KOAN OF THE DAY

How far do you go to humor insane patrons?



So, this patron swept in with the manner, bearing and dress of Norma Desmond (white silk turban and all!) and began asking all of these complicated questions about evolution and taxonomy, most of which were completely beyond the capacity of this small branch and my limited scientific knowledge. She then sighed and said nevermind, because she was on her way to Stanford to conduct more research. While I was attempting to help her with a question concerning the evolution of elephants I found a site about manatees and remarked how interesting it was that they were relatives of the elephant. She gave me a piercing look and replied with icy hauteur,



“They most certainly are related. Manatees have breasts, you know, and are milk producing. That is why sailors would drag them on board and have sex with them.”



Whoa. I know manatees are rumored to be the inspiration for mermaids. I also realize that they are slow moving and that sailors get very lonely at sea, but I refuse to believe that the sailors would haul these 1 ton creatures aboard deck and resort to that sort of desperate and unnatural behavior, especially with cabin boys so handy. In any case, it was a very odd thing to say and I didn't know really how to respond and how much further I should keep going along with her on her research.



After I submitted an interlibrary loan for some obscure book on bushmen she thanked me and strode regally out of the library. At the door she crossed paths with the library tech, who saw my face and started laughing and filled me in on her. I apparently got off easy today, because she is notorious here and throughout the neighborhood for her imperious peculiarity, which lately seems to be taking a tragic turn toward raving lunacy with sexual overtones.



She was recently banned from the coffee shop across the street, not for saying something you would expect, like “I’m ready for my closeup, Mr. Demille, " but for screeching repeatedly at the owner of the packed coffee house, “I know you want to look at my pussy!”

KOAN OF THE DAY
How far do you go to humor insane patrons?

So, this patron swept in with the manner, bearing and dress of Norma Desmond (white silk turban and all!) and began asking all of these complicated questions about evolution and taxonomy, most of which were completely beyond the capacity of this small branch and my limited scientific knowledge. She then sighed and said nevermind, because she was on her way to Stanford to conduct more research. While I was attempting to help her with a question concerning the evolution of elephants I found a site about manatees and remarked how interesting it was that they were relatives of the elephant. She gave me a piercing look and replied with icy hauteur,

“They most certainly are related. Manatees have breasts, you know, and are milk producing. That is why sailors would drag them on board and have sex with them.”

Whoa. I know manatees are rumored to be the inspiration for mermaids. I also realize that they are slow moving and that sailors get very lonely at sea, but I refuse to believe that the sailors would haul these 1 ton creatures aboard deck and resort to that sort of desperate and unnatural behavior, especially with cabin boys so handy. In any case, it was a very odd thing to say and I didn't know really how to respond and how much further I should keep going along with her on her research.

After I submitted an interlibrary loan for some obscure book on bushmen she thanked me and strode regally out of the library. At the door she crossed paths with the library tech, who saw my face and started laughing and filled me in on her. I apparently got off easy today, because she is notorious here and throughout the neighborhood for her imperious peculiarity, which lately seems to be taking a tragic turn toward raving lunacy with sexual overtones.

She was recently banned from the coffee shop across the street, not for saying something you would expect, like “I’m ready for my closeup, Mr. Demille, " but for screeching repeatedly at the owner of the packed coffee house, “I know you want to look at my pussy!”

When I arrived at work this morning I was heartened to see the city gardener pruning the trees and bushes in the homeless-friendly garden nooks in front of the branch. The gardener trimmed the foliage practically bare so it looks like Loretta and her gang of paramours will no longer have the habitat and privacy that the overgrown branches and leaves offered. They were leaving a squalid mess for us to clean up each day and one of them had just acquired a boom box so all Friday I had to listen to tinny music in addition to all of the other annoying sounds of their raucous partying. They are as loud, messy, and unwelcome as a flock of grackles.



