didn't foam at the mouth and demand that all traces of this item's existence be removed from the library at once.  They merely thought it should be kept in a section for older children, which, ironically, it already was.

The Lesson/Resources:  Basically, just know your stuff.  Know your collection, categorize it appropriately, and have your policies to fall back on should a real challenge appear.  In that case, ALA has some good resources here, here, and here.  While library school did try to prepare us for dealing with book challenges and the like, they didn't prepare us for the non-challenge that happened here.  "Keep this movie in the section for older children!"  Okay, job's done!

You may have been instrumental in someone's family planning without even knowing it

The Story:  I was cleaning up one evening before closing time, picking up used guest passes and whatnot near the computers in the children's room, and what do I find?  An empty medicine wrapper, complete with instructions and drug facts.  The pill in question is no cough drop or antihistamine; it is a morning-after pill.  

I like to imagine that after a night of passion, a woman realizes she forgot to take her birth control, and rather than risk it, she runs out and gets some insurance against an unwanted baby.  Then, for whatever reason, she has second thoughts, and wonders what it would be like if she were pregnant and if she did keep it.

"But how will I know what children are like without having one?" She asks herself.  "I know, I'll go to the library!"

Little did she know what children who hang out at the library are really like.  After an afternoon sitting amongst the video game obsessed pre-teens shouting over each other on the computers and watching the parade of children throwing temper tantrums as they're hauled out by their parents, she thinks to herself, "Fuck this!  I am never having kids." and dry-swallows it, not bothering to throw away her trash, walks away, and never looks back.

Now, I want to be clear that I support a woman's right to do whatever she pleases with her body, including choosing to not have a baby by any medically sound and legal methods available to her.  The person who left this at the library did just that, and I do not fault her for it.

However, she chose not to throw the wrapper in the trash, and by littering and leaving it for me to find and clean up, whoever this woman is has willingly made herself fodder for jokes.

No lesson or resources here, except to expect the unexpected, a constant in our profession, and take the laughs where you can.

One man's trash...

...is still trash.

The Story:  The little bus pictured above had seen better days.  The steering wheel was broken, there were other moving parts that had long ago fallen off, paint was faded in many places, things that shouldn't move did, things that should move didn't...in short, it was a wreck.  It took a long time to find something to replace it, because the company that made it didn't make anything even remotely resembling it anymore, and pretty much every other toy vehicle was either cheap plastic or some version of a powerwheels car.  Finally, I find the wooden firetruck pictured below.

It's cute, and new, and roughly the same size and does most of the same stuff.  Sure, it's a little smaller and lighter, but there really isn't anything else out there exactly like the bus.  The plan was to just switch them when nobody was around, because as I had learned from the raccoon saga, children and/or parents don't like to see change in the library playscape.  There was a miscommunication when I talked to the maintenance person whose job it was to put this thing together and put it in the play area.  He thought we were just adding one, and put it out during the daytime with families around.  Well, shit.  Now I had to explain to him that there really wasn't room in the play area for two vehicles, and the whole reason for getting the firetruck was to get rid of the bus.  And so, he gets rid of the bus while people are around, which is miscommunication #2.  One of the parents starts grilling me about why we're getting rid of the bus, clearly ignoring anything I say about how broken it is.  Then he asks what we're doing with it, which is not an answer he wants to hear.  Finally, I tell him that if he likes it so much he can have it, because we're just putting it in the dumpster anyway.  He starts asking again if we can't donate it anywhere, and I tell him that other places don't want our broken toys any more than we do.  Again, I offer him the bus.  He declines again, but spends the next 20 minutes talking very loudly to anyone in the children's room who will listen about what a great travesty it is, what a great loss, to get rid of one stupid, broken toy.

He finally leaves, and the custodian brings the bus out to the dumpster with my help (it's awkward, but not heavy).  Before he can put it in, two contractors who are there working on the lights or something outside the building see us walking by and one of them asks, "Are you getting rid of that?" and when I answer that we are, and he can have it if he wants, he's just as baffled as the dad from earlier.  We leave it next to the dumpster and tell him he's got until the library closes to pick it up and take it home if he wants it, because then it has to get tossed.  Lo and behold, it's still sitting there when we open the next morning, and I make sure that the bus gets thrown out.

The Lesson:  Like with the raccoon, never change the library environment or get rid of things when there are witnesses.  While nobody will actually claim responsibility or ownership of your castoffs, there will be plenty of people who will be appalled that you're throwing away something that is broken and no longer useful.

The Resources:  It would be a little cheeky, but one could recommend some good books about decluttering your life to some of the patrons who insist that everything has value.  Also, the post about the raccoon has some good books on accepting the loss of toys for children.  Alternately, this one is pretty much just about experience.  Also, if you're curious about the firetruck, here's where I got it.