herbiehancock

The Chamber of Commerce in my town hosted their annual Business & Industry Show at the local Middle School yesterday, and I was there with our display booth from the library.   It is part of my job to put the display together including taking all of the pictures that are on the board and arranging the table when it is all set up.  We generally have three or four events during the year when we take the display booth somewhere and have it set up.  Another part of my job is designing and creating brochures, pamphlets, and bookmarks like you see on the right side of the table. We held drawings and gave away a children's book and a tote bag with the library logo on it every hour.  At the end of the show, we gave away the gift basket which held four children's books plus a tote bag, a mug, and a cap all with the library logo on them.   We also had pens and pencils and bookmarks to give away as freebies to anyone who wanted them. It was a nice change of pace to wo...

It was kind of strange at work this past week.  The warmer temperatures melted ice and snow rapidly on the roof of our building which caused several leaks in the ceiling of my office and out in the hallway.  I worked to the sound of constantly dripping water hitting buckets and wastebaskets around me (which for a while advanced to a steady stream as if a faucet were running). On another day, I put a new ink cartridge in the printer in my office, but the printer refused to recognize that it was there.  It just kept telling me to install a new cartridge even though I already had.  I did all the troubleshooting I knew to do, but nothing worked.  I called in the computer tech guy for the library who tried all the same things that I had tried--none of which worked for him either.  After doing some research and checking things out thoroughly, he decided that a new printer was in order.  He shopped around to find the best deals and ended up ordering...

One thing I really like about the town I live in is how the people here carry on traditions and pass them on from year to year. One tradition that this town holds dear is a parade around the courthouse square on the Friday evening after Thanksgiving Thursday.  This parade heralds the arrival of Santa Claus to our town for the Christmas season.  As Santa rides around the square in his horse-drawn wagon ( Yes, I know it is supposed to be a reindeer-pulled sleigh--work with me here people! ), the switch is flipped to turn on the Christmas lights around the square.  The lights are strung from the very top of the courthouse down to points all around the square so that when you look up you will see a canopy of lights in a sort of pinwheel above you.  It is really quite beautiful. The library where I work has a tradition of its own for this parade.  As our entry in the parade, we have people costumed as children's book characters walking alongside our library van. ...

   Yesterday afternoon, I had the opportunity to drive to Bowling Green, Ohio to attend a presentation at the library there by a lady named Nancy Pearl.  There may be one or two of my readers who have been around long enough and who read both of my blogs that remember me doing a post before about Nancy Pearl .  She is a librarian and writer.  She wrote the book, Book Lust: Recommended Reading for Every Mood, Moment and Reason , among others.  She also has her own action figure or doll, if you prefer, which brings her finger to her mouth in the classic "Shhhh!" pose when you push a little button.  The action figure is a bit of whimsy that amuses me.     The real life Nancy Pearl, in person, was quite amusing too.  She gave a very interesting and entertaining speech which included many anecdotes about how her local library was a major influence on her as a child when growing up, what it was like for her to later become a librarian, an...

I wrote about the City Orchestra that has recently formed in my little town a few days ago and showed pictures of their performance in the atrium at the hospital.   They had their second performance last night.  It was originally scheduled to be held on the courthouse square in the gazebo there, but thunderstorms had been rolling through our area most of the afternoon, so the concert was moved to the ice rink instead so that it would be under cover in case more rain came through.   The City Orchestra was to perform first and then the City Band.   This picture was taken before the concert began.  Some of the musicians are still arriving and those in the audience are trickling in with their lawn chairs to set up in the rink to listen to the performance. They are starting to warm up in this picture.  That's my son with his bass standing there in the center of the picture. They are still getting set up here.  This gives you a better view of the number of ...

Last weekend, the menfolk in my family went to the big auto show in Detroit leaving me at home and up to my own devices.  I had work that I wanted to get done at my mom's house, so I stayed behind.  I am still sorting through the things left in her house.  My brother and I each have only so much room for the items we want to keep.  Once the snow gets completely melted and the temperatures get high enough that we can stand outside without our faces freezing off, we will be having an auction to sell off what remains.  Personal things, like her clothes, won't be sold, of course. There is limited storage at the nursing home where my mother lives.  She shares one tiny closet with her roommate, and there is very little space for her clothes in it.  As a result, she still has quite a few clothes at her house that are in good condition and fit her but that there is simply no room for at the nursing home.  So I wanted to figure out a place to store her ex...