With the protective covering now gone I'm hoping that the front of the library will not the be the attraction it has been for the homeless, who have been even more of a problem than usual due to a recent politically expedient crackdown on homeless and aggressive panhandlers in a popular tourist area near this branch. During the diaspora there's been a real influx into this neighborhood and we're all suffering for it.



One character named Dennis, whom my boss calls Dennis the Menace, threatens my boss' life regularly because he threw him out of the library once. When he's not revolving in and out of prison, he lies in wait in the park and tries to ambush my boss. Recently when my boss and his six year old son were walking by the park Dennis staggered drunkenly toward him and threw a punch. Fortunately he was way too drunk to make his target and he lost his balance and faceplanted down on the sidewalk. A few days later he wandered loaded into the library during children's story time and plopped down amidst the mothers and children, but the police were hot on his trail due to a prior complaint so they just followed him in and arrested him on the spot.



Back to Loretta, neighborhood street vixen... Our local beatcop paid us a visit today and told me that Loretta has a violent jealous streak and will attack any female who draws her beaux' attention away from her. She's all talk and not much action, though she can really scream some filth at perceived rivals and did so this last week right across the church steps as people were streaming out of mass. She also fell on her face recently and for a while one of her eyes was sealed shut. Now the swelling has gone down but the eye remains damaged and wanders lazily around. This hasn't seemed to detract from her allure significantly because I saw her surrounded by her usual group of admirers earlier today.

When I arrived at work this morning I was heartened to see the city gardener pruning the trees and bushes in the homeless-friendly garden nooks in front of the branch. The gardener trimmed the foliage practically bare so it looks like Loretta and her gang of paramours will no longer have the habitat and privacy that the overgrown branches and leaves offered. They were leaving a squalid mess for us to clean up each day and one of them had just acquired a boom box so all Friday I had to listen to tinny music in addition to all of the other annoying sounds of their raucous partying. They are as loud, messy, and unwelcome as a flock of grackles.

With the protective covering now gone I'm hoping that the front of the library will not the be the attraction it has been for the homeless, who have been even more of a problem than usual due to a recent politically expedient crackdown on homeless and aggressive panhandlers in a popular tourist area near this branch. During the diaspora there's been a real influx into this neighborhood and we're all suffering for it.

One character named Dennis, whom my boss calls Dennis the Menace, threatens my boss' life regularly because he threw him out of the library once. When he's not revolving in and out of prison, he lies in wait in the park and tries to ambush my boss. Recently when my boss and his six year old son were walking by the park Dennis staggered drunkenly toward him and threw a punch. Fortunately he was way too drunk to make his target and he lost his balance and faceplanted down on the sidewalk. A few days later he wandered loaded into the library during children's story time and plopped down amidst the mothers and children, but the police were hot on his trail due to a prior complaint so they just followed him in and arrested him on the spot.

Back to Loretta, neighborhood street vixen... Our local beatcop paid us a visit today and told me that Loretta has a violent jealous streak and will attack any female who draws her beaux' attention away from her. She's all talk and not much action, though she can really scream some filth at perceived rivals and did so this last week right across the church steps as people were streaming out of mass. She also fell on her face recently and for a while one of her eyes was sealed shut. Now the swelling has gone down but the eye remains damaged and wanders lazily around. This hasn't seemed to detract from her allure significantly because I saw her surrounded by her usual group of admirers earlier today.

Dogster

We're babysitting Michael, Elizabeth's little stepbrother, in Marin on this President's Day and have been working on our Dogster profiles all day, a fun activity to share with a 9 year old boy. Check out Spoon, Billy Jack, Angus and friends.

Dogster
We're babysitting Michael, Elizabeth's little stepbrother, in Marin on this President's Day and have been working on our Dogster profiles all day, a fun activity to share with a 9 year old boy. Check out Spoon, Billy Jack, Angus and friends.

