June 8, 2016

 Today was my first day as a librarian and this entry could be super long but it is after midnight and I'm tired and tomorrow I will be working for over twelve hours. I'm freaking tired.

This morning I got up earlier, took a shower, and then let the dogs out and fed them while I ate breakfast and made my lunch. Then I got dressed for work and headed out. I got there before the library actually opened so I had to use one of the staff entrances, which felt really strange, like I was doing something I wasn't supposed to be doing.

The first part of the morning was spent with a brief look around the reference desk and then a quick little tour around the building. That all went much faster than my new boss had intended. Eventually we had killed enough time to go meet with the business manager who inundated us with a crazy amount of paperwork and forms and information. We signed a bunch of stuff while we were in that meeting and were given even more to take home. Neither of us had been told but we were supposed to bring various forms of ID. I obviously didn't have that on me so I grabbed a couple on my lunch break. I also filled out the direct deposit form. And when I went back later to give those things to the business manager I was also able to fill in my emergency contact phone numbers because it is 2016 and smart phones have ruined the need to memorize phone numbers.

After that meeting we had another mini tour and then we got a break. Me and the other new librarian both took our break in the upstairs breakroom and were able to talk and learn more about each other which was nice. I think following that break we had a more in-depth tour of the library and then we went upstairs to learn more stuff and find out what our individual job duties are going to be. My main one is to work on teaching technology classes and other things tech related but I also have other, less interesting stuff, like something involving tax forms. We still had some time after that so the boss asked us more about ourselves because she hadn't been able to get too personal during our interviews.

For lunch I ended up going home. Travel ended up eating into about half of my break but I had already made my lunch so I didn't have to lose time on that. I was also able to get the stuff I mentioned earlier so I could get that turned in.

This afternoon we logged into a computer for the first time and perused the staff blog. There were other things we were supposed to look at but we have to wait to get permission for that, which will hopefully happen sometime tomorrow.

Following that there was an adult services staff meeting. It started with an activity that had us sitting in two different groups and we had to come up with ideas for our ideal library and write them on sticky notes and talk about it with our group. Then we had to pretend budgets weren't an issue. Then that magic was a thing. From there we had to pick one element and expand on it by drawing a picture on the giant sheet of paper on our table. We decided to combine the ideas for our ideal library and draw a type of floor plan. It included a space for the TARDIS, a Holodeck, unicorn petting zoo, non-traditional collection room (like tools and baking pans), a makerspace, an outdoor seating area, and a water park (because why not). After that exercise one of the librarians gave a short presentation on a free project management website that we are going to start using to organize our projects as a department. I think there is potential there.

The day was kind of done after that. We were told to go on a break and I wandered around the stacks for awhile and found a few books that I want to read so I wrote those down. And then the break never ended. I wandered around for a little while longer and then sat down to read through some of the papers we got today about all the benefits and different things. That ended up lasting until six o'clock and it was time to leave.

It was Chipotle night so I headed over there. For the next however long Chipotle night is going to be moved to Tuesday because getting there after six o'clock, even during the summer, means having to stand in a long line. While standing in line I realized my grandpa's pocket knife had fallen out of my pocket while sitting in the chair at the library. That made me freak out a little bit. After leaving Chipotle I went back to the library and thankfully the pocketknife, and my nail clippers, were both still on the chair, kind of smooshed down in the side of it. I'm glad the pattern of the chair fabric was a bit obnoxious so my stuff kind of blended in. I don't know what I would have done if I had lost my grandpa's knife. The new rule is that I won't be carrying it with me when I wear dress pants because the pockets suck on dress pants.

After dinner I broke out all the crap I still had to sign and got my mom's opinion on stuff like which health plan option to take. I didn't finish going through everything and making decisions until nearly ten o'clock. Good grief.

It is now one o'clock in the morning. I planned on sleeping in a little tomorrow because I didn't have anything for my practicum until ten o'clock. Tonight when I checked my email I saw that my supervisor had emailed me and asked if I wanted to shadow a tour and information literacy instruction session at 8:30AM tomorrow morning. Despite really wanting to sleep in because I know I will be at work until nine o'clock tomorrow night, I also really want to shadow the tour and instruction session. So I will be waking up early and going to that. After that I have a meeting with my supervisor about something, maybe the assessment project. Then I'm going to run home and each lunch before going to work. It's going to be such a long day. Is it September yet?