2011/06/18

Blogging Reference

Most Holy and Adorable Trinity, I praise you and give you thanks for all the favors you have bestowed upon me.  Your goodness has preserved me until now.

Summer.  I scooted to work through empty streets.  A very hot, dry spell has been broken by brief thunderstorms this week.

10:00  Open.

PC for Nathan.

Where are Christian books?  Anything by James P. Knox?  No, but show him the section.

PC for Larry.

Ron K., (retired colleague), says hello.  Was disappointed by The Tragedy of Arthur by Arthur Phillips, in spite of the good review in the NYT.  He had not seen a NYT in a while.  Just buys the Summer movies issue.  Was surprised to see the new e-book bestseller lists.

Make sound work on his PC.

Where is Henderson Room?  Is meeting people to study chemistry.  Make sure room is open.

She wonders if Alice Bliss by Laura Harrington is available in large print.  No, just regular print.

PC for Monea.

Do our netbooks have CD drives?  Call SW in Media.  No.

PC for Sonya.

Can he use his own card stock in our copier?  Not a good idea.  He wants to make 2-sided Father's Day cards.

Today's and Friday's newspaper.

What time do we close?

PC's for James, Ron.

He wants two new Cussler titles, The Kingdom and The Race.  Place holds.

Where is Consumer Reports?

When does issue of Forbes on best mutual funds come out?  I try at Forbes online, our db's, do searches.  Come up empty.  Embarrassing...

Where are books on CD?

Returns USA Today.  Likes my shoes.

NYT.

Today's paper.

Why can't she print?  Her browser has crashed.

12:50  Back from lunch.  Started The Grass Harp by Truman Capote.

PC for Patrice.

Phone:  Where do they give the GED test in Gadsden County?  She wants to help her cousin, who dropped out of school.

MF goes to lunch.

Where is a water fountain?  (Our water fountain on the second floor broke.)

How to spell magnolia.

Can he have some glue to repair his book?  Give him my bottle of Elmer's and some rubber bands.

Where is her print job?

Glue man wants to see Bible reference works.  Take him to the section, and when we get there, another man looks lost.  He too is looking for the Bible section.

PC's for Andy, Gene.

Phone:  Where can she get an analog converter box?

He says the sound and USB ports in front don't work.  He's got his stuff plugged in back.  Need to test it later.

PC for Chloe.

He can't find Spymasters by W.E.B. Griffin on the shelf.  It isn't out yet.  2012 pub date.

PC's for George, Johnny, Lee.  Johnny and Lee have just come from Washington.  Lee can't believe how hot it is, is happy to be in the air-conditioning.

Can she renew her interlibrary loan, Living Out Loud: Activities to Fuel a Creative Life by Keri Smith?  Send the request, ask her to call Monday and talk to K.

PC's for Chulesia, Deb, Robert.  Deb says she's freezing!  I know, it IS cold.

Phone:  The number for Haverty's Furniture

Phone:  What is ethnic origin of Jackie Evancho, child star?  Ukrainian or Slovak, people say.

How can he find dissertations on ethics and sports?

"My mouse froze."

Tell Susan she has to wait 30 min. to get another PC.  She is online all day when we're not busy, watching political speeches by President Obama and others.

PC's for Michael and Mike.

PC for Vincent.

PC for Daniel.

He wants to check today's newspaper.

Phone:  Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson.  Copies available at branches.  Place hold for pick-up here.

PC's for Cameron, Janet.

Deb wants Wite-Out®.  Give her Liquid Paper®

PC for Alex.

If she checks out a book from the second floor, does she have to let us know before she takes it down to check out?  (No.)

Mom w stroller wants books on childbirth and parenting.  Take to shelf.

Show him where his printer is.

PC for Brett.

Fill printer with paper.

PC for Vincent

4:00  Finished inputting today's materials requests from our database.  These are requests, submitted online by web form, for materials not in the library catalog, to be filled by purchase or by interlibrary loan.  It's a new responsibility I've taken on since DL retired, trading it for the job of AskaLibrarian virtual reference coordinator, which had become wearisome after eight years.

PC for Kay.

Make round of floor.  Straighten 338's.  Tarot woman is back to using her old, large Celtic Sacred Circle deck.  She had bought a new Hanson-Roberts deck.  Push chairs into carrels.  All quiet.

4:22  Check out three books for my week off:  The Grass Harp by Truman Capote, Not Untrue & Not Unkind by Ed O'Loughlin, and Netherland by Joseph O'Neill.

PC for Scott.

PC for Antonio.

Complaint that iBoss, the county's new Internet filter, is blocking MyYearbook, a social network.  Yep, it is.  MyYearbook looks ok to me.  Apologize for the inconvenience, tell him they are still working out the kinks.

30 min. announcement.

