RE:ODDBALL OPERATIONAL QUESTIONS This is the first time I have dared to write a reply to the list although I have enjoyed reading it for several months. It takes a lot nerve to write a message when you know it will be read by people all over the world including Canberra, Australia. (I nearly fell off my chair when I read a message from there several months ago) So now that you all know how nervous I am, here goes: CMCCAWLE 07 Mar 1991 22:03 UTC
One of our librarians complained for years that our local newspapers were a day late because they came in the mail. We couldn't figure out how to deal with home delivery, because we knew they would be stolen if thrown on the driveway. It seems too much to expect to ask a librarian to pick up a copy and bring it in, so I sympathize with T. Sanders not wanting to go by the drug store. We finally solved the problem by installing a book drop just for the newspapers. We are able to get three papers placed in the book drop: our town paper, the Philadelphia Inquirer, and the New York times. This seems to work well. We don't have a problem with the delivery people. When the library is closed, as we are for a week at Christmas, they just pile up in the book drop. Everyone is happy with the new system. I think if there are services which were provided by someone who has left, and no one wants to do it any more, someone will just have to tell the person gently that that is the case. As it happens, two staff members in Serials save stamps for a man who comes in from the community for them periodically. The staff members love doing it for him, and have even found some rare stamps from places we never heard of, which was fun. But if they left and no one wanted to do it, we would just have to tell him we were sorry but we couldn't do it for him any longer. Here's one I'll bet will shock you. We have a local man who became a quadriplegic playing football. He is famous around here and comes in the library a lot in his wheel chair. Everyone loves him and he gets a lot of special help from the staff with micro printers and anything he needs to reach that he can't. He graduated from here a few years ago and got a standing ovation at graduation. Well, one of the staff members told me a while ago that the women at Circulation empty his urine bag when he asks them to. I was more than a little surprised. That seemed above and beyond the call of duty, but I guess I was proud of them for being able to do it (I'm not sure I could). Last week I actually witnessed one of them doing that for him. So I guess my feeling is, if someone wants to do it, whatever it is, more power to them. If no one wants to perform a particular function or "special service", then the patron just has to be gently told so. Christina McCawley Serials and Acquisitions Librarian West Chester University West Chester, PA CMCCAWLE@WCU