LA FACE, OAKLAND BOOTY

Or, I officially have back



Yesterday I was punchdrunk and exhausted from a full day at the reference desk at at the busiest branch in the system, but my day still wasn't over because we had signed up to play in a Valentine's Day Ultimate Frisbee night tournament. Although I had a wonderful time, this was the first time that I have touched a disc or done any serious running around since the beach tournament in Mexico back in the beginning of December. An extended holiday season of gluttony and sloth has resulted in a sad state of physical condition for me, especially concerning the size of my ass. The Chinese girls at work have turned me onto these instant noodles that are soaked in fat and humming with MSG, which have compounded the problem because I now crave them daily like opium and they are sold at the convenience store right across the street from the library. In any case, I am so sore today from the tournament that I've been staggering around all morning in this really stilted and embarrassing way, like I've been afflicted by a palsy.



I really have been in a serious denial and needed the Ultimate frisbee wake-up call. I should have been clued in that my butt had become seriously badonkadonk by the renewed interest of all the brothers who hang out in the park that I have to pass through on my way to the ATM and post office. Their recent ardent attention and catcalls are a more accurate gauge of the size of my backside than any scale or constricting tightness of my clothes. I'm relieved that Ultimate season will put me back on a more salutary and clean living path. I love Ultimate and I really have come to rely on it to keep the baser parts of my nature in check.

LA FACE, OAKLAND BOOTY
Or, I officially have back

Yesterday I was punchdrunk and exhausted from a full day at the reference desk at at the busiest branch in the system, but my day still wasn't over because we had signed up to play in a Valentine's Day Ultimate Frisbee night tournament. Although I had a wonderful time, this was the first time that I have touched a disc or done any serious running around since the beach tournament in Mexico back in the beginning of December. An extended holiday season of gluttony and sloth has resulted in a sad state of physical condition for me, especially concerning the size of my ass. The Chinese girls at work have turned me onto these instant noodles that are soaked in fat and humming with MSG, which have compounded the problem because I now crave them daily like opium and they are sold at the convenience store right across the street from the library. In any case, I am so sore today from the tournament that I've been staggering around all morning in this really stilted and embarrassing way, like I've been afflicted by a palsy.

I really have been in a serious denial and needed the Ultimate frisbee wake-up call. I should have been clued in that my butt had become seriously badonkadonk by the renewed interest of all the brothers who hang out in the park that I have to pass through on my way to the ATM and post office. Their recent ardent attention and catcalls are a more accurate gauge of the size of my backside than any scale or constricting tightness of my clothes. I'm relieved that Ultimate season will put me back on a more salutary and clean living path. I love Ultimate and I really have come to rely on it to keep the baser parts of my nature in check.

Boundaries



Last night I broke a cardinal rule I had established for myself when I started working at the public library: I saw one of my patrons socially. I made this exception for a lovely and elegant Dutch woman for whom I am always ordering Inspector Maigret mysteries from other branches. Even though it's the easist thing in my job description to do, she makes a huge production out of it and carries on like I'm pulling strings and granting her special favors and really going out of my way for her. She is always so charming and thankful and tells me things like, "I would have nothing to reeeeed if it weren't for you." She is a nice compensation for some of the borderline personalities who wander into the library that I have to deal with.



My friend Jack and I helped find an apartment in Paris over Christmas for her and so she wanted to take me out to dinner. She's a neighbor of mine so we had dinner at a Thai restaurant down the street. She's led a very interesting life (she lived under German occupation as a child) and it was a lovely dinner and I'm glad that I did it.

I'm also considering breaking my rule again and taking the Feisty Old Broad to an Irish pub for her birthday and getting loaded with her. She always keeps me entertained with her outlandish statements and stories which always make for really good blog material.



I have a sad feeling that I am the only meaningful human contact a lot of my more lonely patrons have, and their intense neediness and desperation for companionship can be a little overwhelming, and at times, scary. Some patrons misinterpret my librarian service ethic as an invitation into my personal life. We had to change my listing in the phone book because a few patrons who lack proper boundaries somehow found out what my last name was and were calling me at home, sometimes at 7:30 in the morning, which really freaked me and Elizabeth out. There's a balance between being civil servant rudeness/apathy and friendliness and I'm still working on it.



