We’ve all had the following experience. You call customer service or walk into a store. Perhaps something is broken or maybe you want to buy something. But no one there seems to know what they’re doing. Frustration ensues and you may get your way or might end up walking out and going elsewhere. Really there’s…
Tis the season! The holiday season is in full swing. Down here that means the Christmas lights have been hung from the street lamps (see below). Every year for the past few years there has been a “Caroling Pub Crawl” which ironically involves neither caroling nor pubs. Sadly I could not go. The Library at…
Flying is so wonderful. Being that Thanksgiving was this week, I traveled back home. Now due to bad weather I’d moved my flight up from Wednesday to Tuesday. You don’t want to know what that cost. But my efforts to have smooth sailing were in vain. The flight was delayed more than five hours, not…
Thursday afternoon I was blithely sitting behind my computer preparing for an important phone call. Suddenly the electricity did something rude: it went out. The call would have to wait. We quickly realized that the entire campus was affected. Patrons came in for a time, hoping the lights they saw meant computers were working too. …
One of the most interesting things about Cleveland is learning who knows who. For example several days ago I told a coworker that I am going to be in the market for a new car soon as my lease is expiring. She apparently knew the owner of the dealership I was thinking of buying from…
This weekend was eventful, but not the good kind of eventful. Upon leaving work Friday I’d planned on spending a quiet few days at home. But it didn’t take long for something to go wrong. I won’t get into the specifics, but there was a technical glitch at work which prevented the library’s patrons from…
Back in New York Halloween has changed over the years. When I was a kid there was trick or treating of course. I’d dress up, usually as a ghost or maybe a skeleton if I was feeling adventurous, and go house to house in the neighborhood. Possibly because we lived on a main road, people…
This week I heard an amazing fact. Many of the students at Delta State have never lived outside Mississippi. Some have never even left the region. Now that should not be surprising since before moving to the South I’d never lived outside New York State. But my world view was broader which was one of…
For much of this past week I was at the Mississippi Library Association Conference. Several of us carpooled down with me riding with the Dean of Libraries. This year it was held in Biloxi. The Association hadn’t been to the Gulf Coast since before Katrina hit so this year was special in a lot of…
This weekend was special here in Cleveland. You see every year over the second weekend of this month Octoberfest is held. You have probably heard that term before. It gets attached to a lot of things around this time of year. The first, and probably largest, is held every year in Munich, Germany. According to…