Friday, August 01, 2008

Miss Information does not have the energy to deal with this

The library had a power failure on Wednesday afternoon. Obviously it stayed open. The building had enough lights in most areas, except the washrooms where brave, flashlight bearing staff members helped total strangers find the toilet paper. Miss Information doesn't know who you have to annoy to be assigned to bathroom attendant duty, but she didn't make the cut.

Instead she was stationed at the reference desk where she got to watch numerous people press the elevator button and wait apparently believing that the elevator is powered by fireflies. Miss Information is now sorry she started that rumour.

The computers were sorely missed, although the librarian who was in the middle of his monthly Internet training program soldiered on. His presentation is so well choreographed that he continued pointing out important details on the now blank projection screen. After a couple of minutes he, too, gave up.

An Internet workshop is only truly meaningful if there is an Internet.

After a couple of hours power was restored. Oh. Um. Yay.

The children who had been playing Manhunt and Girlslap in the dark made for the (still non working) computers at top speed, knocking over customers, slamming into each other. It was like the movie Village of the Damned except the library kids are evil.

Miss Information and her colleagues frantically rushed around trying to restart the computers before the children developed a taste for human flesh.

She has never seen anything like it. They were vicious. Miss Information could easily believe they'd spent the summer at some kind of commando training camp, except that they never leave the library. Maybe Manhunt is a skill-building activity after all.

Next time there's a power failure Miss Information is putting on a kevlar vest and turning the reference desk into a bunker.

8 Comments:

At 3:49 PM, Blogger The_Myth said...

Isn't it a public safety hazard to have a place open for business even though there is no power for lights?

Could you use that argument to get permission to close in the future? ;-)

 
At 4:04 PM, Blogger Kimber said...

It's rather ironic they expect people to read in the dark.

 
At 11:26 AM, Blogger kittenpie said...

I think tasers run on batteries...

 
At 2:20 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Fisher-Price should build libraries. That way there would be a big red crank on the side of the building for the elevators.

 
At 1:24 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

This summer has been crazy with computer obsessed kids. We must eliminate RuneScape and WebKins...

 
At 9:44 AM, Blogger Lisa said...

If the power goes out, does the internet make a sound?

 
At 7:36 PM, Blogger Andi @ udandi / Lunch It Punch It said...

the power went out at our library and we stayed open, too. I enjoyed watching our director pick up a cordless phone and wonder why it wasn't working :)

 
At 3:07 PM, Blogger Annemarie said...

And now that we're on voip phones, if the power goes, so do they. One minute of missing runescape is a crime against humanity and deserves a public spectacle, such as drawing and quartering a staff member. At least that's how I have interpreted teen comments about outages.

 

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