Saturday, September 17, 2011

Miss Information is annoyed by the nervous

The library hosts a film club. Once a month a bunch of people get together to watch a movie and discuss it. It seems lovely and civilized. Miss Information has never been. The movies don't have enough explosions for her. She does have to field questions about the films, however.

"This movie, The Dresser? What's it about?"

Before Miss Information converted to her policy of only watching movies with car chases and exploding robots, she used to indulge in the occasional arty flick. So she's actually seen The Dresser. She can't remember much but tells the woman that it's a nice movie about an actor and his wardrobe guy.

The woman is not convinced. The title bothers her. "Sounds gay. Is it gay? 'Cause the title makes it sound kinda gay."

Miss Information can't really remember. She doesn't classify the movies she watches into categories like "gay", "kinda gay", "not gay". Of course the exposition in exploding robot movies is not always the best. So she consults the Internet Movie Database. The word "effeminate" is mentioned.

Miss Information tries to be reassuring. The description doesn't even hint that there's any sex in the film but the woman is not reassured. She's been fooled before. Movies don't sound at all gay and then she watches them and all of a sudden--GAY. All over the place.

At this point Miss Information gives up and tells the woman that perhaps she'd better skip this movie if she's that worried. Miss Information kind of thinks maybe the woman should skip all movies from now on and just move to a cave but whatever. It's an important lesson: The next time someone asks Miss Information whether a movie is "too gay" for them, the answer is going to be "yes". It doesn't matter whether the movie is Saving Private Ryan or Bambi. They are all too gay for you woman.

In fact, Miss Information refrained from pointing this out but the library is probably too gay for this patron.

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Miss Information is annoyed by mediocrity

Sometimes Miss Information gets a little sad. This new branch is pretty pleasant and that's a good thing. It's just that all of those skills she's honed in her years of serving the unpleasant are all going to waste. Fortunately on Tuesday there was a screaming guy in the library.

The man had apparently been screaming on another floor and he was being led out the door by the security staff and in charge librarian.

Miss Information's desk is right by the door. She was in the middle of helping someone when the screaming man appeared. At last a chance to use her skills. She turned to the patron and shrugged. Oh, that felt good.

She enjoyed the screaming man incident. It was not just that it livened things up. It was what he was screaming. Oh, sure there was a lot of the usual swearing and accusing. Besides that though, the man was vexed. He had been shh'ed. The nerve. It was unfair, the man believed, because he was "only talking in a mediocre tone" and they shouldn't have told him to be quiet.

See, there are no library rules about mediocre tones. Of course if Miss Information were king of the library, any mediocrity would be banished from the premises. No more mediocre conversations, no more mediocre books, no more mediocre wifi....it would be sweet.

Miss Information is annoyed by mediocrity

Saturday, September 03, 2011

Miss Information is annoyed by the uncertain

"Where is that DVD I saw last time I was here?" asked the woman.
Probably library staff all over the world react in terror to this question. See, you're making a lot of assumptions there, lady. We don't know when you were last here, we don't know what DVD it was and depending on whether you were here 6 hours ago or 6 years ago the DVD could be 1000 different places or a million different places. In any case, Miss Information has no idea where the DVD you saw the last time you were here is. But maybe you could give her a hint.

Name of the DVD? The woman has no idea. It's a television show. About detectives. Who solve crimes. Now, where is it?
Um...any other hints? Actors? Again, no idea. But the library has the entire series. Lots of episodes. Now where are they?
Miss Information works in a great big library. It has many television series on DVD. In addition to her beloved Doctor Who, the library has purchased, well, just about every series about detectives. Who solve crimes. All the major networks are covered. The library doesn't like to play favorites so there are television shows about detectives (who solve crimes) from at least 4 continents, maybe 5.

The woman is getting annoyed now. Surely not at Miss Information who is doing her best. The woman insists that everyone knows the show. Miss Information should know the show. The woman marches off to find her daughter who will know the show. The daughter doesn't know the show, so that's a dead end.

Eventually, Miss Information suggests the woman go off and figure out what the show is and then come back.

It is unfortunate Miss Information was unable to solve the Case of the Clueless Customer. Sadly the Mystery of the Missing DVD has remained a mystery.