The Cool Place to Be

The chair with its back to the window is my favorite reading chair at our local library, the Phoenix branch of the Jackson County Library System. This is where I sat today from just after 2 to just after 3:30 browsing the books waiting for me on the request shelf. It wasn't exactly how I'd dreamed of it since Monday because I'd planned to get there before noon and stay until it closed at 4. But because I couldn't get to sleep early enough because of the heat a various anxiety issues (some of which I discussed in yesterday's post) I also couldn't get my act together in time this morning to leave before eleven-thirty as planned in order to beat the heat. In fact I didn't walk out the door until 1:30 and by then the temps were pushing 90. So I walked slower which meant it took me a good 40 minutes and possibly 45 to get there. Also had a bad stumble that twisted my ankle mildly and jarred my back and hip at about a third of the way there and then limped for most of the rest of the walk.

After sitting in that chair browsing the books (mostly the crochet pattern book) until 3 I was finally ready to start browsing the shelves when Ed showed up. I wasn't expecting him that early as he had warned me he might not get off work before 5. He wanted to leave almost immediately but he gave me another twenty minutes before he pressed. Having the ride home was more important than spending another 90 minutes in the wonderful air conditioned and brightly lit room.

Walking out the library doors was a shock. It felt much like opening the oven door but you have to walk out into it. Temps mus have been pushing 100 by then. They had topped them by a degree or two before dinner.

I can't believe I managed to find spaces for all the books I brought home. As I was shuffling them around and reminding myself what was due when and what was not likely to renew and so forth it occurred to me that it was time to take inventory in such a way I can keep track at a glance. I used to have a system and dropped it for a new system which I let slide before it became habitual. Before the libraries closed in 2007 I had a system I'd been using for over a decade. It consisted of making a bibliography slip for ever first time check-out and fishing the bib slips of repeat check-outs out of the file and paperclipping the bib slips for a single library visit together with something indicating the due date for that batch. I usually had nine of these batches I was keeping track of at any one time because back then I went to the library weekly at least and the books were checked out for three weeks and renewable twice for a total of nine weeks.

Then in February of last year when I started using the WhizFolder application for all my other note taking I thought it made sense to start making my bib slips in Whiz. But I never established a good habit of getting them done. The old way I did in my lap with the stack of books as a 'desk' for the little 3x5 slips. Doing it in Whiz meant finding a way to set a book next to my laptop and prop it so that it was just the right distance while making sure the light was shining on it and not on the laptop screen.

It just occurred to me--and I don't know why I didn't see it before--that I can copy and paste the bib info off the library's online catalog. And the list of all my items out is in my library account. Like DUH.

So I'm set up here with my library account open in a tab next to this one and I'm going to go back and forth using copy/paste. Don't worry I'm not planning to make a habit of listing all the items I check out here. After this one time I'll probably use my gmail and create a draft I can delete after the list is transferred to WhizFolders.

Here's the current list of items out on my card:

Title: Annie Hall [videorecording (DVD)]
Author: Allen, Woody.
Publisher: MGM Home Entertainment [distributor, 1998]

Title: Amarcord [videorecording (DVD)]
Author: Fellini, Federico.
Publisher: Criterion Collection, c2006.

Title: Eve's Christmas [videorecording (DVD)]
Author: Donovan, Elisa.
Publisher: Image Entertainment, [2005]

Title: Sit and be fit [videorecording (DVD)]: arthritis workout
Author: Wilson, Mary Ann.
Publisher: Sit and Be Fit, c2008.

Title: Keeping up appearances [videorecording (DVD)] 9 videodiscs (ca. 1340 min.)
Author: Clarke, Roy, 1930-
Publisher: Distributed in the USA and Canada by Warner Home Video, c2004

Title: The song is you : a novel
Author: Phillips, Arthur, 1969-
Publisher: Random House, c2009.

Title: The crime of reason : and the closing of the scientific mind
Author: Laughlin, Robert B.
Publisher: Basic Books, c2008.



Title: Mistress Shakespeare
Author: Harper, Karen (Karen S.)
Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons, c2009.

Title: Home safe [text (large print)] : a novel
Author: Berg, Elizabeth.
Publisher: Random House Large Print, 2009.

Title: Willow
Author: Hoban, Julia.
Publisher: Dial Books, c2009.

Title: How fiction works
Author: Wood, James, 1965-
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008.

Title: Goldengrove : a novel
Author: Prose, Francine, 1947-
Publisher: Harper, c2008.

Title: Fool on the hill : a novel
Author: Ruff, Matt.
Publisher: Grove Press, c1988.

