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Today was my day of manual labor for the library system - a gentleman living about ten miles outside of town has sold his collection (people kept tossing around the figure of 30,000 books) to the University, and so the University library had to come and collect them. They recruited students with the lure of high pay, free food, and a break from the tedium of our regular jobs.
We boxed and moved 30,000 books in under six hours. I started out making boxes (tape gun! whee! tape fumes! double whee!) and then advanced to packing boxes under the supervision of a preservation person. The making of boxes was nice, the packing unexpectedly arduous - lots of crouching and kneeling, staring down into a box on the dimly lit second floor of this barn, surrounded by dust and crumbling books, slinging full boxes around every few minutes. No one I was working with wanted to take the offered breaks before lunch, so I trucked on along with them, surreptitiously stretching my back and legs when I could.
Before lunch, a librarian came up the stairs to announce that, no matter when we finished, we would be paid through four o'clock, so not to slow down on that account. Everyone was operating in a constant daze of amazement at what we were accomplishing.
We all wore nametags, so now not only have I seen a handful of grown-up librarian types dashing around in grubbies lugging books and chowing on pizza and cranapple, but I know their names. Had one of those random inexplicable attractions to one of the mid-thirtyish librarian guys; he had long hair and a Budweiser t-shirt, and I never spoke to him.
Came home and collapsed, and just now woke up from my first-ever dream featuring Paul Gross - you'd think that would have happened before now. There was something about sending him a book, trying to get it made into a movie - I was worried because I was sure that he received such entreaties all the time, but hoped that the author - I think it was Sean Stewart, which makes me wonder just what sort of movie I was envisioning - would stand out as he was Canadian. And then I was standing in front of him - Paul Gross, the actor/director/producer guy, not any character he played, that was clear - wearing a Mountie uniform (and it fit really nicely I was quite enjoying it) and I shook out my hair, and he commented on how long it was, seeming impressed. So. Dunno what that means...
We boxed and moved 30,000 books in under six hours. I started out making boxes (tape gun! whee! tape fumes! double whee!) and then advanced to packing boxes under the supervision of a preservation person. The making of boxes was nice, the packing unexpectedly arduous - lots of crouching and kneeling, staring down into a box on the dimly lit second floor of this barn, surrounded by dust and crumbling books, slinging full boxes around every few minutes. No one I was working with wanted to take the offered breaks before lunch, so I trucked on along with them, surreptitiously stretching my back and legs when I could.
Before lunch, a librarian came up the stairs to announce that, no matter when we finished, we would be paid through four o'clock, so not to slow down on that account. Everyone was operating in a constant daze of amazement at what we were accomplishing.
We all wore nametags, so now not only have I seen a handful of grown-up librarian types dashing around in grubbies lugging books and chowing on pizza and cranapple, but I know their names. Had one of those random inexplicable attractions to one of the mid-thirtyish librarian guys; he had long hair and a Budweiser t-shirt, and I never spoke to him.
Came home and collapsed, and just now woke up from my first-ever dream featuring Paul Gross - you'd think that would have happened before now. There was something about sending him a book, trying to get it made into a movie - I was worried because I was sure that he received such entreaties all the time, but hoped that the author - I think it was Sean Stewart, which makes me wonder just what sort of movie I was envisioning - would stand out as he was Canadian. And then I was standing in front of him - Paul Gross, the actor/director/producer guy, not any character he played, that was clear - wearing a Mountie uniform (and it fit really nicely I was quite enjoying it) and I shook out my hair, and he commented on how long it was, seeming impressed. So. Dunno what that means...