2011/06/15

Another Virus Attack, WORM_OTURUN.ASH


We had to shut down all the public PC's again this morning, for about an hour and a half.  This was a new one.  Rather than disguising itself as an anti-virus scanner, it prompts users to install a "browser update", (in poor English).  A user asked for help with it, and as I was showing it to MK, another user got it.  MK called downstairs, and it was popping up there too.

I wished I had taken a picture of it, but I found the above image online, from a June 2nd warning to users at the Chicago-Kent College of Law.  There is a good account of this virus at the TrendLabs Malware Blog from June 8th, The Worm, the Rogue DHCP, and TDL4, with a handy Infection Diagram.

Apparently, it often propagates via removable Flash drives.  Staff received e-mail afterward cautioning us not to put users' Flash drives into staff PC's.  (Sometimes people will ask if we can print something out for them when they are in a hurry and there is a wait for a public PC.)

2011/06/09

Questions to the Answer Squad

I don't know who came up with The Answer Squad as the nickname for reference services.  It is on our business cards, and it is the signature for our e-mail reference service, which I handle most of the time.  It's been a busy week for Answer Squad e-mail reference.  We do what is called "ready reference".  That is, we don't have the time for in-depth research.  I can only give 10-20 minutes to a question.  The more open-ended a question is, the more I will try to just point them to some promising sources or links.

>>> 5/29/2011 12:35 PM >>>
I am trying to find what years - say, from 1950 through the present - were the best for safe, sound home construction. For instance, after Hurricane Andrew it was found that codes for homebuilding were not up to standard. Also for instance, I have a friend who has a house built in the fifties that is very sound, and apparently was built better than homes in the '70s and '80s.
I am trying online, but haven't found a way to make a good search.  Any links or hints would be welcome!
Thanks for your question.  I have done some looking.  The best results I have gotten are some forum discussions, in which the question seems to be debatable.

 The best discussion is at MetaFilter, Modern vs bygone home building techniques .  The search string was "era of solid home construction". 
 Another one is The era of the quality home .  The search string was "era quality home construction". 
I hope this helps.

 >>> 6/2/2011 8:46 PM >>>
Hi, I am a master's student at Florida State University in Tallahassee, FL. In order to complete one of the courses I am taking I need to complete a bibliography of ten titles. The assignment requires that I compile a list of books on any topic. I have chosen the topic of “Cinderella tales from around the world” I need to find ten different Cinderella stories from anywhere around the world. I was hoping that you could help me understand how to write an optimal bibliography. I also need help locating 3 more titles. I have thoroughly searched and have found 7 Cinderella stories from:  the Caribbean, the Dominican, Korea, Persia, Middle Eastern, Egypt, and Mexico. I was hoping that you could help me locate a title from Africa, Europe, Spain, or anywhere else. Thank you so very much for all your help.
Thanks for your question.  While I don't have the time to research for you, I can point you to a couple of things.

 A good way to get started researching a topic is to find an encyclopedia entry that includes a reading list.  The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales has a good entry on Cinderella that mentions a number of versions of the story, with print references for further reading.  Your FSU library will have or be able to get them for you.  We have this book in our reference collection.
On writing bibliographies, see the page at OWL, the Perdue Online Writing Lab, Annotated Bibliographies .
I hope this helps.

>>> 6/7/2011 6:30 PM >>>
Can you find out all (or at least most) the newspapers that printed the old 1944-1946 Wonder Woman comic strip in their papers?  So far I only know that the New York Journal American printed.  What other newspapers printed this comic strip back in 1944-1946?
Thanks for your question.  I am unable to answer your question with the resources at my disposal.  Wonder Woman:  The Complete History, by Les Daniels, says on page fifty that the strip was syndicated by King Features, and made its debut "in papers including the New York Journal-American on May 8, 1944, but a year later she was gone.  According to comic strip historian Bill Blackbeard, the strip simply wasn't picked up by enough important papers, and lacking the distribution, 'it never made money.'"

 Daniels doesn't cite his sources.  Other web results such as the Wikipedia entry on WW simply refer to Daniels.
 You might try sending your question to Andy Mangels at the Wonder Woman Museum, webmaster@wonderwomanmuseum.com .

>>> 6/8/2011 11:35 AM >>>
I am seeking information about women in the workforce, all about their lives and how they became equal to men from 1900 to 1960
Thanks for your question.  The library has plenty of books and information about women in society.  A few titles are:

America's Women:  400 Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines, by Gail Collins

Born for Liberty:  A History of Women in America, by Sara M. Evans

A Century of Women:  A History of Women in Britain and the United States, by Sheila Rowbotham

The Reader's Companion to U.S. Women's History

The World Split Open:  How The Modern Women's Movement Changed America, by Ruth Rosen

 These are all in the Sociology section at 305.4.
 Online, you could start at the Resource Center page of The National Women's History Project.