Take John the Fisherman, the one who wanted to give me crabs (see Feb 5 post). He doesn't see the the fact that I live with a woman, that we have a 30 year age difference, that he's semi-homeless and lives on a boat, or that he reeks of brine and dope as any sort of barriers to our love.

He's a Vietnam Vet (I'm surprised that his bantam stature - he's only about 5'6 - didn't earn him a 4F deferment) and seasonal fisherman. On the first occasion I met him, he leaned over my desk to look at my computer screen and a fat smoldering marijuana roach fell out of his pocket right onto my keyboard. The next time I helped him he gave me this sad song and dance of how he left this paperback book belonging to the library on a boat and had no way of getting it back. This book was just an uncatalogued donation so I gave him a break and took it off his record. This was evidence enough for him that I had fallen deeply in love with him. Now whenever he's in town he's always trying to chat me up while I'm trapped at the reference desk, mostly to complain about his treatment at the VA hospital, especially how it will only cover two Viagra pills a month, which, he said to me sauvely with a raised eyebrow, "is hardly adequate."



When I declined his invitation to accompany him to some 'happening' up in Marin for the weekend he didn't take the news too well, but when I didn't react with appropriate gratitude (i.e., I didn't want to have sex with him) when he donated a Harry Potter book to the library he acted really hurt, like I led him on or something, and had cruelly wounded his pride intentionally. I shouldn't feel bad but I do, so I'm making it a goal to work on my personal boundaries and make my intentions more clear.

Boundaries

Last night I broke a cardinal rule I had established for myself when I started working at the public library: I saw one of my patrons socially. I made this exception for a lovely and elegant Dutch woman for whom I am always ordering Inspector Maigret mysteries from other branches. Even though it's the easist thing in my job description to do, she makes a huge production out of it and carries on like I'm pulling strings and granting her special favors and really going out of my way for her. She is always so charming and thankful and tells me things like, "I would have nothing to reeeeed if it weren't for you." She is a nice compensation for some of the borderline personalities who wander into the library that I have to deal with.

My friend Jack and I helped find an apartment in Paris over Christmas for her and so she wanted to take me out to dinner. She's a neighbor of mine so we had dinner at a Thai restaurant down the street. She's led a very interesting life (she lived under German occupation as a child) and it was a lovely dinner and I'm glad that I did it.
I'm also considering breaking my rule again and taking the Feisty Old Broad to an Irish pub for her birthday and getting loaded with her. She always keeps me entertained with her outlandish statements and stories which always make for really good blog material.

I have a sad feeling that I am the only meaningful human contact a lot of my more lonely patrons have, and their intense neediness and desperation for companionship can be a little overwhelming, and at times, scary. Some patrons misinterpret my librarian service ethic as an invitation into my personal life. We had to change my listing in the phone book because a few patrons who lack proper boundaries somehow found out what my last name was and were calling me at home, sometimes at 7:30 in the morning, which really freaked me and Elizabeth out. There's a balance between being civil servant rudeness/apathy and friendliness and I'm still working on it.

Take John the Fisherman, the one who wanted to give me crabs (see Feb 5 post). He doesn't see the the fact that I live with a woman, that we have a 30 year age difference, that he's semi-homeless and lives on a boat, or that he reeks of brine and dope as any sort of barriers to our love.
He's a Vietnam Vet (I'm surprised that his bantam stature - he's only about 5'6 - didn't earn him a 4F deferment) and seasonal fisherman. On the first occasion I met him, he leaned over my desk to look at my computer screen and a fat smoldering marijuana roach fell out of his pocket right onto my keyboard. The next time I helped him he gave me this sad song and dance of how he left this paperback book belonging to the library on a boat and had no way of getting it back. This book was just an uncatalogued donation so I gave him a break and took it off his record. This was evidence enough for him that I had fallen deeply in love with him. Now whenever he's in town he's always trying to chat me up while I'm trapped at the reference desk, mostly to complain about his treatment at the VA hospital, especially how it will only cover two Viagra pills a month, which, he said to me sauvely with a raised eyebrow, "is hardly adequate."

