Daily Thoughts 6/4/2010

Château de Chantilly, Oise, Picardie, France. Le cabinet des Livres. 29 August 2008(2008-08-29), Tango7174, Gnu Free Documentation License 1.2, From Wikimedia

Daily Thoughts 6/4/2010

Book Blogger Convention, Content, Comraderie, and Cake http://news.shelf-awareness.com/mv/a1/896491.html#3941145 . I like Shelf Awareness, I subscribe to the email newsletter. They often have nice daily recommendations of books to read and summations about authors and other people in the book trade.

I was at this panel at Book Expo America, BEA Librarians Shout It Out. http://news.shelf-awareness.com/mv/a1/895877.html#3940027 It was excellent.

Book and Bake Sale

It is book and bake sale time at the library. The Friends of the Library are selling coffee, cake, and books in the community room. It has a pleasant genteel feel to it. They are also running the sale on Saturday. They are raffling off an icecream maker. They also have the petition out to keep the library open. A retired children's librarian who is part of the Firends of the Library helps run the sale.

There are piles of books on the tables, pleasant people to talk to, and lots and lots of books. In addition there are a lot of audiobooks. The crowd is mostly older ladies. Eventually, the book dealers will show up to look at the books, usually at the end of the show. Some will be asking to take away all the books that did not sell at a discount.

It is a genteel kind of thing to do. There were a lot of the regulars who went to the book sale. Several regular library patrons and even a few people who lived across the street from the library came to the book sale.

I spent some time during lunch looking over the books on the tables; self help, sports, fiction, art, religion, childrens books, audiobooks and general nonfiction. It was nice talking to people who wandered in for a few minutes. Usually all of the librarians at some point go down to the booksale to look around say hello to the Friends of the Library, look at the books, and say hello to people. The cookies were tasty. I'll get some coffee tomorrow.

Library book sales are generally good public relations. They sell books inexpensively which we would not necessarily add to the collection.

Everyday Things

I spent some time looking at the displays. I also spent some time looking at Bookletters this morning talking to our representative about layout. I am working on creating another bookmark, this time for Latino American authors.

On the train home, I read some of Linchpin Are You Indispensable? by Seth Godin. It is about how work is changing. He is describing how the world of work is changing so fast that it is necessary to have people comfortable changing things as part of organizations. People who are creative, artistic, and can find solutions in addition to managers and workers. Things are changing so fast that it is hard to keep up with things at times.

Good Morning, The Complete Idiot's Guide To Managing Your Time

Italian panel depicting Charles Darwin created ca. 1890, on display at the Turin Museum of Human Anatomy.

The Complete Idiot's Guide To Managing Your Time by Jeff Davidson

This morning I finished reading The Complete Idiot's Guide To Managing Your Time by Jeff Davidson. This is a practical book. What people want to know about these kinds of books is not whether the book itself is good and easy to read, but whether they would get something worthwhile out of reading the text. By the way, the book is easy to read, although it is a bit formulaic.

The main concept that interested me was the idea that your desk is like an aircraft carrier, it needs to be completely swept clean of everything before you put anything down on it. This way, there are no distractions when you are working on something. I never thought of it like this. I always had piles of paper on my desk. I did not think of them as being distracting, but that is how I am.

Now, I kind of understand why people think people are more productive if they have an absolutely clean desk. The funny thing is that the time I see most people cleaning their desk is just before they go on vacation when they will be doing nothing. It is kind of perturbing.

The book reinforced some of my habits. I try to get enough sleep every night, I don't always succeed, but I try. I always take my lunch hour and try to take my scheduled breaks. I know I will not work as well if I don't. I also believe in doing one thing at a time consistently every day, day after day. Right now, every day, I am taking time to order books, weed books, check the displays, and make sure the area I am in is clean and orderly. I also try to take lunch outside. This gives me a slight breather from being in the building.

I think the book would be useful for most people in some way or other to learn about time management. It is not just about managing time, it is also about how not to get overwhelmed by the office. How and when to say no, when to take vacations, how to be orderly, and how to make decisions quickly.

Good Morning

This is the kind of review that makes you want to go out and buy the book. Review of Your Hatemail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by John Scalzi. http://www.sfsite.com/11b/hm284.htm . I am rather surprised that I have never received any truly dreadful hatemail for writing this blog. I have been contentious at times, but nothing which is dreadful.

The library is having its book and bake sale today November 21 and November 22. I went downstairs to the community room to buy a cup of coffee from The Friends of the Library. It was a rather genteel environment. They were playing I Got My Thrill on Blueberry Hill by Louis Armstrong on the CD Player. There was a nice assortment of baked goods next to the coffee which was 75 cents. I looked around at some of the books. There were a few nice art books, which people might buy. A retired librarian runs the Friends of the Library sale. I thought the best selection was in the childrens books.

Prince of Stories, The Many Worlds of Neil Gaiman, Hank Wagner, Christopher Golden & Stephen R. Bissette came in for me to read. It is a fresh new book. There is a foreword written by Terry Pratchett. The book is a doorstopper. It is 545 pages long.

I am also going to try and read The Collins Best Practices series of business books: Managing People Secrets to Leading for New Managers, Difficult People Working Effectively with Prickly Bosses, Coworkers, and Clients, and Hiring People, Recruit and Keep the Brightest Stars. These are short concise books which look practical.

I went and gave instructions for the Job Information Center books to be taped and labeled, weeded some more books in the social sciences, and did a few miscellaneous tasks to make sure everything was in order before I left for vacation.

I changed the floor display from "energy issues" to books on globalization and the issues surrounding globalization; free trade, fair trade, immigration, NAFTA, hegemony, the rise of BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, and China), and other large things. I am hoping that people will like the books.

I sometimes feel a little nervous before I go on vacation, that there will be some mistakes that will happen. I can be a bit cautious about these things.

Booksales

After my trip to the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art Festival, I stopped off at a used bookstore called Housing Works in Manhattan. I was surprised at how sparse the selection was. The selection used to be quite good. I guess not as many people are donating books to charitable organizations.

I should not be surprised. They don't have a booksale at the library near my house. This is kind of surprising. You would think every library needs a book sale. But, I guess this is getting quaint and old. People are clearly not reading as many books so booksales don't do as well.

The booksale at our library even looks a little quaint to me. It doesn't seem to be selling a whole lot of books. Even our larger booksale didn't do so well with a room full of books. Very few booksellers came to buy books. According to my supervisor, the book dealers used to line up to buy books from our booksale. Maybe, people are selling their books on ebay instead. You never can be too sure about these things. When I went to the sale, I did not see much to buy. However, I did buy a brownie and a cup of coffee.

Right now, It is very hot where I am working. It is 92 degrees inside. The fans are blowing around the building while I am sitting here. I took some time to look through the New York Times Book Review for this week, but didn't find anything.

I put another book on hold, The Post American World by Fareed Zakaria. It is #7 on the Publishers Weekly Nonfiction Bestseller List. I think the book is focused on the rise of China and India. I'm not too sure yet. I also placed Shadowbridge by Gary Frost on hold.

Two more books came in for me to read, The Good Fairies of New York by Martin Millar. There is a surprise, Neil Gaiman wrote an introduction to the book which should be entertaining. The book is a trade paperback. The other book which came in is Rainbow's End by Vernor Vinge.

When I get up to walk around the building I sweat a bit. I weeded some more law books this morning. My library aide, called in sick today. It is quite hot.