One Week in the Life of a Librarian

Monday
Find out super-expensive specialized database I was supposed to show to students was no longer available. Call vendor. Find out that our access had expired even though this database in on disk. Not only did I need to show this to students, they had an assignment based on it. Negotiate limited access to the database so students can complete assignment.

Watch the Fucking Vikings slaughter the Packers. IM friend in South Dakota during the game. By the third quarter our conversation had become nothing more than a series of swear words.

Tuesday
Find out I had to teach a class on Thursday. Not too bad, but it was the class I had scheduled for October 29. Scramble to find someone to cover desk hours.

But nothing broke on Tuesday.

Go to Costco to buy several hundred dollar of candy for Halloween-themed library open house.

Wednesday
Prepare to do two two-hour instruction sessions, back to back. First one goes fine. At some point between the two sessions, the input on the projector in the lab stopped working. Four different people come in to look at it... No go. Realize I have to show thirty-five college students how to use three different databases... without a projector. What to do? Wing it. Spend an hour describing how to use the databases while trying to get at least half of the class to work through a search process. It was like herding cats. Wonder if I should humiliate the student who spent the entire hour looking at pictures from cakewrecks.com. Since I stood directly behind her the entire time, doubt humiliation would be effective. Decide it's her grade, not mine. Students applaud when I am done since I had to wing it. Several of them sent me messages congratulating me for working under unusual circumstances.

Thursday
Internet access is slow but figure it is my computer. Arrive at Surprise Class across campus to find out access to the Internet is hit and miss. Some sites work, most don't. Once again, spend twenty minutes talking to students about their research, answering questions. Get into what databases I can. With fifteen minute left to class, everything works again. Run through New, Complicated Marketing Database in a few minutes.

Later that day, find out database on disk that was a problem on Monday needs to be reactivated every time someone wants to use it. Not a big deal except that the activation code is a nonsensical series of about fifty characters... and we shouldn't have to keep activating it. Exchange a series of emails with the vendor to find out what is wrong. Get nowhere.

Ask colleague: Is being royally pissed off enough of a reason to drop a resource. Colleague's response: It's the best reason.

Friday
Arrive at work to find a faculty member wandering around the ref desk trying to figure out why a different database wasn't working properly. It had recently changed names/vendors and with that comes some weirdness. Find a work-around for his assignment with print resources. Inquire about database status; get it fixed. Email professor and receive super nice thank-you email.

Wonder why students in Surprise Class are using an older print resource and not the New Marketing Database. Find out our fancy New Marketing Database has gone down. Panic slightly. Due to time difference, there is a good chance this won't be fixed before Monday. This source is needed for assignment due Tuesday. Call support line for vendor--find out the number on their site is no longer in service. Panic, a lot. Find way to customer support through sales rep's voice mail. Get nowhere because it's after 4:00 on Friday and they're in the Central timezone.

Email all faculty using this source for assignments and explain alternate resources and apologize profusely. Receive super nice email from professor of Surprise Class thanking me for teaching her class on short notice and telling me I had the attention of all the students (save for the two that were sleeping); she tells me I should be proud.

Continue email correspondence with the vendor of the database on the disk. Receive email instructions that were supposed to fix the problem. All they did was spit out the same activation code. Contact the person in the library who could help figure out if this was a computer problem or database problem. He was gone. Email the vendor rep, but it was 4:00 on a Friday and she was in the Central timezone.

Find out that the people who could help investigate issues with the New Marketing Database are also gone today.

This all happens between three different hour long research consultations that involved the database on the disk... and each time I had to enter the fifty-character activation key.

Work late reference shift.

Think about how I had planned on going to Seattle this weekend. One friend I had hoped to see bailed on me. Other friends are busy. Still plan on going... until I get home and realize I would rather have a low-key weekend of sleep and relaxation.

I'm exhausted.