When I declined his invitation to accompany him to some 'happening' up in Marin for the weekend he didn't take the news too well, but when I didn't react with appropriate gratitude (i.e., I didn't want to have sex with him) when he donated a Harry Potter book to the library he acted really hurt, like I led him on or something, and had cruelly wounded his pride intentionally. I shouldn't feel bad but I do, so I'm making it a goal to work on my personal boundaries and make my intentions more clear.

THE VERY IDEA



When I lived in Birmingham, Alabama there was a dive gay bar that was so nasty no self respecting homosexual would dare to be seen in it until 4:00 AM, at the very earliest. One night the bar and all of the patrons were held up. When the gunmen demanded that everyone get down on the sticky, sludge covered floor, all obeyed immediately except one defiant drag queen, who said, "You can beat me, you can shoot me, but there is no way on God's earth that you can make me lie down on THAT floor!"

The gunmen gallantly allowed her to remain standing while they completed the robbery.

THE VERY IDEA

When I lived in Birmingham, Alabama there was a dive gay bar that was so nasty no self respecting homosexual would dare to be seen in it until 4:00 AM, at the very earliest. One night the bar and all of the patrons were held up. When the gunmen demanded that everyone get down on the sticky, sludge covered floor, all obeyed immediately except one defiant drag queen, who said, "You can beat me, you can shoot me, but there is no way on God's earth that you can make me lie down on THAT floor!"
The gunmen gallantly allowed her to remain standing while they completed the robbery.

Grandma Fontaine



The other day I picked up a copy of Gone with the Wind and was once again reminded why it remains my favorite book of all time, one that I'm drawn to read again and again. Margaret Mitchell’s classic endures for many reasons, but one of the most compelling is Mitchell’s ability to make even the most minor character fully realized, characters that ring so true that they have become Southern archetypes. My favorite example of this is the O’Hara’s neighbor, the fierce dowager Grandma Fontaine, who makes only two brief appearances in the 1000 plus page book.



After she shoots the Yankee deserter, Scarlett takes possession of his horse and in a few days rides over to the neighboring Fontaines’ for the first time since the war began. After Scarlett tells them all that the Yankees burned most of the cotton crop, Grandma Fontaine responds.



"Be thankful it wasn't your house," said Grandma, leaning her chin on her cane. "you can always grow more cotton and you can't grow a house. By the bye, had you all started picking your cotton?"



"No," said Scarlett, "and now most of it is ruined. I don't imagine there's more than three bales left standing, in the far field in the creek bottom, and what earthly good will it do? All our field hands are gone and there's nobody to pick it."



"Mercy me, all our field hands are gone and there's nobody to pick it!" mimicked Grandma and bent a satiric glance on Scarlett. "What's wrong with your own pretty paws, Miss, and those of your sisters?"



"Me? Pick cotton?" cried Scarlett aghast, as if Grandma had been suggesting some repulsive crime. "Like a field hand? Like white trash? Like the Slattery women?"



"White trash indeed! Well, isn't this generation soft and ladylike! Let me tell you, Miss, when I was a girl my father lost all his money and I wasn't above doing honest work with my hands and in the fields too, till Pa got enough money to buy some more darkies. I've hoed my row and I've picked my cotton and I can do it again if I have to. And it looks like I'll have to. White trash, indeed!"'



Grandma Fontaine shrewdly preceives that Scarlett has more to unburden, and takes her aside so Scarlett can tell her the real truth of all the horrors and deprivation that she has had to endure since she last saw the Fontaines’: her mother’s death, her father’s descent into madness, the horror of Melanie’s labor, their harrowing escape from Atlanta, how the entire household is on the brink of starvation. After she listens she tells Scarlett a story I have never forgotten, a story that we can all draw strength and courage from.