Title: The bell at Sealey Head
Author: McKillip, Patricia A.
Publisher: Ace Books, 2008.

Title: The secret papers of Madame Olivetti
Author: Vanderbilt, Annie.
Publisher: NAL Accent, 2008.

Title: Designer beadwork : beaded crochet designs
Author: Benson, Ann.
Publisher: Sterling Pub., c2005.

Title: Hunger's brides : a novel of the baroque
Author: Anderson, Paul (W. Paul)
Publisher: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2005.

Title: The crochet stitch bible
Author: Barnden, Betty, 1948-
Publisher: Krause Pub., 2004.

Title: Moral minority : our skeptical founding fathers
Author: Allen, Brooke.
Publisher: Ivan R. Dee, c2006.

Title: The Bates method for better eyesight without glasses
Author: Bates, William Horatio, 1860-1931.
Publisher: ISIS, 1971.

Title: The spark in the stone : skills and projects from the Native American tradition
Author: Goodchild, Peter.
Publisher: Chicago Review Press, c1991.

Title: The weekend novelist
Author: Ray, Robert J. (Robert Joseph), 1935-
Publisher: Dell Pub., c1994.

Title: How to crochet : the definitive crochet course complete with step-by-step techniques, stitch libraries and projects for your home and family
Author: Turner, Pauline.
Publisher: Distributed in the U.S. by Sterling Pub., 2001.

Title: The book against God
Author: Wood, James, 1965-
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003.

Title: The anatomy of hope [text (large print)] : how people prevail in the face of illness
Author: Groopman, Jerome E.
Publisher: Random House, 2004.

Title: Knit and crochet with beads
Author: Chin, Lily M.
Publisher: Interweave Press, c2004.

Title: The gospel according to America : a meditation on a God-blessed, Christ-haunted idea
Author: Dark, David, 1969-
Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press, c2005.

Title: Crocheting school : a complete course
Author: Sterling Publishing Company
Publisher: Sterling Pub. Co., 2004.

Title: The faith of a writer : life, craft, art
Author: Oates, Joyce Carol, 1938-
Publisher: Ecco, 2003.

Title: Big book of scrap crochet projects
Author: Blizzard, Vicki.
Publisher: House of White Birches, c2003.

Title: An alchemy of mind : the marvel and mystery of the brain
Author: Ackerman, Diane.
Publisher: Scribner, 2004.

Title: So you want to write : how to master the craft of fiction and the personal narrative
Author: Piercy, Marge.
Publisher: Leapfrog Press, 2001.

Title: The ethic of time : structures of experience in Shakespeare
Author: Sypher, Wylie.
Publisher: Seabury Press, 1976.

Title: The upstart crow : an introduction to Shakespeare's plays
Author: Lloyd Evans, Gareth.
Publisher: Dent, 1982.

Title: At risk
Author: Hoffman, Alice
Publisher: Putnam, c1988.

Title: Writing fiction : a guide to narrative craft
Author: Burroway, Janet
Publisher: Longman, c2000.

Title: Shakespeare cats
Author: Herbert, Susan, 1945-
Publisher: Thames & Hudson, 2004.

Title: The Marshall plan for novel writing
Author: Marshall, Evan, 1956-
Publisher: Writer's Digest Books, 2001.

Title: First draft in 30 days : a novel writer's system for building a complete and cohesive manuscript
Author: Wiesner, Karen, 1969-
Publisher: Writer's Digest Books, c2005.

Title: The tyranny of dead ideas : letting go of the old ways of thinking to unleash a new prosperity
Author: Miller, Matthew, 1961-
Publisher: Times Books, 2009.

Title: Lamentation
Author: Scholes, Ken.
Publisher: Tor, 2009.

And on Ed's card either checked out for me or something he's checked out that caught my eye:

Title: Joshua [videorecording (DVD)].
Author: Williamson, Fred.
Publisher: Artisan Home Entertainment, c2002.

Title: Jellyfish [videorecording (DVD)]
Author: Fogiel, Yael.
Publisher: Zeitgeist Films, [2008]

Title: Dear husband
Author: Oates, Joyce Carol, 1938-
Publisher: Ecco Press, c2009.

Title: The heretic's daughter : a novel
Author: Kent, Kathleen, 1953-
Publisher: Little, Brown, 2008.

Title: Quantico
Author: Bear, Greg, 1951-
Publisher: Vanguard Press, 2007.

Title: Quantico rules
Author: Riehl, Gene.
Publisher: St. Martins Minotaur, 2003.