Saturday, June 15, 2013

Miss Information thinks people should get a clue

This week one of the elevators at the library was malfunctioning. No one told Miss Information directly but she saw that it was festooned with yellow caution tape and used her awesome powers of logic to determine that there was something wrong with it. 

Not everyone is so blessed. As she sat at the information desk, she was inundated with questions. Well, one question--can I use that elevator?


Hm. Let's see. In order to use that elevator you would either have to unwrap the caution tape or crawl around it like Catherine Zeta-Jones avoiding lasers in that jewel theft movie, so no, you can't use it.

Tired of this nonsense, Miss Information took Friday off to go to a concert and mingle with hipsters. Unfortunately she was in the alcohol free section because she made up a great drinking game. Hipster beard? Drink. Hipster glasses? Drink. Hipster hat? Drink. All three? Chug, chug, chug! She'd have been unconscious in no time but then she would have missed conversations like this:

Woman 1: (asking about her friend's new, large and tragically ugly Day of the Dead skull tattoo) How long did that take?
Woman 2: Well she started at 3 and I didn't get out of the chair until 7 so, like, 5 hours!

No one in the group corrected her math. Miss Information was tempted but decided against when she realized that she will never escape the stupid people.

Thursday, June 06, 2013

Miss Information is annoyed by the pilgrims.

Miss Information has a policy of never arguing with patrons. Sometimes she just can't help herself, though. Damn her insane obsession with accuracy!

Here's what happened:
While Miss Information was placing a hold for a patron, the woman began chatting about colonial education. She wanted to know if Miss Information had experienced it. Where was she from? Here. Oh, well then where was her family from?
 
Miss Information mentions that the mighty Clan Information settled in these here parts way back in the early 1700s.
 
"Oh," the woman responds. "They came over on the Mayflower?"
Well, no. A bit later than that.
 
The woman sniffs. "It must have been the Mayflower."
 
Um. No. There were all sorts of ships. It was definitely not the Mayflower.
 
"Of course it was the Mayflower!" the woman insisted.  "Were they Quakers?"
 
Err, no. Miss Information isn't clear on the details but she thinks they were Church of England or Scotland. Some of them were definitely military, though. Miss Information doesn't think they sound like Quakers...

The woman insisted. "They were Quakers! From the Mayflower!"
 
This goes on for a little while with the patron casting withering glances at Miss Information the entire time. Imagine not knowing your own history! Meanwhile Miss Information is trapped into insisting that she is an expert on her family's genealogy when she really knows very little, preferring to live in the here and now. 
 
Well, usually she prefers the here and now. The conversation she is having now with this woman is making her wish she was living in the 1700s herself.