I've taken a couple of days off to enjoy the spectacular weather. I realized I needed a break when I got all embarrassingly choked up after this totally scary gangbanger whipped around and asked,



"Got any good teen fiction in lately?"



He had already read most of my favorites, but I did send him away with M.T. Anderson's hilarious Burger Wuss.

I've taken a couple of days off to enjoy the spectacular weather. I realized I needed a break when I got all embarrassingly choked up after this totally scary gangbanger whipped around and asked,

"Got any good teen fiction in lately?"

He had already read most of my favorites, but I did send him away with M.T. Anderson's hilarious Burger Wuss.

Arachnophilia



We have a new pet! A spider has established residency next to our Wriggly Wranch, the composting bin that is home to our industrious colony of worms, collectively known as Shayna. Shayna makes nutrient rich plant food out of all the produce scraps that we feed her, but unfortunately the produce also attracts flies and other swarming, freeloading nuisances. A clever spider spun its web right next compost bin yesterday, and Elizabeth noticed today that it already had hauled in a big fat housefly. We watched the spider wrapping up the fly in its final silky resting place this afternoon - fascinating! Our own little tiny Wild Kingdom.



We keep the compost bin on the back stairs landing, so I'm sure that the fly was en route to our apartment - trying to sneak through the back door. I'm very grateful to the spider for waylaying it permanently before it ended up in our bedroom where I just know it would take big, lazy backwashing slurps out of the glass of water I like to keep on the nightstand and torment us all night buzzing and hurling itself retardedly against the blinds.

Arachnophilia

We have a new pet! A spider has established residency next to our Wriggly Wranch, the composting bin that is home to our industrious colony of worms, collectively known as Shayna. Shayna makes nutrient rich plant food out of all the produce scraps that we feed her, but unfortunately the produce also attracts flies and other swarming, freeloading nuisances. A clever spider spun its web right next compost bin yesterday, and Elizabeth noticed today that it already had hauled in a big fat housefly. We watched the spider wrapping up the fly in its final silky resting place this afternoon - fascinating! Our own little tiny Wild Kingdom.

We keep the compost bin on the back stairs landing, so I'm sure that the fly was en route to our apartment - trying to sneak through the back door. I'm very grateful to the spider for waylaying it permanently before it ended up in our bedroom where I just know it would take big, lazy backwashing slurps out of the glass of water I like to keep on the nightstand and torment us all night buzzing and hurling itself retardedly against the blinds.

No shoes, no shirt, no dice

When spring weather hits town many of our patrons thoughts turn to flights of fancy (see the DSM IV & Tennyson). As the temperature becomes milder patrons often need to be gently reminded of the library dress code, which although lax, does require shoes and shirts. I have to say that I’m blown away by the number of people who wander around this city barefoot. I’m not even talking about the mentally ill who don’t know any better, but hippie Bohemian types who skip around the city streets like they’re Zola Budd. What are these people thinking? This city’s sidewalks are an obstacle course of health hazards: little ponds of saliva from old men of a certain ethnicity who will not be broken of their spitting habit, bottlecaps, glass, dog/human feces, thorns, litter, and other disgusting pathogen bearing matter that I don’t know what else to call but filth. They're just asking for some hookworm to drill its way up through their heel. (OK, that’s just in the South where I grew up, but still. Have some common sense.)



On the first day of good weather last year, a homeless man wearing only soiled khaki clamdiggers walked in and approached the reference desk. I used to keep some a bottle of hand lotion at my desk because the hand sanitizing lotion that I was rubbing on my hands compulsively was very drying, so I liked to alternate between the two. Before I could tell him that he needed to have a shirt on to be in the library he spotted the lotion and asked,



“Mind if I have some of that?”



Not waiting for a reply, he leaned over my desk and vigorously pumped about a third of the bottle's contents into his hand. He then began lovingly and sensuously rubbing it all over his upper body. After he was finished caressing himself, he stood preening before me. After inspecting himself carefully to be sure that he had applied the lotion evenly and thoroughly, he thanked me. He then sauntered out, a new and confident hitch in his step, and I never saw him again. Now I keep my lotion in a drawer, hidden away from the public's sight.

