herbiehancock

FIVE FEET HIGH AND RISING "How high's the water, mama?  Five feet high and rising."  Those are some of the lyrics from an old Johnny Cash song I can remember hearing when I was a little girl, probably on the country music radio station my mom and grandma used to listen to back then.  Does anyone else remember that one?  This is the song if you'd like to hear it. This song has been playing in my head this week because of the weather we've been having.  Although we finally had a dry day today, most of the rest of the week was filled with one torrential rainstorm after another. Yesterday, it came down so hard and so fast that there was much flooding in our corner of the state. Many streets and basements were flooded here in town.  There was even some flooding in the library.  Luckily it was confined to non-public areas, but it was still significant.   Work had to come to a standstill for some of the staff so that they could deal with the rising water...

It's been a busy week.  At the library I've been up to my eyeballs in promoting and publicizing the summer reading programs which will be beginning in June at all six of our locations.  We've got a wide variety of programs planned.  There will be a local author book signing, a science program, a magician, a representative from the zoo with animals in tow for a nature program, and a visit from the mascot of an Indiana baseball team.  Also, the theme for summer reading this year is "One World, Many Stories," with an emphasis being on learning about the traditions, customs, and culture of other lands.  So the branch managers have special programs and activities planned about numerous countries around the world.  It's my job to take all these dates and times and details and add clip art and photos and such and design flyers and handouts and posters to promote these programs.  I also write press releases for the local newspapers, put notices about them on t...

I woke up at 6:00 this morning, the usual time for me on a work day.  Knowing that coverage of the Royal Wedding was supposed to have started at 4:00 am on the television, I turned it on to see how far along the ceremony was.  As it turned out, the procession was just then starting up the aisle at the church, so apparently I didn't miss too much.  It wasn't worth missing any sleep over. My husband watched some of it with me providing his own running commentary to accompany the ceremony "Mystery Science Theater 3000" style.  For example, as the bride was coming down the aisle, Prince Harry turned and said something to Prince William.  Husband chimed in with, "You can still back out if you run now!" When the camera panned across the faces, husband said, "Oh look, there's the Queen--oh no, wait--that's Elton John."   Young son joined in too.  Noticing the long train on the bride's dress, he contributed, "Don't step on her dress!  ...

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...

This is the sunrise view at the library as I arrive early in the morning.  I work in that building on the left . Do you remember a couple of weeks ago I told you about my computer and printer woes at the library?  My hard drive crashed and my printer refused to recognize the toner cartridge.  The computer guy ordered the hard drive for the computer and two new printers for me, and they were delivered, but he then had some unexpected surgery which kept him away from the library for about a week.  Since almost all of the work I do at the library involves the computer in some way, I was stuck unable to do what I needed to do for my job.  So I filled my time with boring, busy work which made for some very long days. This week, the technology guy was back to work part-time.  While here he realized that it was going to take longer to get my computer and new printers up and running than he first anticipated.  So he moved my files from my office computer to o...

   I attended our library staff appreciation Christmas party last Thursday evening.    I had a great time.      I work with a lot of very good people.  We are a silly bunch of folks who know how to laugh and have fun.  When I got home that night, my face hurt from laughing so much .    The costume of the evening was reindeer antlers and red foam noses as you can plainly see.  One of my co-workers brought these in for the whole staff to wear and keep to take home! I'm clear in the back row, far right in the red sweater in case you can't recognize me with my antlers and nose on.     We enjoyed a delicious catered dinner in a festively decorated meeting room at the library.  We all sat down together at a very long table.  (W ell, it was several tables end to end, but we were all together.)  Dinner included chicken breasts cooked in and smothered with mushroom sauce, roast beef, lasagna, two kinds of s...