"Child, it's a very bad thing for a woman to face the worst that can happen to her, because after she's faced the worst she can't ever really fear anything again. And it's very bad for a woman not to be afraid of anything. You think I don't understand what you've told me--what you've been through? Well, I understand very well. When I was about your age I was in the Creek uprising, right after the Fort Mims massacre--yes," she said in a far away voice, "just about your age for that was fifty-odd years ago. And I managed to get into the bushes and hide and I lay there and saw our house burn and I saw the Indians scalp my brothers and sisters. And I could only lie there and pray that the light of the flames wouldn't show up my hiding place. And they dragged Mother out and killed her about twenty feet from where I was lying. And scalped her too. And ever so often one Indian would go back to her and sink his tommyhawk into her skull again. I--I was my mother's pet and I lay there and saw it all. And in the morning I set out for the nearest settlement and it was thirty miles away. It took me three days to get there, through the swamps and the Indians, and afterward they thought I'd lose my mind... That's where I met Dr. Fonatine. He looked after me... Ah, well, that's been fifty years ago, as I said, and since that time I've never been afraid of anything or anybody because I'd known the worst that could happen to me. And that lack of fear has gotten me into a lot of trouble and cost me a lot of happiness. God intended women to be timid frightened creatures and there's something unnatural about a woman who isn't afraid... Scarlett, always save something to fear--even as you save something to love..."



Mitchell has been accused of romanticizing master/slave relations and slave conditions. She was most harshly criticized for never mentioning miscegenation, but those detractors obviously overlooked Grandma Fontaine’s comments about all of her family's black female slaves running off with Yankee soldiers.



"They promised all the black wenches silk dresses and gold earbobs. . . . some of the troopers went off with the black fools behind them on their saddles. Well, all they'll get will be yellow babies and I can't say that Yankee blood will improve the stock."



"Oh, Mama Fontaine!"



"Don't pull such a shocked face, Jane. We're all married, aren't we? And, God knows, we've seen mulatto babies before this."



Part of my library job description is reader’s advisory so I highly recommend this book to you, one of the great masterpiece’s of Southern literature.

Grandma Fontaine

The other day I picked up a copy of Gone with the Wind and was once again reminded why it remains my favorite book of all time, one that I'm drawn to read again and again. Margaret Mitchell’s classic endures for many reasons, but one of the most compelling is Mitchell’s ability to make even the most minor character fully realized, characters that ring so true that they have become Southern archetypes. My favorite example of this is the O’Hara’s neighbor, the fierce dowager Grandma Fontaine, who makes only two brief appearances in the 1000 plus page book.

After she shoots the Yankee deserter, Scarlett takes possession of his horse and in a few days rides over to the neighboring Fontaines’ for the first time since the war began. After Scarlett tells them all that the Yankees burned most of the cotton crop, Grandma Fontaine responds.

"Be thankful it wasn't your house," said Grandma, leaning her chin on her cane. "you can always grow more cotton and you can't grow a house. By the bye, had you all started picking your cotton?"

"No," said Scarlett, "and now most of it is ruined. I don't imagine there's more than three bales left standing, in the far field in the creek bottom, and what earthly good will it do? All our field hands are gone and there's nobody to pick it."

"Mercy me, all our field hands are gone and there's nobody to pick it!" mimicked Grandma and bent a satiric glance on Scarlett. "What's wrong with your own pretty paws, Miss, and those of your sisters?"

"Me? Pick cotton?" cried Scarlett aghast, as if Grandma had been suggesting some repulsive crime. "Like a field hand? Like white trash? Like the Slattery women?"

"White trash indeed! Well, isn't this generation soft and ladylike! Let me tell you, Miss, when I was a girl my father lost all his money and I wasn't above doing honest work with my hands and in the fields too, till Pa got enough money to buy some more darkies. I've hoed my row and I've picked my cotton and I can do it again if I have to. And it looks like I'll have to. White trash, indeed!"'