No shoes, no shirt, no dice

When spring weather hits town many of our patrons thoughts turn to flights of fancy (see the DSM IV & Tennyson). As the temperature becomes milder patrons often need to be gently reminded of the library dress code, which although lax, does require shoes and shirts. I have to say that I’m blown away by the number of people who wander around this city barefoot. I’m not even talking about the mentally ill who don’t know any better, but hippie Bohemian types who skip around the city streets like they’re Zola Budd. What are these people thinking? This city’s sidewalks are an obstacle course of health hazards: little ponds of saliva from old men of a certain ethnicity who will not be broken of their spitting habit, bottlecaps, glass, dog/human feces, thorns, litter, and other disgusting pathogen bearing matter that I don’t know what else to call but filth. They're just asking for some hookworm to drill its way up through their heel. (OK, that’s just in the South where I grew up, but still. Have some common sense.)

On the first day of good weather last year, a homeless man wearing only soiled khaki clamdiggers walked in and approached the reference desk. I used to keep some a bottle of hand lotion at my desk because the hand sanitizing lotion that I was rubbing on my hands compulsively was very drying, so I liked to alternate between the two. Before I could tell him that he needed to have a shirt on to be in the library he spotted the lotion and asked,

“Mind if I have some of that?”

Not waiting for a reply, he leaned over my desk and vigorously pumped about a third of the bottle's contents into his hand. He then began lovingly and sensuously rubbing it all over his upper body. After he was finished caressing himself, he stood preening before me. After inspecting himself carefully to be sure that he had applied the lotion evenly and thoroughly, he thanked me. He then sauntered out, a new and confident hitch in his step, and I never saw him again. Now I keep my lotion in a drawer, hidden away from the public's sight.

The Wrath of Punky



The Feisty Old Broad told me the other day that Punky assaulted one of his buddies, Steve-o, in the park. Punky can be very dangerous because he is treacherously temperamental and does not fight fairly. The other day he approached and, without warning, sucker punched Steve-o, another park regular. He then struck him in the right eye with a heavy glass Jim Beam bottle. Now Steve-o has a black eye, brilliantly hued and swollen. It is quite breathtaking.



Punky has been in a very petulant and resentful mood toward Steve-o lately because Steve-o struck the homeless/residential hotel dweller equivalent of the lottery: he began successfully collecting SSI. After petitioning the system with the tenacity of the herpes virus, Steve-o was finally approved for disability by his exhausted caseworker for some vague psychological disorder, which I have diagnosed as chronic shiftlessness.



What I didn't realize about SSI is that you are paid retroactively to the date of your initial application, so if it has taken its sweet time wending its way in the system through all the various rejections, appeals, and red tape then you are going to receive a sizeable lump payment. Steve-o himself received $7000, which is $2000 dollars more than earned marrying a Chinese woman in the immigrant scam ring he freelances for. In something straight out of Catch-22, the maximum amount you can keep in a checking account if you are on SSI is $2000, so you have to either keep the rest of the money in cash or money orders or some commodity like collectible stamps or heroin. Since Steve-o doesn't have a mattress to squirrel any valuables away in, he immediately squandered the entire amount on very lavish solo methamphetamine binge. Now he doesn't have one dime left, but at least he has a steady source of income courtesy of the taxpayer.



As Steve-o's friend, Punky felt entitled to a cut of this windfall, but as soon as Steve-o cashed his check he sensibly vanished before lampreys like Punky could suction themselves on. When he reappeared, jittery and 15 pounds thinner, he didn't have any money or drugs left to share. Punky had been brooding and stewing about Steve-o's lack of generosity and selfish extravagance until he finally erupted and assaulted Steve-o in a fit spiteful rage when he saw him strolling through the park. Punky will not be denied.



Not to sound all Reagan, but is this really the best use of our tax dollars? I'm grateful that we don't in our own small way contribute to the problem by keeping a copy of the DSM IV at this branch. When I work at the branches that do, I see hopeful welfare scammers poring over it, intently searching out information to build their disability case. That way, when they meet with their case agent they can be all prepared to recite verbatim the definition of whatever diagnosis they're after.



My friend who is a social worker would sometimes have up to 4 patients a day tell him exactly,

"I'm having flights of fancy and feel as though my thoughts are racing. My attention is too easily drawn to unimportant or irrelevant external stimuli," which is straight out of the DSM's definition of bipolar disorder.

The Wrath of Punky

The Feisty Old Broad told me the other day that Punky assaulted one of his buddies, Steve-o, in the park. Punky can be very dangerous because he is treacherously temperamental and does not fight fairly. The other day he approached and, without warning, sucker punched Steve-o, another park regular. He then struck him in the right eye with a heavy glass Jim Beam bottle. Now Steve-o has a black eye, brilliantly hued and swollen. It is quite breathtaking.

