Good news/bad news
First, the good news. The MARAC conference this past weekend went very well, my bit was well-attended and (I think) effective in getting the basic groundwork of its subject across. Did a little schmoozing and networking. Met an archivist from the Woody Guthrie Archives and one from the Rockefeller Foundation, which was cool. Archivists are found in such interesting places, places you'd never think about. I mean, who wouldn't want to be the archivist for the Metropolitan Opera or Blue Man Group, or the reference librarian for NPR?? There we are, working away in the background, making sure things are where they're supposed to be and questions can be answered. Go us :)
Also -- bonus! -- I had the opportunity for a lovely long chat over wine with the very talented and intelligent ennyousai. We swapped book recommendations, theorized about why so many librarians and archivists write fanfic, and agreed that Patrick Stewart and Derek Jacobi could read, oh, the telephone book and we would still be giddily enthralled. We also shared our puzzlement over why libraries all seem to feel they must be on Facebook. I mean, if you're a fan of the library, you're already a fan of the library, right? A Facebook page is unlikely to persuade throngs of library non-fans to come to Jesus, as it were, so what's the point? It just becomes a time-suck and yet another place that has to be kept up to date and interesting. Like we don't all have enough work to do, what with backlogs and reference requests and so on and so forth.
The bad news was family: my grandfather died on Friday. He was in his 90s, very frail and in hospice, so it wasn't unexpected, but still...he and my grandmother were married almost 70 years and I don't think they've spent a night apart in, well, ever. So we're leaving Thanksgiving day to go back to my home town to spend a few days with her, and for the memorial service on the 30th.
I have wonderful memories of him -- he was a huge fan of the Bugs Bunny Roadrunner Show and of Hogan's Heroes (he was a pilot in WWII), and I remember sitting on his lap as a child watching them with him. I still think of him when I hear the Hogan's Heroes theme song :) When I was little and staying with them, my grandmother would let me bring him his coffee in the mornings. I remember myself at maybe seven years old, carrying the coffee mug ve-e-e-ery carefully, setting it on the bedside table, and carefully prodding the big mound under the covers that was my grandfather. He would be all covered up with just his wild hair showing, all sticking up like porcupine quills, and he would open one squinty eye (he was NOT a morning person LOL!) and one hand would snake slo-o-o-owly out to get the mug and pull it in. Then in about half an hour he'd finally be awake, and if it was Saturday, we'd pile into his big lounger chair and watch cartoons together. Once when my brother came to visit, he complained about Mom forcing him to eat veggies and my grandfather sent him home with a signed certificate saying he didn't have to eat broccoli LOL! And then there were his sneezes. They started somewhere around his toes and you could hear them rumbling upwards until they arrived with something like Force 5 on the Richter scale :)
He was smart and funny and kind and generous and very, very dignified, and I will ♥ miss him ♥...
Also -- bonus! -- I had the opportunity for a lovely long chat over wine with the very talented and intelligent ennyousai. We swapped book recommendations, theorized about why so many librarians and archivists write fanfic, and agreed that Patrick Stewart and Derek Jacobi could read, oh, the telephone book and we would still be giddily enthralled. We also shared our puzzlement over why libraries all seem to feel they must be on Facebook. I mean, if you're a fan of the library, you're already a fan of the library, right? A Facebook page is unlikely to persuade throngs of library non-fans to come to Jesus, as it were, so what's the point? It just becomes a time-suck and yet another place that has to be kept up to date and interesting. Like we don't all have enough work to do, what with backlogs and reference requests and so on and so forth.
The bad news was family: my grandfather died on Friday. He was in his 90s, very frail and in hospice, so it wasn't unexpected, but still...he and my grandmother were married almost 70 years and I don't think they've spent a night apart in, well, ever. So we're leaving Thanksgiving day to go back to my home town to spend a few days with her, and for the memorial service on the 30th.
I have wonderful memories of him -- he was a huge fan of the Bugs Bunny Roadrunner Show and of Hogan's Heroes (he was a pilot in WWII), and I remember sitting on his lap as a child watching them with him. I still think of him when I hear the Hogan's Heroes theme song :) When I was little and staying with them, my grandmother would let me bring him his coffee in the mornings. I remember myself at maybe seven years old, carrying the coffee mug ve-e-e-ery carefully, setting it on the bedside table, and carefully prodding the big mound under the covers that was my grandfather. He would be all covered up with just his wild hair showing, all sticking up like porcupine quills, and he would open one squinty eye (he was NOT a morning person LOL!) and one hand would snake slo-o-o-owly out to get the mug and pull it in. Then in about half an hour he'd finally be awake, and if it was Saturday, we'd pile into his big lounger chair and watch cartoons together. Once when my brother came to visit, he complained about Mom forcing him to eat veggies and my grandfather sent him home with a signed certificate saying he didn't have to eat broccoli LOL! And then there were his sneezes. They started somewhere around his toes and you could hear them rumbling upwards until they arrived with something like Force 5 on the Richter scale :)
He was smart and funny and kind and generous and very, very dignified, and I will ♥ miss him ♥...