Grandma Fontaine shrewdly preceives that Scarlett has more to unburden, and takes her aside so Scarlett can tell her the real truth of all the horrors and deprivation that she has had to endure since she last saw the Fontaines’: her mother’s death, her father’s descent into madness, the horror of Melanie’s labor, their harrowing escape from Atlanta, how the entire household is on the brink of starvation. After she listens she tells Scarlett a story I have never forgotten, a story that we can all draw strength and courage from.

"Child, it's a very bad thing for a woman to face the worst that can happen to her, because after she's faced the worst she can't ever really fear anything again. And it's very bad for a woman not to be afraid of anything. You think I don't understand what you've told me--what you've been through? Well, I understand very well. When I was about your age I was in the Creek uprising, right after the Fort Mims massacre--yes," she said in a far away voice, "just about your age for that was fifty-odd years ago. And I managed to get into the bushes and hide and I lay there and saw our house burn and I saw the Indians scalp my brothers and sisters. And I could only lie there and pray that the light of the flames wouldn't show up my hiding place. And they dragged Mother out and killed her about twenty feet from where I was lying. And scalped her too. And ever so often one Indian would go back to her and sink his tommyhawk into her skull again. I--I was my mother's pet and I lay there and saw it all. And in the morning I set out for the nearest settlement and it was thirty miles away. It took me three days to get there, through the swamps and the Indians, and afterward they thought I'd lose my mind... That's where I met Dr. Fonatine. He looked after me... Ah, well, that's been fifty years ago, as I said, and since that time I've never been afraid of anything or anybody because I'd known the worst that could happen to me. And that lack of fear has gotten me into a lot of trouble and cost me a lot of happiness. God intended women to be timid frightened creatures and there's something unnatural about a woman who isn't afraid... Scarlett, always save something to fear--even as you save something to love..."

Mitchell has been accused of romanticizing master/slave relations and slave conditions. She was most harshly criticized for never mentioning miscegenation, but those detractors obviously overlooked Grandma Fontaine’s comments about all of her family's black female slaves running off with Yankee soldiers.

"They promised all the black wenches silk dresses and gold earbobs. . . . some of the troopers went off with the black fools behind them on their saddles. Well, all they'll get will be yellow babies and I can't say that Yankee blood will improve the stock."

"Oh, Mama Fontaine!"

"Don't pull such a shocked face, Jane. We're all married, aren't we? And, God knows, we've seen mulatto babies before this."

Part of my library job description is reader’s advisory so I highly recommend this book to you, one of the great masterpiece’s of Southern literature.

Ve’re from Holland, may ve use your interrrnet?

Despite the relentless globalization efforts of Nike, a sure-fire way remains in identifying Euro tourists before they even open their mouth: their footware, especially if they’re wearing tennis shoes. Even if the brand name weren’t completely unrecognizable, the shoes just look different and slightly…off.
The neighborhood branch where I work is in area heavily frequented by tourists, and the Euros love to come in to use our free internet, even if it means waiting an hour for the 15 minute express terminal. There is pay internet right across the street, but I have been forced to come to the conclusion that these tourists are the cheapest people on the planet and prefer to wait in a chair next to a reeking homeless man who is muttering to himself about the Kennedy’s beaming thoughts into his head than pay a few dollars to check their e-mail.
See for yourself if you can spot the European tourist by playing Blair Magazine’s Gay or Eurotrash and Lesbian or German Lady games.

Ve’re from Holland, may ve use your interrrnet?