Punky has been in a very petulant and resentful mood toward Steve-o lately because Steve-o struck the homeless/residential hotel dweller equivalent of the lottery: he began successfully collecting SSI. After petitioning the system with the tenacity of the herpes virus, Steve-o was finally approved for disability by his exhausted caseworker for some vague psychological disorder, which I have diagnosed as chronic shiftlessness.

What I didn't realize about SSI is that you are paid retroactively to the date of your initial application, so if it has taken its sweet time wending its way in the system through all the various rejections, appeals, and red tape then you are going to receive a sizeable lump payment. Steve-o himself received $7000, which is $2000 dollars more than earned marrying a Chinese woman in the immigrant scam ring he freelances for. In something straight out of Catch-22, the maximum amount you can keep in a checking account if you are on SSI is $2000, so you have to either keep the rest of the money in cash or money orders or some commodity like collectible stamps or heroin. Since Steve-o doesn't have a mattress to squirrel any valuables away in, he immediately squandered the entire amount on very lavish solo methamphetamine binge. Now he doesn't have one dime left, but at least he has a steady source of income courtesy of the taxpayer.

As Steve-o's friend, Punky felt entitled to a cut of this windfall, but as soon as Steve-o cashed his check he sensibly vanished before lampreys like Punky could suction themselves on. When he reappeared, jittery and 15 pounds thinner, he didn't have any money or drugs left to share. Punky had been brooding and stewing about Steve-o's lack of generosity and selfish extravagance until he finally erupted and assaulted Steve-o in a fit spiteful rage when he saw him strolling through the park. Punky will not be denied.

Not to sound all Reagan, but is this really the best use of our tax dollars? I'm grateful that we don't in our own small way contribute to the problem by keeping a copy of the DSM IV at this branch. When I work at the branches that do, I see hopeful welfare scammers poring over it, intently searching out information to build their disability case. That way, when they meet with their case agent they can be all prepared to recite verbatim the definition of whatever diagnosis they're after.

My friend who is a social worker would sometimes have up to 4 patients a day tell him exactly,
"I'm having flights of fancy and feel as though my thoughts are racing. My attention is too easily drawn to unimportant or irrelevant external stimuli," which is straight out of the DSM's definition of bipolar disorder.

This is your life

We’re having an unusual spell of gorgeous weather in the city. On my daily morning walk with the dogs we pass through a bench lined promenade next to the bay. This morning, every single bench was occupied by a homeless character I recognized from the library, including the kicker, who has been disturbingly dark roasted by sun, grime, and exposure. Each one was stretched out with a breakfast 40, sunning him/herself. They were all lined up, just like intoxicated turtles on a log, or like deceased, beloved relatives beckoning you by in the tunnel that leads toward the white light in a near death experience.



It was like a stroll down memory lane, and as a couple of them recognized me and waved I thought to myself, “I really need to vary my walking route.”

This is your life
We’re having an unusual spell of gorgeous weather in the city. On my daily morning walk with the dogs we pass through a bench lined promenade next to the bay. This morning, every single bench was occupied by a homeless character I recognized from the library, including the kicker, who has been disturbingly dark roasted by sun, grime, and exposure. Each one was stretched out with a breakfast 40, sunning him/herself. They were all lined up, just like intoxicated turtles on a log, or like deceased, beloved relatives beckoning you by in the tunnel that leads toward the white light in a near death experience.

It was like a stroll down memory lane, and as a couple of them recognized me and waved I thought to myself, “I really need to vary my walking route.”

Haiku for Punky and his recent permanent wave



Mullet resplendent

Crowning glory, but the perm?

Gilding the lily

Haiku for Punky and his recent permanent wave

Mullet resplendent
Crowning glory, but the perm?
Gilding the lily

Dear Porn Seeker,



Thanks to Nedstat, a website traffic monitor, I can see what search terms people have used to find this site on Google. When looking to get your freak on, here's a tip: using proximity connectors will really help you with your searching precision and rate of relevant returns. Otherwise, Google's algorithm, powerful but by no means perfect, will return some results that might surprise and baffle you. I'm sure the person with a very creepy fetish who used the search string: heroin addict lesbian goth girls cutting themselves in the bathroom was highly disappointed to see this website, which has nothing to do with the subject he/she was looking for, as one of the top returns.



Here are some other good searches that lead to Foxylibrarian:

ethiopian prostitute san francisco herald



young asian boy guy man men smoke smoking cigarette -blowjob -pussy



I don't seem to have near the misdirected traffic that my comrade at Sex and the Library has, though.