Despite the relentless globalization efforts of Nike, a sure-fire way remains in identifying Euro tourists before they even open their mouth: their footware, especially if they’re wearing tennis shoes. Even if the brand name weren’t completely unrecognizable, the shoes just look different and slightly…off.
The neighborhood branch where I work is in area heavily frequented by tourists, and the Euros love to come in to use our free internet, even if it means waiting an hour for the 15 minute express terminal. There is pay internet right across the street, but I have been forced to come to the conclusion that these tourists are the cheapest people on the planet and prefer to wait in a chair next to a reeking homeless man who is muttering to himself about the Kennedy’s beaming thoughts into his head than pay a few dollars to check their e-mail.
See for yourself if you can spot the European tourist by playing Blair Magazine’s Gay or Eurotrash and Lesbian or German Lady games.

TAKE ME DOWN TO PARASITE CITY



Before my recent posts have you running off to your doctor for a thorough worming, I want to caution you that hosting a few parasites might be such a bad thing. There are theories that the recent rise in auto-immune diseases such as Crohn’s Disease, Lupus, MS, arthritis, etc. could be in part blamed on our excessively sanitary, parasite-free lifestyles. Studies suggest that our immune system turns on our bodies if there’s nothing foreign for it to fight off, like a bored army stationed in a village might. With nothing to occupy the soldiers, they begin to drink, carouse, and terrorize the local civilian population: your body.



Thanks to my appetite for raw fish and meat and, most of all, my slatternly ways, I probably have a gut teeming with the little fellows, plenty to keep my immune system distracted. I feel like I have established a nice host/parasite equilibrium, with the exception of my relationship to Billy Jack, the Jack Russell terrier.

I have always suspected that there was a good and healthy reason for my aversion to cleanliness.

TAKE ME DOWN TO PARASITE CITY

Before my recent posts have you running off to your doctor for a thorough worming, I want to caution you that hosting a few parasites might be such a bad thing. There are theories that the recent rise in auto-immune diseases such as Crohn’s Disease, Lupus, MS, arthritis, etc. could be in part blamed on our excessively sanitary, parasite-free lifestyles. Studies suggest that our immune system turns on our bodies if there’s nothing foreign for it to fight off, like a bored army stationed in a village might. With nothing to occupy the soldiers, they begin to drink, carouse, and terrorize the local civilian population: your body.

Thanks to my appetite for raw fish and meat and, most of all, my slatternly ways, I probably have a gut teeming with the little fellows, plenty to keep my immune system distracted. I feel like I have established a nice host/parasite equilibrium, with the exception of my relationship to Billy Jack, the Jack Russell terrier.
I have always suspected that there was a good and healthy reason for my aversion to cleanliness.

Differing Perspectives



How the pendulum swings in just a little more than a decade. May I also add that I'm really tired of teachers assigning their hapless students heavy research projects on some obscure little Indian tribe (probably invented for casino privledges) or mission and then requiring the primary source for the information to be from a book (internet or encyclopedias won't do), which often does not exist, anywhere. Teachers, please let's work together on this, and do a little homework of your own.



Mission to paradise : the story of Junipero Serra and the missions of California / by Kenneth M. King. Chicago : Franciscan Herald Press ; [San Francisco] : distributed by the Society of California Pioneers, 1975



The Missions of California : a legacy of genocide / Rupert Costo, Jeannette Henry Costo, editors.

Publication info. [San Francisco] : Published by The Indian Historian Press for the American Indian Historical Society, c1987.

Differing Perspectives

How the pendulum swings in just a little more than a decade. May I also add that I'm really tired of teachers assigning their hapless students heavy research projects on some obscure little Indian tribe (probably invented for casino privledges) or mission and then requiring the primary source for the information to be from a book (internet or encyclopedias won't do), which often does not exist, anywhere. Teachers, please let's work together on this, and do a little homework of your own.

Mission to paradise : the story of Junipero Serra and the missions of California / by Kenneth M. King. Chicago : Franciscan Herald Press ; [San Francisco] : distributed by the Society of California Pioneers, 1975

The Missions of California : a legacy of genocide / Rupert Costo, Jeannette Henry Costo, editors.
Publication info. [San Francisco] : Published by The Indian Historian Press for the American Indian Historical Society, c1987.