Dear Porn Seeker,

Thanks to Nedstat, a website traffic monitor, I can see what search terms people have used to find this site on Google. When looking to get your freak on, here's a tip: using proximity connectors will really help you with your searching precision and rate of relevant returns. Otherwise, Google's algorithm, powerful but by no means perfect, will return some results that might surprise and baffle you. I'm sure the person with a very creepy fetish who used the search string: heroin addict lesbian goth girls cutting themselves in the bathroom was highly disappointed to see this website, which has nothing to do with the subject he/she was looking for, as one of the top returns.

Here are some other good searches that lead to Foxylibrarian:
ethiopian prostitute san francisco herald

young asian boy guy man men smoke smoking cigarette -blowjob -pussy

I don't seem to have near the misdirected traffic that my comrade at Sex and the Library has, though.

MAGIC REALISM?





From an interview with Isabel Allende in the 1994 May/June issue of Common Boundary  entitled, “Writing from the Belly.”



I recall a story you told about one of the accounts in one of your books. You wrote about a mine where peasants had been murdered. There was a kind of psychic thread that moved through your writing process.



That story is from Of Love and Shadows…The story you are referring to is of a political crime that happened in 1973. Fifteen peasants were murdered, and their bodies were never found. Five years later the Catholic Church opened an abandoned mine and found the bodies. No one knows how they got the news and how they opened it before the police could stop them. It was in the media, and there was a trial; that is how I learned about it.



When I wrote the story, I had some partial information, but only what the Chilean government released. I had to fill in the gaps with my imagination. When I finished the story, my mother read the book and she said, “This is totally unbelievable. The fact that a priest learns in confession that the bodies are in the mine, takes his motorcycle, goes to a place that has been closed by the police during curfew, opens the mine, finds the bodies, photographs them, and brings the photographs to the cardinal – that’s impossible!” And I said, “Well, Mom, it’s a literary device. I have no other way of solving the plot”



The book was published in 1984. In 1988, I was able to return to Chile. While I was there, a Jesuit priest came to speak with me, and he said he had learned in confession that the bodies were in the mine. He had gone there during curfew on his motorcycle; he opened the mine, photographed the bodies, and took the photographs to the cardinal. That’s how the Catholic church opened the mine before they were stopped by the authorities. He asked me how I had known, because the only people who knew about this were the cardinal and himself. I said, “I don’t know. I thought I had made it up – but maybe the dead told me.”

MAGIC REALISM?


From an interview with Isabel Allende in the 1994 May/June issue of Common Boundary  entitled, “Writing from the Belly.”

I recall a story you told about one of the accounts in one of your books. You wrote about a mine where peasants had been murdered. There was a kind of psychic thread that moved through your writing process.

That story is from Of Love and Shadows…The story you are referring to is of a political crime that happened in 1973. Fifteen peasants were murdered, and their bodies were never found. Five years later the Catholic Church opened an abandoned mine and found the bodies. No one knows how they got the news and how they opened it before the police could stop them. It was in the media, and there was a trial; that is how I learned about it.

When I wrote the story, I had some partial information, but only what the Chilean government released. I had to fill in the gaps with my imagination. When I finished the story, my mother read the book and she said, “This is totally unbelievable. The fact that a priest learns in confession that the bodies are in the mine, takes his motorcycle, goes to a place that has been closed by the police during curfew, opens the mine, finds the bodies, photographs them, and brings the photographs to the cardinal – that’s impossible!” And I said, “Well, Mom, it’s a literary device. I have no other way of solving the plot”

The book was published in 1984. In 1988, I was able to return to Chile. While I was there, a Jesuit priest came to speak with me, and he said he had learned in confession that the bodies were in the mine. He had gone there during curfew on his motorcycle; he opened the mine, photographed the bodies, and took the photographs to the cardinal. That’s how the Catholic church opened the mine before they were stopped by the authorities. He asked me how I had known, because the only people who knew about this were the cardinal and himself. I said, “I don’t know. I thought I had made it up – but maybe the dead told me.”

I'm from the government and I'm here to help you



The library tech at the branch I'm working at today gave me a head ups about a patron who has become a bit of a problem. Imagine if Lenny and Squiggy had a baby - and by Lenny I mean the lummox from Of Mice and Men.



Characteristics he shares with Squiggy:

black hair, greased and slicked back

black leather jacket

an annoying relentlessness

Characteristics he shares with Lenny from Of Mice and Men:

hulking physique

mental retardation

capacity to suffocate things accidentally

Whenever I'm here he always comes in and asks for books about careers in the FBI. There is only one FBI vocational book in the entire system, and it is a reference book down at the main. Each time I print it out the record for him and tell him that he has to go down to the main library if he wants to look at it.



Well, now it was reported that he is impersonating an FBI agent in the neighborhood. He has really become emboldened and will go so far as to whip open up his jacket like he's flashing his badge and gun when he is trying to enforce random citizens to do things like pick up a piece of litter on the street. The other day he told a frail, elderly Asian patron that he was with the FBI and he was going to arrest her if she didn't stop that man immediately, a vagrant who was urinating outside the library window. She was terrified, and cowered in the children's area until he left when she then reported him to the tech.



Now we're supposed to tell him if he comes in that falsely identifying yourself as an FBI agent is a federal charge. I'm hoping that I will be on my dinner break.

I'm from the government and I'm here to help you

The library tech at the branch I'm working at today gave me a head ups about a patron who has become a bit of a problem. Imagine if Lenny and Squiggy had a baby - and by Lenny I mean the lummox from Of Mice and Men.

Characteristics he shares with Squiggy:

black hair, greased and slicked back

black leather jacket

an annoying relentlessness

Characteristics he shares with Lenny from Of Mice and Men:

hulking physique

mental retardation

capacity to suffocate things accidentally

Whenever I'm here he always comes in and asks for books about careers in the FBI. There is only one FBI vocational book in the entire system, and it is a reference book down at the main. Each time I print it out the record for him and tell him that he has to go down to the main library if he wants to look at it.

Well, now it was reported that he is impersonating an FBI agent in the neighborhood. He has really become emboldened and will go so far as to whip open up his jacket like he's flashing his badge and gun when he is trying to enforce random citizens to do things like pick up a piece of litter on the street. The other day he told a frail, elderly Asian patron that he was with the FBI and he was going to arrest her if she didn't stop that man immediately, a vagrant who was urinating outside the library window. She was terrified, and cowered in the children's area until he left when she then reported him to the tech.

Now we're supposed to tell him if he comes in that falsely identifying yourself as an FBI agent is a federal charge. I'm hoping that I will be on my dinner break.

The library where I was stationed last week is in an industrial, toxic wasteland of old shipyards, petrochemical refineries, and munitions factories: a case study in environmental racism. There is not much around the library now but projects, liquor stores, and Nation of Islam temples.



Aside from the depressing and carcinogenic surroundings, it is actually a very pleasant place to work. The stern old African American librarians who work at that branch brook no nonsense and have all the patrons, especially the children, walking the line. After the rowdiness and insolence I have faced at some of the other branches, it's really a welcome change. While I was there a little boy actually raised his hand like he was in some English public school and asked in a quavering voice,



"Mrs. Lieberrian? May I please have a turn on the computer?"



While I was there, one of the support staff, a teenage boy, told me with gallant delicacy, "Well, ma'am, see, that gentlemen over at the far table. Well, well he sometimes does things with his er... man parts that can be quite offensive. But I'll keep an eye on him for you."



I feel very safe there. Another librarian,a small and gentle rabbinical man who also floats at different libraries, was stationed there one time. He doesn't drive so after the library closed the two librarians escorted him to the bus stop and waited with him until his bus came, glowering like German Shepherds at anyone passing by. No one messed with them.

The library where I was stationed last week is in an industrial, toxic wasteland of old shipyards, petrochemical refineries, and munitions factories: a case study in environmental racism. There is not much around the library now but projects, liquor stores, and Nation of Islam temples.

Aside from the depressing and carcinogenic surroundings, it is actually a very pleasant place to work. The stern old African American librarians who work at that branch brook no nonsense and have all the patrons, especially the children, walking the line. After the rowdiness and insolence I have faced at some of the other branches, it's really a welcome change. While I was there a little boy actually raised his hand like he was in some English public school and asked in a quavering voice,

"Mrs. Lieberrian? May I please have a turn on the computer?"

While I was there, one of the support staff, a teenage boy, told me with gallant delicacy, "Well, ma'am, see, that gentlemen over at the far table. Well, well he sometimes does things with his er... man parts that can be quite offensive. But I'll keep an eye on him for you."

I feel very safe there. Another librarian,a small and gentle rabbinical man who also floats at different libraries, was stationed there one time. He doesn't drive so after the library closed the two librarians escorted him to the bus stop and waited with him until his bus came, glowering like German Shepherds at anyone passing by. No one messed with them.